Influence: the Psychology of Persuasion (Cialdini)

Lecturing on Cialdini's Influence book to Master students for a course in Advanced Consumer Marketing at Linköping University, Sweden.

Cialdini (2016) - "Pre-Suasion": http://www.slideshare.net/guyaderhugo/presuasion-a-revolutionary-way-to-influence-and-persuade

1. Influence: 

the Psychology of Persuasion
(Cialdini, 1984)

2. ✦We all have built-in automatic response to stimuli called
‘fixed-action patterns’. Behaviors comprising these
patterns occur in virtually the same fashion and the
same order every time.
✦Regular, blindly mechanical patterns of action are
activated by a ‘trigger feature’.
✦Cialdini characterizes these automatic responses with
the phrase ‘click-whirr’: 

“Click and the appropriate tape is activated; 

whirr and out rolls the standard sequence of behaviors”

3. •We need shortcuts in a complex world.
•“In fact, automatic, stereotyped behavior is
prevalent in much human action, because in many
cases, it is the most efficient form of behaving…in
other cases it is simply necessary…”
•These fast behaviors perform a useful function, 

e.g. they save us time when making snap
decisions.
•See also Kahneman’s Nobel Prize lecture (2002):
http://www.nobelprize.org/mediaplayer/?id=531

4. The contrast principle “affects the way we see the
difference between two things that are presented one after
the other”.


If the difference between the compared items is big,

we will tend to see a greater difference than actually exists.
•A spouse is less attractive when compared to very beautiful people.
•An expensive sweater is seen to be less costly when it is contrasted to the
price of an expensive suit.
•A more expensive house contrasts favorably to a shabby "setup" property.

6. The Rule: We should try to repay, in kind, what another person has
provided us.
✦One of the most potent forms of influence.
✦All human societies subscribe to the rule (Gouldner 1960).
✦Unique adaptive mechanism of human beings studied by many
disciplines.
✦Each of us has been well trained to comply with and believe in the
reciprocity rule!
✦Note: The Rule Does Not Apply to Family and Other Close
“Communal” Relationships.
Reciprocity

7. Why is the rule easily exploited?
1.The Rule is Extremely Powerful.
2.The Rule Applies Even to Uninvited Favors.
3.The Rule Can Spur Unequal Exchanges.
4.The Rule Can Work Even When We Don’t Like the Requester.
5.The Rule Also Applies to Concessions.
6.When Paired with Perceptual Contrasts the Rule May be
Even More Powerful.
Reciprocity

8. Reject-Then-Retreat technique

aka the Door-in-the-Face technique
Steps:
1.Ask for a large favor.
2.It is turned down.
3.Ask for a small favor that was wanted all along. 

(It is viewed as a concession).
4.The need to respond with a reciprocal concession is created.
5.Smaller favor is fulfilled.
Example: the County Youth Counseling Program
Reciprocity

9. Defense
✓Rejecting the rule when appropriate
✓Accept offers for what they fundamentally are:
•Authentic Generosity –> enter into exchange
•Trick –> reject the rule and react accordingly
✓The rule says that favors are to be met with favors; 

it does not require that tricks be met with favors.
Reciprocity

10. Scarcity
•Opportunities seem more valuable to us
when their availability is limited
•We want it even more when we are in
competition for it
The scarcity principle holds true for two
reasons:
1.Things difficult to attain are typically more valuable.
2.When something becomes less accessible, the
freedom to have it may be lost.
e.g. The Cookie Jar
Rule: people assign more value to things when they are less available.

11. The scarcity principle is more likely to hold true under
two conditions:
•Scarce items are heightened in value when they are
newly scarce. That is things have higher value when
they have become recently restricted (i.e. more than
those things that were restricted all along).
•People are most attracted to scarce resources when
they compete with others for them.
Scarcity

12. Psychological Reactance Theory
•People respond to the loss of freedom by wanting to have it
more.
•As a motivator, psychological reactance is present
throughout the great majority of a person's lifespan.
•However, it is especially evident at a pair of ages:
•"the terrible twos";
•the teenage years (Romeo and Juliet)
•People at these ages are especially sensitive to
restrictions.
Scarcity

13. Defense
•It is difficult to prepare ourselves cognitively against scarcity
pressures because they have an emotional quality that
makes thinking difficult.
Scarcity
•In defense, we might attempt to be alert regarding the sudden rush
of emotions in situations involving scarcity.
•Perhaps this awareness may allow us to remain calm and take steps
to assess the merits of an opportunity in terms of why we really want
and objectively need.

14. Authority
•There is strong pressure to comply with the request
of authority.
•Offers a shortcut through complexities of life.
•We are taught to obey authority from a very early
age through virtually all of society’s institutions.
Milgram experiment
Subjects were all male who are known for their
aggressive tendencies?
Subjects didn’t know the harm high shock voltage
could cause?
Subjects were freaks who enjoyed the chance to
inflict misery?

15. Obedience-to-authority: A deep-seated sense of duty to authority
“It is the extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths on the command of an
authority that constitutes the chief finding of the study” (Milgram, 1974).
Blind obedience: we don’t have to think, therefore we don’t. 

But what if the authority is wrong? (e.g. R. Ear vs Rear)
Connotation, not content: clothing (lab coat, uniform, business suit, etc),
titles, size and status.
Authority
Defense:
#Heightened awareness to authority power.
#Recognition of how easily authority can be faked.
#Sensitivity to actual vs. fake authority: 

Is this authority truly an expert?
#Sensitivity to sincerity of authority: 

How truthful can we expect this expert to be?

16. Commitment & Consistency
•Whirring Along

The drive to be consistent (in our beliefs, words, and
deeds) or look consistent, often causes us to act
contrary to our own best interests.
•Quick Fix

Being consistent helps us to deal with the
complexities of daily life: we only need to say or do
whatever is consistent with our earlier decisions.
•Foolish Fortress

I have a problem. I need a solution. 

I don’t need reason and I don’t want to think about it.
•Seek and Hide

Automatic consistency can be a gold mine (e.g. Toys).
Good consistency =
highly valued in society.

17. Approaches to get people committed:
1.Control ‘em!
2.How would you feel about spending 3h for charity?
3.How are you? Good, are you willing to help the victims…
4.The Foot-in-the-Door technique: get people to comply to a big favor,
by starting with a small request.
Commitment & Consistency
https://youtu.be/YzQnqZzPHDU

18. Professionals love commitments that produce inner change:
•The change cover many situations.
•The change is lasting.
•“Growing legs to stand on”.
Commitment & Consistency
Defense:
•Be aware of our tendency to be automatically and unthinkingly
consistent.
•Problem: we do need automatic consistency. If we did not have it we
would spend all our time thinking about and reevaluating past events.
So how do we know when consistency likely will lead to a poor choice?
Two separate kinds of warning signals:
•Stomach signs
•Heart-of-hearts signs (“knowing what I now know”…)

19. Liking & Similarity
I like you, because…
1.Physical attractiveness: halo effect of 

“good-looking equals good”
2.Similarity: we like people who are similar to us
(clothes, background, interests…)
3.Praise: compliments.
4.Contact: repeated contact under positive
conditions facilitates liking.
5.Cooperation or association
“Finding a salesman you like, plus the price.
Put them both together, and you get a deal”.

20. Defense
•Why would I defend myself against a nice person?
•Is it reasonable that I like this person this much?
•Focus on the effects rather than the causes.
Liking & Similarity

21. Consensus & Social Proof
Other peoples’ behavior and thoughts 

= mental shortcut (heuristic) to future behavior & cognition
When we don’t know how to behave – we learn from others
(often unconsciously)!
•Somebody starts yawning…
•A person is standing staring up in the sky…
•One spectator starts applauding…
•Ever laughed to a TV-show with laughs in it?
The bystander effect
•Diffusion of responsibility
•Pluralistic ignorance
•e.g. Murder of Kitty Genovese

22. Consensus & Social Proof
Two situations, to be aware of, in which incorrect data cause the
principle of social proof to give us poor guidance:
•Sabotage: Purposely falsified social evidence 

(e.g. canned laughter, ‘claques’).
•Looking up: Innocent natural errors that produce
snowballing social proof that lead to an incorrect
decision (e.g. pluralistic ignorance).
Proper behavior 

= the behavior of people similar to ourselves