Persuasion: Can We Be Doing The Opposite

One of the reasons to follow TED talks is to gleam presentation ideas. But often the talks themselves are very interesting and relevant to something I am thinking about.

Often it is said that presentations are made for two reasons only. One reason is to inform and the other reason is to persuade. Put the second reason in back of you mind and hold it there for about 20 minutes for now.

The presentation by Dan Ariely called Are We In Control Of Our Decisions is not only humorous but shockingly interesting in the fact that he makes some very good points about how irrational our decision making can be if looked at more closely.



While watching this I started wondering about presentations and the affect of our presentations driving people to buy into our idea or dislike it. Or more concisely ..... persuasion.

Perhaps it is not good enough to ask is our presentation persuasive or unpersuasive but more is it actually persuasive in the in the wrong direction?

I am unclear on examples that apply to my situations at this time but it seems that being persuasive is harder if you have more than two options to explain to someone.