![]() ![]() Why Influence? Everyday Modern Definitions Ethics I Ethics II Disciplines Approach Bad Info Structure Mindfulness Mindlessness 6 Principles Matrix Cults I Cults II Cults III Framing I Framing II Framing III Framing IV Framing V Framing VI Framing VII Framing VIII Bibliography Classwork |
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Bad information. It's everywhere! It used to travel laboriously from person to person. In our age, the media broadcasts it, the newspapers print it, the radio spews it, the web spawns it, gurus make seminars out of it, and neighbors and coworkers help pass it along. Like a disease, pseudoscience runs through broad gutters of sophisticated misinformation, contaminating the groundwater of common knowledge and leeching into the minds of the media-fed masses. Undetected and uncorrected, furtively avoiding verifiable fact, bad information propagates disastrous errors and mistakes. And, when it comes to the study of persuasion, there's plenty of bad information to go around:
The knowledge of influence is vital to survival in societies that are based on persuasion, not coercion. (Like ours! And the rest of the free world.) The importance of this knowledge was apparent to our ancestors, and the ancient study of persuasion--rhetoric--was part of the curriculum of the educated citizen of the past. Take, for instance, the medieval curriculum of the trivium, which consisted of grammar, logic, and rhetoric. One third of the curriculum concentrated on nothing but how to influence others! Another third focused on how to create a correctly-worded message, and the final third concentrated on how to create reasoned arguments. But the scientific renaissance at the beginning of this century deemphasized
the persuasive arts. Since there was no true science of persuasion (until
the rise of social influence in the 1950s), persuasion wasn't taught as
part of modern curricula. It still isn't, unless you happen to take an
advanced social psychology course in college. And even then, social psychology
is a relatively "young" science, and not exactly a dominant social institution. So, you free-marketers out there, tell me what happens when a large demand exists but no sanctioned product to fill it? Exactly right-- a black market develops. And our society has a teeming, thriving black market of influence. Since the persuasive arts and sciences of today are relegated to the academic stratosphere, society has found something to fill the gap--because something is better than nothing. Right? Consequently, our society is swarming with persuasion peddlers and influence gurus-- some are knowledgeable, thoughtful, and effective; many are brash and ignorant people who mix a little truth with a lot of hype and a feel-good philosophy to create their own "magic elixirs of persuasion." Hey, it sells. There are a number of sources of information to avoid, or at least examine carefully before "buying." The breeding grounds of bad information as relates to persuasion are often found in conjunction with:
chology, speaker, speaker bureau, speech, stanford, steven covey, tom peters, trainer, washington speake |