Republic of the Philippines

UNIVERSITY OF EASTERN PHILIPPINES

University Town, Catarman, Northern Samar
Web:http://uep.edu.ph
Email: uepnsofficial@gmail.com

PURPOSIVE COMMUNICATION
Module 5
Week 5

ICY ROSE C. EULIN

Course Instructor
 Communication for Various Purposes

SECOND FUNCTION: TO PERSUADE

Persuasion is the process of creating, reinforcing, or changing people’s beliefs or actions. The ability to
speak and write persuasively will benefit you in every part of your life—from personal relationships to
community activities to career opportunities. It is also vital to your being an informed citizen or
consumer. The more you know of persuasion, the more effective you become in using your power of
critical thinking to assess the barrage of persuasive messages you are exposed to everyday.

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN INFORMATIVE AND PERSUASIVE SPEECHES

Informative speakers fulfil the role of an expert on a topic and seek to facilitate audience understanding
about it. In contrast, persuasive speakers take the role of promoter or proponent, advocating a
particular view on the topic they want the audience to adopt. A persuasive speaker not only becomes an
expert of the topic; he also goes beyond arguing for a specific viewpoint he wants the audience to
accept. He voices a clear position on a topic, where as an informative speaker remains “neutral”.

ELEMENTS OF PERSUASION

Aristotle, one of the first people to theorize about persuasion, believes that the persuasive messages
rest on the three elements of what he calls proofs, namely, ethos, pathos, and logic.

1. Ethos. This is the Greek word for “character’. Here, the speaker attempts to persuade other by using
authoritative and trustworthy course or support of the message.

2. Pathos. This refers to the speaker’s appeal to emotions, a speaker might use pathos to arouse the
audience’s feelings, such as by displaying photos to convince them to contribute to charitable
organizations.
3. Logos. This involves logic to support a speaker’s statements and, thereby, persuading his audience.
One way of doing this is by developing a coherent space that moves logically through his argument,
emphasizing reasoning (includes statistics and appropriate data), then moving in to a powerful
conclusion.

TYPES OF PERSUASIVE SPEECHES

Persuasive speeches address three types of questions: fact, value and policy, and while the general
purpose of these types of speeches is to persuade an audience, the kinds of outcomes they will produce
differ.

1. Speeches on Question of Fact. A question of fact asks whether something is true or false. The
speaker tries to persuade an audience that something did or did not occur, or that event did, in
fact, cause another.

Example:

Organizational Pattern: Chronological

Topic: Worldwide Oil Production
General Purpose: To Persuade
Specific Purpose: To convince the audience that the oil production in the world has not yet peaked.
Thesis: Recent evidence shows that worldwide oil production has increased and will
continue to increase.
Main points: Oil production has been highly variable throughout history.

I. Demand for oil has quadrupled in the past five years.

II. New sources of crude have been discovered, recently,
III. Despite competition from alternative energy industries oil production will continue to
increase.

Organizational patterns for speeches or questions of facts are chronological, spatial, topical, a cause and
effect.
2. Speeches on Question of Value. A question of value asks for subjective evaluation of something’s
worth, significance, quality or condition. Here, the speaker argues that something is good or bad, right
or wrong, beautiful or ugly, boring or engaging. Funny or serious—all qualitative judgements about
something’s significance. It addresses individual opinion and cultural beliefs rather than proving
something to be objectively true or false. It may include a call for action, but it does not ask for specific
changes in political or organizational policy.

Questions of value can address timeless issues, such as morality of war, or more contemporary
concerns, like the personal or ethical uses of social networking websites.

The pattern for developing speeches or questions of value is either chronological or topical.

Organizational Pattern: Chronological

Topic: Electric cars
General Purpose: To persuade
Specific Purpose: To convince the audience that electric cars are superior to gasoline engine or
hybrid vehicles.
Thesis: Electric cars represent the feature of automobile industry because they
perform better that gasoline engine or hybrid vehicles.

Main points:
I. The original automobile was stream-driven and invented in France in 1769.
II. The prototype of the gasoline-powered automobile was introduced in Austria in 1864.
III. Commercially successful hybrid entered the U.S market in the 1960’s.
IV. Electric cars are gaining popularity now and will eventually make other vehicle
obsolete.

3. Speeches on Question Policy. A question of policy asks what specific course of action should be taken
or how a problem should be solved.

Questions of policy may reflect current controversies. These questions also range from general to
specific. Speeches on the question policy ask the audience to personally take (or not take) a particular
action or support (or not support) a particular position. Speakers might request immediate involvement,
general support for social or political movement of some kind, disapproval of an idea, or change in
behaviour.

Organizational patterns for speeches on question of policy are the problem-solution pattern and the
problem-cause-solution pattern.

Organizational Pattern: Problem-cause-solution

Topic: Junk food on campuses
General Purpose: To persuade
Specific Purpose: To encourage the audience to sign a petition on banning the sale of junk food
on the campuses.
Thesis: Junk food should be banned on campuses because it contributes to obesity,
poor nutrition, and immune-system problems.
 Main points:

I. Many college students are overweight, eat poorly, and have weak immune system.
II. Junk food is a strong contributing factor to these problems.
III. We must work to ban the sale of junk food on campuses.

ETHICAL PRINCIPLES OF PERSUASIVE SPEAKING

The following principles should be followed by persuasive speakers:

1. Be careful about whom you trust.

2. Analyze and evaluate messages for reasonableness, truth, and benefit to you and the community.

3. You and your messages are persuasive if you have a long positive history.

4. Always be respectful to your audience.

5. Avoid fallacies.
Communicate!
1. Determine if the illustration is an informative or persuasive speech. Justify your answer.
2. What kind of question is it about?
3. Determine the organizational pattern followed in the examples.
4. What ethical principles are observed in the sample speech? Prove your answer.