Persuasive Appeals Research Articles

Political identity, preference, and persuasion

ABSTRACTThe current research examines how political identity shapes preferences for objects and messages that highlight either equality or hierarchy. We find that liberals show a greater preference for an object associated with less as opposed to more hierarchy, whereas conservatives do not exhibit such a preference (Study 1). We also find that liberals are more persuaded by persuasive appeals that endorse equality rather than hierarchy, whereas conservatives are less sensitive to this distinction (Study 2). Finally, we identify the moderating role of political identity salience: When one’s political identity is made salient, liberals show an increased preference for messages highlighting equality, whereas conservatives become more persuaded by messages highlighting hierarchy (Study 3).

Replying to a Crisis: James Macpherson's The Rights of Great Britain Asserted against the Claims of America

The chaotic period of the American Revolution engaged many writers on both sides of the Atlantic arguing for and against the claims of the American colonists. One of the most popular and effective statements of the British position regarding the rebellion emerged from James Macpherson, poet of Ossian, historian, and government writer. As an accomplished literary talent in the service of politics, Macpherson wrote the pamphlet, The Rights of Great Britain Asserted against the Claims of America (1775), designing a persuasive appeal to the British public for preserving order and supporting the Monarchy. Macpherson displays a controlled, often dispassionate voice in dealing with the American rebellion, while seeking humane solutions with creativity, conviction, and agility in an environment of popular discontent and political instability. Finally, as a poet, he insisted on balancing the historian's empirical demand for facts with sensitivity and a liberal spirit of dialogue often in opposition to the dominant opinion of his King and ministers.

How well will this brand work? The ironic impact of advertising disclosure of body‐image retouching on brand attitudes

AbstractPrior research has demonstrated various effects of exposure to thin‐idealized models in advertisements on consumers’ product evaluations. Although this past research provides important insights, it does not take into account that many of these thin‐idealized images have been digitally manipulated. The present work studies the consequences of disclosure of this digital manipulation and the process consumers engage in when evaluating the brands responsible for these advertisements. We demonstrate that retouched advertisements may, contrary to conventional wisdom, have favorable consequences. Indeed, we show that individuals have more favorable brand attitudes for retouched (vs. unretouched) ads when retouching is disclosed (vs. undisclosed). We show that disclosed retouched ads utilize a two‐sided persuasive appeal, therefore leading consumers to evaluate the brand more favorably. We replicate this effect and explore attractiveness‐relevant products and type of disclosure as boundary conditions.

India's Obsession with Kashmir: Democracy, Gender, (Anti-)Nationalism

This article attempts to make sense of India's obsession with Kashmir by way of a gendered analysis. I begin by drawing attention to the historical and continuing failure of Indian democracy in Kashmir that results in the violent and multifaceted dehumanisation of Kashmiris and, in turn, domesticates dissent on the question of Kashmir within India. This scenario has been enabled by the persuasive appeal of a gendered masculinist nationalist neoliberal state currently enhanced in its Hindutva avatar. I focus on understanding how the violence enacted upon Kashmiri bodies is connected to feminised understandings of the body of Kashmir in India's imagination of itself as a nation state. I argue that the gendered discourses of representation, cartography and possession are central to the way in which such nationalism works to legitimise and normalise the violence in Kashmir. I conclude with a few reflections on how Kashmir is a litmus test for the discourse on (anti-)nationalism in contemporary India.

Impact of social information on intentions to volunteer domestically for foreign causes

It is a big challenge for nonprofits devoted to foreign causes to recruit volunteers. To help address this issue and contribute to an understudied area of volunteer recruitment research—the effectiveness of persuasive appeals used for recruitment—this study examined the impact of social information on people's intentions to volunteer domestically for foreign causes because such information is found to influence giving behavior. To be more specific, an online experiment was conducted to investigate how and why social information may influence volunteer intentions. The results showed that the information exerted anticipated indirect positive impacts on the intentions (through increasing the perception that fellow citizens would volunteer in response to a recruitment appeal and arousing collective pride) but had no significant overall impact on the intentions. The findings not only contribute to our understanding of how and why social information may influence volunteering domestically for foreign causes but also suggest effective appeals that nonprofits devoted to foreign causes can use to recruit new volunteers and expand their volunteer base.

Medicine, market and communication: ethical considerations in regard to persuasive communication in direct-to-consumer genetic testing services

BackgroundCommercial genetic testing offered over the internet, known as direct-to-consumer genetic testing (DTC GT), currently is under ethical attack. A common critique aims at the limited validation of the tests as well as the risk of psycho-social stress or adaption of incorrect behavior by users triggered by misleading health information. Here, we examine in detail the specific role of advertising communication of DTC GT companies from a medical ethical perspective. Our argumentative analysis departs from the starting point that DTC GT operates at the intersection of two different contexts: medicine on the one hand and the market on the other. Both fields differ strongly with regard to their standards of communication practices and the underlying normative assumptions regarding autonomy and responsibility.MethodsFollowing a short review of the ethical contexts of medical and commercial communication, we provide case examples for persuasive messages of DTC GT websites and briefly analyze their design with a multi-modal approach to illustrate some of their problematic implications.ResultsWe observe three main aspects in DTC GT advertising communication: (1) the use of material suggesting medical professional legitimacy as a trust-establishing tool, (2) the suggestion of empowerment as a benefit of using DTC GT services and (3) the narrative of responsibility as a persuasive appeal to a moral self-conception.ConclusionsWhile strengthening and respecting the autonomy of a patient is the focus in medical communication, specifically genetic counselling, persuasive communication is the normal mode in marketing of consumer goods, presuming an autonomous, rational, independent consumer. This creates tension in the context of DTC GT regarding the expectation and normative assessment of communication strategies.Our analysis can even the ground for a better understanding of ethical problems associated with intersections of medical and commercial communication and point to perspectives of analysis of DTC GT advertising.

A rhetorical situation triggers accounting communication. The case of the conflict between the Bank of German States and the Government in 1955/56

The two research questions of this paper are: How does the rhetorical situation trigger the accounting communication in a case of conflict? Which persuasive strategies are chosen to alter the situation? The paper accordingly combines Bitzer's theory of the rhetorical situation with the Aristotelian framework of persuasive appeals and insights from argumentation theory. The paper empirically demonstrates the usefulness of this framework to deepen our understanding of accounting communication in a historical case study. The historical case is the change of monetary policy of a public financial institution, the Bank deutscher Länder BdL, and its conflict with the government in 1955/56. The analysis of the rhetorical discourse focuses on the narrative part of BdL's Annual Report 1955, the Gürzenich hall speech of German Chancellor Adenauer on 23 May 1956, and the Monthly Report of May 1956. The paper demonstrates how the rhetorical situation triggers the accounting communication of the BdL. It also reveals changes in the argumentation strategy and the affective appeals as reactions to the new rhetorical situation created by the Chancellor's speech.

Vedantic applications of augmented reality for strategic social marketing campaigns in India

PurposeSocial outreach campaigns such as mainstream commercial marketing campaigns are drawn to digital communication practices for increased visibility, speed and recall. This paper aims to highlight the usefulness and application of augmented reality (AR) technologies and proposes a change-driven usage of the AR environments for social marketing.Design/methodology/approachParadigmatic structural analysis is used to extract the underlying schematic forms. A multimodal analytic approach is used to propose the conceptual framework.FindingsAR is defined vis-à-vis conceptualizations of reality and hyper-reality from the Vedantic philosophical texts and treatises. The study examines and demonstrates an earlier version of AR expression in ancient times in the use of spatio-temporal constructs and their degrees of modality. It derives a conceptual schema based on AR resonant applications in narratives from the Vedantic literature. Based on these, the study highlights the persuasive appeal and co-creative potential of these illustrative examples to recommend marketing communication strategies for social outreach campaigns.Research limitations/implicationsThe analysis recognizes a conceptual bridge between human extra-sensory/transcendental ability and contemporary technology. This study identifies five propositional structures (PS). It opens up the field of social marketing research to alternative methodologies such as multimodal analysis.Practical implicationsWhile most of contemporary AR usage is in commercial marketing, this study has derived specific guiding principles/propositional structures. These can be applied to create specific virtual environments that can simulate and demonstrate desirable societal outcomes and behaviours. As newer technologies permit further and more futuristic design interventions, developers could experiment with transitional states to impact behaviours, with implications for experimental layering of information.Originality/valueThis study responds to a call for innovative design interventions in the field of social marketing. Its originality lies in its use of the Vedantic framework which has not been explored in this direction elsewhere.

Ronald Reagan as a Public Speaker: In Search of the Aristotelian Rules of Rhetoric in Selected Addresses Delivered by the 40th US President

The main aim of this paper is to investigate the rhetorical style of Ronald Reagan (1911–2004), both as a President of the United States and as a public speaker. This study is focused on two elements, namely the range of rhetorical devices selected by President Reagan in his selected speeches, as well as a proposed explanation of the use of such devices in the context of a speaker–audience interaction. The latter part of this analysis is centered on the concept of the three persuasive appeals initially defined by Aristotle. In the first part of this paper the concept of the three persuasive appeals (the Aristotelian triangle) is presented and its particular elements explained. Directly afterwards, some theoretical frameworks for the use of linking devices are established. After the theoretical section, three selected Ronald Reagan speeches are analyzed. The focus is on the use of rhetorical devices in the given addresses. Finally, a research conclusion is included with an intention to identify the strategies and the style used by President Reagan in his interaction with the audience. This analysis may be of some help in order to understand how a speaker can powerfully influence listeners by using rhetorical tools.

On Rhetorical Functions of Narratives in Hillary Clinton’s Speeches

Hillary Clinton is generally considered as a competent female politician and an excellent orator. She has impressed the world with her elegant words, storytelling styles and unique personal charm. Scholars have probed into her speeches from different angles and found that kinds of discourse strategies have been applied to enhance the appeal of her speeches, which to a great extent reflect her identities as a female and a politician. Taking Hillary Clinton’s speeches in different contexts for example, this paper makes a study on the features and rhetorical functions of narratives in her speeches. It attempts to point out the way narratives work to enhance the persuasive power of her speeches. Based mainly on theories about persuasive appeals of speech, identification between speaker and listeners, and rhetorical functions of narratives in speech discourses respectively proposed by Aristotle, Burke and Yang, the present research forms its own theoretical basis and seeks out how narratives work to provide factual evidences for her arguments, to stir the emotions of the audience through appealing to her authority and identifying with them emotionally, and to help organize the discourse. 14 speeches by Hillary have been collected to make data analysis and sample illustration. The research yields two major findings as follows: 1. Narratives are frequently applied by Hillary Clinton in each of the 14 speeches as an effective speech strategy and also a rhetorical device. She tends to narrate relevant events to promote the achievement of the speech purpose by highlighting the theme, supporting the viewpoints and stimulating emotions; 2. Comparatively, most of the narratives, altogether 96% of them, are employed to provide factual evidences for her viewpoints, emphasizing more on the post-narrative effect, and to stir the empathy of the listeners by presenting her ethos and identifying emotions. The current research is of practical significance for language learners and researchers to evaluate more effectively and investigate more deeply into language of female politicians.

Psychological targeting as an effective approach to digital mass persuasion

People are exposed to persuasive communication across many different contexts: Governments, companies, and political parties use persuasive appeals to encourage people to eat healthier, purchase a particular product, or vote for a specific candidate. Laboratory studies show that such persuasive appeals are more effective in influencing behavior when they are tailored to individuals' unique psychological characteristics. However, the investigation of large-scale psychological persuasion in the real world has been hindered by the questionnaire-based nature of psychological assessment. Recent research, however, shows that people's psychological characteristics can be accurately predicted from their digital footprints, such as their Facebook Likes or Tweets. Capitalizing on this form of psychological assessment from digital footprints, we test the effects of psychological persuasion on people's actual behavior in an ecologically valid setting. In three field experiments that reached over 3.5 million individuals with psychologically tailored advertising, we find that matching the content of persuasive appeals to individuals' psychological characteristics significantly altered their behavior as measured by clicks and purchases. Persuasive appeals that were matched to people's extraversion or openness-to-experience level resulted in up to 40% more clicks and up to 50% more purchases than their mismatching or unpersonalized counterparts. Our findings suggest that the application of psychological targeting makes it possible to influence the behavior of large groups of people by tailoring persuasive appeals to the psychological needs of the target audiences. We discuss both the potential benefits of this method for helping individuals make better decisions and the potential pitfalls related to manipulation and privacy.

A picture is worth a thousand words: Electronic cigarette content on Instagram and Pinterest

INTRODUCTIONThis study examined electronic cigarette (e-cig) content in visual materials posted on the social-media platforms Instagram and Pinterest. Both platforms allow users to upload pictures to the internet and share them globally. Users can search for pictures tagged with specific keywords and phrases.METHODSUsing content analysis, this study identified themes in image postings of e-cigs on social media. During five weeks of data collection, keywords were used to identify pictures related to e-cigs. These pictures were then coded into one or more categories.RESULTSThe three most popular categories for Instagram posts were marketing, customization and juices/flavors. The three most popular categories for Pinterest posts were customization, marketing and memes.CONCLUSIONSBecause of the persuasive power of visuals, it is important to examine communication on Instagram and Pinterest as well as the specific visual messages communicated. Stores and manufacturers use these and similar platforms to communicate with users and potential users; thus it seems that marketers are capitalizing on opportunities for persuasive appeal. The results highlight the popularity of e-cig content on these two social media platforms and reveal an emphasis on marketing and customization.

Saving water to save the environment: contrasting the effectiveness of environmental and monetary appeals in a residential water saving intervention

To convince people to reduce their energy consumption, two types of persuasive appeals often are used by environmental organizations: Monetary appeals (i.e., ‘conserving energy will save you money’) and environmental appeals (i.e., ‘conserving energy will protect the environment’). In this field study we aimed to compare the effects of monetary and environmental appeals on showering habits. During two weeks we measured showering behavior in one hundred households. As compared to monetary appeals, environmental appeals were more effective in decreasing participants’ shower frequency. Interestingly, the monetary appeal was judged as somewhat more motivating to save water than the environmental appeal. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

Do multicultural Hispanic Americans choose more culturally appropriate persuasive arguments than monocultural Americans?

Given the increasingly diverse workforce and consumer base, organisations can benefit from understanding the persuasive skills of multicultural employees — people who identify with more than one culture. Drawing upon the regulatory focus and cultural frame switching literatures, this study hypothesises that monocultural Americans tend to use the same persuasive appeal regardless of a customer’s culture, while multicultural Hispanic Americans use culturally appropriate strategies, ie promotion-focused appeals for American customers, and prevention-focused appeals for Hispanic customers. Partial support for this hypothesis is found. Implications for the personal selling and multiculturalism literatures are discussed.

In Pursuit of Light War in Libya: Kairotic Justifications of War That Just Happened

Abstract This essay examines President Barack Obama’s March 28, 2011 address on the war in Libya to theorize a shift in twenty-first-century war rhetoric in which violence is insulated from critique through the numbing of public sensation. In contrast to traditional persuasive appeals aimed at securing collective participation and approval for war, Obama’s oratory is characteristic of “light war,” a mode of conflict that flows more freely by placing few demands on thought, feeling, and attention. I argue that Obama’s rhetoric limits the potential for audiences to sense the material consequences of war through a set of kairotic justifications in which violence is considered “just” in the dual sense that it just ended, and that it is just war, or merely a banal and quotidian version of conflict. After unpacking the anesthetizing features of Obama’s discourse, I conclude by addressing the prospects of resistance given the compressed interval for public thought and feeling to interrupt violent practices.

Emotion Decoding and Incidental Processing Fluency as Antecedents of Attitude Certainty.

Previous research demonstrates that attitude certainty influences the degree to which an attitude changes in response to persuasive appeals. In the current research, decoding emotions from facial expressions and incidental processing fluency, during attitude formation, are examined as antecedents of both attitude certainty and attitude change. In Experiment 1, participants who decoded anger or happiness during attitude formation expressed their greater attitude certainty, and showed more resistance to persuasion than participants who decoded sadness. By manipulating the emotion decoded, the diagnosticity of processing fluency experienced during emotion decoding, and the gaze direction of the social targets, Experiment 2 suggests that the link between emotion decoding and attitude certainty results from incidental processing fluency. Experiment 3 demonstrated that fluency in processing irrelevant stimuli influences attitude certainty, which in turn influences resistance to persuasion. Implications for appraisal-based accounts of attitude formation and attitude change are discussed.

What’s Love Got To Do With It?: Emotion, Rationality, and Framing LGBT Rights

Recent years have a seen a dramatic and rapid shift in attitudes about same-sex marriage—quite possibly one of the largest shifts in public opinion ever recorded. Another shift has occurred regarding the framing of persuasive appeals by gay rights advocacy organizations. Earlier campaigns focused on rationality by highlighting the idea of equal rights for Lesbian Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender individuals; more recent campaigns have focused on love and commitment. Is one type of framing more effective than the other? Are attitudes about marriage equality more likely to shift when arguments are framed rationally or when they are framed emotionally? We conducted a series of randomized experiments to explore these questions. We find that rights are more effective in the abstract but that videos highlighting same-sex couples in loving and committed relationships are more effective than videos focused on rights and equality.

More than Old Friends? Narrative in Australia's Relationship with Korea

Attempts to come to terms with Australia's relationship with South Korea routinely emphasise material dynamics, such as volume and value of trade, military exchange and security cooperation, or formal diplomatic engagement. This study focuses instead on the nuances of persuasive appeal in “stories”, which comprise a key component of the broader narrative of Australia's relationship with South Korea. I undertake a rhetorical analysis of three key stories conveyed at all levels of official foreign policy communication. I find the Australian narrative seeks to endow the bilateral relationship with authority, establish a sense of similarity and commitment, and invokes indebtedness and reciprocity. While such representations are significant to the broader bilateral relationship, a key challenge here concerns the extent to which these representations are genuinely shared and resonant depictions of Australia-South Korea relations.

Building a Trustworthy Corporate Identity: A Corpus-Based Analysis of Stance in Annual and Corporate Social Responsibility Reports

This article presents a corpus-based analysis of stance in a specialized corpus of annual and corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports. It investigates how companies use stance expressions to construct and promote a positive corporate identity in order to gain the trust of the stakeholder groups that these texts target. The results show that companies profile distinct identities in annual and CSR reports. In annual reports, they use stance resources to portray themselves as unbiased, rational, and competent decision makers. In CSR reports, they present themselves as committed, honest, and caring corporate citizens. These discursive identities are interpreted as strategic self-representations that optimize the persuasive appeal of the reports by addressing the specific expectations of the target readerships. This study sheds some new light on the identity work performed by companies in their public discourse. It also provides novel insights into the impression management strategies used by companies in annual and CSR reports. Finally, it provides both linguists and business communication scholars with a robust descriptive basis for critically assessing financial and CSR reporting.

Three Pink Decades: Breast Cancer Coverage in Magazine Advertisements

ABSTRACTBreast cancer advocacy has experienced tremendous success since the 1980s. Yet, the quality and authenticity of breast cancer information in the media are sometimes questionable. Using a content analysis, we examined the informative (donation information, breast cancer advocacy content, etc.) and persuasive (appeals used, cues to action, etc.) contents of magazine advertisements relevant to breast cancer. While ads offered minimal informative content about the disease or about ways by which sales will contribute to the breast cancer cause, they integrated “breast cancer appeals,” such as the color pink, the pink ribbon, and mostly positive depictions of survivorship and hope, into the ads. Breast cancer thus took center stage in the persuasive content of the ads, but a back seat when it came to their informative content. We discuss the implications of those findings in light of the meanings and purposes of cause-related marketing campaigns.