Request solicitation and semantic evocation of freedom: an evaluation in a computer-mediated communication context.
The "But you are free of..." technique is a compliance procedure which solicits someone to comply with a request by simply telling him that he is free to accept or to refuse the request. This semantic evocation leads to increased compliance with the request. A new evaluation of the generality of this technique was tested in an experiment in which subjects received an anonymous electronic mail which asked them to consult the site of a humanitarian association for children. Analysis showed that, when the semantic evocation of freedom is included in the message, a higher compliance rate was observed than in a situation in which this evocation was omitted.
D000329:Advertising; D003142:Communication; D003201:Computers; D005260:Female; D005610:Freedom; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet / Q000295:instrumentation; D008297:Male; D012660:Semantics