Unit-1 PERSUASION

Persuasion;

The process by which a message induces change in beliefs, attitudes, or behaviours.

Paths to Persuasion: Central and Peripheral Routes

Introduction:

Persuasion involves influencing others through various factors studied by psychologists like

Carl Hovland during World War II. Understanding the paths to persuasion sheds light on how

people process and respond to persuasive messages.

Two Paths to Influence:

1. Central Route to Persuasion:

Characteristics: Involves thoughtful consideration of arguments presented in a message.

Occurs when individuals are motivated and able to think critically about an issue.

Process: Individuals focus on the strength and compelling nature of the presented arguments.

Persuasion is likely when strong, convincing arguments are presented.

Example: If a person carefully evaluates the pros and cons of a product before making a

decision, they are likely taking the central route.

2. Peripheral Route to Persuasion:

Characteristics: Involves less thoughtful processing and consideration of arguments. Occurs

when individuals are distracted, uninvolved, or busy.

Process: Rather than evaluating the strength of arguments, individuals focus on cues or

peripheral aspects of the message. Automatic acceptance without deep thinking is common.
Example: Consumers making impulsive decisions in a store, influenced by familiar or easily

understood cues without considering detailed product information.

Effects of Each Route:

1. Central Route: Swiftly changes explicit attitudes. Requires motivation and cognitive

resources. Strong arguments lead to persuasion, while weak arguments may lead to

counterarguing.

2. Peripheral Route: More implicit and automatic. Builds implicit attitudes through

repeated associations between attitude objects and emotions. Relies on cues that

trigger automatic acceptance, especially in situations where individuals are less

motivated or able to engage in deep thinking.

Application in Advertising: Advertisers adapt strategies based on consumers' thinking

processes. Peripheral route used in brief media like billboards, focusing on visual cues and

associations. Central route employed in detailed media like magazines, providing information

and features for logical consumers. The dual processing models of central and peripheral

routes to persuasion help explain how people respond to persuasive messages. Whether

through thoughtful consideration or automatic cues, understanding these routes enhances our

comprehension of how attitudes are shaped and changed.

Different Paths for Behavior Change

Central Route Processing:

Involves careful thought and mental elaboration on issues. Relies on the strength of

persuasive appeals and individual thoughts in response. More enduring change compared to

the peripheral route. Changed attitudes are likely to persist, resist attack, and influence
behavior. Example: Deep thinking about the benefits of a product leading to a lasting

preference.

Peripheral Route Processing:

Produces superficial and temporary attitude change. Relies on simple rule-of-thumb

heuristics and quick judgments. Attitude change may not necessarily translate into lasting

behavior change. Often results in snap judgments based on heuristics. Example: Trusting an

advertisement because the spokesperson is likable, without deeply considering the product's

features.

Behavior Change and Routes to Persuasion:

Central route processing more likely to lead to enduring behavior change. Peripheral route

processing may change attitudes but is often less effective in changing behavior.

Examples from sex education and HIV-prevention education highlight the challenges of

relying solely on the peripheral route.

Role of Heuristics:

In situations where thoughtful analysis is not feasible, people use heuristics. Simple rules of

thumb, such as trusting experts or finding long messages credible, guide decision-making.

Heuristics help in making quick judgments without extensive thought.

Elements of Persuasion

Introduction:

Persuasion involves four key elements: (1) the communicator, (2) the message, (3) how the

message is conveyed, and (4) the audience. Understanding these elements helps determine

whether the central or peripheral route to persuasion is taken.

1. Who Says? The Communicator:

Social psychologists emphasize the impact of the communicator on the audience's reception

of a message. Credibility: Source credibility, including perceived expertise and

trustworthiness, influences the persuasiveness of a message.

The sleeper effect: The impact of a credible or noncredible source may change over time.

Perceived Expertise: Experts are more persuasive, and confidence in the communicator

contributes to credibility.

Perceived Trustworthiness: Sincerity and honesty enhance trustworthiness, and trust increases

when a speaker argues against self-interest.

Attractiveness and Liking: People are more likely to respond positively to those they like.

Physical Attractiveness: Beautiful or appealing communicators often have more influence.

Similarity: We tend to like and be influenced by those who are similar to us. Mimicry and

mirroring: Imitating others subtly increases influence. Shared group identity: Messages from

within one's group are often more persuasive.

Behavior Change and Routes to Persuasion: Attractiveness and liking can open individuals

to both central and peripheral route persuasion. Central route processing is associated with

enduring behavior change, while peripheral route processing may result in temporary attitude

change.

2.What Is Said? The Message Content

Reason vs. Emotion: Consideration of whether logical or emotional messages are more

persuasive. Audience responsiveness varies—educated audiences prefer rational appeals,

while less interested audiences are influenced by their liking of the communicator.

Formation of Attitudes: Initial attitudes formed through emotion are more persuaded by

emotional appeals, and vice versa for reason-based attitudes.

Effect of Good Feelings: Messages associated with positive feelings are more persuasive.

Good moods lead to positive thinking and reliance on peripheral cues.

Arousing Fear: Negative emotions, such as fear, can be effective in messages promoting

health behaviors. The degree of fear matters, and messages should offer a solution for greater

effectiveness.

Discrepancy: The level of disagreement in a message influences opinion change. Credibility

of the source interacts with the degree of discrepancy.

One-sided vs. Two-sided Appeals: Acknowledging opposing arguments can enhance

persuasiveness, depending on the audience's awareness of those arguments. Two-sided

appeals are more effective when the audience is exposed to opposing views.

Primacy vs. Recency: Primacy effect: Information presented early is more persuasive.

Recency effect: Recent information can outweigh past information temporarily.

The order of presentation influences preferences, with a tendency to prefer the first option.

3.Channel of Communication in Persuasion

Written vs. Spoken Appeals: Common belief in the power of written words.

Overestimation of the impact of spoken appeals. Studies showing limitations of spoken

messages, such as sermons on racial attitudes.

Active Experience vs. Passive Reception: Passively received appeals not always futile but

may lack effectiveness. Example of an antilitter campaign showing limited impact on

behavior change. Power of repetition in advertising and political messaging.

Fluency and Believability: Repetition, fluency, and believability in persuasion. Scary

implications of believable lies displacing hard truths. Mere repetition increasing a statement's

fluency and perceived credibility.

Significance and Familiarity: Persuasion decreases as the significance and familiarity of the

issue increase. The power of media in influencing minor issues vs. major, familiar issues.

Active Experience and Attitude Strength: Active experience strengthens attitudes.

Attitudes rooted in personal experience are more confident, stable, and less vulnerable.

Personal vs. Media Influence: Studies demonstrating that personal influence is more

significant than media influence. Field experiments illustrating the impact of personal

contacts on political persuasion and health habits.

Two-Step Flow of Communication: Elihu Katz's two-step flow of communication: from

media to opinion leaders to the rank and file. Influence of opinion leaders ("influentials") in

various fields, including marketing and politics. Media's Subtle Influence: Even without

direct exposure, media influence permeates culture. The two-step flow model and the indirect

effects of media influence on individuals.

Comparing Media: Media persuasiveness ranked from live (face-to-face) to written,

audiotaped, and videotaped. Understanding and recalling messages: written vs. audiovisual

media. Written messages most persuasive for difficult content, while audiovisual media may

focus on peripheral cues.

4.To Whom Is It Said? The Audience

Self-Esteem: Low self-esteem individuals are slow to comprehend messages and hard to

persuade. High self-esteem individuals comprehend but stay confident in their opinions.

Moderate self-esteem people are the easiest to influence.

Age and Thoughtfulness: Social and political attitudes often correlate with age.

Two explanations: life cycle (attitudes change with age) and generational (attitudes remain

from youth). Generational explanation is supported by research.

Formative Years: Teens and early twenties are crucial for attitude formation. Political

attitudes formed around age 18 tend to last. Events during formative years shape enduring

attitudes.

Flexibility in Older Adults: Older adults can change attitudes with changing cultural norms.

Possible increased susceptibility to attitude change near the end of life.

Central Route Persuasion: Focus on responses evoked in the mind, not just the message.

Minds don't passively absorb; persuasion occurs if favorable thoughts are summoned.

Counterargument: Forewarning and knowing persuasion attempts lead to counterargument.

Example of forewarning high schoolers about a talk on teen driving.

Distraction: Distraction enhances persuasion by inhibiting counterargument.

Example: Political ads using visuals to distract from message analysis.

Uninvolved Audiences: Two routes to persuasion: central route (analytical) and peripheral

route (heuristic cues). Analytical individuals prefer central routes; others rely on peripheral

cues.

Need for Cognition: High need for cognition prefers systematic thinking; low need relies on

peripheral cues. Techniques like rhetorical questions and repetition stimulate thinking.
Thinking strengthens strong messages and weakens counterarguing for weak messages.

Practical Implications: Effective communicators consider audience reactions and stimulate

active thinking. Techniques like rhetorical questions and engaging examples foster central

route processing.

Extreme Persuasion: How Do Cults Indoctrinate?

Cult; Cults, or new religious movements, like Unification Church, People's Temple, Branch

Davidians, and Heaven's Gate. Examples of extreme behaviors and mass suicides. Hindsight

Analysis: Explanation post-events using persuasion principles. Doesn't determine the truth of

beliefs, merely explains social phenomena.

Cult Leaders: Examples: Sun Myung Moon, Jim Jones, David Koresh, Marshall

Applewhite.

Leaders use charisma and persuasion to attract followers. Sun Myung Moon (Unification

Church): Attracted followers with a mix of Christianity, anticommunism, and leader

glorification. Commitment to Moon's wishes led to financial and personal sacrifices. Jim

Jones (People's Temple): Led 914 followers to mass suicide in Guyana with a lethal drink.

Charismatic control over followers. David Koresh (Branch Davidians): Used scripture

memorization and persuasion to control followers. Exploitative practices, celibacy for

members, and manipulation. Marshall Applewhite (Heaven's Gate): Sought sexless devotion,

castration, and preached a spaceship voyage to salvation. Persuaded followers to renounce

families, sex, drugs, and possessions.

Explanations: Dispositional explanations blame victims as gullible or unbalanced.

Principles of conformity, compliance, dissonance, persuasion, and group influence provide a

common ground for understanding their behavior.

Attitudes Follow Behavior: Discussion about internalizing commitments made voluntarily,

publicly, and repeatedly. Compliance leading to acceptance and commitment advocacy.

Foot-in-the-Door Phenomenon: Inducing commitment through gradual, non-abrupt

methods.

Examples of Unification Church using dinners, weekend retreats, and longer training

sessions.

Progressive Recruitment and Demands: Activities in cults becoming gradually more

demanding. Monetary offerings starting voluntarily, then turning mandatory. Workloads

progressively increasing to strengthen commitment.

Gradual Progress: Cults operating gradually to avoid detection. Testimony of a former cult

member, Grace Stoen, on the slow progression of giving up things.

Elements of Cult Persuasion

Analyzing Cult Persuasion: Utilizing factors from the chapter to analyze cult persuasion.

Consideration of the communicator, message, and audience.

The Communicator: Cults thrive under charismatic leaders who attract and guide members.

Credible communicators are perceived as expert and trustworthy. Jim Jones used psychic

readings to establish credibility.

The Message: Emotional and vivid messages, along with warmth, appeal to lonely or

depressed individuals. Messages often convey a sense of trust, family, and having "the

answer."

Communication occurs through lectures, small-group discussions, and direct social pressure.
The Audience: Recruits are typically young people under 25. Many are educated, middle-

class individuals who overlook contradictions in the message. Potential converts often face

personal crises or transitional life stages.

Group Effects: Cults illustrate the power of a group to shape views and behavior. Members

are separated from previous support systems, creating a "social implosion." Isolation from

families and friends eliminates counterarguments, fostering group identity.

Influence Techniques: Techniques involve increasing behavioral commitments, persuasion,

and group isolation. Not all techniques have unlimited power; success rates vary among

different cults. Some techniques share similarities with those used by benign groups, like

fraternities and therapeutic communities.

Constructive Use of Persuasion: Persuasion is a tool used in counseling, psychotherapy,

and self-help groups for positive change. Positive examples include supportive relationships,

expertise, a rationale for change, and transformative rituals.

Persuasion in Various Contexts: Examples from fraternities, sororities, self-help groups,

and psychotherapy. The importance of recognizing the blurry line between education and

indoctrination, enlightenment and propaganda.

Two Concluding Observations: Acknowledgment that groups, leaders, educators, and

persuaders use similar tactics. Persuasion, like other powers, is not inherently good or bad; its

morality depends on how it's used.

Guarding Against Misuse: Recognition that powers like persuasion can be harnessed for

both constructive and destructive purposes. The responsibility of scientists and citizens to

guard against immoral uses while recognizing the inherent neutrality of these powers.

How Can Persuasion Be Resisted?

 Defensive Tactics in Persuasion: Similar to martial arts training, defensive strategies are

essential to resisting persuasion. Existing research has primarily focused on persuasive

attacks rather than defense.

Natural Tendency to Accept Persuasion: People naturally find it easier to accept persuasive

messages than to doubt them. Once an assertion is understood, it is temporarily believed,

making resistance challenging.

Strategies for Resistance: Rethink habitual responses to authority figures. Seek more

information before committing time or money. Question what is not understood.

Strengthening Personal Commitment: Publicly committing to a position before

encountering others' judgments. Standing up for convictions makes individuals less

susceptible to external influence.

Challenging Beliefs: Mildly attacking a person's position may lead to increased commitment

to that position. Such attacks, if not overwhelming, can trigger a more defensive response.

Developing Counterarguments: Weak attacks prompt counterarguments that can later be

used against stronger attacks. Inoculating against persuasion involves exposing individuals to

mild challenges and having them refute those challenges.

Real-Life Applications: Inoculation Programs:

Inoculation programs have been successful in smoking prevention and consumer education.

Inoculating children against peer pressure to smoke or the influence of advertising has shown

positive results.

Inoculating Children Against Peer Pressure: Inoculation programs involving role-playing

and critical thinking skills have reduced teen smoking rates. Media resistance skills acquired

during such programs also help resist peer pressure and reduce alcohol consumption.
Inoculating Children Against Advertising Influence: Research explores how to immunize

children against the effects of television commercials. Critical thinking skills and discussions

about commercials help children develop a more realistic understanding.

Implications of Attitude Inoculation: Building resistance involves teaching individuals

about various perspectives and preparing them to counter persuasive appeals. Exposure to

diverse views fosters discernment, making individuals more likely to modify their beliefs in

response to strong arguments. Ineffective appeals can be counterproductive, potentially

hardening individuals against future persuasion attempts.