Abstract
Rhetorical figures can be effective means in the persuasion process. Traditionally, rhetorical figures are subdivided into schemes (i.e., superficial deviations such as rhyme) and tropes (i.e., meaningful deviations such as metaphors and puns). This paper reports of an experiment and interviews on the effects of verbal and visual schemes and tropes (versus non-rhetorical figures) in magazine advertisements on the attitude towards the ad. A taxonomy consisting of 9 categories (verbal versus visual non-rhetorical figures, schemes, and tropes) was used, and 4 ads per category (36 in total) were each presented to 79 participants (non-students). The results showed, amongst others, that the attitude towards ads with visual tropes was higher than towards ads without rhetorical figures. If and how the attitude towards ads with tropes differs from the attitude towards ads with schemes remains to be investigated.
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