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The
Nature of Attitudes and Persuasion
What is Persuasion?
Why Study Persuasion?
Persuasion as an Alternative to Apathy or Coercion
The Nature of Attitudes
The Process of
Persuasion
Glossary
Additional Readings
Self-Test
Why Study Persuasion?
The idea that persuasion is
important, and well worth learning, is true for several
reasons. First, persuasion can be found almost everywhere
humans can be found. As explained above, students, parents,
teachers, politicians, sales persons, friends, and others use
persuasion in their everyday lives. Mass media from print
(newspapers, magazines, direct mailing) to electronic (radio,
television, the World Wide Web) positively thrives on
advertisements. These are examples of the kinds of situations
all of us could encounter, in which we have the opportunity to
try to persuade others. Thus, thinking about the varied
contexts in which communication occurs shows that persuasion
exists throughout human society.
In these situations persuasion exists in one or both of two
forms: we can try to persuade others, and other people
can try to persuade us. Persuasion, coming from us to
others and from others to us, frequently occurs in
interpersonal or dyadic situations. Although we rarely have to
opportunity to persuade others via the mass media, that is a
context in which others frequently develop persuasive messages
aimed at us. A moment’s reflection should convince you that
understanding the nature of persuasive communication, and how
it works, is well worth knowing. Whenever we want to influence
others through messages (speaking, writing, or using pictures
and symbols), we need to understand persuasion in order to
increase the likelihood that our message(s) will be
successful. However, it is also important for us to understand
the persuasion aimed at us so that other people cannot unduly
influence us.
We can also see that persuasion pervades our lives by thinking
about the activities that make up our daily lives. Persuasion
is a part of education and learning. A college recruiter,
alum, or parent may try to persuade us to attend his or her
school. Once at school, students persuade their friends when
to take classes (e.g., in the morning or afternoon) and which
classes to take. Professors and academic advisors can persuade
students what major to select, and whether to go to graduate
or professional school. Students may persuade professors to
accept an assignment late, to change a grade, or to take a
test early. Persuasion is a part of work. During employment
interviews, we want to persuade the employer to offer us a
job. At work, we persuade co-workers about projects, bosses
about promotions, and customers about our products or company.
We may even try to persuade (rather than order) subordinates
about their tasks to keep morale up. Many professions, like
sales, politics, and the law, are essentially about persuading
others. Persuasion is also a part of recreation and
relaxation. We persuade our families, roommates, and friends
that we should go out to eat, and which restaurant to
patronize. We persuade our friends that we ought to go see a
movie, and then which film to see. We tell our friends about a
new musical group we have heard or a book we have read,
persuading them to buy it. So we persuade each other while
learning, working, and socializing. The fact is, most of us
have never thought about just how much of our lives are
influenced by persuasion.
However,
it is important to realize that the fact that we persuade, and
are persuaded, so often does not mean we are already experts
in persuasion. Of course, we have learned something about
persuasive strategies through trial and error. However,
thousands and thousands of scholars in disciplines like
communication, psychology, and advertising have systematically
studied persuasion for many, many years. In fact, rhetoricians
like Aristotle have written about how to persuade others since
four centuries before the Christian era. Practitioners, like
lawyers, politicians, and advertisers have also devoted an
incredible amount of time and effort to understanding
persuasion “in the real world.”
Three hundred years after Aristotle, Cicero was one of the greatest orators in ancient Rome. He was an accomplished orator and was elected
consul, a position roughly analogous to President. Cicero also wrote several books on rhetoric or
persuasion. More recently, social scientists have conducted
tens of thousands of experiments into the nature of persuasion
or attitude change. Thus, there is an incredible wealth of
knowledge about persuasion that has accumulated over literally
hundreds of years, from scholars and practitioners, in a
variety of disciplines. There is much useful to be learned
about persuasion.
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