{"id":5308,"date":"2017-06-02T23:19:42","date_gmt":"2017-06-02T22:19:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kennethsorensen.dk\/?p=5308\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T16:19:37","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T15:19:37","slug":"the-technique-of-evocative-words","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kennethsorensen.dk\/en\/the-technique-of-evocative-words\/","title":{"rendered":"The Technique of Evocative Words"},"content":{"rendered":"

The persuasive power of advertising is well known, but the same means can be used to evoke positive psychological qualities. Cards with printed positive words can create a beneficial atmosphere in many places.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n
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By Roberto Assagioli, MD<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/b> Source: Psychosynthesis Research Foundation Issue No. 25<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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There are numerous techniques that allow us to act on our psyche (and on that of others) in order to modify and even transform it. One of them is simple, easy to apply, and at the same time very effective. It involves the use of evocative words and is based on well-substantiated facts about the psyche.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The fundamental fact upon which this technique is based is the receptivity, plasticity, or malleability of one’s psyche, which can be compared to a practically limitless series of unexposed photographic frames that are continually being impressed by internal and external stimuli.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

For the present, let us concern ourselves with the effects of external stimuli. The impressions that reach us from the environment exert a strong influence on the psyche.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

They modify it and continually condition it, very often in a harmful way. We live in a septic psychic climate or atmosphere by which we are constantly being contaminated. No special demonstration of this is necessary; present-day life offers clear and often dramatic proof of it. And yet, we expose ourselves and others to these influences with a careless disregard and nonchalance which a future civilization will deem inconceivable, and symptomatic of our psychological “stone age.” But effective and easily applied means exist both for safeguarding us from these harmful influences and for neutralizing their effects. One of them consists in consciously exposing ourselves to beneficent and constructive stimuli and influences.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The effectiveness of words<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n

Those words have their effects on our mood and ideas do not require demonstration. Words are symbols that not only indicate or point out objects or psychic facts, but that also possess the power of stimulating and arousing activity associated with them. They “evoke” and make operative the meanings and <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span>Id\u00e9e-forces<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/i> that they signify. This process follows certain laws of which the principal ones are:<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

I. Every idea or image tends to produce the state of mind, the physical state, and the acts that correspond to it.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

II. Attention and repetition reinforce the effectiveness of the idea or image.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

III. The effects of the idea or image, ie, the activation of that which it signifies, are produced without our being aware of them. Baudoin (1920) called this the “law of subconscious teleology.”<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Recent research (Zajonc, 1970) has shown that the more repetitive perception of an unfamiliar stimulus word, even a non-valued nonsense syllable, is enough to increase one’s attraction to that stimulus. Other studies indicate that persuasion is more effective if it aims to foster opinion in a positive direction rather than in a negative one.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n