...the next step should probably be establishing this person’s moral beliefs/what they want to see in the world (i.e. if they will find meaning in contributing to the problem of global health, animals, long termism etc). What does the person value now, and how is this understanding tied to their sense of identity?
This actually reminds me of a technique that’s used in political campaigning.
Back in my pre-EA days, my husband and I were involved with a local political party. People making campaign calls etc. were trained to find something the person they were speaking to valued, and then tie that to one of the party policies. E.g. “oh, you care about child poverty? Our MPs are passionate about that too! We’re working on this policy/proposal etc.”
The idea was to frame voting for the party as a natural extension of the person’s own values: as something they might want to do, rather than as something we were trying to persuade them to do. It can come across a bit scungy/manipulative if the tone isn’t just right, but it seemed to be pretty effective overall.
I don’t know how common the approach is outside of that particular political party, but it seems likely to be a more widespread campaign technique. There’s definitely some precedent for the approach, in any case.
But yeah, I definitely would feel a bit manipulative if I didn’t feel like I knew the person properly—I want to present to them ideas that I think they’d really engage with and would interest them, rather than giving them the impression I’m trying to force a viewpoint on them
This actually reminds me of a technique that’s used in political campaigning.
Back in my pre-EA days, my husband and I were involved with a local political party. People making campaign calls etc. were trained to find something the person they were speaking to valued, and then tie that to one of the party policies. E.g. “oh, you care about child poverty? Our MPs are passionate about that too! We’re working on this policy/proposal etc.”
The idea was to frame voting for the party as a natural extension of the person’s own values: as something they might want to do, rather than as something we were trying to persuade them to do. It can come across a bit scungy/manipulative if the tone isn’t just right, but it seemed to be pretty effective overall.
I don’t know how common the approach is outside of that particular political party, but it seems likely to be a more widespread campaign technique. There’s definitely some precedent for the approach, in any case.
Ahh that’s really interesting to know!
But yeah, I definitely would feel a bit manipulative if I didn’t feel like I knew the person properly—I want to present to them ideas that I think they’d really engage with and would interest them, rather than giving them the impression I’m trying to force a viewpoint on them