Priming is an effect when one learns something based on unconscious stimuli, which activate specific mental pathways. The organism widely uses such a process for social perception, which results in most people’s reactions being unconscious. For example, when two people are talking, their speeches influence each other differently based on their own perceptions of various words.
Two people can have distinctive meanings for the same word, and thus, their unconscious reactions will be different. The unconscious stimulation of mental pathways will cause changes in the person’s behavior. Examples are physiological desires, such as thirst, which stimulate the pathway motivating a person to find water as quickly as possible.
From an experimenter’s perspective, priming could influence a person’s social judgment, which means that some of their views may be changed by simply choosing the right words for the experimenter. In that way, priming is an unconscious stimulation of a person’s mental circuits, either by inner or outer stimuli, which may change their behavior completely.