The art and science of persuasion

Comm Arts professor helps students hone public service messages

In this day and age, persuasive tactics are everywhere we look — even in the classroom.

For six years, James Dillard, professor of communication arts, has been giving his students hands-on learning experience with persuasive messages through his class, Theory and Practice of Persuasion.

People come into contact with persuasive tactics on a daily basis through advertising, political campaigns and public service announcements, which makes it important to know how to interpret them, he says.

“This class tries to show how to be a better and more effective consumer of persuasion messages. If people see how campaigns work on the inside, they can better process the information for themselves,” Dillard says. “Having the students conduct personal campaigns is the best way to make it come alive and put the theories into practice.”

First, the class as a whole decides on the greater social issue they will focus on during the semester. Students then form groups of up to three people to focus their campaigns.

Health has been a common broad topic that has sprouted campaigns about blood donation, water intake, sexual health, binge drinking and effects of the environment.

Junior Melissa Delman focused her campaign on encouraging women to perform monthly self-breast examinations.

“We chose that topic because in my group one of the girl’s mom had died of breast cancer, so it was a lot more personal of a cause,” she says. “Having a social issue related to something personal really encouraged us.”

Delman and her group members focused their attention on young campus women by giving short seminars at Elizabeth Waters Residence Hall and at a sorority house. They also utilized the Campus Women’s Center for information.

“Students often hook up with an existing agency and collaborate with them to do a greater good,” Dillard says. “Some students contact [University Health Services] when they are doing topics that are campus-related health topics, such as binge drinking or sexual health.”

Reaching out to the community is an important part of this class. Students are frequently the targeted group but campaigns have been aimed at groups all over the city, Dillard says.

Senior Andrea Tollefson focused her campaign on local businesses.

“My campaign concerned promoting soy protein health benefits for women,” she says. “I arranged face-to-face lunchtime meetings with women at several Madison- area businesses. A lot of businesses want to do wellness seminars, so they were happy to help me out.”

The class has a service-learning component, which enabled it to receive a grant from the Morgridge Center for Public Service. Each group gets about $75 for their campaigns, depending on how many groups are in the class.

“The groups really benefit from having a budget,” Dillard says. “Being funded helps make the city a better place and gives the campaigns more punch.”

But a lot of work goes into the campaign before the students even think about ways to spend the money. Research is the building block of the entire process.

“You really need to be focused. There is no way to anticipate the magnitude of the campaign until you are in it,” Delman says. “You have to want to put in the time and care about the topic.”

Tollefson agrees the class can be hectic at times but was overall very rewarding.

“[Comm Arts 368] is a good class because it’s so applicable,” she says. “Many classes in Com Arts are mostly theory based. This is so hands-on and probably about as similar to the real world as you can get in a 15-week class.”

Dillard says the students impress him each year with their creativity in campaigns and their ability to transfer the skills and ideas learned in class to the real world.

“The campaign process shows you how to think theoretically, not to just talk but to really do something to make the world better,” Dillard says.

Despite the smaller focus of her campaign, Delman believes it was worthwhile not only to herself but to the community.

“We took a big issue and brought it down to something smaller and easier to change in a woman’s life,” she says. “This might not have been a major life-changing event for the women we spoke to but if we could get a few more women concerned about doing self-exams it was worthwhile.”