strategies for Organizing Persuasive Messages 17.5 405
Here’s how a persuasive speech could be organized using a cause-and-effect
strategy:
I. There is high uncertainty about whether interest rates will increase or
decrease. (cause)
II. Money markets are unstable in Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin
America. (cause)
III. There has been a rise in unemployment. (cause)
IV. In the late 1920s in the United States, these three conditions were
followed by a stock-market crash. They will likely cause another crash
today. To avoid losing money, you should decrease the amount of
money you have invested in stocks. (effect)
The challenge in using a cause-and-effect organizational strategy is to prove that
one event caused another. Earlier, we noted the causal fallacy (“after this, therefore
because of this,” or post hoc, ergo propter hoc). Simply because two events occurred
at the same time or in close succession does not prove that there is a cause-and-
effect relationship. Suppose a study found that many people who spend several
hours a day on the Internet are also psychologically depressed. This finding does
not necessarily prove that Internet use causes depression—other factors could have
caused the depression. Perhaps people who are depressed are more likely to use
the Internet because they find comfort and security in using technology.
The Motivated Sequence
The motivated sequence is a five-step organizational plan that has proved
successful for several decades. Developed by Alan Monroe, this simple yet effective
strategy for organizing speeches incorporates principles that have been confirmed
by research and practical experience.^38 Based on the problem– solution pattern, it
also uses the cognitive dissonance approach that we discussed in Chapter 16: First,
disturb your listeners; then point them toward the specific change you want them
to adopt. The five steps are attention, need, satisfaction, visualization, and action.
- attention. Your first goal is to get your listeners’ attention. In Chapter 10, we
discussed specific attention-catching methods of beginning a speech. Remember
the particular benefits of using a personal or hypothetical example, a startling
statement, an unusual statistic, a rhetorical question, or a well-worded analogy.
The attention step is, in essence, the introduction to your speech.
Heather caught listeners’ attention at the start of her award-winning
speech “End the Use of Child Soldiers”* with this riveting introduction:
When 12-year-old Ishmael Beah left his village in Sierra Leone to
perform in a talent show in a town just a few miles away, he had no
- Heather Zupanic, “End the Use of Child Soldiers,” Speech excerpts in “The Motivated
Sequence” section are from Winning Orations 2009, Mankato, MN; Interstate Oratorical
Association, 2009. Reprinted with permission.