Elaboration Likelihood Model’s Influence on Persuasive Appeals
Persuasion is a part of every single aspect of our lives.
That TV commercial you have to see twenty times a day? Persuasion.
That annoying political campaign volunteer that calls you 10 times a week during an election cycle? Persuasion.
Even your friend asking you to go to their favorite bar every single Friday night is an example of persuasion.
But when we are persuaded so many times how does that effect us? Do we change the way we think? Do we suddenly change our opinions on something? Do we suddenly want to go to that dive bar every Friday now? Or do we start putting our foot down and rejecting that message?
The Elaboration Likelihood Model seeks to explain that.
And what the h*ll is Elaboration Likelihood Model Emily?
Hang on I’ll explain. Just let me get to my point.
Let’s imagine that we are going to buy a new car.
Of course, as soon as we enter the lot, we are immediately greeted by the annoying salesman.
Now this annoying salesman is just trying to do his job of course, but he is going to persuade us through and through to drive off the lot in a brand new 2022 car, the most expensive model of course. But will his persuasion work on us? Will we indeed walk off the lot with a brand new car?
The Elaboration Likelihood Model outlined by Richard Petty and John Cacioppo in 1986 proposes two routes a message can take in terms of changing a person’s attitude and behavior.
This theory helps explain why some messages stick and are influential and others are not. And also why the same message may be effective for some people and the opposite on others.
Depending on what sticks and what doesn’t really depends on two things.
Elaboration Likelihood Model says that each and every persuasion goes through one of two processes before whether or not the message convinces us: central route and peripheral route.
Central route is when people elaborate on a persuasive argument, listening carefully and thinking about the logic behind the message.
Let’s go back to the car lot shall we? In the central route, we will be careful when considering our purchase. Does the price make sense? Is the gas mileage reasonable? Will it be able to carry all of my family? Is it reliable? How are the reviews? All of these questions will come into play as soon as that salesman tries to sell us that car.
On the other-hand though, the peripheral route is when someone has little to know interest in the subject and/or has lesser ability to process the message.
In our car sales case, this may mean we are looking at the car in the mindset of how cool is the color? Are the rims nice? What kind of features does the car have? Is it more expensive than our friends? How cool will we look driving the car? This means that as the car salesman rattles off all of the technical aspects of the car that type of persuasion might not convince us to buy the new car in the peripheral route. Whereas talking about all the bells and whistles and cool factor would.
Next time you’re being persuaded to buy a new car or even go to that dive bar on a Friday with your friends, think about how you’re being persuaded and what persuades you the most. Is this subject more of a central path persuasion for you? Or more of a peripheral path?
