Have you ever been told that you need to let your anger out or it will explode? As it turns out, that's completely wrong. Cracked has a great list of psychology myths everyone believes that are utterly and completely wrong. Be warned, some of the language is NSFW.
Link
"Product cues that evoke certain images (e.g., prestige) are viewed as activating similar beliefs about the self (e.g., high status), which prompts a comparison process to determine whether the product and self-image are congruent. Escalas and Bettman (2003) adopt a prototype matching view, where individuals imagine prototypical users of alternative brands and select ones that maximize similarity to their actual or desired selfconcept, thereby forging a self-brand connection."
The Development of Self-Brand Connections in
Children and Adolescents
Carlson School of Management
University of Minnesota
http://www.csom.umn.edu/Assets/69662.pdf
Whether they call it NLP after Richard Bandler, or a more general theory of associations generally implied or call it a systematic method of transference or an SBC (self-brand connection). The current is the same.