About a third of adults reported symptoms of anxiety or depression this year. And I recently discovered that writers and designers like me have played a small part in ratcheting up our society’s collective anxiety.
In The Anatomy of Anxiety, Ellen Vora writes:
“We see messages that we’re not enough and something needs fixing. We’re bathed in fear because marketers are trying to make a buck. Are you feeling anxious? Maybe you’re being sold something.”
When I read this, I felt icky about my work as a copywriter turned content designer. I pictured my already-anxious audience retreating into their phones and scrolling past dozens of marketing messages. Little do they know, the tension is embedded in every app, baked into every post, threaded through all their emails.
I’ll explain. Copywriters, content designers, and UX writers leverage behavioral psychology to sell things. I am guilty of crafting countless messages that create a false sense of urgency so my target audience will click, buy, or donate. Or fabricating problems where none previously existed.
Here are a few universal human weaknesses that marketers exploit to sell things.
