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Tyler Tomooka

Dr. Jessica Zisa

Writing 2

20 April 2024

Genre Translation of “Appearance vs. health motives for exercise and for weight loss”

Over the past ten weeks, I have been attempting to write a genre translation of

“Appearance vs. health motives for exercise and for weight loss” in the form of a short youtube

ad as it is one among the many peer reviewed articles that have very interesting, but scientifically

inclined discussion. In this case, the article has a main focus on the psychology of weight loss

and how it relates to body image, but is bogged down significantly by statistical analysis that

most people don’t have the time to care about. In the advertisement, I pose as a CDC speaker

informing the target audience about the information presented in the article, acting more as a

PSA than a traditional advertisement.

The information I will attempt to translate are the psychological correlations and

causality regarding ties between self reported motivations, diet, and exercise. Data table 2 shows

a beta value of -0.04, strongly indicating negative correlation, while exercise is mostly correlated

to dieting with health related motives (0.88p value). The power and beta values are looking at the

interaction between motivation x action, split between motivations for exercise, and then a subset

of people concerned about weight loss. As it turns out, weight loss was a motivation almost

exclusively for health while exercise combined with diet was almost exclusively for appearance.
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These tables are hard to read and interpret, so great care needs to be taken when interpreting the

information for a wider audience.

The awareness ad genre is one that focuses less on details, but more on creating concern

and shares. Few advertisements are like this, and they almost exclusively come from government

organizations or non-profits. The best examples of these are usually public health ads, whether it

be COVID-19 awareness ads or the more recent Syphilis awareness ads. In both of these cases,

scientific papers and research into these two infectious diseases needed to be translated to the

general public, many of whom don’t read newspapers or even watch the news. In both cases,

these ads target audiences who would benefit from hearing the information, but don’t necessarily

have the time or the desire to listen. An awareness ad wouldn’t be an awareness ad if it was

specific, long, or complicated, similar to other awareness media such as posters, flyers, and

blogs.

The first choice was to make sure that the statistics and data were highlighted at the

beginning, instantly attempting to hook the audience with logos. In “Alvarez, Wan, and Lee

"Workin’ Languages- Who We Are Matters in Our Writing," the words we choose often stifle our

message as we address them to different audiences. In order to reach as many as possible and

avoid “essentially silencing your voice” (Alvarez, 2) when translating. This advice in our early

reading really stuck with me, because we often associate rules and stifling behaviors with genre,

but this doesn’t have to be the case. When we open with a “universal language” of sorts, it gets

the message across much clearer while polarizing the audience. Unfortunately, leaning too far

into this makes the message clumsy and cumbersome, which is why the data was ultimately

shown through they graphs and casually explained through speech.

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One major challenge this genre translation faces is the innate distrust of advertisers

everywhere. In Laura Bolin Carroll’s “Backpacks vs Briefcases,” Carroll discusses how readers

(and seasoned writers) think rhetorically almost subconsciously, the example in the text saying

“The moment your professor walked in the room, you likely began analyzing her and making

assumptions… You might have noticed what kind of bag she is carrying—a tattered leather

satchel? a hot pink polka-dotted backpack? a burgundy briefcase?” (Carroll, 1) In my case, the

rhetoric is almost spelled out for them. When a user opens a video and sees an ad, their mind

immediately knows that a writer is attempting to influence them, almost automatically framing

the writer as untrustworthy. With this backdrop painted, it’s not possible to “gain their trust,”

whatever that would mean. Hopefully, once the descriptions start coming in, some of the

audience will immediately think of their friend, coworker, or sibling struggling with this very

issue. By leveraging exigence, concern, and relatability, the lack of ethos can be overcome.

This genre isn’t just all about getting around difficulties. As a multimodal media, an

advertisement’s visual elements help retain attention and emotionally sway its audience. While

an online article or newspaper clipping is easy to click off of or ignore, a multimodal media

attacking all the senses and all the heartstrings, it becomes much more difficult to ignore the

media staring the audience down. According to Melanie Gagich, this is because it takes

advantage of the five modes of communication, “visual, linguistic, spatial, aural, and gestural.”

(Gagich, 2) Elements like the woman at the start measuring herself with the statistics and music

is exactly how the genre stands out and is impossible to ignore. Forgetting one of these elements

would be failing to use this genre to its fullest, potentially costing more than the genre gains.

Arguably, the gestural element is missing in the ad, but it’s not from a lack of trying. I can’t do it
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without sounding like a clown, so until the uncanny valley can be crossed my voice remains on

the side of monotone.

The multimodal, attention catching nature of a youtube ad is a double edged sword. As

fast as an audience can be hooked, they can just as easily forget it. To combat this, many political

ads and products will include a jingle at the end in order to get something, anything stuck in your

head that can be associated with the product or candidate. In other cases, they choose to use a

slogan. In my case, the crab pot metaphor is used in order to attempt to construct a strong visual

that is hard to shake out of the head. Something that I hoped to clear up between the genre

translation is the interpretation of correlation between events with no conclusions. Although this

approach strips away some of the truth behind the uncertainty and unmeasurability of

psychological studies, it is worth it to raise awareness and for the reader to discover these

uncertainties on their own.

At the end of the day, this genre translation is all about informing those who would not

normally want to listen. The rhetorical choices I make are all a result of that: simplifying,

objectifying, and emotionally translating a purely academic psychological article. The revision

process helped clean up their video, hopefully giving it the CDC PSA vibe, helping to gain the

trust of the audience and exploit their ethos.

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Works Cited

Alvarez, Sara P, Amy Wan, and Eunjeong Lee. "Workin' Languages: Who We Are Matters in

Our Writing." Writing Spaces: Readings on Writing, Volume 4, edited by Dana Lynn

Driscoll, Megan Heise, Mary K. Steward, and Matthew Vetter, Parlor Press, 2022, pp.

1-17.

Carroll, Laura Bolin. “Backpacks vs. Briefcases: Steps toward Rhetorical Analysis” Writing

Spaces: Readings on Writing, Volume 1, edited by Dana Lynn Driscoll, Megan Heise,

Mary K. Steward, and Matthew Vetter, Parlor Press, 2010, pp. 45-57.

Gagich, Melanie. “An Introduction to and Strategies for Multimodal Composing.” Writing

Spaces: Readings on Writing, Volume 3, edited by Dana Lynn Driscoll, Megan Heise,

Mary K. Steward, and Matthew Vetter, Parlor Press, 2020, pp. 65-85.

Vartanian, Lenny R., et al. “Appearance vs. health motives for exercise and for weight loss.”

Psychology of Sport and Exercise, vol. 13, no. 3, May 2012, pp. 251–256,

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2011.12.005.