Persuasion

7 Key excerpts on "Persuasion"

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  Media, Persuasion and Propaganda

  • Marshall Soules(Author)
  • 2015(Publication Date)
  • Edinburgh University Press

    (Publisher)

  96 5 Psychology of Influence Since the mid-1800s, capitalist societies have provided a mass market laboratory for marketers, advertisers, publicists, politicians and propa-gandists to test their persuasive powers. Market research, surveys, focus groups, clinical experiments, studies of spending habits and trends and data analysis have all contributed to our understanding of motiva-tion and behaviour in the material world and in the broader context of human culture. Robert Cialdini’s applied approach to Persuasion provides a core focus for this chapter. Cialdini emphasises that uncer-tainty and ambiguity are key elements in Persuasion psychology. They provide openings for creative – possibly misleading – communication, again reminding us of the trickster’s modus operandi . Recent advances in neuroscience reveal that reason alone is often unable to remove ambiguity, inspire trust and support optimum decision-making. We need our emotions to point us in the right direction. Persuasion in the spectrum of influence Persuasion wears many masks across a spectrum of influence that ranges from giving advice and gaining compliance, to education, promotion, propaganda and physical coercion. These masks disguise Persuasion and make it difficult to define without adding numerous qualifications. Gass and Seiter ([1999] 2007) try to balance competing claims to arrive at a definition of Persuasion as ‘the activity of creating, reinforcing, modifying or extinguishing beliefs, attitudes, intentions, motivations, and/or behaviours within . . . a given communication context’ (33–4). Their catalogue of actions and outcomes illustrates the difficulty of defining Persuasion easily. Like fish in water, we are immersed in per-suasion before we know we are swimming. PSYCHOLOGY OF INFLUENCE 97 Persuasion is • either ‘pure’ or ‘borderline’: Persuasion can be mixed with other intentions (borderline), so it does not always announce itself clearly.

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  Media Effects

  Advances in Theory and Research

  • Mary Beth Oliver, Arthur A. Raney, Jennings Bryant(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  8

  Currents in the Study of Persuasion

  James Price Dillard

  The study of Persuasion is concerned with how messages that are intended to bring about a specific change in message recipients do or do not achieve that aim. This chapter provides a broad overview of scholarship meant to address that issue. Because Persuasion research is so plentiful, and has been for so long, my account is necessarily selective. The material that did find its way into this chapter is organized into four sections: (a) theories of attitude and Persuasion, (b) message design, (c) campaign processes, and (d) resistance to Persuasion.

  Theories of Attitude and Persuasion

  The influence of the rhetorical tradition can be seen in the utility of four concepts articulated by Aristotle more than 2,000 years ago (Aristotle, 1991). Despite their age, logos, pathos, ethos, and kairos still provide a serviceable means of organizing contemporary theoretical perspectives.

  Logos

  Logos is the mode of Persuasion characterized by its emphasis on logic and argument. One contemporary perspective that aligns with logos is the theory of reasoned action (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975) and its progeny, the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen, 1991) and the integrative model of behavior (Fishbein, 2000). The most recent iteration of this framework asserts that behavior is determined by (a) beliefs about its consequences (which produce attitudes), (b) beliefs about what others do or think that the target should do (which produce perceived norms), and (c) beliefs about whether or not the target is able to execute the behavior in question (which produce control judgments). In each of these three domains, individuals reason from molecular beliefs to aggregate beliefs and, on the basis of those collective judgments, choose a course of action.

  The reasoned action perspective is a theory of behavior change, not a theory of Persuasion. But, its identification of the three bases of behavior has straightforward implications for message content, a thorough examination of which can be found in O’Keefe (2016). It is worth noting that members of the trio are not functionally the same. Behavior change follows from more favorable attitudes and more intense social pressure, but neither of these factors matter much unless the target sees him or herself as capable of the behavior (Yzer, 2007). Hence, favorable control beliefs constitute a necessary condition for the effects of attitudes and norms on Persuasion.

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  Skilled Interpersonal Communication

  Research, Theory and Practice

  • Owen Hargie(Author)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Jowett and O’Donnell (2019 , p. 31) define Persuasion as ‘a communicative process to influence others’. In fact, there are four main differences between the two processes.

  Conscious awareness. While it has been shown that a great deal of influence takes place at a subconscious level (Hogan and Speakman, 2006 ; Jarrett, 2008 ), Persuasion attempts are carried out with clear and deliberate intent. For example, a film star who wears a certain brand of T-shirt on a TV show may influence young people to purchase a similar product, without consciously intending so to do. However, if the same film star had agreed to appear in a TV advert to promote this brand of T-shirt, then it would have been quite clear that a Persuasion attempt was being made. Given this aspect of intentionality, interpersonal Persuasion has been defined as ‘the conscious manipulation of face-to-face communication to induce others to take action’ (Robbins and Hunsaker, 2014 , p. 339). It involves, ‘communication behaviors that are intended to affect other’s responses’ (Stiff and Mongeau, 2016 , p. 5). Taking this line of thought further, Persuasion always involves influence, but influence does not always involve Persuasion. This distinction was recognised by Hybels and Weaver (2011 ), who defined Persuasion as the process that occurs when one person influences the values, beliefs, attitudes or behaviour of another.

  Resistance. There is now considerable evidence to show that once people have made up their minds, they become very resistant to change, even when it would be profitable, logical or socially desirable to do so (Chen et al., 2013 ). Therefore, Persuasion is required to effect change. Knowles and Riner (2007 ) identified overcoming resistance as a key defining feature of the process, noting that ‘Persuasion is only required when people feel “I don’t like it!”, “I don’t believe it!”, or “I won’t do it!” … All Persuasion, therefore is implicitly aimed at resistance’. Likewise, Sanders and Fitch (2001 ) highlighted that Persuasion is influence when there is resistance, whereas influence per se, ‘is achieved by offering inducements that make it expedient or self-interested in the moment for that particular target person to do what is being asked, given his or her existing convictions and dispositions’ (p. 263). They also made the important point that ‘not everything is a persuadable’ (p. 268). Persuadable actions are those that are not obligatory, and as such there may well be resistance to what is being suggested. In similar vein, Johnston (1994

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  Social Beings

  Core Motives in Social Psychology

  • Susan T. Fiske(Author)
  • 2018(Publication Date)
  • Wiley

    (Publisher)

  Cognitive dissonance theory shows that people seek to keep their cognitions consistent, including their cognitions about their attitude-relevant behav- ior. Thus, cognitive consistency theories partly illustrate the core social motives of self-enhancing and belonging, seeing oneself as not violating personal or normative self-standards. Nevertheless, the core social motive of understanding primarily underlies consistency processes, in that peo- ple seek the clear object appraisals afforded by cognitively consistent attitudes. Most dissonance research emphasizes self-inflicted attitude change; we now turn to attitude change engineered by others. Attitude Change via Understanding Persuasive Communication 211 Attitude Change via Understanding Persuasive Communication Recall the corporate merger that opened this chapter. The public relations Persuasion campaign consumed millions of dollars and person-hours. Persuasion theories focus on just such deliberate attempts to change people’s attitudes, as in advertising, propaganda, legal argument, and health education. People think they can resist Persuasion (Wilson, Houston, & Meyers, 1998): People say they are unwilling to change their attitudes, think they can generate effective counterarguments, and later underestimate how much their attitudes indeed have changed. Social psychologists know better. Researchers analyze persuasive communications for their effectiveness, typically by break- ing down the process, as this section will show in two major approaches, one classic and one new. The object-appraisal function, exemplifying the core social motive of understanding, espe- cially represents how persuasive communications succeed. Note the general focus on cognitive processes of Persuasion, as compared with the more emphatically affective processes of attitude formation described earlier.

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  Human Communication Theory and Research

  Concepts, Contexts, and Challenges

  • Robert L. Heath, Jennings Bryant(Authors)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Let’s begin this review by recalling the discussion from the previous section: social judgment–involvement theory fostered research into the cognitive processes that operate once a person receives a message that advocates an attitude position. One of that theory’s predictions was that high amounts of ego-involvement reduce the likelihood of attitude change. When a message differs from an attitude position the person holds, it threatens the individual’s self-concept, and resistance to change sets in.

  To refine this line of analysis, investigators examined the cognitive processes people use, whether complex or simple, when they desire information about objects and issues related to their personal interest. Advancing cognitive–involvement theory, Petty and Cacioppo (1979) discovered, in contrast to social judgment–involvement theory, that high levels of involvement do not invariably decrease Persuasion. Indeed, high involvement can enhance Persuasion if the message contains cogent arguments and if people have enough knowledge regarding an issue to enable them to process issue-relevant statements.

  Cognitive–involvement theory defines cognitive response as “a unit of information pertaining to an object or issue that is the result of cognitive processing” (Cacioppo, Harkins, & Petty, 1981, p. 37). An argument is any bit of information that is “relevant to a person’s subjective determination of the true merits of an advocated position” (Petty & Cacioppo, 1986a, p. 16). Persons use cognitive processes to reduce each persuasive argument to its component parts (the information contained) and compare them to opinions they hold.

  This approach to Persuasion begins by acknowledging that individuals set out to receive, obtain, and process information in an effort to form correct and useful attitudes. Cognitive–involvement theory assumes that people want correct and useful attitudes and will expend the effort needed to obtain and process information to do so (Petty & Cacioppo, 1986b). Attitudes allow individuals to know, in their judgment, which opinions and actions are rewarding. Individuals are confronted with evaluating their physical and social world. They make choices. They want those choices to be rewarding. They know that they need well-founded attitudes to make those choices.

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  Social Influence, Power, and Multimodal Communication

  • Isabella Poggi, Francesca D'Errico(Authors)
  • 2022(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  Within them, Persuasion clearly belongs to the communicative side of social influence; but at the same time, as observed in Chapter 1, communication is definitely a way to influence others. Yet, even if both communication and Persuasion are means for influence, and Persuasion necessarily exploits communication, not all communication (even requestive communication) is necessarily persuasive. If thief A, holding a gun, tells the robbed B “your life or your purse”, or if captain A orders soldier B “shoot them”, they aim at influencing B, but not at persuading him (they do not leave him free to comply or not). If A asks B “Can you pass me the salt?”, he is using communication to influence, but not to persuade (it is not in B's interest). So what is the peculiar way in which Persuasion influences through communication? Among the types of influence through goal hooking seen above, one aspect is shared, in fact, by both inducement and conviction: in both, to have B pursue goal GA, A must make B believe that GA is worth pursuing – it is a goal of high value – because it is a subgoal of some goal GB that B already has. But while in inducement, the imbalance of power between A and B does not allow the latter a truly free choice, in conviction B can freely decide whether to pursue the goal proposed by A. His belief that GA is a subgoal of GB, while in inducement can be jeopardized by internally feeling that there is something else (A's power or A's interest) to link the two goals, in conviction is strongly held by B. In this perspective, Persuasion is an action aimed at social influence that shares some features with a particular kind of speech act: advice (Poggi & Vincze, 2008b). In fact, suadeo, the Latin word embedded in the root of the word “per suas ion”, means “I give advice”. And advice (Poggi & Castelfranchi, 1990) is a particular speech act – namely, a request – in which the action the Sender requests the Addressee is in the Addressee's interest

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  Advertising Exposure, Memory and Choice

  • Andrew A. Mitchell(Author)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • Psychology Press

    (Publisher)

  II Psychological Processes in Persuasion Passage contains an image

  4 The Attitude-to-Behavior Process: Implications for Consumer Behavior

  Paul M. Herr University of Colorado-Boulder Russell H. Fazio Indiana University

  DOI: 10.4324/9780203772195-7

  Within any given product category, consumers typically can choose among a variety of specific brands. Presumably, consumers’ attitudes toward each brand (i.e., their summary evaluations) guide or influence this selection process. Indeed, such an assumption appears to be central to much advertising. Although a goal of advertising is often to increase sales, the manner in which this goal is pursued is often via social influence attempts directed at attitudes. Advertising is typically concerned with the formation of positive attitudes toward the specific product—under the assumption that such information or change will prompt corresponding behavior.

  Thus, it is important for marketing researchers to arrive at an understanding of the attitude–behavior relation. The purpose of this chapter is to describe a model of the process by which attitudes guide behavior and an associated conceptualization of attitudes. The model, which has been proposed by Fazio and his colleagues (Fazio, Chen, McDonel, & Sherman, 1982 ; Fazio, Powell, & Herr, 1983 ) and is detailed in Fazio (1986 ), concerns the various steps involved in the process by which an individual’s attitude can influence behavior. Our intent is to summarize the process model (and some of the research that has been conducted to test it) and to discuss its applicability to consumer behavior. In addition, the process model is contrasted with the Ajzen and Fishbein (1980

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