Using experimental methods to assess the persuasiveness of corporations' trust-repair discourse strategies

Persuasion and manipulation have been central concerns of Critical Discourse Analysis since its beginnings (e.g. Hart 2014; Van Dijk 1996). Traditionally, the persuasive and manipulative potential of texts has been explored by means of interpretive analysis. However, the actual perlocutionary effects of the strategies identified through this process are rarely (if ever) evaluated empirically. This paper aims to show that experimental techniques can usefully complement traditional discourse analysis methods by allowing researchers to test hypotheses about the persuasiveness of discursive strategies, and thus gain new and empirically-grounded insights into the dynamics of social influence, power, and ideology.The results of two experiments are presented. Using Fuoli and Paradis’ (2014) model of trust-repair discourse as a point of departure, the studies aim to assess the persuasiveness of different trust-repair strategies deployed by corporations after being publicly accused of incompetence or wrongdoing. In experiment 1, apology and denial strategies are compared by means of a scenario-based questionnaire. 448 subjects took part in the experiment. Linear regression analyses reveal that denial is more effective than apology in repairing trust after integrity-based violations, i.e. when a company is accused of having intentionally deceived the public, and that individual assumptions about corporations in general significantly affect context-specific assessments.Experiment 2 uses a forced-choice, within-subjects design to investigate whether simple declarative assertions (e.g. ‘this will not happen again’) are perceived as more credible than epistemically modalized statements (e.g. ‘we believe that this will not happen again’), and in what circumstances. 29 participants took part in the experiment. The results, which were analyzed using mixed-effects logistic regression analysis, indicate that the type of trust violation as well as the content of the statement significantly affect participants’ choices. Unmodalized statements are preferred when the company’s ability is questioned and the statement is about the future (cf. example above). Conversely, when the company’s integrity is at stake, assertive statements are preferred when the statement concerns the company’s past behavior (e.g. ‘we have always been honest to our customers’). The results of these experiments shed new light on the discursive dynamics of trust and demonstrate the usefulness of experimental techniques to CDA

Pictorial and multimodal metaphors of DISTRUST in subverted BP logos from Greenpeace’s ‘Behind the logo’ competition

Trust is a valuable relational asset for companies. A high level of public trust can bring a number of benefits to business organizations, including increased customer satisfaction, higher investor confidence, and fewer regulatory restrictions (Barney and Hansen, 1994; García-Marzá, 2005; Ingenhoff and Sommer, 2010; Pirson and Malhotra, 2011). But trust is also a fragile commodity; it takes a long time to build, but just moments to destroy. Episodes of wrongdoing or negligence can generate distrust in a company. Recent history has provided a number of such examples – from Enron and WorldCom in the early 2000s to the more recent BP, FIFA and Volkswagen controversies.What happens when trust is broken? How do we perceive and understand trust- breaking events? How do we communicate distrust? This paper is part of a larger project that investigates the cognitive underpinnings and discursive dynamics of TRUST and DISTRUST, which are still poorly understood (Fuoli and Paradis, 2014). It examines the pictorial and multimodal metaphors (Forceville 1996, 2002; Forceville and Urios-Aparisi, 2009) used by participants in the ‘Behind the logo’ rebranding competition launched online by Greenpeace in the aftermath of BP’s Gulf of Mexico oil spill of 20101. As part of the competition, participants were asked to re-design BP’s sunflower logo to reflect what they thought are the ‘real’ values and principles guiding the company’s behavior. The result is a collection of culture-jammed or ‘subverted’ logos (see e.g. Harold, 2007; Kukuk, 2014; Rumbo, 2002) that capture the widespread feelings of distrust and resentment towards BP after the spill and the controversies that arose from it.The analysis aims to (i) identify and describe the pictorial and multimodal metaphors found in the subverted logos that relate to the concept of DISTRUST, and (ii) uncover regularities in how this construct is conceptualized and understood by the participants in the competition. The identification and analysis of the metaphors follows the criteria outlined by Forceville (1996, 2002). Preliminary results reveal consistent patterns in the way that DISTRUST in BP is conceptualized and expressed, and in how the company portrayed. Common pictorial metaphors found in the corpus include TRUST IS A FRAGILE OBJECT, BEING UNTRUSTWORTHY IS BEING DOUBLE-SIDED, BEING UNTRUSTWORTHY IS HIDING SOMETHING, and UNETHICAL IS DIRTY.In addition to advancing our understanding of the cognitive and discursive dynamics of TRUST and DISTRUST, this paper adds to the literature on pictorial and multimodal metaphor by examining the phenomenon of subvertising, which, to date, has not been systematically investigated

A model of trust-repair discourse

This article proposes a novel theoretical framework for examining trust-repair discourse. The model identifies two fundamental discourse strategies available to the trust-breaker when trust is at stake (i) to engage with and act upon the discourses that represent a potential source of distrust - neutralize the negative, (ii) to communicate a trustworthy discourse identity - emphasize the positive. These strategies are realized in discourse through the use of dialogic engagement and evaluative/affective language, respectively. The ultimate communicative goal of the strategies is that of promoting the addressees' positive (re-)assessment of the speaker's ability, integrity and benevolence. The model is applied to the analysis of the CEO letter published by BP one year after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The analysis has the twofold purpose of demonstrating the viability of the model and determining the discourse strategies deployed by the CEO to repair trust in the company after the accident

Building a trustworthy corporate identity:a corpus-based analysis of stance in annual and corporate social responsibility reports

This article presents a corpus-based analysis of stance in a specialized corpus of annual and corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports. It investigates how companies use stance expressions to construct and promote a positive corporate identity in order to gain the trust of the stakeholder groups that these texts target. The results show that companies profile distinct identities in annual and CSR reports. In annual reports, they use stance resources to portray themselves as unbiased, rational, and competent decision makers. In CSR reports, they present themselves as committed, honest, and caring corporate citizens. These discursive identities are interpreted as strategic self-representations that optimize the persuasive appeal of the reports by addressing the specific expectations of the target readerships. This study sheds some new light on the identity work performed by companies in their public discourse. It also provides novel insights into the impression management strategies used by companies in annual and CSR reports. Finally, it provides both linguists and business communication scholars with a robust descriptive basis for critically assessing financial and CSR reporting

Combining corpus and experimental methods to gain new insights into APPRAISAL in spoken discourse

The mainobjective of this paper is to challenge the treatment of first-person epistemicand evidential complement-taking predicate (CTP) constructions in Martin andWhite’s (2005) appraisal theory,and to offer suggestions for improving the model. Based on empirical evidencefrom a corpus-based analysis and a laboratory experiment, we demonstrate that CTPconstructions do not only serve to expand the dialogic context in which theyoccur, but also to put a lid on alternative views. The paper contributes to the refinement of appraisal as a corpus annotation tool,and provides a practical illustration of the usefulness of combining corpus andexperimental methodsto gain new and robust insights into linguistic phenomena. In appraisal, first-person CTPs such as I think and I believe are classified as instances of dialogic expansion in that they make dialogic space for possiblesubsequent arguments (Martin & White, 2005: 98). They are set in contrast toexpressions of dialogic contraction (e.g.obviously, however, but), which areused in discourse to challenge, resist or reject alternative value positions. Inspoken discourse, however, CTP constructions do not appear to always perform anexpansive function. In (1), for example, Ithink is prosodically unaccented, serving as a starting point for theopinion expressed in the complement clause, which contains an evidential markerwith a falling accent – obviously –signalling a high degree of commitment (Cruttenden, 1997; Kärkkäinen, 2003). (1) B: I think he was \obviously trying to steer us in that direction and sort of A: yes B: dropping hints Martinand White (2005: 103) recognize that the function of engagement expressions "may vary systematically under theinfluence of differentco-textual conditions, and across registers, genres and discourse domains."These conditions, however, are not discussed in detail by the authors, nor havethey been systematically investigated in the literature. In this study, we combinecorpus-based and experimental methods to test the effect of different contextualfactors on the dialogic function of CTP constructions. The study is conducted in twophases. First, an exploratory analysis of CTP constructions in the London-LundCorpus (LLC) of spoken British English is carried out to identify factors thatmay play a role in determining the dialogic force of the constructions. The annotationof CTP constructions in the corpus is performed following Fuoli’s (forthcoming) step-wise method for annotatingappraisal, and is validatedthrough an inter-rater reliability test. Hypotheses derived from the corpusfindings are then tested in a controlled experimental setting. The resultsindicate that CTP constructions not only serve to expand the dialogic contextin which they occur, but may also function to inhibit dialogue. Interlocutorstatus, prosodic marking and the co-occurrence of a contractive marker are shownto have a significant effect on the function of CTP constructions