The winner of a clash of knowledge is often determined less by the features of the knowledge itself than by the way the knowledge is presented, with the winning side frequently being the one that makes the most persuasive presentation of its case. The most persuasive presentations are those that incorporate one or another of six universal principles of influence: (a) Reciprocation: People are more willing to comply with requests (e.g., for favors, services, information, or concessions) from those who have provided such things first. (b) Commitment/Consistency: People are more willing to be moved in a particular direction if they see it as consistent with an existing commitment. (c) Authority: People are more willing to follow the directions or recommendations of a communicator to whom they attribute relevant authority or expertise. (d) Social Validation: People are more willing to take a recommended action if they see evidence that many people, especially similar ones, are taking it. (e) Scarcity: People find objects and opportunities more attractive to the degree that they are scarce, rare, or dwindling in availability. (f) Liking/Friendship: People prefer to say yes to those they know and like.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Ardry, R. (1970). The social contract. New York: Antheneum.
Aune, R. K., & Basil, M. C. (1994). A relational obligations approach to the foot-in-the-mouth effect. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 24, 546–556.
Bettencourt, B. A., Brewer, M. B., Croak, M. R., & Miller, N. (1992). Cooperation and the reduction of intergroup bias. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 28, 301–319.
Blass, T. (Ed.). (2000). Obedience to authority: Current perspectives on the Milgram paradigm. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Cialdini, R. B. (2001). Influence: Science and Practice (4th ed.). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Cialdini, R. B., Vincent, J. E., Lewis, S. K., Catalan, J., Wheeler, D., & Darby, B. L. (1975). Reciprocal concessions procedure for inducing compliance: The door-in-the-face technique. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 31, 206–215.
Donaldson, S. I. (1995). Peer influence on adolescent drug use: A perspective from the trenches of experimental evaluation research. American Psychologist, 50, 801–802.
Donaldson, S. I., Graham, J. W., Piccinin, A. M., & Hansen, W. B. (1995). Resistance-skills training and onset of alcohol use. Health Psychology, 14, 291–300.
Drachman, D., deCarufel, A., & Insko, C. (1978). The extra credit effect in interpersonal attraction. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 14, 458–465.
Efran, M. G., & Patterson, E. W. J. (1974). Voters vote beautiful: The effects of physical appearance on a national election. Canadian Journal of Behavioral Science, 6, 352–356.
Efran, M. G., & Patterson, E. W. J. (1976). The politics of appearance. Unpublished manuscript, Canada: University of Toronto.
Gouldner, A. W. (1960). The norm of reciprocity: A preliminary statement. American Sociological Review, 25, 161–178.
Knishinsky, A. (1982). The effects of scarcity of material and exclusivity of information on industrial buyer perceived risk in provoking a purchase decision. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Tempe, AZ: Arizona State University.
Lefkowitz, M., Blake, R. R., & Mouton, J. S. (1955). Status factors in pedestrian violation of traffic signals. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 51, 704–706.
Lynn, M. (1991). Scarcity effects on value. Psychology and Marketing, 8, 43–57.
McGuire, W. J. (1985). Attitudes and attitude change. In G. Lindzey & E. Aronson (Eds.), Handbook of social psychology (3rd ed., Vol. 2, pp. 233–346). New York: Random House.
Milgram, S., Bickman, L., & Berkowitz, L. (1969). Note on the drawing power of crowds of different size. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 13, 79–82.
Rafaeli, A., & Sutton, R. I. (1991). Emotional contrast strategies as means of social influence. Academy of Management Journal, 34, 749–775.
Reingen, P. H. (1982). Test of a list procedure for inducing compliance with a request to donate money. Journal of Applied Psychology, 67, 110–118.
Reingen, P. H., & Kernan, J. B. (1993). Social perception and interpersonal influence: Some consequences of the physical attractiveness stereotype in a personal selling setting. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2, 25–38.
Schwartzwald, J., Bizman, A., & Raz, M. (1983). The foot-in-the-door paradigm: Effects of second request size on donation probability and donor generosity. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 9, 443–450.
Shaffer, D., Garland, A., Vieland. V., Underwood, M., & Busner, C. (1991). The impact of curriculum-based suicide prevention programs for teenagers. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 30, 588–596.
Smolowe, J. (1990, November 26). Contents require immediate attention. Time, p. 64.
Stelfox, H. T., Chua, G., O’Rourke, K, & Detsky, A. S. (1998). Conflict of interest in the debate over calcium-channel antagonists. New England Journal of Medicine, 333, 101–106.
West, S. G. (1975). Increasing the attractiveness of college cafeteria food. Journal of Applied Psychology, 10, 656–658.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2008 Springer Science + Business Media B.V.
About this paper
Cite this paper
Cialdini, R.B. (2008). Turning Persuasion from an Art into a Science. In: Meusburger, P., Welker, M., Wunder, E. (eds) Clashes of Knowledge. Knowledge and Space, vol 1. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-5555-3_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-5555-3_12
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-1-4020-5554-6
Online ISBN: 978-1-4020-5555-3
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawSocial Sciences (R0)