Chapter 1 - Universiteit Twente

General Introduction
include the low-ball procedure (after obtaining a commitment to an offer it is made less
desirable, Burger & Petty, 1981), the that’s-not-all technique (an initial offer is improved
before the target can respond, Burger, 1986; Pollock, Smith, Knowles, & Bruce, 1998),
and the disrupt-then-reframe-technique (a small disruption in the request is followed
by a direct persuasive reframing of the request, Davis & Knowles, 1999; Fennis, Das, &
Pruyn, 2004, 2006).
But how and why do these techniques promote compliance? Recently, Cialdini and
others (e.g., Cialdini, 1993; Cialdini & Goldstein, 2004) have forwarded the principle
of automaticity as the cornerstone of all influence techniques. According to these
scholars, the effectiveness of most techniques hinges on the notion of automaticity or
‘mindlessness’ (Langer, 1992). Instead of carefully scrutinizing the merits of a request
or offer, people appear to respond mindlessly (i.e., with little conscious effort) when
confronted with a social influence technique. Under these conditions of reduced mental
alertness, people are thought to fall back on habit and routine and are prone to employ
‘mental shortcuts’ or simple heuristics for deciding how to act. Use of these heuristics
will generally increase the likelihood of compliance (Cialdini, 1993)
As such, it has been generally assumed that the foot-in-the-door technique is effective
because it mindlessly triggers people’s desire to be or appear consistent with prior
commitments (Burger, 1999). In the example at the beginning of this chapter one
(publicly) declared one’s interest in reading, which rendered it more difficult to decline a
subsequent discount offer of a book club. Apparently one feels committed to and wants
to be consistent with what one has already said. People are also thought to engage in
a self-perception process after seeing themselves agreeing with the initial request, and
apparently infer from this that they are ‘the kind of person to comply with these kinds of
requests.’ For example, stating to a fundraiser that you have a positive attitude toward
charitable giving will likely induce the self-perceived notion that you are the kind of
person that supports charities. This highly salient self-perception is then assumed to
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