A Current Research On Applying Persuasion Theory To English Public Speaking Of Non-English Majors

In college English speech, or even at all levels of English speech contest, theauthor always feels the students’ speech writing lack of substantive persuasion andappeal. Based on this feeling, the researchers surveyed60non-English majorsophomores. And use the students’ speech writing to analysis the findings. It turnedout that the consciousness of using three appeals is not enough and when studentsprepared for their speech. And they don’t know how to use appeals. These factorslead to Students cannot make full use of the appeals to achieve the purpose ofpersuading and infection in English speech.The effective of English Speech largely depends on the use of ethos, pathos andlogos. Three appeals have different implementation methods in speech discourse. Theproper use of these methods reflects rhetoric requirements of English speech.However, from questionnaire and speech discourse analysis, the rhetoric skills whichthe students used in English speech are thin. They cannot be flexible or fully use theappeals. Their speeches have low rhetoric value and weakness effectiveness.Based on the above circumstances, the author of this study resolves thefollowing three research questions:1) Do second year English major students often use persuasion theory to improve theeffect of speech, if they do, what kind of theory is most widely used?2) Is it feasible that Aristotle persuasion theory can be used to improve speech writingskills?3) What are the difficulties when students use these appeals?Research method of this thesis is a combination of quantitative and qualitative.Firstly, the researchers surveyed60non-English major sophomores throughquestionnaire, so as to understand the students’ application of Aristotle’s persuasiontheory. The author use SPSS statistical software to analyze the experimental data.Besides,10students of the experimental group accepted the author’s groupinterviews which to understand what the difficulties of the students use theory are.Through analyzing the data, the author draws the conclusion as follows:Firstly, non-English major sophomores often use persuasion theory to improvethe effect of speech. But more students depend on the pathos, while ignoring theethos and logos.Secondly, Aristotle’s persuasion theory plays a vital part in improving students’ English speech.Thirdly, Students depend too much on their own personal experience during English speech.