Author and speaker Martin Lindstrom set out on a mission – to find out how we react to brands, and why we buy. He undertook an incredibly expensive research project using MRI technology to watch over 2,000 brains react to different stimuli in an effort to determine which types of marketing work and which don’t.

The results are uncovered in  Buy∙ology (Doubleday, 2009) and they are fairly surprising. Lindstrom has revealed that the warning labels on cigarette packages not only fall short as a deterrent, but that they trigger a smokers urge and reinforce the desire that they were designed to suppress …or where they? Lindstrom carries the message that the big tobacco companies know what they are doing, and are pouring tremendous amounts of their marketing budgets into advertising so subversive that you don’t know your being duped.

Although the study is interesting, thought provoking, and scientifically backed the book picks up most when discussing other issues of branding such as whether sex really does sell (sometimes), or whether having famous actors reinforce your brand – or simply make the actors more famous (the latter).

The author clearly knows his field and has the resume to prove it. The book gets heavy at times with discussion of forced associations, somatic markers, and brain-scanning lingo that goes under-explained. However it is ultimately readable, with information that is more intriguing than entertaining which provides my personal preference in a business book; more raised eyebrows than chuckles.