Digital Rhetoric 04: Persuasion and strategic communication

Everywhere we go, we are bombarded with information that might persuade to in different ways. Information can be expressed quite explicitly using words (saying "I don't agree with you") or cues (A small shrug, shaking the head silently, folding your arms).

Persuasion is when someone, in a planned manner, tries to alter the opinions of other. This change of mind should be obtained through logical and truthful argumentation and use of information, not through force, lies and misinformation. Argumentation could be a speech, but it could also be a commercial, a poster, a picture etc. The receiver of all this information is called the audience. That's you, reading my text. You are receiving the information that I put up on this blog.

Persuasion takes place between the intention and the audience. The audience will always have to be persuaded, no matter how positive they are towards the intention. It's therefore dreadfully important to consider the type of audience when designing the argumentation.

Benoit:
Benoit talks about 4 different types of audiences and how to deal with them:

Hostile audiences

• Emphasize common ground 
• Call for a fair hearing 
• Refute negative attitude towards you as a speaker 
• Acknowledge past mistakes 
• Express understanding and reassure the audience 
• Neutralize hostile questions 

Apathetic audiences

• Show how audience and real people are affected 
• Establish common ground 
• Surprise the audience with startling information or new behavior 
• Invite audience participation 

Motivated audiences

• Reinforce similarities with the audience 
• Convey respect 
• Use extended narratives 
• Attend to the rhythm of the speech 

Multiple/mixed audiences

• Focus on part of the audience OR 
• Provide unequal attention to the different components in a multiple audience 

Fogg:
Fogg is interested in captology, which is the study of computers as persuasive technologies or how one can use the computer to change the attitudes/behavior of people. He distinguishes between two types of persuasion:

• Macrosuasion, which is the overall persuasion intent of the product (e.g. a change of opinion) and 
• Microsuasion, which can be desgned as dialogue boxes, visual elements, interactions sequences etc. that are designed to lead and help the user at the computer. When trying to persuade an audience, the physical attractiveness of the system changes the social influence over the audience. Take for example the differences between IKEA's help-bot Anna in Nordic countries and USA respectively: 

Similarity and affiliation makes it easier for a user to work with a system/understand information, so the audience in Nordic countries are generally friendlier towards a blonde and blue-eyed Anna, as she represents a typical member of their society. 

Todays readings:

• William Benoit, Pamlea Benoit (2008): "Persuasive messages: The process of influence" 
• B.J. Fogg (2003): "Persuasive technology: Using computers to change what we think and do"