Inherent Barriers

If there is anything, anywhere that anyone is not currently doing, the one single reason that it’s not being done is: there’s a reason.

There are many reasons not to do something and as far as your paper and purpose go, these reasons are you inherent barriers. In other words, your job is to overcome any reason that your audience may have to not do whatever it is that you want them to do.

Want an example? Okay. Say you want your snowmobiling audience to not die in avalanches. What are the reasons they might? First, they might not be aware of the danger. How could you overcome that IB? Tell them about it. Maybe describe how to read terrain and snow conditions, how to watch the weather, and how to drive carefully. Maybe they just don’t care, they’re willing to run the risk of avalanche in order to get the first tracks up and down that steep powder. How do you get over that? Make them care. They might change their minds if they knew what it feels like when you get buried by a thousand pounds of snow, or if they knew what their chances of rescue and survival they had. Get the idea?

PROCCESS:

  1. If you want to overcome inherent barriers, you first have to know what they are. Take a minute (or three) to brainstorm and come up with as many as you can. Ask for others’ input. Think specifically about your audiences’ values and ways of thinking. Ask people why they don’t do whatever. Plan to deal with all the important barriers, at least, in your paper.
  2. Brainstorm up some ideas for how to overcome the IB’s. What would change their minds? What information do they lack? What do they need to care more about? What do they need to care less about? Again, ask for help. You can’t possibly think of all the answers alone. Save yourself time and effort. Do a better job and learn more in the process.
  3. Don’t finish up your brainstorm list and call it done. You’ll probably think of more good ideas as you write.

This should be obvious, but you if everyone’s already doing something (like breathing oxygen—we’re all addicted), then it’s not a valid persuasive purpose. I suspect the reason some students write papers on topics with no inherent barriers is so they can recycle a paper from their last English class or maybe chemistry. (Then again, you could always adjust your audience—dead people aren’t breathing.)

If you can’t overcome even one of your important inherent barriers (and if you can’t overcome it, that makes it an important one), then you can’t succeed at your paper. Don’t give up too quickly, of course; you may find a way. But if it really can’t be done, then you should adjust your purpose (easiest) or audience, or change topics. See why this is an important process to go through early?

Do you need an example of why you have to overcome all of your readers’ inherent barriers? Say you want your readers, who are all under water, to breathe oxygen. It’s great stuff, you tell them. It’ll make them feel better, look better, live longer. It’ll help them get more dates, earn better grades, and be generally more successful. They even want to breathe it—they’d give anything for just a little bit of it. They’re also surrounded by oxygen, and it’s free. The one single problem is that troublesome little molecular bond that the oxygen has with hydrogen (H2O). No matter how bad they may want to breathe that oxygen, they won’t and can’t do it. That one little inherent barrier changes everything. Don’t choose a topic like that.

Other invalid purposes:

  • We should not use nuclear weapons (duh)
  • We should reintroduce wolves into Yellowstone Park (already done)
  • Don’t stick your finger in your eye or the light socket

On the other hand, purposes with weak inherent barriers can be real winners. This means that there are reasons that certain people aren’t already doing what you’d like them to do, but maybe inside they really want to. They just need a little help. Maybe they just need a little information or encouragement.

Examples of easy everybody-wins purposes:

  • Follow these simple steps to raise your child’s self esteem
  • What you need to know to avoid dying in an avalanche
  • How a trust can save you over 75% on your annual IRS bill
  • Anything that everyone wants to do, but just doesn’t know how

Finally, learn to recognize the really tough inherent barriers. Apathy is often caused by ignorance, but sometimes you don’t have the information to cure it (or maybe that information simply doesn’t exist).

Examples of nearly impossible inherent barriers:

  • Large quantities of toll painting displayed in your home heightens children’s artistic abilities
  • How to increase your own attractiveness through medieval torture
  • You can be paid for laying in bed: the injuries that pay out top workman’s comp benefits

Focussing on Inherent Barriers also helps you to write an effective paper because it forces you to focus on your readers’ needs instead of simply rambling on with whatever comes into your head. All of your ideas also become more interesting when you put it in context of your readers’ interests.