Persuasion Technology - Beyond Web 2.0

Social psychologists have long identified that people show a preference for things that they are familiar with. This is called the exposure effect, and it was first studied by Robert Zajonc. The exposure effect is the reason why advertisements work. See a brand often enough on television, and we will likely choose it when we go to the grocery story.

In addition to brands, the exposure effect also works on people.

We tend to listen more to people who look and sound like us. If those people look like someone we trust, then we have a strong predisposition towards trusting them as well. That is why women who have good relationships with their dads are attracted to men who resemble their fathers. This is also true of people who talk like our parents and relatives, or use terms that we are familiar with.

These persuasion techniques have long been used by advertisers to increase product sales. Because of the rise in online advertising, we are beginning to see more and more persuasion technologies being utilized in online communities, including HubPages.

The Stanford Political Communication Lab has studied how morphing the face of political candidates with faces of people we trust can improve their electability.

Their results show that when a relatively unknown candidate's face was morphed with the features of Senator Clinton, the candidate's electability rating increased.

This result held, no matter the gender or political affiliation of the morphed candidate.

Researchers at Accenture Technology Labs have worked on creating a quote engine that contains quotes by top executives in Fortune 500 companies. Through this quote engine, they can customize which specialized terms and catch phrases to use when interacting with each client company.

This helps to facilitate discussions, and ultimately benefits all parties involved.

We may soon see a future where things are not what they seem. Imagine reading the news, or visiting a website, where the photographs automatically morph to approximate a likeness of your own face or the faces of people you know.

In this future, Senator McCain may look like your dad, and talk like your grandma.

This won't even be consciously noticeable by you, but unconsciously, you will be affected by it.

Not surprisingly, many people are disturbed by such a future.

But persuasion technologies are just tools, and they can be applied for good, evil, or nothing at all. The important lesson to learn here is not to shy away from persuasion technology, but rather to embrace it and learn as much from it as we can. In this way, we are more equipped to use it ourselves and more equipped to catch and process it when it is being used on us.

As social animals we are automatically engaged in the activity of persuasion every day of our lives. Whenever we strike up a conversation with someone, or answer questions, persuasion is probably involved in there somewhere.

Given that persuasion is such an important part of our lives, it strangely receives very little of our attention. There is no focus whatsoever on persuasion in our school system.

In fact, the academic system tends to instill bad persuasive habits. Academia promotes arrogance, extreme use of jargon, a pedantic communication style, and tries to exclude those that are not like-minded.

Contrast this to a great persuader like the Dalai Lama, who listens to others, is non-confrontational, and always tries to include people rather than separate them. His lectures bring out great crowds, from all walks of life, and he is able to relate to a vast variety of people on a wide variety of subjects.

As long as we are interacting with people, we can't help, but be engaged in the act of persuasion many, many times, each and every day of our lives. You can either learn to be an effective communicator (persuader) like the Dalai Lama, or decide to be bad at it by ignoring and condemning it.

I strongly believe that a good understanding and application of persuasion techniques in all aspects of life can bring about much success and happiness.

We currently live in a time where online communities including Facebook, HubPages, youTube, Flickr, and many more are experiencing an unprecedented amount of success.

More and more people are participating in social networking sites, and many opportunities are available for individuals to make money through blog advertising (e.g. Google AdSense), and affiliate product marketing. In this environment, persuasion tools such as the ones described above will likely become extremely popular and extremely important.

Web 2.0 is here; Web 3.0 is going to be all about persuasion technologies.

Join HubPages and persuade others to your point of view.