Methods of Persuasion: How to Use Psychology to Influence Human Behavior (19 page)

It might seem like an obvious conclusion, but what exactly determines someone’s motivation? Perhaps the most important aspect is the perceived importance of your message. Your target will be more motivated to critically evaluate your message when they view that information as important to understand.

Consider this book as an example. When people read the sales description for
Methods of Persuasion
, which type of evaluation—systematic or heuristic—do you think most people use? Though I’d like to think that people carefully evaluate the description of my book, with all else being equal, people are likely to base their purchase decision on a simple-minded evaluation. Why? Most people don’t view a book purchase to be a life-altering event; there are very few significant outcomes for their compliance (or lack thereof). Rather than carefully read the description or seek information elsewhere on the web, they’re likely to base their decision on irrelevant heuristics, such as the number of positive reviews or my perceived popularity.

Some of you might be questioning the previous claim because you can remember instances where you
did
decide to purchase a book based on a careful evaluation of the description. Though it might seem like a discrepancy, you need to remember that circumstances (e.g., a book purchase) don’t determine how your message is evaluated; it’s the level of motivation in someone. It could be the most trivial situation possible, but if someone has high motivation to evaluate the relevant information, then he will use systematic processing.

Ability.
Your target’s ability to evaluate is the second factor that determines how your message is evaluated. This section explains two aspects of someone’s ability: their intellectual capacity and opportunity to evaluate.

Intellectual Capacity.
One aspect of people’s ability to evaluate is their intellectual capacity, which is different than general intelligence. If I was listening to a speech on supersymmetric quantum mechanics, I would have absolutely no idea what the speaker was talking about. Does that mean I’m stupid? No. It simply means that I don’t know enough about that specific topic. In this situation, you bet that I would rely on peripheral cues (e.g., the speaker’s confidence or presentation style) to judge the accuracy and strength of the speech’s content. How else could I evaluate the speech if I don’t understand the actual message? In this situation, my intellectual capacity would be too low to use systematic processing to evaluate the arguments, and so I’m forced to rely on peripheral cues to evaluate the speech.

Opportunity.
The second aspect of your target’s ability to evaluate is related to external constraints. If your target is lacking time or if there are many distractions, then she will speed up her evaluation by relying on peripheral cues, such as your likability and attractiveness. Perhaps your boss was in a rush when she evaluated the first monthly report, so she simply judged the content of the report based on your high level of confidence. Using that simple yet irrelevant cue to judge the report was much faster than digesting the actual content in the report. But perhaps your boss’s schedule was less hectic for the second monthly report, and so she had a greater opportunity to evaluate it.

PERSUASION STRATEGY: ALTER THEIR EVALUATION

The previous section explained that motivation and ability to evaluate are the two factors that determine how people evaluate messages. When your target’s motivation and ability are
low
, your target will rely on peripheral cues to judge your message (e.g., number of arguments, aesthetics, their perception of you). When your target’s motivation and ability are
high
, your target will effortfully evaluate your message and judge it based on the strength of your arguments.

This step in METHODS will teach you two overall strategies to apply that knowledge toward successful persuasion; you can either:

1. Alter your target’s motivation or ability to ensure that your message is evaluated in the most favorable manner (explained in this chapter), or you can . . .
   
2. Use your knowledge of the previous factors to predict how your target will evaluate your message so that you can tweak your message accordingly (explained in the next chapter).
   

In this first persuasion strategy, you alter the factors that you learned in the previous section to ensure that your target evaluates your message in the most favorable manner (whether that evaluation is systematic or heuristic processing).

If there are strong reasons why your target should comply with your request, you should ensure that your target evaluates those reasons using systematic processing. On the other hand, if you think that the odds are stacked against you because your arguments are very weak, then don’t worry . . . you’re not completely screwed yet! If you get your target to evaluate your message using heuristic processing, you can cause her to brush over your weak arguments and judge your message based on other factors that are irrelevant to your actual message.

HOW TO ELICIT SYSTEMATIC PROCESSING

There are many ways to alter your target’s motivation and ability so that they use systematic processing. This section will describe two example strategies: grab someone’s attention and increase the relevance of your message.

Grab Their Attention.
People consistently function on autopilot. Do you ever hang up on telemarketers without actually listening to what they’re selling? When you present a request to people, they will often feel a natural reflex to immediately reject your request because that’s the reaction to which they’ve become accustomed.

In order to prevent that mindless refusal and elicit an effortful evaluation of your message, you need to first successfully grab their attention. How? Here are three simple techniques that you can use to capture someone’s attention:

• Give ’Em Caffeine.
  Wait, caffeine? What the heck are you supposed to do—ask your target if she wants a cup of coffee before you make your request? Well, why not? It couldn’t hurt. In fact, research shows that caffeine significantly enhances systematic processing. In one study, researchers exposed students to arguments about voluntary euthanasia, a message that all of the students opposed. However, students who consumed a caffeinated drink were significantly more persuaded by the arguments compared to students who didn’t consume a caffeinated drink (Martin et al., 2007). If the circumstances are suitable, you can ensure that your message is evaluated in a more effortful manner by offering your target a caffeinated drink (perhaps you take your client to a coffee shop to discuss your business proposal).
  
• Enhance Message Aesthetics.
  If a caffeinated drink is out of the question, research also shows that enhancing the aesthetics of your message can also grab people’s attention so that they pay more attention to your underlying arguments (MacInnis, Moorman, & Jaworski, 1991). You’ve probably been watching television when a visually stunning commercial appears and grabs your attention. Once it grabs your attention, you think that it might contain an important or compelling message, and so you pay more attention to that commercial.
  
• Pique Technique.
  One final technique to capture your target’s attention is the
  pique technique
  . Rather than plainly state an ordinary request, you can present your request in an odd manner to snap your target out of her autopilot state of mind. To test that claim, research assistants disguised themselves as beggars and asked people on the street for either 17 cents, a quarter, 37 cents, or “any change.” What’s interesting is that the “beggars” received more money when the request was unusual (17 cents and 37 cents) because people on the street were yanked from autopilot, and they were forced to evaluate the odd request instead of mindlessly refusing it (Santos, Leve, & Pratkanis, 1994).
  

Increase Personal Relevance.
In addition to grabbing your target’s attention, you can also trigger a more effortful evaluation of your message by enhancing its perceived relevance to your target. If your target believes that your message will affect him—either positively or negatively—then he’ll be more motivated to pay attention to your message (Petty & Cacioppo, 1990).

One basic technique involves describing the consequences of your message, especially in a vivid manner. For example, commercials about driver safety are much more effective when they show vivid images of bloody victims, rather than images of test dummies (Rogers & Mewborn, 1976).

But there are others techniques besides describing the consequences. Here are three other specific techniques that you can use to enhance the perceived relevance of your message:

• Use 2nd Person Pronouns.
  Research in advertising shows that using the word “you” in a message can dramatically increase the persuasiveness of an advertisement. For instance, when people evaluated an advertisement for a calculator, they developed a significantly more favorable attitude toward the calculator when the researchers used 2nd person pronouns (e.g., “You know that calculator technology . . . ,” “You may remember . . .”) compared to neutral statements (e.g., “If a mistake was made . . .”) (Burnkrant & Unnava, 1995).
  
• Tell a Story.
  Do you ever wonder why television advertisers try to communicate their product benefits by depicting a story or narrative with characters/actors? Why not simply describe the benefits of their product instead? When television viewers watch a narrative commercial, they empathize with the characters (especially if they view them to be similar), and viewers start to picture themselves using the product in their own life (Deighton, Romer, & McQueen, 1989).
  
• Ask Rhetorical Questions.
  Have you wondered why I ask so many rhetorical questions throughout this book, such as this rhetorical question that you’re reading right now? I use a lot of rhetorical questions because they spark greater personal relevance. When students were exposed to a message arguing for a comprehensive exam for seniors, they were more persuaded when the arguments were presented in a rhetorical manner (e.g., “Don’t you agree that . . . ,” “Isn’t it true that . . .”) because those questions subtly influenced students to relate the arguments to their own life (Petty, Cacioppo, & Heesacker, 1981).
  

Now that you understand how to increase someone’s motivation and ability to extract an effortful evaluation of your message, the next section will explain how to decrease someone’s motivation and ability so that you can extract a simple-minded evaluation of your message.

HOW TO ELICIT HEURISTIC PROCESSING

If the arguments in your message are fairly weak, you’ll want to elicit a greater reliance on heuristic processing. How can you do that? It might be easier than you think. If you picture your target as a computer program, her default setting is heuristic processing. In other words, if you don’t do anything to increase her motivation or ability, she will typically default to evaluating your request in a simple-minded manner. But if you want to further enhance this reliance, you can implement a few techniques to subtly dissuade your target from relying on systematic processing. Three example strategies include increasing the complexity of your message, enhancing their mood, and sparking their arousal.

Increase Message Complexity.
When it comes to persuasion, we’re usually told to make our message as clear as possible. Surprisingly, however, that’s not always the best strategy. There are some situations where increasing the complexity of your message can actually help you persuade your target. That notion can help explain why people are more likely to buy gourmet cheese if an advertisement describes it in a difficult-to-read font, compared to an easy-to-read font (Pocheptsova, Labroo, & Dhar, 2010).

The explanation to that odd finding can be found in processing fluency. Remember how people misattribute their evaluation of information to the ease and speed with which they process that information? I explained how people who list 12 instances of their assertiveness perceive themselves to be less assertive (compared to people who list 6 instances) because they misattributed their difficulty in generating examples to a low level of assertiveness.

People make similar misattributions when they view advertisements for unique products, such as gourmet cheese. People were more likely to purchase a gourmet cheese when an advertisement described it in a difficult-to-read font because people misattributed the difficulty in processing to the uniqueness of the cheese, a perception that made it seem more appealing. When the advertisement was depicting an everyday cheese, that effect disappeared; people were more likely to purchase an everyday cheese when the advertisement described it in an easy-to-read font because that ease of processing generated feelings of familiarity.

Processing fluency and message complexity can also enhance the perception of other stimuli. Consider a research study that involved a description of an online coaching service that helps students apply to graduate school. Students perceived that service to be more valuable and they were more willing to pay for a one-year subscription when the coaching service was presented using a light blue font with a white background (a difficult-to-read display) compared to when it was presented using a black font with a white background (an easy-to-read display). Students developed a more favorable evaluation of the coaching service when it was presented in a difficult-to-read format because they misattributed their difficulty in processing to the difficulty in applying to graduate school, a perception that sparked a greater need for the coaching service (Thompson & Chandon Ince, 2013).