The Art and Science of Manipulative Language
By Viviana Masia
How does the brain handle speech that is intended to mislead—in advertising, in political rhetoric, and even in ordinary conversation?
This Article From Issue
September-October 2022
Volume 110, Number 5
Page 300
We human beings, as homines loquentes, rely on verbal language to carry out many functions: to make ourselves understood, to learn about facts or ideas, to spread cultural values, and to induce people to do what we want them to do—that is, to manipulate other people.
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- Human communication takes place on several levels at once: not just speech, gestures, and body language, but also messages that are implied but not explicitly uttered in words.
- The implicit level of communication can be a particularly effective channel for leading the recipients of a message to act or think in a specific way without directly questioning it.
- By learning to spot implied messages in various forms of discourse, recipients gain the ability to examine such messages directly and thereby avoid being manipulated by them.
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