COM 114 Persuasive Speaking

Persuasive

Speaking

17

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Nature of Persuasion

■ Persuasion: Influencing the attitudes, values, beliefs, or

behavior of others

– Persuasive speaking: Persuasion in a public speech

■ Successful persuasive speakers convince an audience to

agree with them, change their behavior, or take action

– Rhetoric: Use of all available means of persuasion

Nature of Persuasion (continued)

■ Persuasive speakers develop solid arguments

– Argument: Articulating a position with the support of

logos, ethos, and pathos

■ Logos: Constructing logical arguments supported with

evidence and reasoning

■ Ethos: Highlighting competence, credibility, and good

character

■ Pathos: Appealing to emotions

Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM)

■ Explains how one evaluates information before making a

decision

– Involves one of the following ways:

■ Central route - Listening carefully, reflecting thoughtfully,

and mentally elaborating on the message

■ Peripheral route - Relying on simple cues

■ Persuasive speakers use strategies that address both central

and peripheral routes

Propositions

■ Declarative sentences that clearly indicate the speaker’s

position on the topic

– Proposition of fact: Convinces the audience that

something did or did not occur, is or is not true, or will or

will not occur

– Proposition of value: Convinces the audience that

something is good, fair, moral, sound, or its opposite

– Proposition of policy: Convinces the audience that a

specific course of action should be taken

Tailoring Propositions to the Target Audience

■ Target audience: Group of people a speaker wants to

persuade

– Persuasion is based on the audience’s initial attitude

toward a topic, which can be classified as opposed, no

opinion, and in favor

■ Seek incremental change from the opposing audience

– Incremental change: Attempt to move an audience

only a small degree in the speaker’s direction

Tailoring Propositions to the Target Audience (continued)

– Classify target audience with no opinion as either

uninformed, neutral, or apathetic

– If the target audience is only mildly in favor, their beliefs

need to be reinforced and strengthened

– Induce audience in favor of the topic to further commit

to the belief by giving new reasons and more recent

evidence

Rhetorical Appeals to Logos - Logos-Based Arguments

■ Claim (C): Conclusion the speaker wants the audience to

agree with

■ Support (S): Evidence offered as grounds for accepting the

claim

■ Warrant (W): Reasoning process that connects the support to

the claim

Rhetorical Appeals to Logos - Logos-Based Arguments (continued)

– Inductive reasoning: Arriving at a general conclusion

based on several pieces of evidence

– Deductive reasoning: Arguing that if something is true

for everything in a certain class, then it is true for a given

item in that class

■ Syllogism: Three-part form of deductive reasoning

– Includes a major premise, minor premise, and claim

Rhetorical Appeals to Logos - Types of Logical Arguments

■ Arguing from sign

– Supports a claim by citing information that signals a

claim

■ Arguing from example

– Supports a claim by providing one or more individual

examples to support a claim

Rhetorical Appeals to Logos - Types of Logical Arguments (continued)

■ Arguing from analogy

– Supports a claim with a single comparable example that

is similar to the subject of the claim

■ Arguing from causation

– Citing events that always bring about or lead to a

predictable effect or set of effects

Rhetorical Appeals to Logos - Fallacies

■ Flawed reasoning

■ Hasty generalization: Claim is either not supported with

evidence or is supported with only one weak example

■ False cause: The alleged cause fails to produce the effect

■ Either/or: Claim is supported by suggesting that there are

only two alternatives when others exist

Rhetorical Appeals to Logos - Fallacies (continued)

■ Straw man: Speaker weakens the opposing position by

misrepresenting it and then attacks that weaker position

■ Ad hominem: One attacks or praises the person making the

argument, rather than the argument itself

Rhetorical Appeals to Ethos - Conveying Good Character

■ Audience members believe in a speaker based on his or her

goodwill

– Goodwill: Audience’s perception that a speaker:

■ Understands them

■ Empathizes with them

■ Is responsive to them

Rhetorical Appeals to Ethos - Conveying Competence and Credibility ■ A speaker’s terminal credibility should be greater than his or

her initial credibility

– Terminal credibility: Perception of a speaker’s expertise

at the end of the speech

– Initial credibility: Perception of a speaker’s expertise at

the beginning of the speech

Rhetorical Appeals to Ethos - Conveying Competence and Credibility (continued) ■ Explain one’s competence

– Helps achieve a level of derived credibility

■ Derived credibility: Perception of a speaker’s expertise

during the speech

■ Use evidence from respected sources

■ Use nonverbal delivery and vocal expression

Rhetorical Appeals to Pathos

■ Audience involvement can be increased by evoking negative

or positive emotions during a speech

– Negative emotions - Fear, guilt, shame, anger, and

sadness

– Positive emotions - Happiness or joy, pride, relief, hope,

and compassion

Guidelines for Appealing to Emotions

■ Tell vivid stories

■ Use startling statistics

■ Incorporate listener-relevance links

■ Choose striking presentational aids

■ Use descriptive and provocative language

■ Use nonverbal delivery, gestures, and facial expressions to

highlight the emotions conveyed

Persuasive Speech Patterns

■ Statement of reasons

– Helps confirm propositions of fact by presenting best-

supported reasons in a meaningful order

■ Comparative advantages

– Attempts to convince that something is of more value

than something else

Persuasive Speech Patterns (continued 1)

■ Criteria satisfaction

– Seeks agreement on the criteria that should be

considered when evaluating a proposition

– Shows how it satisfies the criteria

■ Refutative

– Arranges main points according to opposing arguments

■ Helps challenge the points and strengthen one’s own

Persuasive Speech Patterns (continued 2)

■ Problem–solution

– Explains the nature of a particular problem and then

proposes a solution

■ Problem–cause–solution

– Demonstrates that there is a problem caused by specific

things

■ Proposes a solution that addresses the causes

Persuasive Speech Patterns (continued 3)

■ Motivated sequence

– Problem–solution pattern with explicit appeals designed

to motivate the audience to act

– Replaces the introduction-body-conclusion model with

steps of attention, need, satisfaction, visualization, and

action appeal