February 21, 2004

Influence: the Psychology of Persuasion

This user's manual for survival in a hard-sell, high-pressure society is on my top-ten list of non-fiction books. How do door-to-door salespeople, marketers, car dealers, strangers, con artists, and cult leaders convince people to hand over their money or time seemingly against their will? The author studied this phenomenon and came up with six methods that other people use to influence you to do things that aren't necessarily in your best interest: reciprocity, scarcity, liking, authority, social proof, and commitment/consistency. Filled with wonderfully lucid examples and anecdotes, Influence is not only profoundly insightful, it's a lot of fun to read.