“Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking popularizes some provocative research and anecdotes about rapid cognition, claiming that many of our opinions are formed in the first seconds of an encounter. Students viewing a few seconds of a teacher with the sound turned off produce basically the same ratings of her effectiveness as students who have her for a full semester. Ordinary research subjects can similarly use ten-second clips of a doctor talking to a patient to predict quite accurately whether the doctor will be sued for malpractice. If first impressions dominate, then managing a trademark’s selling power requires control over those first impressions in a consumer’s mind.”

Of course, I prefer Noah Tall’s Blank to Gladwell’s Blink:

http://www.amazon.com/Blank-Actually-Thinking-Mindless-Parody/dp/0060875763