Palindromes Reduce Consumer Skepticism in Ads

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A new study from researchers at the University of Florida Warrington College of Business has found that the use of easily reversible, or "bi-polar," words in marketing messages can reduce consumer skepticism. The research demonstrates that negating statements with bi-polar words like "intense" requires more mental effort, resulting in lower confidence among consumers in judging the truthfulness of the claim compared to uni-polar words like "prominent." The findings suggest marketers should use affirmative statements with easily reversible words to maximize confidence in their desired messaging while minimizing confidence in skeptical consumers' disbelief.

Why it matters

As consumers are bombarded with hundreds or thousands of marketing messages daily, the level of confidence they have in believing or disbelieving those claims can be more important for marketing success than the sheer number of messages. This research provides a simple lexical strategy for marketers to influence consumer confidence in their product claims.

The details

Across two experiments with over 1,000 participants, the researchers found that when people encounter easily reversible, or "bi-polar," words like "intense" in marketing messages, they experience lower confidence in their judgments of the truthfulness of the claim compared to words that are harder to reverse, like "prominent." This is because negating statements with bi-polar words requires a more elaborate cognitive process, resulting in less confidence. For example, the statement "The scent is intense" can be easily negated to "The scent is mild," whereas "The scent is prominent" is harder to negate.

• The study was published on April 14, 2026.

What they’re saying

What’s next

The researchers suggest that further studies could explore how this effect applies to different types of marketing messages and consumer decision-making contexts.