•Persuasion— efforts to

change others’ attitudes

through the use of various
kinds of messages
 Persuasion:
Communicators, Messages, and Audiences
- Baron

• Communicators and Audiences (findings from

early research by Hovland, Janis, and Kelley, 1953)
• Communicators who are perceived as credible experts, are
attractive, speak rapidly, and appear confident are more
persuasive.
• Messages that do not appear to try to change attitudes are
more persuasive.
• Fear appeals are more persuasive

• A two-sided approach is more persuasive when the

audience’s attitude is different from the communicator’s.

• Younger people (e.g., between the ages of 18 and 25) are

more likely to be persuaded than are older people
 Resisting Persuasion Attempts
• Reactance—negative reactions to threats to one’s
personal freedom
• Often increases resistance to persuasion and can even
produce negative attitude change or that opposite to
what was intended
• Is one reason why hard-sell persuasion attempts often fail

• Forewarning—advance knowledge that one is

about to become the target of an attempt at
persuasion and increases resistance to the
persuasion that follows
• Provides opportunity to develop counterarguments
• Selective Avoidance—tendency to direct attention
away from information that challenges existing
attitudes, which increases resistance to persuasion

• In addition, people seek information consistent with

their attitudes (selective exposure).
 The Power of Persuasion -

• In 2003, there was a rift between America and other countries as to the
military action against Iraq where Americans favoured it and others
opposed it.
• Why was there an opinion gap between countries? Was there any
persuasion at work?
• YES! US media led half of the Americans to believe that Saddam
Hussein was involved in 9/11 and also to believe that weapons of mass
destruction were to be found in Iraq.
• Persuasion occurs TOP-DOWN, from elites or someone in power to the
rest. Hence, wherever people lived the war was seen in that light-either
as ‘Americas liberation of Iraq’ or as ‘Americas invasion of Iraq’
So is Persuasion All Bad?

• All the schools that have opened and are promoting

education in Pakistan, have they changed the minds of the
lower class towards education? Eg, TCF.
• Polio campaigns?

Bad persuasion- Good persuasion-

Propaganda Education
Al-Gore’s Case
• This individual for three decades has been
raising awareness about the negative impact of
pollution. From melting ice caps to rising seas to
climate warming etc.
• Through many means he is working towards
creating awareness and changing people’s
attitude towards pollution, he is involved in
MASS PERSUASION.
• Is his work education or propaganda? Whatever
it is, persuasion is everywhere.
 NASA Faked Moon Landing
• Claim happens to be that in 1969, NASA 9/11, Gore’s case
put two men down on the moon. and Nasa landing-all
• Many believe it to be a fake landing and three are examples
a fake set up. of controversy
theories. They are
• Over the years, there were many debatable, there is
rebuttals claiming that the landing was disagreement, and
a fact and not faked. whichever side of
the story persuades
• Two sides, which one persuaded better-gets more
better? support.
What Path Leads to Persuasion? (Pg 231-
233)

Factors that influence

persuasion

The message, the

communicator, the The people’s thoughts
content, channel of in response to all that
communication, stated on the left.
audience.
Persuasion entails clearing several hurdles, the more hurdles
cleared out of the way, the smoother the process of persuasion.
 Central route -The
central route
occurs Peripheral route-
when interested The peripheral
people focus on route occurs when
the people are
arguments and influenced by
respond with incidental
favorable cues, such as a
thoughts. If the speaker’s
argument is weak, attractiveness.
people counter
argue..
Implicit and
Explicit and Reflective Automatic
Remember What Primacy Effect Was?

• Information presented early is most

persuasive. First impressions are
important.
• For example, can you sense a difference
between these two descriptions?
• John is intelligent, industrious, impulsive,
critical, stubborn, and envious.
• John is envious, stubborn, critical,
impulsive, industrious, and intelligent.
 Persuasion Techniques (Compliance)

• Foot-in-the-door Technique—requesters begin

with a small request and then, when it is granted,
escalate to a larger one
• Researchers posing as drive-safely volunteers asked Californians to
permit the installation of huge, poorly lettered “Drive Carefully”
signs in their front yards. Only 17 percent consented.
• Others were first approached with a small request: Would they
display three-inch “Be a safe driver” window signs? Nearly all readily
agreed. When approached two weeks later to allow the large, ugly
signs in their front yards, 76 percent consented (Freedman & Fraser,
1966).
• Lowball Procedure—an offer or deal is changed
to make it less attractive to the target person
after this person has accepted it
Cialdini and his collaborators found that this technique
indeed works. When they invited introductory
psychology students to participate in an experiment at
7:00 am, only 24 percent showed up. But if the students
first agreed to participate without knowing the time and
only then were asked to participate at 7:00 am, 53
percent came.
• Door-in-the-face Technique—requesters begin with a
large request and then, when this is refused, retreat
to a smaller one
• When Robert Cialdini and his colleagues (1975) asked some of their Arizona
State University students to chaperone delinquent children on a zoo trip,
only 32 percent agreed to do so. With other students the questioner first
made a very large request—that the students commit two years as
volunteer counsellors to delinquent children. After getting the door-in-
the-face in response to this request (all refused), the questioner then
counteroffered with the chaperoning request, saying, in effect, “OK, if
you won’t do that, would you do just this much?” With this technique,
nearly twice as many—56 percent— agreed to help.
 - Baron Chap 8

• That’s Not All Technique—requesters offer

additional benefits to target persons before they
have decided whether to comply with or reject
specific requests
Cognitive Dissonance
What is it and How do we manage it?
• Cognitive Dissonance—an (unpleasant)
internal state which results when individuals
notice inconsistency between two or more
attitudes or between their attitudes and
their behavior

• It can result in attitude change

• Dissonance and attitude change: The effects of
Induced or Forced Compliance
• Dissonance and the less-leads-to-more effect
• Less reasons or rewards for performing an attitude-discrepant
behavior often results in more dissonance and thus greater
attitude change, since it gives people less justification.
• Effect only occurs when people believe that they have a choice
about performing the behavior and when they feel personally
responsible for their choice and its negative effects.
• Effect only occurs when people view the reward as a well-
deserved payment, and not as a bribe.
• Dissonance is stronger and attitudes change more when
there is no real justification for engaging in attitude-
discrepant behavior.
• When dissonance is a tool for beneficial
changes in behavior
• Dissonance can promote positive behavioral
changes, especially when it generates hypocrisy—
publicly advocating some attitudes or behavior
and then acting in a way that is inconsistent with
these attitudes or behavior.
• For maximum effectiveness of this tool:
• People must publicly advocate the desired behaviors.
• People must be induced to think about their own
failures to engage in these behaviors in the past.
• People must be given access to direct routes to
dissonance reduction.