Common Emotional Strategies
ch. 2 , p. 92-104
In Pullman’s book, Persuasion he states, ” how we talk to ourselves affects our beliefs and commitments just as much as how we talk to others can influence theirs”. In my particular project my targeted audience are 14 year old girls battling depression and suicidal thoughts. People no matter the age are always absorbing new information and reacting on such, but children tend to be the most impressionable so the approach and discussion always matters.
As I addressed my audience I made sure to draw on connections between the artist, themselves, and I. I pushed the idea that they are not alone and that it gets better. I added in photos to present peaceful pictures, generating a safe head space to get away too. I set the stage for a safe and welcoming environment. I asked questions to interact and added a game to give a more friendly and open environment with the intent to ease a person’s mind when talking to a stranger that can’t actually see. I talked of hope, friendship, understanding, empathy, and the light at the end of the tunnel by giving personal details.
Pullman depicts emotional ploys as the ones stated above as in confidence, befriending, and self-disclosure. Confidence is depicted by a rhetor pointing out “resources and remedies” or even encouraging the audience “to feel like they will survive or at least that the suffering” will stop, diminished, and/or concurred. I persuaded my own audience to that they “are not alone” and that I got through it and they can too. Even at the end of my project I added a link to the national suicide hotline for those who are seeking professional help. The link to get professional help was a resource and my remedy for helping those as risk. While I sought out to inform my audience that things get better; I also made the attempt to continuously develop a friendship and mention it numerous times that my audience and I are friends. I even ask and communicate with them as if we are. I implant this notion in their heads, hoping they will subconsciously accept it and therefore accept my stance. Pullman says this is using the ploy of befriending, the “friendlier you are the more persuasive you are”. While lastly, I used self-disclosure by exploiting my own battle with depression and suicidal thoughts as an adolescent. Again, Pullman characterizes this persuasive style by stating that when a rhetor talks about themselves and their struggles they “can draw people closer” to them “by showing that [they] are willing to be vulnerable with them, the essence of a personal friendship” However, Pullman warns that if things are disclosed too quickly the audience may become distrustful and if information is with held too long the audience becomes disinterested. In my case I informed my readers I would tell me my story, but I did not give them my fruit early. Instead, I waited until the mid-point of my project, essentially, to give them a piece of my life. Pullman also states, “people tend to remember negative experiences more keenly than positive ones – negative emotions make us focus” and with that said by my project focusing on a dark subject it’ll be something people will remember.
Such persuasive ploys have lead my project into the right direction; not only is it persuasive, or allusive to the idea that my audience and I are friends, but it is also memorable.
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