Editing Vance Packard

{{Short description|American journalist and social critic (1914–1996)}}
{{Infobox person
| name           = Vance Oakley Packard
| image          =
| image_size     =
| caption        =
| birth_date     = {{birth date|1914|5|22|mf=y}}
| birth_place    = Granville Summit, [[Pennsylvania]], U.S.
| death_date     = {{death date and age|1996|12|12|1914|5|22|mf=y}}
| death_place    = [[Martha's Vineyard]], [[Massachusetts]], U.S.
| education      = [[Pennsylvania State University]]<br/>[[Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism]]
| occupation     = Journalist, social critic, and author
| spouse         = Virginia Matthews
| parents        = Philip J. Packard<br>Mabel Case Packard
| children       = 2 sons, 1 daughter
}}

'''Vance Oakley Packard''' (May 22, 1914 – December 12, 1996) was an American journalist and [[social critic]]. He was the author of several books, including ''The Hidden Persuaders'' and ''[[The Naked Society]]''. He was a critic of [[consumerism]].

==Early life==
Vance Packard was born on May 22, 1914, in [[Granville Township, Bradford County, Pennsylvania|Granville Summit, Pennsylvania]], to Philip J. Packard and Mabel Case Packard.<ref name="nytimesobit">{{cite news|last1=Severo|first1=Richard|title=Vance Packard, 82, Challenger of Consumerism, Dies|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1996/12/13/arts/vance-packard-82-challenger-of-consumerism-dies.html|access-date=December 7, 2017|work=The New York Times|date=December 13, 1996}}</ref> Between 1920 and 1932, he attended local public schools in [[State College, Pennsylvania]], where his father managed a [[dairy farm]] owned by the [[Pennsylvania State University|Pennsylvania State College]] (later Penn State University).<ref name="nytimesobit"/> He identified himself as a "farm boy" throughout his life, although he moved to State College and in later life lived in affluent areas.<ref>Nelson, M.T., "The Hidden Persuaders: Then and Now," ''Journal of Advertising,'' Vol. 37, no. 1, 2008, DOI: 10.2753/JOA0091-3367370109, p. 114</ref> In 1932, he entered [[Pennsylvania State University]], where he earned a B.A. degree, majoring in English. He graduated in 1936, and worked briefly for the local newspaper, the ''[[Centre Daily Times]]''.<ref name="nytimesobit"/> He earned his master's degree at the [[Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism]] in 1937.<ref name="nytimesobit"/>

==Career==
Packard joined the  ''Boston Daily Record'' as a staff reporter in 1937.<ref name="nytimesobit"/> He became a reporter for the [[Associated Press]] around 1940, and in 1942, joined the staff of ''[[The American Magazine]]'' as a section editor, later becoming a staff writer.<ref name="nytimesobit"/> That periodical closed in July, 1956, and Packard became a writer at ''[[Collier's]]''. After its closing by the end of the year, he devoted his full attention to developing book-length projects of his own.<ref name="nytimesobit"/> Halfway into the next year,<ref>[https://www.amazon.com/Hidden-Persuaders-Vance-Packard/dp/097884310X "''The Hidden Persuaders'' – Paperback"]</ref> his ''The Hidden Persuaders'' was published to national attention, launching him into a career as a full-time social critic, lecturing and developing further books.<ref>Horowitz, D., ''Vance Packard and Social Criticism,'' Horowitz, 1994, p.6</ref> He was a critic of [[consumerism]],<ref name="nytimesobit"/> which he viewed as an attack on the traditional [[American way of life]].<ref name="americanconamericasforgotten">{{cite news|last1=Del Masto|first1=Addison|title=America's Forgotten Post-War Conservative|url=http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/americas-forgotten-post-war-conservative/|access-date=December 7, 2017|work=The American Conservative|date=December 6, 2017}}</ref>

In July 2020, an academic description reported on the nature and rise of the "[[robot prosumer]]", derived from [[Technology#Medieval and modern history (300 CE – present)|modern-day technology]] and related [[participatory culture]], that, in turn, had been predicted substantially by [[List of science fiction authors|science fiction writers]], as well as Packard.<ref name="EA-20200724">{{cite news |author=Lancaster University |author-link=Lancaster University |title=Sci-fi foretold social media, Uber and Augmented Reality, offers insights into the future - Science fiction authors can help predict future consumer patterns. |url=https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-07/lu-sfs072420.php |date=24 July 2020 |work=[[EurekAlert!]] |access-date=26 July 2020 }}</ref><ref name="JCC-20200723">{{cite journal |last=Ryder |first=M.J. |title=Lessons from science fiction: Frederik Pohl and the robot prosumer |date=23 July 2020 |journal=[[Journal of Consumer Culture]] |volume=22 |pages=246–263 |doi=10.1177/1469540520944228 |doi-access=free }}</ref><ref name="LU-20200726">{{cite thesis |last=Ryder |first=Mike |title=Citizen robots:biopolitics, the computer, and the Vietnam period |url=https://eprints.lancs.ac.uk/id/eprint/141870/ |date=26 July 2020 |journal=[[Lancaster University]] |access-date=26 July 2020 |type=phd }}</ref>

===''The Hidden Persuaders''===<!-- This section is linked from [[Subliminal message]] -->
{{Redirect|The Hidden Persuaders|the unrelated 2011 British film|The Hidden Persuaders (film)}}
[[File:BK cover Hidden Persuaders.gif|right|thumb|Vance Packard's book ''The Hidden Persuaders'', about [[media manipulation]] in the 1950s, sold more than a million copies.]]
In ''The Hidden Persuaders'', first published in 1957, Packard explored advertisers' use of consumer motivational research and other psychological techniques, including [[depth psychology]] and [[subliminal message|subliminal]] tactics, to [[mass manipulation|manipulate]] expectations and induce desire for products, particularly in the American postwar era. He identified eight "compelling needs" that advertisers promise products will fulfill (Emotional Security, Reassurance of worth, Ego gratification, Creative outlets, Love objects, Sense of power, Roots, Immortality).

According to Packard, these needs are so strong that people are compelled to buy products merely to satisfy those needs. The book also explores the manipulative techniques of promoting politicians to the electorate. Additionally, the book questions the morality of using these techniques.<ref name=DiRenzo>Gordon Di Renzo (1958) ''The American Catholic Sociological Review'', Vol. 19, No. 4 (Dec., 1958) (Review)</ref>

While the book was a top-seller among middle-class audiences, it was widely criticised by marketing researchers and advertising executives as carrying a sensationalist tone and containing unsubstantiated assertions{{which|date=March 2022}}.<ref>Nelson, M.T., "The Hidden Persuaders: Then and Now," ''Journal of Advertising,'' Vol. 37, no. 1, 2008, DOI: 10.2753/JOA0091-3367370109, p. 113</ref>

=== ''The Naked Society'' ===
{{main|The Naked Society}}
In his 1964 book called ''The Naked Society'', Packard criticized advertisers' unfettered use of private information to create marketing schemes. He compared a recent [[Great Society]] initiative by then-president [[Lyndon B. Johnson]], the [[National Data Bank]], to the use of information by advertisers and argued for increased [[data privacy]] measures to ensure that information did not find its way into the wrong hands. The essay led [[United States Congress|Congress]] to create the [[Special Subcommittee on the Invasion of Privacy]] and inspired privacy advocates such as [[Cornelius Edward Gallagher|Neil Gallagher]] and [[Sam Ervin]] to fight Johnson's flagrant disregard for consumer privacy.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/05/opinion/google-facebook-privacy.html|title=The End of Privacy Began in the 1960s| newspaper=The New York Times | date=5 December 2018 | last1=O'Mara | first1=Margaret }}</ref>

==Personal life and death==
Packard was married to Virginia Matthews; they had two sons and a daughter.<ref name="nytimesobit"/> They resided in [[New Canaan, Connecticut]] and Martha's Vineyard.<ref name="nytimesobit"/> He died in 1996 at the Martha's Vineyard Hospital.<ref name="chicagotribuneobit">{{cite news|title=Consumerism critic, author Vance Packard|url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/167501509/?terms=%22Vance%2BPackard%22|access-date=December 7, 2017|work=The Chicago Tribune|date=December 13, 1996|page=13|via=[[Newspapers.com]]|url-access=registration }}</ref>

== Publications ==
* 1946 ''How to Pick a Mate'' – a guide co-authored with the head of the Penn State [[marriage counseling]] service
* 1950 ''Animal IQ: The Human Side of Animals'' – a popular paperback on [[animal intelligence]]
* 1957 ''The Hidden Persuaders'' – on the [[advertising]] industry – the first of a popular series of books on sociology topics ({{ISBN|0-671-53149-2}})
* 1959 ''The Status Seekers'' – describing American social stratification and behavior
* 1960 ''[[The Waste Makers]]'' – criticizes [[planned obsolescence]] describing the impact of American productivity, especially on the national character
* 1960 ''Oh, Happy, Happy, Happy'' – foreword by Vance Packard, with Charles Saxon
* 1962 ''The Pyramid Climbers'' – describes the changing impact of American enterprise on managers, the structured lives of corporate executives and the conformity they need to advance in the hierarchy
* 1964 ''[[The Naked Society]]'' – on the threats to [[privacy]] posed by new technologies such as computerized filing, modern [[surveillance]] techniques and methods for influencing human [[behavior]]
* 1968 ''The Sexual Wilderness'' – on the [[sexual revolution]] of the 1960s and changes in male-female relationships
* 1972 ''A Nation of Strangers'' – about the attrition of communal structure through frequent geographical transfers of corporate executives
* 1977 ''The People Shapers'' – on the use of psychological & biological testing and experimentation to manipulate human behavior
* 1983 ''Our Endangered Children'' – discusses growing up in a changing world, warning that American preoccupation with money, power, status, and sex ignored the needs of future generations
* 1989 ''[[The Ultra Rich (book)|The Ultra Rich: How Much Is Too Much?]] '' – examines the lives of thirty American multimillionaires and their extravagances

== See also ==
* [[Brainwashing]]
* [[History of advertising]]
* [[History of marketing]]
* [[Marketing research]]

==Further reading==
* [http://www.salon.com/1996/12/17/media_174/ The Salon Dec 17, 1996] The Hidden Persuader
* Horowitz, D. (2009) Vance Packard and American Social Criticism (University of North Carolina Press Enduring Editions) {{ISBN|0-8078-5735-1}}
* {{cite journal|last=Petersen|first=William|title=Review of ''The Status Seekers''|journal=American Sociological Review|year=1960|volume=25|issue=1|pages=124–126|jstor=2088964|doi=10.2307/2088964}}
* {{cite journal|last=Dash|first=Samuel|title=Review of ''The Naked Society''|journal=Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science|year=1965|volume=306|pages=204–205|doi=10.1177/000271626536000148|jstor=1035075|s2cid=144925231}}
* {{cite journal|last=Schwartz|first=Alan U.|title=Review of ''The Naked Society''|journal=Harvard Law Review|year=1965|volume=78|issue=3|pages=701–705|jstor=1339131|doi=10.2307/1339131}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

== External links ==
* [http://www.salon.com/media/media961217.html Salon.com article]
* [http://www.ditext.com/packard/toc.html Excerpts from ''The Hidden Persuaders'']

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Packard, Vance}}
[[Category:Privacy activists]]
[[Category:Activists from Connecticut]]
[[Category:Activists from Massachusetts]]
[[Category:Activists from Pennsylvania]]
[[Category:1914 births]]
[[Category:1996 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Bradford County, Pennsylvania]]
[[Category:People from New Canaan, Connecticut]]
[[Category:People from Martha's Vineyard]]
[[Category:Pennsylvania State University alumni]]
[[Category:Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism alumni]]
[[Category:Advertising theorists]]
[[Category:American male journalists]]
[[Category:20th-century American journalists]]
[[Category:20th-century American economists]]
[[Category:20th-century American non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:20th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:Writers from Massachusetts]]
[[Category:Writers from Pennsylvania]]