Going Deeper Into Persuasion

For thousands of years, people have tried to figure out the best way to persuade other people to do things. We know that persuasion has been the subject of serious study since the days of classical Greece. Plato worried about the rhapsodes' ability to appeal to citizens' emotions and persuade them to do things that were not in the best interest of the city or themselves. And Aristotle wrote one of the great treatises on persuasion. Among the Romans the ability to persuade was considered a hallmark of responsible citizenship.

The message and The receiver

Since world war ii, researchers have worked particularly hard to identify the elements of persuasion. Why? They  have some practical motives: improving advertising and marketing campaigns, motivating audiences, influencing the electorate, girding consumers and voters against propaganda, understanding the dynamics of brainwashing, and -yes-writing better proposals. From all this speculation and research, four elements have consistently been a vital part of nearly every theory of persuasion: the message, the receiver, the channel, and the source. Giving them some consideration will give us a deeper understanding of the process of persuasion.