3 Types of Persuasive Devices

If your teacher has asked you to prepare a persuasive speech or essay, you must use different types of persuasive devices or risk failing. As a tutor, explaining the types of persuasive devices is one of the first things I do when helping my students.

But what are persuasive devices? They are strategies that help make your point more convincing. While many specific strategies exist, they can be placed into 1 of 3 groups or types of persuasive devices.

Make your persuasive speech or essay better by including all 3 types of devices.

Appeals to Emotions

When you appeal to your audience’s emotions, you want them to feel a particular way. For example, you may want them to feel sad and angry that Orcas are being held captive. Some specific persuasive devices used to appeal to emotions include:

1. Emotive Language – e.g., appalling conditions, shook in terror, glared defiantly
2. Addressing the Reader – e.g., you wouldn’t like being caged
3. Strong Modality – e.g., we must stop this

Appeals to Reason

When you appeal to reason, you present your stance as logical and rational. In addition to structuring your case as at least 3 compelling reasons (e.g., 1 per paragraph), each reason should contain specific persuasive techniques. Some specific persuasive devices that appeal to reason are:

1. Examples – e.g., in 1991, 3 orcas drowned their trainer at SeaWorld
2. Expertise – e.g., experts claim this aggression was due to years of abuse
3. Statistics – e.g., there are at least 55 orcas helped in captivity

Appeals to Values

When you appeal to values, you influence how your audience interprets and evaluates things. Common values include survival, freedom, equality, responsibility, truth, justice, connection, compassion, duty of care, and well-being. For example:

1. Rhetorical questions – e.g., if you wouldn’t like to live in a cage, isn’t it wrong to treat orcas this way?
2. Value statements – e.g., it wrong to torture orcas just so we are entertained
3. Authoritative statements – e.g., –  mental distress can have dire consequences