Want to persuade someone? Try this time-tested technique (it’s nearly foolproof)

Christopher Carpenter, Communications Professor at the Western Illinois University, has painstakingly reviewed more than 40 studies on over 20,000 subjects to test the world’s #1 persuasion technique.  The technique is simple, easy to execute, and according to Carpenter’s analysis, consistently effective.     

It’s called BYAF, which stands for “But You Are Free,” and here’s how it works: when you ask someone to do something, add the phrase “but you are free” to the end, as in: “But obviously don’t feel obliged,” or “but of course you are free to do as you like.” 

The psychology behind it is transparent – you’re letting someone know that they have the right to choose.  And despite its simplicity, Carpenter reports that it is extremely effectively, roughly doubling the chances that someone will say yes to the request.

And the actual words you use don't seem to matter. Instead, the key is being face to face with someone, not doing it over the phone, by letter or email (side note: research did support some benefits via email, but significantly less than a face to face encounter).

How often should be use this technique?  Well, don’t over do it, as Melanie Pinola explains, in a piece for lifehacker.com: 

“Obviously, you wouldn't want to use this technique all the time, lest you start looking like someone with passive-aggressive issues (‘Hey, honey, can you take out the garbage? But you are free not to’), but acknowledging the other person's ability to choose could make them feel more empowered (and on your side). It even works on stubborn children and adults sometimes (‘I like this choice best. But you're free to choose another one.’)

Interested in other persuasion techniques?  Check out these two:

Switch to the present tense

Jay Heinrich, author of “Thank You for Arguing: What Aristotle, Lincoln, and Homer Simpson Can Teach Us About the Art of Persuasion,” offers a list of 10 ways to persuade people and ranks “switching to the present tense” as his #1.  The web site sourcesofinsight.com quotes Heinrich, who shares this wonderful example:

“My son George is a master of this essential tool of argument. One morning I found myself stranded in the bathroom, wearing only a towel, with a completely empty tube of toothpaste. I knew the likely perpetrator.

‘George!’ I yelled. ‘Who used up all the toothpaste?’

I heard my 27-year-old’s sarcastic voice on the other side of the door. ‘That’s not the point, is it, Dad?’ George said. ‘The point is, how are we going to keep this from happening again?’

He had me. George lived through my rhetoric research and heard me read aloud from every draft of my book. He knew that the most productive arguments use the future tense, the language of choices and decisions. It works like a charm. When you’re accused of something (past tense) or insulted (present), switch tenses. Talk about how to correct the situation or improve the relationship. That’s the stuff of the future. Aristotle called this kind of persuasion ‘deliberative argument.’ It was his favorite kind of rhetoric, and you can see why. It takes the anger out of confrontations.”

Whisper in the right ear

Believe it or not, this appears to be true.  If you want someone to do something, it’s better to whisper in their right ear than their left, according to three studies by Dr. Luca Tommasi and Daniele Marzoli from the University Gabriele d'Annunzio in Chieti, Italy. The researchers conducted three studies in a nightclub setting, observing listening patterns (right ear vs. left ear) of more than 200 subjects.  In the third study, a woman approached 176 individuals and asked them for a cigarette.  Clubbers were twice as likely to hand over a cigarette if the request was directed at the right ear (regardless if the person asked was a man or a woman).  According to the web site socialservice.tumblr.com:

“These findings confirm previous studies which have found a right-ear preference for attending to and processing verbal stimuli. It is thought that this is because language is preferentially processed by the left side of the brain, which receives its input from the right ear.”

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7 true or false questions: How much do you know about weight loss?

(part 1 in a series)

Seven questions for you today. Score a perfect 7 and we’ll call you . . . doctor of medicine.  Miss all 7 and we’ll call you . . . less often for advice.  The questions are drawn from an exhaustive analysis published earlier this year in The New England Journal of Medicine (the title of the report: “Myths, Presumptions and Facts about Obesity”).  They scoured the popular literature to evaluate dozens of notions about weight loss. Their central question: are these notions true?  You’re about to find out.

Pencils up, here we go:

Lifestyle changes and long-term weight loss

True or False?  “Small sustained changes in energy intake or expenditure will produce large, long-term weight changes.”  Answer: False.

The commonly held notion – that small sustained lifestyle modifications will yield long-term weight loss – simply doesn’t hold up.  The New England Journal report examined the half-century-old rule “which equates a weight alteration of 1 lb to a 3500 calorie cumulative deficit or increment.” However that rule, according to the report, is “derived from short-term experiments predominately performed in men on very-low-energy diets (under 800 calories per day). Recent studies have shown that individual variability affects changes in body composition in response to changes in energy intake and expenditure, with analyses predicting substantially smaller changes in weight . . . than the 3500 calorie rule does.”

Sexual activity and energy expenditure

True or False? “A bout of sexual activity burns 100-300 calories for each participant.”  Answer: False.

According to the New England Journal report: “A man weighing 154 lbs. would . . . expend approximately 3.5 calories per minute during a stimulation and orgasm session. This level of expenditure is similar to that achieved by walking at a moderate pace (approximately 2.5 miles per hour). Given that the average bout of sexual activity lasts about 6 minutes, a man in his early-to-mid-30s might expend approximately 21 calories during sexual intercourse.” The report adds that watching TV for six minutes would burn seven calories, so “the incremental benefit” is just 14 calories.

Rate of weight loss

True or False? “Large, rapid weight loss is associated with poorer long-term weight loss outcomes, as compared with slow, gradual weight loss.”  Answer: False.

What the research shows: “Within weight-loss trials, more rapid and greater initial weight loss has been associated with lower body weight at the end of long-term follow-up” (16.1% of body weight loss vs. 9.7% with low-energy diets).

Breast-feeding and obesity

True or false? “Breast feeding is protective against obesity.” Answer: False.

Said the New England Journal report: “. . . a randomized controlled trial involving more than 13,000 children who were followed for more than 6 years provided no compelling evidence of an effect of breast-feeding on obesity.” These results stand in opposition to a World Health Organization report that concluded: “Persons who were breast-fed as infants are less likely to be obese later in life.” But the New England Journal explains that the WHO, after its report came out, acknowledged publication bias, rendering the results unsound.  Nonetheless, the report did acknowledge: “Although existing data indicate that breast-feeding does not have important anti-obesity effects in children, it has other important potential benefits for the infant and mother and should therefore be encouraged.”

Setting realistic weight-loss goals
True or False?  “Setting realistic goals for weight loss is important, because otherwise patients will become frustrated and lose less weight.” Answer: False.

Apparently, there is no consistent link “between ambitious goals and progress completion or weight loss.” In fact, the New England Journal report cites several studies which found that more ambitious goals sometimes led to greater weight loss.   In two noteworthy studies, patients changed their goals from “unrealistic” to “realistic,” yet the change failed to improve their overall weight loss.

Diet readiness

True or False? “It is important to assess the stage of change or diet readiness in order to help patients who request weight-loss treatment.” Answer: False.

The question at hand – how ready is the patient, psychologically, to undertake a weight-loss program?  The widely held belief is that unless a patient is ready to go (truly ready), long-term success will be jeopardized.  According to the New England Journal report: “Readiness does not predict the magnitude of weight loss or treatment adherence among persons who sign up for behavioral programs or who undergo obesity surgery.” The authors acknowledge the obvious: “People voluntarily choosing to enter weight-loss programs are, by definition, at least minimally ready to engage in the behaviors required to lose weight.”

Important of Physical Education classes

True or False? “Physical-education classes, in their current form, play an important role in reducing or preventing childhood obesity.”  Answer: False.

A sad, but not entirely unexpected, finding.  Explained the New England Journal report: “Findings in three studies that focused on expanded time in physical education indicated that even though there was an increase in the number of days children attended physical-education classes, the effects on body-mass index were inconsistent across sexes and age groups.” The report adds: “There is almost certainly a level of physical activity (a specific combination of frequency, intensity and duration) that would be effective in reducing or preventing obesity. Whether that level is plausibly achievable in conventional school settings is unknown. . . . ”

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What motivates people more: envy or admiration?

Don’t sell envy short.  It can be a strong motivating force in our lives.

In study after study, researchers found that when people envy others – as opposed to simply admire them – it motivates us to do better. But there’s one cautionary note: we must choose our heroes wisely. We must focus on people who are doing just a little bit better than us, not those outside of our reach.

The interplay between envy and admiration is an interesting one.  Both come into play when we view another’s person’s success, but recent research maintains that these feelings are strikingly different in their power to move us.  A PsyBlog entry, published at spring.org.uk, quotes from a recent paper by van de Ven et al (2011):

“. . . being envious of another's achievements is painful. To avoid that pain we translate envy into admiration. In other words: we admit defeat. The other person's achievements are beyond us; we must resign ourselves to being inferior. Unfortunately once we've translated envy into admiration, we lose the motivational power of that envy.”

When it comes to envy, it’s important to note that, in terms of motivation, we’re talking about “benign envy,” not “malicious envy.”  The difference is whether you feel that the person’s success is deserved. In other words, malicious envy (a sense that a person’s success is undeserved) is most often a destructive force, leading people to strike out in a bid to “bring someone down.” But benign envy, properly channeled, can help us grow and reach new heights.

A second article at PsyBlog (spring.org.uk) explained four ways in which benign envy is good for you:

1.       Benign envy motivates, “as long as you compare yourself to the right person,” according to the PsyBlog article.

2.       Benign envy feels good.  The PsyBlog entry points out: “When we see other people doing better than us it can give us hope, which makes up feel good.”

3.       Benign envy makes you more creative, because when we compare ourselves to others, our performance improves, according to a 2007 Johnson & Stapel study on creativity.

4.       Benign envy makes you smarter. PsyBlog cites a 1999 study by Blanton et al which found that “students who compared themselves with others tended to do better in school.”

Said Simon Latham, author of "The Science of Sin: The Psychology of the Seven Deadlies (and why they are so good for you)" (as quoted in PsyBlog):

“If you have the good fortune to observe a skilled performer, you watch, you learn and so you perform better. . . . Envy can change your expectations about what it is possible to achieve.”

Other research findings:

·         Envy vs. admiration – a study out of Tilburg University (Tilburg, The Netherlands) concluded that benign envy was a motivating force “only when people thought self-improvement was attainable. When participants though self-improvement was hard . . . [that] led to more admiration and no motivation to do better.”

·         Do superstars motivate us?  Again, only when their success seems attainable. A study authored by Penelope Lockwood and Ziva Kunda (University of Waterloo) found that “Relevant superstars provoke self-enhancement and inspiration when their success seems attainable but self-deflation when it seems unattainable.”

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