Methods of Persuasion: How to Use Psychology to Influence Human Behavior (13 page)

Because social norms aren’t set in stone, this flexibility allows you to alter the circumstances to convey a social norm for your particular situation. When researchers examined people’s tendency to litter, for example, they found that littering changed in direct proportion with the amount of litter already present. When they increased the pieces of litter on the ground from 1, 2, 4, and 8 pieces, the percentage of people who littered increased from 10 percent, 20 percent, 23 percent, and 41 percent, respectively (Cialdini, Reno, & Kallgren, 1990). With pieces of litter already present, people were more likely to follow the social norm of throwing their trash on the ground, but when fewer pieces of litter were present, people were more likely to follow the social norm of throwing trash into a trash bin.

How can you apply that finding toward persuasion? Let’s use tipping and gratuity as an example. If you work in a place where there’s a tip jar on the counter, you can exert pressure on your customers to leave larger tips (or
any
tip for that matter) by placing a decent number of dollars in the jar at the beginning of the day. Not only will this money convey a social norm of generous tipping, but the dollars in the jar will also convey that the norm is to tip with dollars, rather than small coins.

If you work in a place where tips are shared among all workers, you can tell everyone how much money you’ll be putting in at the beginning of the day and subtract that amount from the total in the tip jar at the end of the day. You’ll be surprised how much more money you’ll receive from that simple technique.

What if, instead of encouraging behavior, such as generous tipping, you wanted to discourage behavior, such as alcohol use among college students? Emphasizing social norms can help you in those situations as well. Suppose that you were hired by a college committee to post signs discouraging alcohol abuse among students. Between the following two messages, which one do you think would be more effective?

• Recent polls suggest that an alarming number of students on this campus abuse alcohol. Please drink safely.
  
• Recent polls suggest that most students on this campus use caution when drinking. Please continue to drink safely.
  

Extensive research suggests that the second message would be much more effective (Cialdini et al., 2006). The first message has good intentions by trying to emphasize a growing problem, but unfortunately, that type of message can do more harm than good because it points the norm toward the undesired behavior (alcohol abuse).

Whether it’s alcohol abuse, suicide, domestic violence, or any other harmful behavior, your attempts to prevent that harmful behavior will be much more effective when you point the norm toward the desired behavior, rather than the harmful behavior. The second statement would be much more effective at reducing alcohol abuse on that campus because it points the norm toward safe drinking, the desired behavior. As Robert Cialdini (2003) describes, “Within the statement ‘Many people are doing this
undesirable
thing’ lurks the powerful and under-cutting normative message ‘Many people
are
doing this.’”

To summarize, when you want to encourage or discourage certain behavior in someone, you should point the norm toward the desired behavior. If you want to increase the size of your tips, demonstrate that most customers tip generously. If you want to discourage alcohol abuse, demonstrate that most students drink safely. Always point the norm in the direction that you want your target to follow.

The next strategy will extend this discussion by explaining one specific and powerful social norm that you can use to add pressure on your target.

Norm of Reciprocity.
One of the most powerful social norms is reciprocity. There’s a reciprocal seesaw connecting us to other people, and it craves balance. When someone does a favor for us, the seesaw gets tilted in our direction, and we feel obligated to do something in return so that the teeter-totter can regain balance. This innate pressure can lead to some very powerful persuasion techniques.

But first,
why
do we feel that pressure? We feel that reciprocal pressure for two reasons. First, by not reciprocating, we’re deviating from a social norm, which is an outcome that, as you learned in this chapter, can lead to painful feelings of social rejection. Thus, our reciprocation is our attempt to prevent any painful feelings that may result from the social rejection that occurs from not reciprocating (Cialdini, 2001).

Second, even beyond that superficial motive, we feel an inner sense of obligation. When someone tilts the seesaw in our direction, we feel obliged to return the favor, even if that favor goes unnoticed. Jerry Burger and his colleagues (2009) tested that explanation by creating an experiment that was supposedly testing visual perception, and each trial included two students, unbeknownst to one of them that the other student was a confederate hired by the researchers.

During a designated break, the confederate left and returned with two bottles of water: one for herself, and one for the other student (she explained that the Biology Club was giving them away for free, so she grabbed an extra one). What do you think happened when, at the end of the experiment, the confederate who had given the water bottle asked the participant to fill out a survey for her psychology professor, a favor that was described as completely optional and anonymous (the survey was to be dropped in a box outside the psychology department a few days later, so the confederate would have no idea if the participant actually completed the survey)?

When students were never given a water bottle from the confederate, only 10 percent complied with the request. But when the confederate returned with a water bottle for the participant, the rate of compliance tripled to 30 percent. Even though the confederate would have no idea if the student actually filled out the survey, students who were given a water bottle felt an inner sense of obligation to reciprocate the initial favor. The norm of reciprocity has become so “internalized” that we succumb to its pressure even when we think that no one is looking (Burger et al., 2009).

What are some specific ways to exert that pressure? The following sections will discuss two simple techniques that you can use to tilt the reciprocal seesaw in your target’s direction: unsolicited favors and compliments.

Unsolicited Favors.
Much like the water bottle in the previous experiment, unsolicited favors can trigger a powerful sense of obligation in someone.

Most of us have experienced it. You’re sitting in your car, minding your own business, when someone pops out of nowhere and starts washing your window. Pretty annoying, right? Unfortunately, these annoying and unsolicited favors will probably continue for a long time. Why? Because they’re incredibly effective at tilting the reciprocal seesaw.

Instead of complaining about those unsolicited favors, why not use them to your advantage? There are endless opportunities to perform small unsolicited favors for people, favors that can trigger a need to reciprocate. The previous strategy explained how leaving dollars in a tip jar can lead to more tips, but what if you only receive direct tips, such as waiters or waitresses? You can increase the size of your direct tips by taking advantage of unsolicited favors. If you perform any type of unsolicited favor for the customers at your table, such as leaving a dinner mint with the check, you put pressure on them to leave a larger tip (Lynn & McCall, 2009).

Compliments.
Let’s face it. People love to be complimented. Granted, you shouldn’t recklessly throw compliments at your target for anything and everything. But you also shouldn’t hesitate to share genuine respect and praise for a quality that you truly admire about your target.

Compliments not only enhance your likability, but they also tilt the seesaw in your target’s direction. When someone compliments you, don’t you feel an urge to say or do something nice in return? It’s almost an automatic response. If someone compliments your outfit, for example, you’ll find yourself scanning that person’s clothing, hair, shoes, anything at all that seems appealing so that you can return the favor.

Research even shows that compliments can lead to different forms of reciprocation, not just a reciprocal compliment. For instance, a few research studies have shown that complimenting customers resulted in larger tips, better product evaluations, and higher sales commissions (Seiter & Dutson, 2007; DeBono & Krim, 1997; Dunyon et al., 2010).

If you’re a waiter or waitress, a simple compliment toward your customer’s food selection (e.g., “I’ve had that meal before, and it’s delicious. Great choice!”) can do wonders. There are three reasons, in particular, why that statement is so powerful:

1. You convey high expectations for the meal. As a result of her heightened expectations, your customer is likely to develop a more favorable perception of the meal (explained in Chapter 3), thereby leading to a more pleasurable overall experience and possibly a larger tip.
   
2. That simple compliment tilts the reciprocal teeter-totter in your customer’s direction, and it will exert greater pressure to give back. What better way to give back than to leave a generous tip?
   
3. By saying that you also enjoy the meal, you reveal a shared similarity. As you’ll learn in the next chapter, revealing this “incidental similarity” can greatly enhance your likability and improve your chances of securing a larger tip.
   

This chapter explained the power behind social pressure and how you can guide your target’s behavior by pointing a social norm in the intended direction (and also by taking advantage of the norm of reciprocity). The next chapter will explain how social pressure can also be applied on an individual level. You’ll learn a very powerful principle that can build your rapport and likability to exert even more pressure on your target.

CHAPTER 7

Reveal Any Similarities

Among the following letters, pick the letter that you prefer the most:

J M L K

Did you make a choice? I chose the previous letters because they’re commonly used as the first letter in people’s names (e.g., Joe, Meghan, Lauren, Kevin). If the first letter of your name appears in that list, you were more likely to choose that letter.

This chapter will explain why that occurs and why we nonconsciously gravitate toward things that we perceive to be similar to us. As you’ll learn in this chapter, revealing nearly any form of similarity—no matter how small or insignificant it may appear—can tremendously boost your persuasion.

THE POWER OF SIMILARITIES

If you’re reading this book, then you probably find psychology interesting. What a coincidence . . . I love psychology too!

One of the most powerful factors that can influence your chances of gaining compliance is the amount of rapport that exists between you and your target. The more he likes you, the greater your chances of succeeding; the less he likes you, the lower your chances of succeeding. Although the title of this chapter could have been titled, “Build Greater Rapport,” the topic of building rapport is extremely broad, so this chapter focuses on explaining the single most effective strategy: emphasizing similarities that you share with your target (for a more comprehensive explanation of rapport-building techniques, refer to Dale Carnegie’s classic book,
How to Win Friends and Influence People
).

The old saying, “opposites attract,” is almost entirely wrong. Extensive research shows that we’re psychologically drawn toward people who resemble ourselves in appearance, interests, and virtually all other aspects. The principle of
incidental similarity
explains how rapport can develop when two people discover a shared similarity, even a small and irrelevant similarity, such as a shared love for psychology (wink wink).

Our psychological compulsion to gravitate toward similarities is so powerful that it can even dictate our lives. How so? In a fascinating study, Pelham, Mirenberg, and Jones (2002) found some peculiar surprises:

• People named Dennis are disproportionately more likely to become dentists, and people named George or Geoffrey are disproportionately more likely to work in fields of the geosciences (e.g., geology).
  
• Roofers are 70 percent more likely to have names beginning with the letter
  R
  , and hardware store owners are 80 percent more likely to have names beginning with the letter
  H
  .
  
• People named Philip, Jack, Mildred, and Virginia are more likely to reside in Philadelphia, Jacksonville, Milwaukee, and Virginia Beach, respectively.
  

Needless to say, similarities are another powerful force that nonconsciously guide our behavior.

As you’ll learn in the rest of this chapter, this principle extends beyond mere letters. You’ll learn why nearly
any
form of similarity that you share with your target can help you build rapport and increase your chances of gaining compliance.

WHY ARE SIMILARITIES SO POWERFUL?

What make similarities so powerful? This section will describe two explanations that research has offered.