Analyzing the Audience

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Chapter 5

• Analyzing the Audience

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Audience-Centeredness

• Audience-centeredness- Keeping the audience
  foremost in the mind at every step of speech
  preparation and presentation.
• Keep several questions in mind
• To whom am I speaking?
• What do I want them to know, believe, or do as a
  result of my speech?
• What is the most effective way of composing and
  presenting my speech to accomplish this aim?
• The speakers aim is to adjust to the concerns of
  the audience, not to show how much she or he
  knows about a wide variety of issues.

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Your Classmates as an Audience

• Each of your classmates is a real person with
  real ideas, attitudes, and feelings.
• The essence of speechmaking is not to learn a
  role that can be played over and over without
  variation, but to adapt ones ideas to particular
  audiences on particular occasions.
• One key to successful speaking is to consider
  every audience-inside the classroom and out-as
  worthy of your best efforts to communicate your
  knowledge or convictions.

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The Psychology of Audiences

• Egocentrism- The tendency of people to be
  concerned above all with their own values,
  beliefs, and well-being.
• Audiences do not process a speakers message
  exactly as the speaker intends. Auditory
  perception is always selective.
• Every speech contains two messages-the one sent
  by the speaker and the one received by the
  audience.
• Listeners will hear and judge what you say on the
  basis of what they already know and believe.
• You must relate your message to your
  listeners-show how it pertains to them, explain
  why they should care about it as much as you do.

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Demographic Audience Analysis

• Demographic Audience Analysis-Audience analysis
  that focuses on demographic factors such as as
• Age
• Gender (Appeal to communication styles)
• Racial, Ethnic, or Cultural Background
• Religion
• Group Membership
• Two step process
• Identifying the general demographic features of
  your audience.
• Gauging the importance of those features to a
  particular speaking situation.

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Gender

• An astute speaker will be equally attuned to both
  the differences and the similarities between the
  sexes
• Avoid using sexist language, almost any audience
  you address will contain both genders.

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Racial, Ethnic, or Cultural Background

• Recognize that some of your listeners may indeed
  have special racial, ethnic, or cultural
  orientations that bear upon your speech topic.
• Try to determine what those orientations are and
  how they are likely to affect the audiences
  response to your message.
• Adjust your message so it will be as clear,
  suitable, and convincing as possible given the
  diverse backgrounds of your listeners.

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Group Membership

• Group affiliations of your audience may provide
  excellent clues about your listeners interests
  and attitudes.

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Situational Audience Analysis

• Situational Audience Analysis- Audience analysis
  that focuses on situational factors such as
• Size of the audience
• Physical Setting
• Disposition Toward the Topic
• Disposition Toward the Speaker
• Disposition Toward the Occasion

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Size

• The larger the audience, the more formal your
  presentation must be.
• Audience size will have the greatest impact on
  your delivery, but it may also affect your
  language, choice of appeals, and use of visual
  aids.

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Physical Setting

• Do everything you can to control the influence of
  physical setting on your audience.
• Look over the room yourself a few days prior to
  your speaking engagement, for a quick inspection.
  (Temperature, seating arrangements, noise, etc.)
• Dont let yourself be influenced by the poor
  physical setting. If your audience sees that you
  are energetic, alert, and involved with your
  topic, chances are they will forget their
  discomfort.

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Disposition Toward the Topic

• Interest
• One of your tasks will be to assess their
  interest in advance and to adjust your speech
  accordingly.
• If your topic is not likely to generate great
  interest, take special steps to get your
  classmates involved.
• Knowledge
• What is your listeners knowledge about your
  topic?
• If your listeners know little about your topic-
  you will have to talk at a more elementary level.
• If your listeners are well informed about your
  topic, you can take a more technical and detailed
  approach.
• Attitude
• If you know in advance the prevailing attitude
  among members of your audience, you can adjust
  what you say to what your audience needs to hear.

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Disposition Toward the Speaker

• An audiences response to a message is invariably
  colored by their perception of the speaker.
• Establish your ethos!
• The more listeners believe that a speaker has
  their best interests at heart, the more likely
  they are to respond positively to the speakers
  message.

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Disposition Toward the Occasion

• No matter what the situation, listeners have
  fairly definite ideas about the speeches they
  consider appropriate.
• Speakers who seriously violate these expectations
  can almost always upset the audience.
• Audiences expect to hear political speeches in
  Congress, sermons at church, and so forth.
• The occasion will dictate how long a speech
  should be.

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Getting Information About the Audience

• Interviewing
• When properly planned, structured, and conducted,
  it can be a superb way of learning about
  individual members of an audience.
• The drawback is the cost in time and energy.
• Questionnaires

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Questionnaires

• Fixed-alternative questions
• Questions that offer a fixed choice between two
  or more alternatives.
• By limiting the possible responses, such
  questions produce clear, unambiguous answers.
• Do you know what the insanity plea is in the US
  legal system? Yes, No, Not Sure

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Questionnaires

• Scale Questions- questions that require responses
  at fixed intervals along a scale of answers.
• Resembles the fixed-alternative questions, but
  they allow more leeway in responding.
• Do you agree or disagree with the following?
  Expert psychologists can determine with a high
  degree of accuracy whether or not a defendant is
  criminally insane.
• Strongly Agree Mildly Agree Undecided
  Strongly Disagree

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Questionnaires

• Open-ended questions
• Allow respondents to answer however they want.
• If you have worked as a volunteer, do you plan to
  do so again? Why or why not?

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Adapting to the Audience

• Audience Adaptation Before the Speech
• Audience Adaptation During the Speech

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Audience Adaptation Before the Speech

• Assess how your audience is likely to respond to
  what you will say in your speech.
• Adjust what you say to make it as clear,
  appropriate, and convincing as possible.
• You speak on a subject in which you are an
  expert, you may find it hard to put yourself in
  the place of someone who knows little about your
  subject. Step outside your frame of reference and
  see things from another persons point of
  view-successful speakers learn to do this.
• At every point you must anticipate how your
  audience will respond.

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Audience Adaptation During the Speech

• Be mindful of your audiences verbal and
  nonverbal feedback.
• Are you audience members sitting on the edge of
  their chairs, or are they slouching in their
  chairs?