Persuasion: What It Is All About
PSY 301: Social Psychology
February 18, 2013
Persuasion: What It Is All About
As human beings, all of us have an element of leadership within us, whether just a small amount or a presidential size amount. Regardless of the amount, we do a lot when it comes to being a leader, of any kind. We lead, mediate, decide, inspire and are depended on for other countless things as part of the title of leader. An important, sometimes obvious and sometimes subtle, component of leadership is the ability to influence others. Influencing others, involves having the ability to persuade them to act, believe, and/or think in the way you desire them to. Factors involved in accomplishing persuasion depend solely on whom the persuader is, what the message is and whom the persuader is trying to persuade; all of which will be delivered in-depth within this essay.
Who (The Persuader)
All people use persuasion on a daily basis, whether they realize it or not, or whether they would like to admit or not. When meeting new people, we try to either persuade them to like us, to leave us alone or to believe in what we do, to get them to sign a petition or to donate money to us for some function/foundation. To persuade successfully, one needs to accomplish the task of having the persuaded relate to the message that is being given and to persuaders themselves. If we feel as though we can relate to the persuader and the persuasion message, on a level that connects us to the persuader, then we are more likely to be persuaded in the first place. Other characteristics that will help in the process of persuasion would be the credibility of the speaker, their authoritativeness, their ability to connect with their audience, their physical appearance, their likeability and whether they are generous, appreciative, sincere, friendly, cheerful and optimistic are viable as well in how their persuasion techniques are.
If the...