Robert Cialdini Undercover: Used Car Lots, Influence and Unity

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Robert Cialdini was born in April 1945 and built an elite academic record: a bachelor of science from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in 1967, a PhD in social psychology from the University of North Carolina in 1970, postgraduate training at Columbia University, and visiting appointments at Ohio State, UC Santa Cruz, the Annenberg School and Stanford's Graduate School of Business. He became Regents Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Marketing at Arizona State University. Convinced that lab studies of college students paid in course credit could not capture real persuasion, he spent three years undercover, answering newspaper ads and sitting through training programs at used car lots, telemarketing centers and fundraising organizations. The result was his 1984 book Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, which named six principles: reciprocity, commitment and consistency, social proof, authority, liking and scarcity.

Influence sold more than five million copies in 41 languages and was listed by Fortune among its 75 smartest business books, and his books overall have sold more than seven million copies in 44 languages, including Yes! and The Small Big. More than 30 years after his first framework, his 2016 book Pre-Suasion added a seventh principle, unity, the power of shared identity. His expertise then moved into politics: he was hired with other behavioral scientists for Barack Obama's 2012 campaign and advised early in Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign. His name also appeared on a leaked membership list for Dialog, a secretive society founded by Peter Thiel.

• Charities that tuck free personalized return address labels into donation requests use reciprocity to create a sense of debt.
• A car salesman's line that another couple is coming back with financing is the episode's example of manufactured scarcity.
• Unity differs from liking by resting on deep shared identity such as family, ethnicity or political affiliation rather than surface affinity.
• Asked about a campaign still underway, he said it was his policy not to discuss ongoing campaigns because the emotions are too deep.
• The Society for Personality and Social Psychology created the Robert B. Cialdini Prize for field research, and in April 2019 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences.