How Media Persuades Us

The mainstream media is very smart aren’t they?  They know just what to say, how to say, and when to say what exactly gets the hungry public’s attention.  They know how to push our buttons, pull on our heart strings, outrage, anguish, and make us feel like we need to get involved.  For that matter, they can make us feel that we shouldn’t get involved.  How is power like this achieved in a non-brutal fashion? One may immediately think the media uses tactics of “shock and awe” to get our attention.  This can be effective, obviously, but it runs much deeper than that. Like anything else, the repeated use of one specific tactic runs its course and becomes more accepted and “normal”.

The probing of what persuades and drives us to do what others want or believe what others say, particularly from the media, begins on a basic and primary level. Robert Cialdini (The Science of Persuasion) discusses six psychological tendencies that matter with regards to persuading another (reciprocation, consistency, social validation, liking, authority, and scarcity). Furthermore, Lazarsfeld and Merton discuss how the mass media serves three primary social functions, status-conferral, the enforcement of social norms, and the well-known narcotizing dysfunction. Blending these two proposals can provide an explanation into how the mass media functions in an efficient and effective fashion.

Status conferral by the media is more present than ever; especially in the social media age (Lazarsfeld and Merton probably had no idea!). Instant tweets, photos, and clips, that one has arrived or is going to an event is common place in our society.  We are made to feel this is important; the media bestows this onto us.  If they are covering this event it surely must be a big deal.  We are socially validated when we see others noticing, snapping pictures, and gathering around the crowd at what is going on.   The handsome and beautiful people reporting these stories may also give us a feeling of liking and wanting to believe and accept what they say.  They look the part, are well dressed, well spoken, and intelligent.  They have positions of authority and power which the masses respond to favorably.  These broadcasts, furthermore, can be dubbed as “special editions” or some other kind of one-time event so it should be followed by the public closely and with importance.  This feeling of scarcity may also prompt us to tune in and listen (and believe) what we are seeing.

The media also functions to inform us of what is acceptable, but more importantly what is not. As Lazarsfeld and Merton state, “publicity closes the gap between private attitudes and public morality” (Lazarsfeld and Merton-“Mass communication, popular taste, and organized social action”). The media expose deviations to the public view forcing the public to take action on what may be privately tolerated. Social norms are created in this way and media continually perpetuates. Mass media applies the same Cialdini concepts appropriately in their perpetuation.  We feel compelled to reciprocate our feelings of outrage or disdain to certain media events.  The importance of consistency is at work, as well, with forming our social norms. We generally want to be consistent in what we say we believe or will do.  An example would be through polls or questionnaires from media outlets, they serve as a function to commit us to being consistent.  We affirm we believe a certain way and we find it important to act out in the same fashion moving forward.  We are then socially validated by seeing the results of these polls and feel satisfied when the majority results agree. Other tendencies apply as well and are interrelated.

The third concept discussed by Lazarsfeld and Merton regards the narcotizing dysfunction.  I find this particularly interesting because at the time this was composed, the concept was quoted as having “little explicit comment.” I think it’s safe to say that this has changed completely with the constant bombardment of today’s 24/7 media coverage, instant access, pc’s and mobile device connectivity, and other on demand social media outlets.  How often do you watch or listen to a media report that is particularly disturbing and you feel overwhelmed?  It’s played continuously with no end.  You feel there is nothing you can do to make it better; this is the erosion of morality in the world we live in and just makes you feel numb. Surely we have all experienced this?  This is the narcotic effect that was discussed over 65 years ago—long before the media frenzied world we live in today.  We are constantly flooded with information which keeps us from really ever trying to do anything about it, we are actually distanced from it.  Lazarsfeld and Merton state, “Yet, quite apart from intent, increasing dosages of mass communication may be inadvertently transforming the energies of men from active participation into passive knowledge.”   It seems quite prophetic and more appropriate now more than ever.  The Cialdini tendencies can be applied here as well. We are reaffirmed by these tendencies of others, who feel the same way about the bombardment of media and become simply a consumer of information.  The media, the certain authority figure, relays this to us, we respect and heed to what they have to say.   We stay consistent and socially validated knowing the issues of the day, but accept being able to do nothing about them.

The media clearly knows which tactics work and how to get their point across (and believed).  Do we, as informed citizens, have other means and methods to decipher and determine what is important, moral, and just?  How do we separate and truly think for ourselves?

 

 

Paul Lazarsfeld and Robert Merton- “Mass communication, popular taste, and organized social action”- 1948

Robert Cialdini- “The SCIENCE of Persuasion”- 2004