Persuasion

Listening to the radio. Watching television. Streaming online music. Even driving down the street. What do all these things have in common? Advertisements, of course! In between songs, your favorite TV show, and on billboards and signs plastered on every available surface, persuasion is truly all around us.

So what is persuasion? Persuasion occurs when a person attempts to convince others to think a certain way or do a certain act. Most commercials and advertisements strive to get people to buy things. However, some are more political or philosophical in an attempt to get society to agree with a specific ideology.

In writing, an author uses persuasion to promote a bias, which is displaying a partiality for or against a person or idea. Authors attempt to persuade readers to agree with a bias using many different methods.

Testimonials and Big Names

The first method is the testimonial, which occurs when one person vouches for someone or something else. You see this all the time in commercials when they state ”real people, not actors.” Then, coincidentally, the people always say how amazed they are with that car, or shampoo, or smart phone. The commercial is using a testimonial from an everyday person to show you how good that product is.

A related method is big names, which is basically a testimonial by a famous person or an expert on that topic. Have you ever seen the blurbs on the back of a book cover? One might have The New York Times raving that this book is amazing. That is a big name since the newspaper is considered an expert in the field of writing.

Another example is the many car commercials that feature celebrities. If a celebrity is driving this car, don’t you want to as well? He might be no expert in cars, but he is a very big name.

Using testimonials and big names shows the reader that the information the author is giving has been accepted by everyday people, experts, or famous people. Isn’t that good enough for you?

Bandwagon Techniques

Another type of persuasion technique is bandwagon, which projects the image that everyone else is already on board with the argument. Basically, everyone else is doing it, you should, too. Jump on the bandwagon!

This method is very similar to testimonials and big names, as it also focuses on our social need to fit in. Humans are an extremely social species. We thrive in groups. When a person feels left out, it causes terrible damage psychologically. We all have a strong emotional need to fit in. The bandwagon method plays directly on that human need. No one wants to be left out.

Loaded Words

The next technique is loaded words, which focuses on using words and phrases with very strong emotional connotations. Nearly all words in our language have some sort of emotional connection. For instance, would you rather be called skinny or slender? Most of us would choose slender. Why? Because it has a positive connotation, whereas skinny has a negative one. Skinny seems deficient in an unattractive way. But being slender is considered very attractive.

Authors will choose their words very carefully in order to create the emotional connection they’re looking for. Think politically. We often hear the phrase ‘tax relief’ promoted as a great thing for any nation. Here, the loaded word is ‘relief,’ as it has a very positive connotation. Everyone likes to feel relief. It means everything is suddenly better. The phrase ‘tax relief’ is an example of using loaded words.

Lesson Summary

To review, authors will use methods of persuasion in order to promote their biases. Persuasion occurs when a person attempts to convince others to think a certain way or do a certain act. Bias is displaying a partiality for or against a person or idea.

There are many strategies an author can use to promote his or her bias in a text. Here are the most common ones we discussed in this lesson:

• Testimonials occur when one person vouches for someone or something else.
• Big names are a testimonial by a famous person or an expert in that topic.
• Bandwagon projects the image that everyone else is already on board with the argument.
• Loaded words use words and phrases that have very strong emotional connotations.