Persuasive Principles Research Articles

Aristotle's Pathos as the Principle of Persuasion and Phoenix's Case

Aristotle's Pathos as the Principle of Persuasion and Phoenix's Case

Personality profiles and persuasion: An exploratory study investigating the role of the Big-5, Type D personality and the Dark Triad on susceptibility to persuasion

The present study investigated the relationship between personality profiles and susceptibility to persuasion. Participants (N = 316) were recruited for an online questionnaire and asked to complete self-reported measures of their personality - Big-5, Dark Triad and Type D. Individual differences in susceptibility to persuasion were also explored using Cialdini's model of persuasion. Latent profile analysis identified three distinct profiles which were labelled Socially Apt, Fearful and Malevolent. These profiles were correlated with scores on the persuasion subscales - authority, commitment, liking, scarcity, reciprocity, consensus - and a number of interesting associations were identified. The malevolent profile self-reported as more susceptible to a higher use of scarcity relative to the other principles of persuasion, and was least susceptible to reciprocity and authority. The socially apt profile appear to be more inclined to be persuaded to do something if it is consistent with their beliefs or a prior act whereas individuals in the Fearful profile were more likely to report obeying those in authority and going along with a crowd. Implications for persuasion are discussed along with research on personality types.

The Influence and Persuasion in The Prophet Muhammad's (peace blessings be upon him) Style

The goals of the paper: This paper aims at recognizing the following: 
 1-the pedagogical methods of the prophet Muhammad (peace be blessings upon him) in influence and persuasion. 
 2-the pedagogical methods of the prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) in influence on the individuals and how to direct them educationally and adjust their delinquent behavior. The Findings of the Paper
 It is very important to identify the prophetic educational principles with their study and application especially when the prophet succeeded to find a great generation that led the whole humanity to the path of security and stability after it was in wrongdoing, delusion and deviation. 
 This study comes to support the educator so that he up-brings of himself and to know the educational principles of the prophet (peace be upon him) in the influence and persuasion in guiding and adjusting their delinquent behavior. In this frame of getting away from the from the correct understanding of the truth of the prophetic biography through his principles of persuasion of the educator and influencing them accompanied by the prophet's behavior who was a Quran walks on earth. Besides, the absence of the sound principles and getting away from the correct approach of the prophet (peace be upon him) in his followers was the motivation after this research paper The Influence and Persuasion in the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) Style. It intends to show and find a suggested formula to make use of the prophet's style in education to uplift our youths to the level of the righteous predecessors (may Allah be pleased with them) in the prophetic age or close to it. I pray to Allah the almighty to grant me the success and rectitude.

Persuasive technology as an intervention programs for Health care in Malaysia: a review

The statistics regarding health problem in Malaysia shows more than 50% of Malaysian adults have at least one of Non-Communicable Disease. Thus, effort to create awareness as well as promoting mind-set change with regards to health habit is paramount. Researches prove that ICT played significant role in influencing the way of thinking, behaviour and decision making. Intervention programs through computer application should be used to persuade and support health awareness, treatment and prevention. This paper investigate and review studies using persuasive technology in health intervention program in Malaysia. It presents the main objective, the technology persuasive principles and final findings of each study. In conclusion, the application of persuasive technology brings positive impact to awareness creation, aiding prevention and support to change as well as influencing people for a better healthy living. Keywords : persuasive technology; health intervention programs; health care; Malaysia.

Towards personalized persuasive strategies for active ageing

As Europe is ageing, the healthcare system is experiencing dramatic strain. Increasing physical activities is important to promote independent living among seniors due to its impact in preventing chronic diseases and long-term care. Smart wearable technologies have been already developed to support citizens to be more physically active. However, the impact of these wearable technologies on seniors is still requires more research. Persuasive system design (PSD) strategies may be applied to motivate seniors to adopt a more active lifestyle. This paper examines 12 student team design concepts which aim to add values to one existing wearable product by redesigning the accompanying application to suit an elderly user group using the PSD principles. From clustering the resulting re-design concepts, we identified themes, suggesting values suitable for an elderly user group that aim to stimulate a more active lifestyle. Furthermore, we identified common persuasive principles applied to redesign concepts in each value theme so as to create design guidelines for active ageing lifestyle.

Interaction of Personality and Persuasion Tactics in Email Phishing Attacks

Phishing is a social engineering tactic where a malicious actor impersonates a trustworthy third party with the intention of tricking the user into divulging sensitive information. Previous social engineering research has shown an interaction between personality and the persuasion principle used. This study was conducted to investigate whether this interaction is present in the realm of email phishing. To investigate this, we used a personality inventory and an email identification task (phishing or legitimate). The emails used in the identification task utilize four of Cialdini’s persuasion principles. Our data confirms previous findings that high extroversion is predictive of increased susceptibility to phishing attacks. In addition, we identify multiple interactions between personality and specific persuasion principles. We also report the overarching efficacy of various persuasion principles on phishing email identification accuracy.

The Monte Carlo based virtual entropy generation analysis

Due to a lack of any persuasive principle in defining a reasonable error criterion, regulations of experiment measurement are mostly experience-based. Measurement criteria developed by virtual entropy generation (VEG) analysis provide a new perspective on experiment control and data reliability. However, it is expensive to validate these criteria through experiments. Therefore, developing affordable numerical tools are necessary and important in VEG analysis. In the present research, we developed a Monto Carlo based model for a counter-flow heat exchanger virtual entropy generation analysis. In the present research, the uncertainty boundary of virtual entropy generation analysis was implanted to a counter-flow heat exchanger through Monte Carlo method. By a comparison study with existing analytical and experiment results, capabilities of the Monte Carlo model were demonstrated in providing quantitative and comprehensive data at a low cost.

On the anatomy of social engineering attacks—A literature‐based dissection of successful attacks

AbstractThe aim of this study was to explore the extent to which persuasion principles are used in successful social engineering attacks. Seventy‐four scenarios were extracted from 4 books on social engineering (written by social engineers) and analysed. Each scenario was split into attack steps, containing single interactions between offender and target. For each attack step, persuasion principles were identified. The main findings are that (a) persuasion principles are often used in social engineering attacks, (b) authority (1 of the 6 persuasion principles) is used considerably more often than others, and (c) single‐principle attack steps occur more often than multiple‐principle ones. The social engineers identified in the scenarios more often used persuasion principles compared to other social influences. The scenario analysis illustrates how to exploit the human element in security. The findings support the view that security mechanisms should include not only technical but also social countermeasures.

Observance of Cialdini’s Principles of Speech Act of Persuasion in 2016 us Presidential Debates

Persuasion is an important factor to politicians to show the power and influence the people. In the United States Presidential Election, debate is one of the tools to convey the candidates' message. Most of the utterances used in debates aimed at affecting and convincing the audiences or the voters. Persuasion according to Searle (1979) is regarded as a directive speech act in which the speaker’s intention is to make the hearers to commit him or herself to perform some form of action. Most of the researchers conducted persuasive speech acts from the point of view of discourse. There is no study about natural data like debates. This study is a study about observance of Cialdini’s principles of speech acts of persuasion in 2016 US presidential debates. Therefore, there are six principles that must be observed, namely consistency, authority, reciprocity, social-evidence, preference/ liking and rareness/ scarcity. It used descriptive qualitative method to get the findings. The findings of the study are proved that most of the presidential candidates observed Cialdini’s principles. They used several ways like asking the voter’s need, making a promise, and disfiguring the interlocutors. Finally, this thesis provides suggestion regarding to the findings. At this point, the first plan is to present some tested principles of persuasion in debate classes. Next point is how you might use the principles to increase community interest in your topic, and to win people over, fairly and ethically, to the way of thinking.

Persuasive technology in online social networks: A systematic literature review

Several taxonomies have been proposed in recent decades to conceptualise persuasive strategies to modify the behaviour and/or attitudes of users through interactive computer products. This article presents a systematic literature review that describes the present scenario of persuasive technologies, and which of these principles are found in the social network environment. For the success of a social network, its users must adopt specific behaviours and, to ensure that they do, the application of persuasive strategies becomes indispensable. Some of the articles found in this systematic review show how online social networks have implemented and used persuasive principles to modify the behaviour of its users.

A Review of Persuasive Principles in Mobile Apps for Chronic Arthritis Patients: Opportunities for Improvement.

BackgroundChronic arthritis (CA), an umbrella term for inflammatory rheumatic and other musculoskeletal diseases, is highly prevalent. Effective disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs for CA are available, with the exception of osteoarthritis, but require a long-term commitment of patients to comply with the medication regimen and management program as well as a tight follow-up by the treating physician and health professionals. Additionally, patients are advised to participate in physical exercise programs. Adherence to exercises and physical activity programs is often very low. Patients would benefit from support to increase medication compliance as well as compliance to the physical exercise programs. To address these shortcomings, health apps for CA patients have been created. These mobile apps assist patients in self-management of overall health measures, health prevention, and disease management. By including persuasive principles designed to reinforce, change, or shape attitudes or behaviors, health apps can transform into support tools that motivate and stimulate users to achieve or keep up with target behavior, also called persuasive systems. However, the extent to which health apps for CA patients consciously and successfully employ such persuasive principles remains unknown.ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to evaluate the number and type of persuasive principles present in current health apps for CA patients.MethodsA review of apps for arthritis patients was conducted across the three major app stores (Google Play, Apple App Store, and Windows Phone Store). Collected apps were coded according to 37 persuasive principles, based on an altered version of the Persuasive System Design taxonomy of Oinas-Kukkonen and Harjuma and the taxonomy of Behavior Change Techniques of Michie and Abraham. In addition, user ratings, number of installs, and price of the apps were also coded.ResultsWe coded 28 apps. On average, 5.8 out of 37 persuasive principles were used in each app. The most used category of persuasive principles was System Credibility with an average of 2.6 principles. Task Support was the second most used, with an average of 2.3 persuasive principles. Next was Dialogue Support with an average of 0.5 principles. Social Support was last with an average of 0.01 persuasive principles only.ConclusionsCurrent health apps for CA patients would benefit from adding Social Support techniques (eg, social media, user fora) and extending Dialogue Support techniques (eg, rewards, praise). The addition of automated tracking of health-related parameters (eg, physical activity, step count) could further reduce the effort for CA patients to manage their disease and thus increase Task Support. Finally, apps for health could benefit from a more evidence-based approach, both in developing the app as well as ensuring that content can be verified as scientifically proven, which will result in enhanced System Credibility.

A Temporal Analysis of Persuasion Principles in Phishing Emails

Eight hundred eighty-seven phishing emails from Arizona State University, Brown University, and Cornell University were assessed by two reviewers for Cialdini’s six principles of persuasion: authority, social proof, liking/similarity, commitment/consistency, scarcity, and reciprocation. A correlational analysis of email characteristics by year revealed that the persuasion principles of commitment/consistency and scarcity have increased over time, while the principles of reciprocation and social proof have decreased over time. Authority and liking/similarity revealed mixed results with certain characteristics increasing and others decreasing. Results from this study can inform user training of phishing emails and help cybersecurity software to become more effective.

BROADENING THE INFLUENCE OF ASSET MANAGERS THROUGH THE SIX PRINCIPLES OF PERSUASION

Asset managers (AMRs) have long struggled to influence others within their organisations to support Asset Management (AM) practices. This dilemma was further highlighted with the issuance of the AM suite of standards, ISO 55000. This paper explores an alternative approach to existing influence and change management approaches. Social psychology, and more specifically Robert Cialdini’s ‘six principles of persuasion’, have benefited advertisers, lawyers, and even waiters in their respective professions, by helping them to influence others and induce compliance. Fortunately, AMRs can now do the same. Implementing these principles offers numerous advantages and requires small, practical, and often costless changes that can make a large difference to their ability to influence and persuade others in an ethical way.

Designing a persuasive physical activity application for older workers: understanding end-user perceptions

ABSTRACTAmong the factors known to encourage healthy ageing is routine physical activity, a behaviour that is not common among the older age group. A Persuasive System Design (PSD) model offers guidelines for designing and evaluating systems aimed at reinforcing, changing or shaping underlying human behaviour and attitudes. The objective of this study was to investigate the perceptions of older workers towards persuasive principles of PSD that was integrated into an application specifically designed to encourage physical activity. Ten older workers aged 50–64 years with different physical activity levels participated in this study. Using a think-aloud technique, the participants interacted with a physical activity application, while verbally expressing their perceptions towards the persuasive elements. The results indicated that the older worker participants had positive views towards persuasive design principles that fell under the categories of primary task, dialogue support and credibility support. However, the persuasive principle of the social support category received contradictory views. Further, it was discovered that the personalisation of persuasive principles, the credibility of tailored contents and the establishment of a sense of similarity are imperative in the designing of effective persuasive physical activity applications targeting older workers.

Visual Exemplification and Skin Cancer: The Utility of Exemplars in Promoting Skin Self-Exams and Atypical Nevi Identification

The present article reports an experiment investigating untested propositions of exemplification theory in the context of messages promoting early melanoma detection. The study tested visual exemplar presentation types, incorporating visual persuasion principles into the study of exemplification theory and strategic message design. Compared to a control condition, representative visual exemplification was more effective at increasing message effectiveness by eliciting a surprise response, which is consistent with predictions of exemplification theory. Furthermore, participant perception of congruency between the images and text interacted with the type of visual exemplification to explain variation in message effectiveness. Different messaging strategies influenced decision making as well, with the presentation of visual exemplars resulting in people judging the atypicality of moles more conservatively. Overall, results suggest that certain visual messaging strategies may result in unintended effects of presenting people information about skin cancer. Implications for practice are discussed.

The relationship between persuasive technology principles, adherence and effect of web-Based interventions for mental health: A meta-analysis

BackgroundResearch has shown that web-based interventions concerning mental health can be effective, although there is a broad range in effect sizes. Why some interventions are more effective than others is not clear. Persuasive technology is one of the aspects which has a positive influence on changing attitude and/or behavior, and can contribute to better outcomes. According to the Persuasive Systems Design Model there are various principles that can be deployed. It is unknown whether the number and combinations of principles used in a web-based intervention affect the effectiveness. Another issue in web-based interventions is adherence. Little is known about the relationship of adherence on the effectiveness of web-based interventions. ObjectiveThis study examines whether there is a relationship between the number and combinations of persuasive technology principles used in web-based interventions and the effectiveness. Also the influence of adherence on effectiveness of web-based interventions is investigated. MethodsThis study elaborates on the systematic review by [37] and therefore the articles were derived from that study. Only web-based interventions were included that were intended to be used on more than one occasion and studies were excluded when no information on adherence was provided. 48 interventions targeted at mental health were selected for the current study. A within-group (WG) and between-group (BG) meta-analysis were performed and subsequently subgroup analyses regarding the relationship between the number and combinations of persuasive technology principles and effectiveness. The influence of adherence on the effectiveness was examined through a meta-regression analysis. ResultsFor the WG meta-analysis 40 treatment groups were included. The BG meta-analysis included 19 studies. The mean pooled effect size in the WG meta-analysis was large and significant (Hedges’ g=0.94), while for the BG meta-analysis this was moderate to large and significant (Hedges’ g=0.78) in favor of the web-based interventions. With regard to the number of persuasive technology principles, the differences between the effect sizes in the subgroups were significant in the WG subgroup analyses for the total number of principles and for the number of principles in the three categories Primary Task Support, Dialogue Support, and Social Support. In the BG subgroup analyses only the difference in Primary Task Support was significant. An increase in the total number of principles and Dialogue Support principles yielded larger effect sizes in the WG subgroup analysis, indicating that more principles lead to better outcomes. The number of principles in the Primary Task Support (WG and BG) and Social Support (WG) did not show an upward trend but had varying effect sizes. We identified a number of combinations of principles that were more effective, but only in the WG analyses. The association between adherence and effectiveness was not significant. ConclusionsThere is a relationship between the number of persuasive technology principles and the effectiveness of web-based interventions concerning mental health, however this does not always mean that implementing more principles leads to better outcomes. Regarding the combinations of principles, specific principles seemed to work well together (e.g. tunneling and tailoring; reminders and similarity; social learning and comparison), but adding another principle can diminish the effectiveness (e.g. tunneling, tailoring and reduction). In this study, an increase in adherence was not associated with larger effect sizes. The findings of this study can help developers to decide which persuasive principles to include to make web-based interventions more persuasive.

Persuasion Principles Index: ready for pretesting advertisements

Purpose– This paper aims to respond to issues posed in the four commentaries on Armstrong, Du, Green and Graefe (2016, this issue) regarding the immediate usefulness of that paper’s test of advertisements’ compliance with persuasion principles, and regarding the need for further research.Design/methodology/approach– This paper addresses commentators’ concerns using logic, prior research findings and further analyses of the data.Findings– The superiority of the index method remains when a simple, theory-based, alternative weighting-scheme is used in the index model. Combinations of three unaided experts’ forecasts were more accurate than the individual forecasts, but the gain was only one-third of the gain achieved by using the Persuasion Principles Index (PPI).Research limitations/implications– Replications and extensions using behavioral data and alternative implementations of the index method would help to better assess the effects of judging conformity with principles as a means of predicting relative advertising effectiveness. Advertisers can expect more accurate pretest results if they combine the predictions of three experts or, even better, if they use tests of compliance with persuasion principles, such as the PPI. The PPI software is copyrighted, but is available now and is free to use.Originality/value– New analysis and findings provide further support for the claim that advertisers who use the PPI approach proposed by Armstrong, Du, Green and Graefe (2016, this issue) to choose among alternative advertisements will be more profitable than those who do not.

Predictive validity of evidence-based persuasion principles

Purpose– This paper aims to test whether a structured application of persuasion principles might help improve advertising decisions. Evidence-based principles are currently used to improve decisions in other complex situations, such as those faced in engineering and medicine.Design/methodology/approach– Scores were calculated from the ratings of 17 self-trained novices who rated 96 matched pairs of print advertisements for adherence to evidence-based persuasion principles. Predictions from traditional methods – 10,809 unaided judgments from novices and 2,764 judgments from people with some expertise in advertising and 288 copy-testing predictions – provided benchmarks.Findings– A higher adherence-to-principles-score correctly predicted the more effective advertisement for 75 per cent of the pairs. Copy testing was correct for 59 per cent, and expert judgment was correct for 55 per cent. Guessing would provide 50 per cent accurate predictions. Combining judgmental predictions led to substantial improvements in accuracy.Research limitations/implications– Advertisements for high-involvement utilitarian products were tested on the assumption that persuasion principles would be more effective for such products. The measure of effectiveness that was available –day-after-recall – is a proxy for persuasion or behavioral measures.Practical/implications– Pretesting advertisements by assessing adherence to evidence-based persuasion principles in a structured way helps in deciding which advertisements would be best to run. That procedure also identifies how to make an advertisement more effective.Originality/value– This is the first study in marketing, and in advertising specifically, to test the predictive validity of evidence-based principles. In addition, the study provides the first test of the predictive validity of the index method for a marketing problem.

Evidence-based advertising using persuasion principles

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to provide commentary on Armstrong, Du, Green and Graefe’s (this issue) article.Design/methodology/approach– The paper is based on reading and thinking about Armstronget al.’s article.Findings– One appealing way that advertising practice can be evidence-based is by applying dependable generalizations about what makes for effective ads. Armstronget al.’s article offers data concerning the application of Armstrong’s persuasive advertising: Evidence-Based Principles (2010) persuasion principles. The article does not provide convincing evidence for the predictive validity of the principles, but it does offer a clear proof-of-concept demonstration of the feasibility of principles-based advertising assessment.Originality/value– The paper’s value lies in its clarification of what claims Armstronget al.’s data do and do not underwrite.

Generalisability of advertising persuasion principles

Purpose– This paper aims to reflect on the generalisability of the predictive validity test of the Persuasion Principles Index (PPI) conducted by Armstronget al.(2016).Design/methodology/approach– Different aspects of the test are considered, such as the sample of ads, the dependent variable and the comparability of the methods used to predict effectiveness, in terms of how relevant these are to real-world advertising testing.Findings– The sample of ads and the testing procedure may have contributed to the success of the PPI predictions over the other copy-testing methods. The sample of print ads does not bear a close resemblance to current advertising. The competing copy tests do not represent modern advertising copy testing.Research/limitations/implications– More research is needed to test the validity of the principles and the predictive accuracy of the PPI across a range of conditions (e.g. different ads, media, products and cultures). Testing against advertising sales effectiveness would be the ideal next step.Practical/implications– It certainly seems the index method has the potential to help advertisers make better decisions regarding what executions to support, for high-involvement products at least. Given the accessibility of the software, it should be easy and cost effective for advertisers to trial the PPI.Originality/value– This commentary directs researchers to the real-world conditions under which advertising pre-tests need to be evaluated.