Page 126 - The Social Animal

108 The Social Animal

into ideas of all kinds. The person who is easiest to brainwash is the
person whose beliefs are based on slogans that have never been se-
riously challenged.

How Well Do the Principles Work?

Suppose you inherited controlling interest in a television network.
Here is a golden opportunity to influence people’s opinions on impor-
tant issues. Let’s say you are an enthusiastic proponent of national
health insurance, and you would like to persuade others to agree with
you. Having just finished reading this chapter, you know how to do it,
and you are in control of a very powerful medium of communication.
How do you set about achieving your goal? That’s simple: You choose
a time slot following a highly intellectual program (to be certain that
well-informed people are watching), and accordingly, you present a
two-sided argument (because two-sided arguments work best on well-
informed people). You arrange your arguments in such a manner that
the argument in favor of national health insurance is stronger and ap-
pears first (to take advantage of the primacy effect). You describe the
plight of the poor,how they get sick and die for lack of affordable med-
ical care. You use vivid personal examples of people you know. You dis-
cuss these events in a manner that inspires a great deal of fear; at the
same time, you offer a specific plan of action because this combination
produces the most opinion change and the most action in the most
people. You present some of the arguments against your position and
offer strong refutation of these arguments. You arrange for the speaker
to be expert, trustworthy, and extremely likable. You make your argu-
ment as strongly as you can to maximize the discrepancy between the
argument presented and the initial attitude of the audience. And then
you sit back, relax, and wait for those opinions to start changing.
It’s not that simple. Imagine a typical viewer: Let’s say she is a
45-year-old middle-class real-estate broker who believes the govern-
ment interferes too much in the private lives of individuals. She feels
any form of social legislation undermines the spirit of individuality
that is the essence of democracy. She comes across your program
while looking for an evening’s entertainment. She begins to hear your
arguments in favor of national health insurance. As she listens, she
becomes slightly less confident in her original convictions. She is not