THE CONTEMPORARY STUDY OF PERSUASION

Contemporary scholars approach persuasion from a social science point of view. This may seem strange. After all, you may think of persuasion as an art. When someone mentions the word “persuasion,” you may think of such things as “the gift of the gab,” “manipulation,” or “subliminal seduction.” You may feel that by approaching persuasion from the vantage point of contemporary social science, we are reducing the area to something antiseptic. However, this is far from the truth. Social scientists are curious about the same phenomena that everybody else is: for example, what makes a person persuasive, what types of persuasive messages are most effective, and why people go along with the recommendations put forth by powerful persuaders. The difference between the scientist’s approach and that of the layperson is that the scientist formulates theories about attitudes and persuasion, derives hypotheses from these theories, and puts the hypotheses to empirical test. By empirical test, I mean that hypotheses are evaluated on the basis of evidence and data collected from the real world.

Theory plays a major role in the social scientific enterprise. A theory is a large, umbrella conceptualization of a phenomenon that contains hypotheses, proposes linkages between variables, explains events, and offers predictions. It may seem strange to study something as dynamic as persuasion by focusing on abstract theories. But theories contain ideas that yield insights about communication effects. These ideas provide the impetus for change. They are the pen that is mightier than the sword.

In fact, we all have theories about human nature and about persuasion (Roskos- Ewoldsen, 1997; Stiff, 1994). We may believe that people are basically good, parents have a major impact on kids’ personalities, or men are more competitive than women.

We also have theories about persuasion. Consider these propositions: ■ Advertising exploits people.

■ You can’t persuade people by scaring them. ■ The key to being persuasive is physical appeal.

At some level these are theoretical statements—propositions that contain interesting, testable ideas about persuasive communication. But there are problems with the state - ments from a scientific perspective. They are not bona fide theories of persuasion. The first statement is problematic because it uses a value-laden term, exploit. Exploitation evokes negative images. Perhaps advertising doesn’t exploit so much as guide consumers toward outcomes they sincerely want. The first rule of good theorizing is to state propositions in value-free language.

The second statement—you can’t persuade people by merely scaring them—sounds reasonable until you start thinking about it from another point of view. One could argue that giving people a jolt of fear is just what is needed to get them to rethink dangerous behaviors like drug abuse or binge drinking. You could suggest that appeals to fear motivate people to take steps to protect themselves from dangerous outcomes. The third statement—that physical appeal is the key to persuasion—can also be viewed with a critical eye. Perhaps attractive speakers turn audiences off because people resent their good looks or assume they made it because of their bodies, not their brains. I am sure you can think of communicators who are trustworthy and credible, but aren’t so physically attractive.

Yet, at first blush, the three statements made sense. They could even be called intuitive “theories” of persuasion. But intuitive theories—our homegrown notions of what makes persuasion tick—are problematic. They lack objectivity. They are inextricably linked with our own biases of human nature (Stiff, 1994). What’s more, they can’t be scientifically tested or disconfirmed. By contrast, scientific theories are stated with sufficient precision that they can be empirically tested (through real-world research). They also contain formal explanations, hypotheses, and corollaries.

Researchers take formal theories, derive hypotheses, and test them in real-world experiments or surveys. If the hypotheses are supported over and over again, to a point of absolute confidence, we no longer call them theories but, rather, laws of human behavior. We have preciously few of these in social science. (Darwinian evolution counts as a theory whose hypotheses have been proven to the point that we can call it a law.)

At the same time, there are many useful social science theories that can forecast behavior, shed light on people’s actions, and suggest strategies for social change. The beauty of research is that it provides us with a yardstick for evaluating the truth value of ideas that at first blush seem intuitively correct. It lets us know whether our gut feelings about persuasion—for example, regarding fear or good looks—amount to a hill of beans in the real world. Moreover, research provides a mechanism for determining which notions of persuasion hold water, which ones leak water (are no good), and, in general, which ideas about persuasive communication are most accurate, compelling, and predictive of human action in everyday life.

Researchers study persuasion in primarily two ways. They conduct experiments, or controlled studies that take place in artificial settings. Experiments provide convincing evidence that one variable causes changes in another. Because experiments typically are conducted in university settings and primarily involve college students, they don’t tell us about persuasion that occurs in everyday life among diverse population groups. For this reason, researchers conduct surveys. Surveys are questionnaire studies that examine the relationship between one factor (e.g., exposure to a media antismoking campaign) and another (e.g., reduced smoking). Surveys do not provide unequivocal evidence of causation.

In the preceding example, it is possible that people may reduce smoking shortly after a media campaign, but the effects may have nothing to do with the campaign. Smokers may have decided to quit because friends bugged them or they wanted to save money on cigarette costs.

Most studies of persuasive communication effects are experiments. Studies of attitudes and media applications of persuasion are more likely to be surveys. Both experiments and surveys are useful, although they make different contributions (Hovland, 1959). To be sure, social scientific research is not without problems. It tends to focus primarily on middle-class university students, more often than not Whites. Studies can employ artificial manipulations of persuasion stimuli and examine only short-term effects. They can miss some of the emotional dynamics of persuasion in action. Nonetheless, research has begun to rectify these problems, and, in the aggregate, yields insights about the processes and effects of persuasion that are hard to obtain through other modalities. At its best, research, the focus of this text, is important because, guided by penetrating theories, it builds knowledge, explains complex phenomena, and can help solve societal problems. Indeed, one must not lose sight of the big picture: the role that persuasion plays in society and the fundamental ethics of persuasive communication. The final

section of the chapter, building on the preceding discussion, examines these broader concerns.