Page 58 - The Power to Change Anything

Change the Way You Change Minds 47

HONEST, SNAKES ARE OUR FRIENDS!

With the stage set, Dr. Bandura and his team were ready to
explore influence techniques. They could now study what
it takes to convince people that some of their views are
unfounded—thus propelling them to change their behavior.
Success would be achieved when subjects could sit with a six-
foot red-tailed boa constrictor draped across their lap. How hard
could that be?
None of the subjects would so much as enter the room con-
taining a snake in a covered terrarium.
Bandura did not start with the method most of us would
have chosen—he did not lecture. When it comes to con-
fronting people who hold unrealistic fears (or just plain stupid
ideas), we’ve all done it. We figure that words, well chosen and
expertly delivered, can set the record straight. Bandura knew
that the best way to overcome a phobia is to confront what one
fears and then to be enabled to exercise control over it, but he
also recognized that lectures and coercion would only reinforce
the phobic’s dread and inability to act.
It turns out that phobics typically remain phobics because
they rarely disconfirm their unfounded fears by approaching
them head-on. Since lectures don’t work with phobics and you
can’t get them to conquer their fear through personal experi-
ence, you have to find something in between—something
more than words and less than personal action. This “in be-
tween” thing turns out to be one of the most highly valued tools
in any influence genius’s arsenal. It’s referred to as vicarious
experience.
Here’s how vicarious experience works. When you expose
subjects to other people who are demonstrating a vital be-
havior, the subjects learn from the surrogate’s successes and fail-
ures. Watching others in action is the next best thing to expe-
riencing something on your own. It’s also far safer than, say,