What is Reddit's opinion of Influence: Science and Practice?

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Robert Cialdini wrote about what i think you are describing as "authority" in relation to the term he coined called "compliance techniques." Counselors and other psychotherapists also have authority and a way to positively influence people. I included a link of where one can buy the book.

https://www.amazon.com/Influence-Practice-Robert-B-Cialdini/dp/0205609996

Friend, I don't normally recommend books to posters, but I'll make an exception here.

I read this book a few years ago and found it useful throughout my career. It's called "Influence" and it focuses on how to be persuasive. It may save you a lot of headaches in the future if you can learn today how to be influential tomorrow. Telling people to do something and using "because the CEO said to do it" is rarely going to make a positive impact.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0205609996/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Cheers!

it came to my attention for a while (went through this, which contains much less "science" than what the cover might lead you to believe), but found that there was nothing that I really needed that other people could provide, so I moved on to other things.

Four suggestions:

 

• A good exercise would be playing tabletop games which involve negotiation. However, you'll either need to choose who you invite to play very carefully or bet money on it (preferably both) in order to make sure people will take the game seriously and care about their decisions. Here's an extensive list.

 

• You may also want to take a look at these two videos by the YouTube channel Charisma On Command: #1 #2. They explain a great deal about negotiation by analyizing Tyrion's actions in Game of Thrones.

 

• If you haven't read Influence: Science and Practice (Public Domain (Amazon), make sure to do so.

 

• Make sure to get at least good at all basic aspects of people skills, otherwise your weakest areas will severely limit your individual ability in negotiating and whatever else you try to do.

 

EDIT: Formatting

Good place to start.

Influence: Science and Practice https://www.amazon.com/dp/0205609996/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_ZS1Q5AST53KHETAWE4SR

Religions are a meme (in Dawkins' original sense of the word) that has coevolved with humans for tens of thousands of years. It uses every human cognitive bias to form strong communities and families. It offers a route to emotional peace in troubled times, whether due to death, illness, injury, loneliness, job loss, etc. It's strongly correlated with happiness. It inspires amazing works of art and architecture. Charity and humanitarian aid are a big component of every major religion. Even when a religion is dead, it inspires fiction for thousands of years afterwards in the form of mythology.

> Do you think capitalism can produce advertising which overrides people's rational thoughts and gives them irrational desires?

Absolutely. If you want to get into the details of how, this is the subject of influence psychology, and Influence: Science and Practice by Cialdini is probably the primary reference. However, it is fairly large, cover in depth, and cost a bit. I recommend first starting with the free resource "Steve's Primer of Practical Persuasion and Influence" - I like the 1996-2004 version, and haven't really pursued the new version - but the author feels the new one is a clear improvement, so maybe give that a go and let me know how it goes.

If you need to look up specific techniques/topics, http://changingminds.org/ is a fantastic resource.

> And if so, how do we deal with that?

Regulation. I'm going to assume a sane country to start with - no first amendment or similar in the way of fairness and a properly free press and political system.

As usual, I'll quote FDR and say "Look to Norway". Regulate for your goals. The goal is to have the advertising contribute to the general good, to make consumers more informed and able to make decisions that are better for them.

Regulation topics in Norway (and these are not all of them):

1. No targeting vulnerable groups. So no advertising towards children, no advertising of medicines except to medical professionals, no advertising of lawyer services.
2. Regulate techniques. No subliminal advertising, no product placement, all visual manipulation has to be clearly marked (think a big banner at the bottom of an ad saying "THE ACTORS HAVE BEEN RUN THROUGH PHOTOSHOP")
3. For any particularly sensitive area, have a pre-approved list of forms. E.g, political ads and medical ads are limited to only a pre-approved list of forms. Medical ads are allowed only in medical journals and have to have a reference to a peer-reviewed paper for any claim. Political ads are allowed only in writing in newspapers (and possibly magazines); no TV, radio, video, online, or billboard ads.

That's a start. The core is: Ads should serve society; ads a great servant and a terrible master.

Copywriting is all based on psychology. You are gently, pushing all the trigger points that makes humans act in the manner which you want them to act. You are using words that brings out their inner desires and then you channel that desire into the products that you are trying to sell.

This book is a great book to read: https://www.amazon.com/Influence-Practice-Robert-B-Cialdini/dp/0205609996/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1O0SWRP4XCVJ7&keywords=influence+robert+cialdini&qid=1570820644&sprefix=influence%2Caps%2C169&sr=8-1

Influence by Robert Cialdini

You know, I would be angry about that too but after reading up on the fact that our people survived 4 systematic genocides under British colonial rule, I'm frankly impressed that we can maintain even that level of civility. That probably sounds nonsensical, but the entire culture, communications, education, and civility of Indian society was utterly wrecked to the point that civil society just collapsed and considering that happened for 300 years...

I seriously recommend more educational institutions for people and I don't mean colleges, I mean community centers to just teach the illiterate to be literate and basic psychological principles like reciprocity.

Maybe try this book, it's about manipulating people through politeness and reciprocity. It's very effective! I got out of a speeding ticket from a police officer by basically telling him about how important I felt that his job was to the community at large.

For more:

http://www.amazon.com/Influence-Science-Practice-5th-Edition/dp/0205609996