Five Steps are used when creating an effective argumentative strategy:
- Challenging your assumptions. What you initially think of the situation just might be wrong.
- Conducting research, and/or brainstorming, and/or analysis to discover as many potential issues on a claim that time will allow.
- Narrowing potential issues by finding the admitted issues, considering the real issues, and selecting the ultimate issues.
- Turning the ultimate issues from questions into statements and advancing these statements as the contentions for your advocated position.
- Organizing your contentions into a case by making them the center of the debate on the claim and arguing them using evidence and reasoning.
Each day people make a variety of claims concerning their beliefs about people, events, and things in their life. We live in a world where opinions and assertions of all types are made in just about every environment we enter. We engage in arguments with others over a variety of topics and subjects.
Yet, without the requirement that a stand on a claim be justified, our arguments would come down to a "Yes, it is," "No it isn't" squabble. The goal of any arguer, from the courtroom to the boardroom to any legislative body to writing an argumentative essay in college, is to present the very best arguments to defend their stand on a claim.
Effective argumentation allows advocates to present reasonable and responsible arguments in defense of the stand they are advocating. As James Sawyer writes,
“Meaningful argumentative communication requires that the argument be grounded upon substantive items or issues, the very foundation of rational argumentative encounters. By carefully examining what you already know through brainstorming and analysis, and then by conducting specific research, you will discover the major issues."
Persuasive communication is the process through which people attempt to influence the beliefs or actions of others. At one time or another all of us have tried to persuade someone to do something, and we have all met with varying degrees of success. For persuasive communication to be effective, certain principles must be followed or the attempt can backfire and cause more resistance to engaging in the target behavior.
Since Aristotle recorded his principles of persuasion in the Rhetoric, humans have attempted to define and refine the principles of successful influence. Persuasion has been studied as an art for most of human history.
As Dr. Marvin Glock of Cornell University puts it,
“In seeking the cooperation of other people, the basic steps are to define a goal, to obtain others’ agreement to work toward that goal, and to provide the support and revisions needed during the project to keep it moving toward your desired end goal.”
