Explores whether response scale ambiguity determines the relative impact of persuasive arguments and social comparison processes. Describes two experiments which demonstrate that response scale ambiguity influences the interpretation of choice shift processes. (MM)

Describes the decision-making process, focusing on the central importance of foreclosed opportunities. Offers a brief history and explanation of the "opportunity cost" approach to the evaluation of contemplated actions. Explores the applications of opportunity cost theory to counterplan argumentation, focusing on issues of counterplan…

Discusses how technical communicators can get their clients to participate in case studies (for use in marketing the technical communicator's services) by analyzing the case study strategy, selecting appropriate clients, understanding their concerns, and developing a professional presentation. (RS)

Discusses a six-step method for writing "customer stories"--a form of promotional writing that highlights the practical benefits of the product a company develops, markets, and supports. (RS)

Advises how to improve sales success by defining selling as the management of buying. Suggests changing one's approach from selling to helping people buy, by understanding customers' point of view. (SK)

Examines the potential of the inoculation message strategy to deflect the persuasiveness of comparative advertisements. Indicates modest potential for inoculation, confirming that inoculation pretreatments confer resistance to a comparative ad's influence on consumer attitudes, especially on behalf of high-involving products. (SR)

Offers a historical perspective on the problems that plague policy debate. Reviews the recent evolution of competitive intercollegiate debate. Draws four conclusions from the analysis and makes suggestions for the future of debate. (PRA)

Stresses the importance of students having the opportunity to engage in policy debate, and illustrates its value. Offers a brief history of the demise of policy debate, and suggests having the National Debate Tournament and the Fall Cross Examination Debate Association debate the same topic to reverse the trend. (PRA)

Ponders the definition of "composition research." Discusses research, inquiry paradigms, teacher research, meta-analysis, and other forms. Debates whether, from an agonistic standpoint, the conflicting meanings of composition research can be reduced to competing ways of knowing or competing modes of inquiry. (PRA)

Focuses on the dangers inherent in the "bureaucratic" mindset that can eliminate the bases for constructive argument. Claims a dramatistic perspective on argument counters this danger and aids in the alteration of frames of reference, simultaneously combating the bureaucratic mindset and increasing the chance for constructive change in…

Explicates George Campbell's theory of persuasion as presented in his "Philosophy of Rhetoric." Suggests that what is truly striking about his theory of persuasion is its remarkable coherence, coherence that comes into view through attention to the three most important, related terms--the sentiments, passions, and dispositions. (CR)

Contributes to scholarship on the rhetorical nature of human agency. Examines in detail a concert by Nicolo Paganini, the 19th-century violinist whose striking expressive force functioned rhetorically to expand ideas concerning music and human agency and to evoke a unique sense of "communitas" by embodying the ideals of the Romantic era.…

Discusses the ability and desirability of debate critics altering decisional filters on activities occurring in the round. States that research on paradigms suggests that a critic must adopt a paradigm, but questions this by suggesting instead that decision-making paradigms can be transient. Summarizes specific paradigms, critiques each paradigm,…

Discusses criteria for judging space/time cases in parliamentary debate and comments on the controversy with regard to issues of appropriateness and adjudication. Presents four short responses to the points raised in this article. (PA)

Finds that the subjective probability model continues to provide some degree of prediction for beliefs (of an individual for circumstances of a single event with multiple causes) prior to the exposure to a message, but that after exposure to a persuasive message, the model did not maintain the same level of accuracy of prediction. Offers several…