Interpersonal influence

Overview

The first forays into the overarching field of interpersonal communication, which emerged in the 1950s and 1960s (Berger, 2014), involved interpersonal influence. While the field of interpersonal communication has grown to include a number of other sub-disciplines, interpersonal influence remains central to understanding how people manipulate each other using verbal and non-verbal methods. Interpersonal influence, also thought of as persuasion or power, can be leveraged in situations from intimate settings, such as within a family unit, to larger group settings, such as in a business or a political environment.

Although the word "manipulate" has some negative connotations, there are many examples where acts of coercion yield positive results. Take for example a parent trying to encourage a child to eat their vegetables. The parent may try any number of verbal and non-verbal strategies for optimizing the child's consumption of vegetables. These strategies may include making threats, rationalizing why the child must eat vegetables, or rewarding the consumption of vegetables with the consumption of a treat.

These strategies (and many others practiced on a daily basis in a number of different circumstances) are examples of using interpersonal influence to change the mind of another person, who will be referred to here as a "target." The above example also highlights how interpersonal influence can be part of a routine that is not always intentional. While the words "influence" and "manipulation" are often associated with actions that are premeditated and purposeful, they can also be subconscious. Words of encouragement to a colleague or friend are positive reinforcements than can be considered influential and can change a target's behavior by making them try harder. Although these small and subtle forms of interpersonal influence are not often the focus of research, they are important considerations for conceptualizing interpersonal influence.

Interpersonal influence occurs on a number of levels in a number of different ways. For example, Dillard, Anderson & Knobloch (2002) have introduced seven distinct types of interpersonal influence that are helpful for understanding persuasion in an intimate, largely benign setting. One of these types is gaining assistance in the form of resources that may be material or nonmaterial. An example of this would be asking a classmate for a piece of paper to take notes with. Another is giving advice. This type of influence is typical of many healthy relationships and friendships and is also a form of support (e.g., "If he's treating you that badly, you should probably break up with him"). Proposing a shared activity, such as suggesting a coffee break to a colleague, is also a type of influence. Other types are changing someone's stance on a subject (e.g., "I don't think your opinion acknowledges the growing body of research surrounding the realities of climate change"), changing relationship status (e.g., escalating or deescalating), obtaining permission (e.g., "Can I bring my new girlfriend over for dinner?") and enforcing the fulfillment of a commitment (e.g., "You promised you would walk the dog!").

These types of influence are helpful for understanding the reason for exerting interpersonal influence, but they do not explain strategies for achieving these objectives. Jensen (2007) provides a brief review of seven important "tactics" that can be used to assert interpersonal influence. These tactics include assertiveness, exchange tactics, coalition tactics, ingratiating tactics, rational persuasion, inspirational appeals, and consultation.

Assertiveness is a pressure tactic in which the persuader uses anger or demands to force the target into compliance. Exchange tactics rely on an implicit or explicit reward for compliant behavior. This reward can be in the form of "cashing in" a favor or offering a future favor. It can also be a direct exchange or a personal sacrifice. Coalition tactics rely on superior positioning evidenced by support from others. This tactic can be seen as "ganging up" on the target. An opposite strategy is to use ingratiating tactics, which make the target feel important through flattery and praise. Rational persuasion uses reason and logic to explain why compliance on a particular issue is most favorable. Inspirational appeals arouse enthusiasm through appeals to the target's personal values. These appeals rely on emotion, charisma and conviction rather than rationality to inspire the desired response. Finally, consultation encourages collaboration between the target and the persuader. This tactic gives the target part ownership of the methods to achieving the persuader's goal.

Tactics used to obtain an interpersonal influence objective can be more or less successful depending on the context. Lee et al. (2017) reviewed the likelihood of success of the tactics mentioned above. They argue that rational persuasion is one of the most all-round effective tactics that can be used in a variety of situations. The same is true with inspirational appeals and consultation, which results in high quality relationships where the target feels valued in the decision-making process. Lee et al. (2017) present evidence from literature that the other tactics are less effective or less used. Exchange tactics, for example, have been found to be a method of last resort, even though these tactics are often effective. Similarly, ingratiating tactics are successful, but are often reserved for building positive relationships instead of persuading others to change their minds. Assertiveness is a more problematic tactic as it implies that the persuader is more dominant that the target. This tactic is only effective if this dominance is accepted by the target, making the success of this tactic questionable. The coalition tactic is also problematic due to the likeliness of the target acting in a defensive manner, thereby holding their original position more strongly.

Lee et al. (2017) also introduced four additional tactics that subdivide some of Jensen's (2007) tactics. These include legitimating tactics, appraising tactics, collaboration tactics, and personal appeals. Legitimating tactics are used to remind targets of persuaders' superior position. These tactics are similar to assertive tactics except that in legitimating tactics, dominance is well established and the bullying sometimes exerted in assertive tactics are not needed. Legitimating tactics are fairly narrow in their scope and can only be used by people in true positions of power where their word is effectively law in that context. Appraising tactics are used to point out to the target how the requested outcome will benefit the target. While this is similar to rational persuasion, it focuses on the rationalizing outcomes associated with the target's personal goals. Like with legitimating tactics, there a fewer scenarios in which these tactics apply. Collaboration tactics offer the target assistance in achieving the requested outcome. These are similar to exchange tactics except that the exchange is directly related to accomplishing the persuader's goal. This tactic is helpful for situations where limited resources or knowhow have determined the response of the target. Personal appeals, similar to emotional appeals, play on the personal connection and friendship between the target and the persuader to illicit support. Personal appeals will only be effective when the target's loyalty to or friendship with the persuader is strong.

Applications

Interpersonal influence tactics such as those reviewed by Lee et al. (2017) and Jensen (2007) can be used for a number of applications. Applications of interpersonal influence that are most studied are in the realms of business and politics. In business, interpersonal influence is often described as a "soft skill" (Riggio, 2013). While "hard skills" like analyzing, planning and strategizing are important for business, "soft skills" like motivating employees, building working relationships, and persuading others are equally important if not more so (Riggio, 2013). The emphasis and success of various interpersonal tactics will vary from business to business and from culture to culture. For example, in Chinese culture, ganqing is a key component of Chinese interpersonal relationships (Barnes, Leonidou, Siu & Leonidou, 2015). The term can be defined as enduring emotional commitment, and it is valued in business for building trusting, reliable relationships. Barnes et al. (2015) found that international companies were more likely to build successful relationships with Chinese companies when they practiced cultivating ganqing. Tactics presented in Lee et al. (2017) that have an element of reliance on a personal relationship (e.g., collaboration tactics and personal appeals) may be highly useful for persuading others in this context.

The political realm is another place where interpersonal influence plays a role. Politicians must be able to reach a consensus on issues with complex logistical, financial, legal, and moral ramification. As with business, there is often no single approach that will result in the optimized satisfaction for all parties involved. Instead, politicians must convince others that their way is the right way by effectively leveraging their interpersonal influence.

The study by Jensen (2007) sought to understand how politicians used personal influence in decision-making. While Jensen (2007) points out that there are many avenues for studying decision-making in the political sphere (e.g., rational choice approach or specific governmental settings), interpersonal influence can be central to shifts in consensus. In the study, proceedings from two policy conferences were assessed for interpersonal influence tactics. Additionally, participants completed surveys after the conference of the tactics they have experienced and used.

The study found that rational persuasion was reported as the most experienced tactic and the second-most used tactic. This form of influence was demonstrated in the conference proceedings as the most successful tactic for influencing decisions on current, immediate topics. However, it was found to be less effective for visioning exercises (used to determine and define future objectives). Jensen (2007) speculated that the intangibility of the non-immediate ideas made a rational approach less appropriate. Besides rational persuasion, the other highly used tactics were inspirational appeals. These were reported as the second most experienced tactic and the most used tactic. Furthermore, emotional appeals were the most successful tactics for both influencing current, immediate decisions and for visioning exercises. Jensen (2007) concludes that convincing others in the realm of politics is "part art and part science," emphasizing that successful interpersonal influence often requires multiple tactics.

Viewpoints

Information and communication technologies have facilitated a move away from face-to-face interaction and toward virtual interactions. The physical distances that technology places between individuals has changed how interpersonal influence is wielded in cyberspace. Opportunities for communication have increased since people can now be reached through e-mail and other communication platforms. Even with companies or organizations that primarily use face-to-face interaction, virtual avenues are exploited more and more. There are even companies and organizations that are built entirely on digital platforms with no need for face-to-face communication.

A study by Wadsworth & Blanchard (2015) investigated what interpersonal influence tactics are used by members of a virtual team and how these tactics resemble or differ from tactics used by individuals in face-to-face scenarios. In their review of the literature, they found evidence that authority is ambiguous in virtual teams, implying that tactics relying on established hierarchies would be less successful than with teams that had more face-to-face interactions. However, this also suggested that the lack of established authority would result in more attempts at interpersonal influence since all members would feel empowered to accomplish a company goal using their own strategies. Additionally, Wadsworth & Blanchard (2015) point out that new interpersonal influence tactics have emerged through studying virtual teams. One of these tactics, described by Steizel and Rimbau-Gilabert (2013), is intermediation. Intermediation is a process through which a team member with less authority convinces a member with higher status to influence an even higher-level member. While this tactic is used in situations where there is an established hierarchy, the virtual setting allows lower level team members improved access to those above them, allowing for a type of knock-on influence to take place.

In their study, Wadsworth and Blanchard (2015) found that five of the tactics commonly used in face-to-face interpersonal influence were also used in the virtual workplace. These tactics were assertiveness, legitimating, rational persuasion, consultation, and personal appeals. The way in which these tactics were implemented, however, were different from face-to-face interactions Examples of these implementations included CCing superiors in messages to legitimate the sender's position to the target. Using all caps in the subject line demonstrated assertiveness, and arguments using rational persuasion could be backed up by using links to documentation or by changing/highlighting sections to making relevant points stand out in a text. The virtual environment provided new ways to implement consultation, such as programs that allow multiple people to edit a document or electronic polls to elicit responses on a topic. Personal appeals relied on perceptions of member friendliness, which was sometimes supplemented by the use of emojis.

Wadsworth and Blanchard (2015) also identified a new category of tactics, which they call ambiguity reduction. In ambiguity reduction, the task is clarified to help the target understand exactly what is expected. While they suspect this category is not unique to the digital environment, Wadsworth and Blanchard (2015) noted that it was very prevalent in virtual space. They found evidence of this tactic being implemented in three main ways. The first was through information sharing. This differs from rational persuasion in that instead of presenting an argument, the persuader provides the information required to complete the task, thereby reducing ambiguity. In this sense, it is more similar to the collaboration tactic presented in Lee et al. (2017). The second way ambiguity reduction was implemented was through creating accountability. Once a decision is made, accountability for implementing the decision is delegated, reducing ambiguity of how the task will get done. This delegation does not involve convincing anyone or changing anyone's mind, but instead relies on asking members directly to verbalize non-verbal cues of willingness that would have been present in a face-to-face environment. The third way of implementing ambiguity tactics was through providing examples. This tactic, like information sharing, makes it easier for the target to comply by increasing clarity.

Additional interpersonal influence tactics are bound to emerge with the spread and evolution of information and communication technologies. Future research on interpersonal influence in virtual, digital spaces will improve understanding of new tactics being employed to persuade others and how these tactics are implemented.

Bibliography

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