Skip to main content
Log in

Discrediting signals. A model of social evaluation to study discrediting moves in political debates

  • Original Paper
  • Published:
Journal on Multimodal User Interfaces Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The paper analyzes the move of discrediting the opponent as a means to persuasion in political debates. After analysis of a corpus of political debates, a typology of discrediting strategies is outlined, distinguished in terms of three criteria: the target—the feature of the opponent specifically attacked (dominance, competence, benevolence); the route through which it is attacked—topic, mode or directly the person; and the type of communicative act that conveys the attack (insult, criticism, correction…). The relevance of body signals in discrediting moves is highlighted.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. EPR (European Pressurized Reactor).

References

  1. Aristotle (1961) Retorica. Laterza, Bari

    Google Scholar 

  2. Walton DN (1992) Types of dialogue, dialectical shifts and fallacies. In: van Eemeren FH, Grootendorst RJ, Blair A, Willard CA (eds) Argumentation illuminated. SICSAT, Amsterdam, pp 133–147

    Google Scholar 

  3. Walton DN (1998) Ad Hominem arguments. Studies in rhetoric and communication. University of Alabama Press, Tuscaloosa

    Google Scholar 

  4. van Eemeren FH, Grootendorst R (1992) Argumentation, communication, and fallacies: a pragma-dialectical perspective. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale

    Google Scholar 

  5. Hovland CI, Weiss W (1951) The influence of source credibility on communication effectiveness. Public Opin Q 15:635–650

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Heider F (1944) Social perception and phenomenal causality. Psychol Rev 51:358–374

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Weiner B (1986) An attributional theory of motivation and emotion. Springer, New York

    Book  Google Scholar 

  8. Seligman MEP (1975) Helplessness: on depression, development, and death. W.H. Freeman, San Francisco

    Google Scholar 

  9. Peeters G (1971) The positive-negative asymmetry: on cognitive consistency and positivity bias. Eur J Soc Psychol 1(4):455–474

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Catellani P (2011) Attacco e difesa nella comunicazione massmediale. In: Catellani P, Sensales G (eds) Psicologia della politica, pp 97–112

    Google Scholar 

  11. Gamson WA, Modigliani A (1987) The changing culture of affirmative action. Res Polit Sociol 3:137–177

    Google Scholar 

  12. Mazzoleni P (2004) La comunicazione politica. Il Mulino, Bologna

    Google Scholar 

  13. Poggi I, D’Errico F, Vincze L (2011) Discrediting moves in political debate. In: Ricci F et al. (eds) Proceedings of second international workshop on user models for motivational systems: the affective and the rational routes to persuasion (UMMS 2011), Girona. LNCS. Springer, Berlin, pp 84–99

    Google Scholar 

  14. Fiske ST, Cuddy AJC, Glick P, Xu J (2002) A model of (often mixed) stereotype content: competence and warmth respectively follow from perceived status and competition. J Pers Soc Psychol 82:878–902

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Ekvall G (1991) The organizational culture of idea-management: a creative climate for the management of ideas. In: Henry J, Walker D (eds) Managing innovation. SAGE, London, pp 73–79

    Google Scholar 

  16. Leach CW, Ellemers N, Barreto M (2007) Group virtue: the importance of morality (vs. competence and sociability) in the positive evaluation of ingroups. J Pers Soc Psychol 93:234–249

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Catellani P, Bertolotti M (2011) Leadership attacks versus morality attacks: their effects on the evaluation of politicians. In: XVI general meeting of the European association of social psychology, Stockholm 12–16 July, 2011

    Google Scholar 

  18. Conte R, Castelfranchi C (1995) Cognitive and social action. University College, London

    Google Scholar 

  19. Miceli M, Castelfranchi C (1998) The role of evaluation in cognition and social interaction. In: Dautenhahn K (ed) Human cognition and agent technology. Benjamins, Amsterdam

    Google Scholar 

  20. Poggi I (2008) Types of emotions and types of goals. In: Proceedings of the workshop AFFINE: affective interaction in natural environment, post-conference workshop of ICMI 2008, Chania, Crete, 24 September 2008

    Google Scholar 

  21. Austin JL (1962) How to do things with words. Oxford University Press, Oxford

    Google Scholar 

  22. Chomsky N (1965) Aspects of the theory of syntax. MIT Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  23. Poggi I (2007) Mind, hands, face and body. A goal and belief view of multimodal communication. Weidler Buchverlag, Berlin

    Google Scholar 

  24. Kendon A (2004) Gesture. Visible action as utterance. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  25. Poggi I (2011) Irony, humour ad ridicule. Power, image and judicial rhetoric in an Italian political trial. In: Vion R, Giacomi A, Vargas C (eds) La corporalité du language: Multimodalité, discours et écriture, Hommage à Claire Maury-Rouan. Presses Universitaires de Provence, Aix en Provence

    Google Scholar 

  26. Zullow HM, Oettingen G, Peterson C, Seligman MEP (1988) Pessimistic explanatory style in the historical record: CAVing LBJ, presidential candidates, and East versus West Berlin. Am Psychol 43:673–682

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. Zullow HM, Seligman MEP (1990) Pessimistic rumination predicts defeat of presidential candidates, 1900–1984. Psychol Inquiry 1:52–61

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Fogg BJ (2002) Persuasive technology: using computers to change what we think and do. Morgan Kaufmann, San Mateo

    Google Scholar 

  29. Curhan JR, Pentland A (2007) Thin slices of negotiation: predicting outcomes from conversational dynamics within the first 5 minutes. J Appl Psychol 92:802–808

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

Research supported by SSPNet Seventh Framework Program, European Network of Excellence SSPNet (Social Signal Processing Network), Grant Agreement N. 231287.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Francesca D’Errico.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

D’Errico, F., Poggi, I. & Vincze, L. Discrediting signals. A model of social evaluation to study discrediting moves in political debates. J Multimodal User Interfaces 6, 163–178 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12193-012-0098-4

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12193-012-0098-4

Keywords

Navigation