Section 1 – Why Persuade?

When your instructor announced on the syllabus or in class that you would be required to give a persuasive speech for this class, what was your reaction? “Oh, good, I’ve got a great idea,” or, “Oh, no!”? For many people, there is something a little uncomfortable about the word “persuasion.” It often gets paired with ideas of seduction, manipulation, force, lack of choice, or inducement as well as more positive concepts such as encouragement, influence, urging, or logical arguments. You might get suspicious if you think someone is trying to persuade you. You might not appreciate someone telling you to change your viewpoints. On the other hand, you might not think you have any beliefs, attitudes, values, or positions that are worth advocating for in front of an audience.

However, if you think of persuasion simply as a formal speech with a purpose of getting people to do something they do not want to do, then you will miss the value of learning persuasion and its accompanying skills of appeal, argument, and logic. Persuasion is something you do every day, in various forms. Convincing a friend to go see the latest movie instead of staying in to watch TV; giving your instructor a reason to give you an extension on an assignment (do not try that for this speech, though!); writing a cover letter and resume and going through an interview for a job—all of these and so many more are examples of persuasion. In fact, it is hard to think of life without the everyday give-and-take of persuasion.

You may also be thinking, “I’ve given an informative speech. What’s the difference?” While this chapter will refer to all of the content of the preceding chapters as it walks you through the steps of composing your persuasive speech, there is a difference. Although your persuasive speech will involve information—probably even as much as in your informative speech—the key difference is the word “change.” Think of it like this:

INFORMATION + CHANGE = PERSUASION

You will be using the information for the purpose of changing something. First, we try to change the audience’s beliefs, attitudes, and actions, and second, possibly the context they act upon. In the next section we will investigate the persuasive act and then move on to the barriers to persuasion.

Section 2 – A Definition of Persuasion

Think of persuasion as a continuum or line going both directions (see Figure 1). Your audience members, either as a group or individually, are sitting somewhere on that line in reference to your central idea statement, or what we are going to call a proposition in this chapter. In your speech you are proposing the truth or validity of an idea, one which the audience may not find true or acceptable. Sometimes the word “claim” is used for proposition or central idea statement in a persuasive speech, because you are claiming an idea is true or an action is valuable.

For example, your proposition might be, “The main cause of climate change is human activity.” In this case you are not denying that natural forces, such as volcanoes, can affect the climate, but you are claiming that climate change is mainly due to pollution and other harmful things humans have done to the environment. To be an effective persuasive speaker, one of your first jobs after coming up with this topic would be to determine where your audience “sits” on the continuum in Figure 1.

+3 means strongly agree to the point of making lifestyle choices to lessen climate change (such as riding a bike instead of driving a car, recycling, eating certain kinds of foods, and advocating for government policy changes).

+2 means agree but not to the point of acting upon it or only acting on it in small ways.

+1 as mildly in favor of your proposition; that is, they think it’s probably true but the issue doesn’t affect them personally.

0 means neutral, no opinion, or feeling too uninformed to make a decision.

-1 means mildly opposed to the proposition but willing to listen to those with whom they disagree.

-2 means disagreement to the point of dismissing the idea pretty quickly.

-3 means strong opposition to the point that the concept of climate change itself is not even listened to or acknowledged as a valid subject .

Since everyone in the audience is somewhere on this line or continuum, persuasion in this case means moving them to the right, somewhere closer to +3. Thinking about persuasion this way has three values:

• You can visualize and quantify where your audience “sits.”
• You can accept the fact that any movement toward +3 or to the right is a win.
• You can see that trying to change an audience from -3 to +3 in one speech is just about impossible. Therefore, you will be able to take a reasonable approach. In this case, if you knew most of the audience was at -2 or -3, your speech would be about the science behind climate change in order to open their minds to its possible existence. However, that audience is not ready to hear about its being caused mainly by humans or what action should be taken to reverse it.

Your instructor may have the class engage in some activity about your proposed topics in order for you to write your proposition in a way that it is more applicable to your audience. For example, you might have a group discussion on the topics or administer surveys to your fellow students. Some topics are so controversial and divisive that trying to persuade about them in class is inappropriate. Your instructor may forbid some topics or steer you in the direction of others.

You might also ask if it is possible to persuade to the negative, for example, to argue against something or try to move the audience to be opposed to something. In this case you would be trying to move your audience to the left on the continuum rather than to the right. Yes, it is possible to do so, but it might confuse the audience. Also, you might want to think in terms of phrasing your proposition so that it is favorable as well as reasonable. For example, “Elderly people should not be licensed to drive” could be replaced with “Drivers over the age of 75 in our state of should be required to pass a vision and health test every two years to renew their drivers’ licenses.” The first one is not clear (what is “elderly?”), reasonable (no license at all?), or positive (based on restriction) in approach. The second is specific, reasonable, doable, and positive.

It should also be added that the proposition is assumed to be controversial. By that is meant that some people in the audience disagree with your proposition or at least have no opinion; they are not “on your side.” It would be foolish to give a speech when everyone in the audience totally agrees with you at the beginning of the speech. For example, trying to convince your classroom audience that attending college is a good idea is a waste of everyone’s time since, for one reason or another, everyone in your audience has already made that decision. That is not persuasive.

Those who disagree with your proposition but are willing to listen could be called the target audience. These are the members of your audience on whom you are truly focusing your persuasion. At the same time, another cluster of your audience that is not part of your target audience are those who are extremely opposed to your position to the point that they probably will not give you a fair hearing. Finally, some members of your audience may already agree with you, although they don’t know why.

To go back to our original definition, “the process of creating, reinforcing, or changing people’s beliefs or actions,” and each of these purposes implies a different approach. You can think of creating as moving an audience from 0 to +1, +2, or +3. You only really “create” something when it does not already exist, meaning the audience’s attitude will be a 0 since they have no opinion. In creating, you have to first engage the audience that there is a vital issue at stake. Then you must provide arguments in favor of your claim to give the audience a basis for belief.

Reinforcing is moving the audience from +1 toward +3 in the hope that they take action (since the real test of belief is whether people act on it). In reinforcing, the audience already agrees with you but need steps and pushes (nudges) to make it action. Changing is moving from -1 or –2 to +1 or higher. In changing, you must first be credible, provide evidence for your side but also show why the audience’s current beliefs are mistaken or wrong in some way.

However, this simple definition from Lucas, while it gets to the core of “change” that is inherent in persuasion, could be improved with some attention to the ethical component and the “how” of persuasion. For that purpose, let’s look at Perloff’s (2003) definition of persuasion:

A symbolic process in which communicators try to convince other people to change their attitudes or behavior regarding an issue through the transmission of a message, in an atmosphere of free choice. (p. 8)

There are several important factors about this definition. First, notice that persuasion is symbolic, that is, uses language or other symbols (even graphics can be symbols), rather than force or other means. Second, notice that it is an attempt, not always fully successful. Third, there is an “atmosphere of free choice,” in that the persons being persuaded can choose not to believe or act. And fourth, notice that the persuader is “trying to convince others to change.” Modern psychological research has confirmed that the persuader does not change the audience directly. The processes that the human mind goes through while it listens to a persuasive message is like a silent, mental dialogue the audience is having with the speaker’s ideas. The audience members as individuals eventually convince themselves to change based on the “symbols” used by the speaker.

Some of this may sound like splitting hairs, but these are important points. The fact that an audience has free choice means that they are active participants in their own persuasion and that they can choose whether the speaker is successful. This factor calls on the student speaker to be ethical and truthful. Sometimes students will say, “It is just a class assignment, I can lie in this speech,” but that is not a fair or respectful way to treat your classmates.

Further, the basis of your persuasion is language; even though “a picture is worth a thousand words” and can help add emotional appeal to your speech, you want to focus on communicating through words. Also, Perloff’s definition distinguishes between “attitude” and “behavior,” meaning that an audience may be persuaded to think, to feel, or to act. Finally, persuasion is a process. Successful persuasion actually takes a while. One speech can be effective, but usually other messages influence the listener in the long run.

Section 3 – Why is Persuasion Hard?

Persuasion is hard mainly because we have a bias against change. As much as we hear statements like “The only constant is change” or “Variety is the spice of life,” the evidence from research and from our personal experience shows that, in reality, we do not like change. Recent research, for example, in risk aversion, points to how we are more concerned about keeping from losing something than with gaining something. Change is often seen as a loss of something rather than a gain of something else. Change is a step into the unknown, a gamble (Vedantam & Greene, 2013).

In the 1960s psychiatrists Thomas Holmes and Richard Rahe wanted to investigate the effect of stress on life and health. As explained on the Mindtools website:

They surveyed more than 5,000 medical patients and asked them to say whether they had experience any of a series of 43 life events in the previous two years. Each event, called a Life Change Unit (LCU), had a different “weight” for stress. The more events the patient added up, the higher the score. The higher the score, and the larger the weight of each event, the more likely the patient was to become ill. (The Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale, 2015)

You can find the Holmes-Rahe stress scale on many websites. What you will find is that the stressful events almost all have to do with change in some life situations—death of a close family member (which might rate 100 LCUs), loss of a job, even some good changes like the Christmas holidays (12 LCUs). Change is stressful. We do not generally embrace things that bring us stress.

Additionally, psychologists have pointed to how we go out of our way to protect our beliefs, attitudes, and values. First, we selectively expose ourselves to messages that we already agree with, rather than those that confront or challenge us. This selective exposure is especially seen in choices of mass media that individuals listen to and read, whether TV, radio, or Internet sites. Not only do we selectively expose ourselves to information, we selectively attend to, perceive, and recall information that supports our existing viewpoints (referred to as selective attention, selective perception, and selective recall).

This principle led Leon Festinger (1957) to form the theory of cognitive dissonance, which states, among other ideas, that when we are confronted with conflicting information or viewpoints, we reach a state of dissonance. This state can be very uncomfortable, and we will do things to get rid of the dissonance and maintain “consonance.” Ideally, at least for a public speaker, the dissonance is relieved or resolved by being persuaded (changed) to a new belief, attitude, or behavior. However, the easiest way to avoid dissonance is to not expose oneself to conflicting messages in the first place.

Additionally, as mentioned before, during a persuasive speech the audience members are holding a mental dialogue with the speaker or at least the speaker’s content. They are putting up rebuttals or counter-arguments. These have been called reservations (as in the audience member would like to believe the speaker but has reservations about doing so). They could be called the “yeah-buts”—the audience members are saying in their minds, “Yeah, I see what you are arguing, but—”. Reservations can be very strong, since, again, the bias is to be loss averse and not to change our actions or beliefs.

In a sense, the reasons not to change can be stronger than even very logical reasons to change. For example, you probably know a friend who will not wear a seatbelt in a car. You can say to your friend, “Don’t you know that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (2009) says, and I quote, ‘1,652 lives could be saved and 22,372 serious injuries avoided each year on America’s roadways if seat belt use rates rose to 90 percent in every state’?” What will your friend probably say, even though you have cited a credible source?

They will come up with some reason for not wearing it, even something as dramatic as “I knew a guy who had a cousin who was in an accident and the cop said he died because he was wearing his seatbelt.” You may have had this conversation, or one like it. Their arguments may be less dramatic, such as “I don’t like how it feels” or “I don’t like the government telling me what to do in my car.” For your friend, the argument for wearing a seat belt is not as strong as the argument against it, at least at this moment. If they are open-minded and can listen to evidence, they might experience cognitive dissonance and then be persuaded.

Section 4 – Traditional Views of Persuasion

In the fourth century BCE, Aristotle took up the study of the public speaking practices of the ruling class in Athenian society. For two years he observed the rhetoric of the men who spoke in the assembly and the courts. In the end, he wrote Rhetoric to explain his theories about what he saw. Among his many conclusions, which have formed the basis of communication study for centuries, was the classification of persuasive appeals into ethos, logos, and pathos. Over the years, Aristotle’s original understanding and definition of these terms have been refined as more research has been done

Section 5 – Constructing a Persuasive Speech

In a sense, constructing your persuasive speech is the culmination of the skills you have learned already. In another sense, you are challenged to think somewhat differently. While the steps of analyzing your audience, formulating your purpose and central idea, applying evidence, considering ethics, framing the ideas in appropriate language, and then practicing delivery will of course apply, you will need to consider some expanded options about each of these steps.

Conclusion

Your persuasive speech in class, as well as in real life, is an opportunity to share a passion or cause that you believe will matter to society and help the audience live a better life. Even if you are initially uncomfortable with the idea of persuasion, we use it all the time in different ways. Choose your topic based on your own commitment and experience, look for quality evidence, craft your proposition so that it will be clear and audience appropriate, and put the finishing touches on it with an eye toward enhancing your logos, ethos, and pathos.

Something to Think About

Go to YouTube and look for “Persuasive Speeches by College Students.” There are quite a few. Here’s one example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNr7Fx-SM1Y.

Do you find this speech persuasive? Why or why not? Based on the content of this chapter, what did the speaker do correctly or perhaps not so correctly that affected his or her persuasiveness?

Sample Outline: Persuasive Speech Using Topical Pattern

By Janet Aguilar

Specific Purpose: To persuade my classmates to eliminate their Facebook use.

Introduction: There she was late into the night still wide awake starring at her phone’s screen. In fact, she had to be at work early in the morning, but scrolling through her Facebook account kept her awake. That girl was me before I deactivated my Facebook account. I honestly could not tell you how many hours I spent on Facebook. In the survey that I presented to you all, one person admitted to spending “too much” time on Facebook. That was me in the past, I spent too much time on Facebook. Time is precious and once it is gone it does not return. So why do you spend precious time on Facebook? Time that could be spent with family, resting, or just being more productive.

Thesis/Preview: Facebook users should eliminate their usage because Facebook can negatively affect their relationships with others, their sleeping patterns and health, and their ability to focus on school work. 

1. Family relationships can be affected by your Facebook usage.
   1. In the survey conducted in class, 11 of 15 students confessed to have ignored someone while they were speaking.
      1. Found myself ignoring my children while they spoke.
      2. Noticed other people doing the same thing especially in parks and restaurants.
   2. According to Lynn Postell-Zimmerman on hg.org, Facebook has become a leading cause for divorce.
   3. In the United States, 1 in 5 couples mentioned Facebook as a reason for divorce in 2009.

Transition: We have discussed how Facebook usage can lead to poor relationships with people, next we will discuss how Facebook can affect your sleep patterns and health.

2. Facebook usage can negatively affect your sleep patterns and health.
   1. Checking Facebook before bed.
      1. In my survey 11 students said they checked their Facebook account before bed.
      2. Staying on Facebook for long hours before bed.
   2. Research has shown that Facebook can cause depression, anxiety, and addiction.
      1. According to researchers Steels, Wickham and Acitelli in an article in the Journal of Social & Clinical Psychology titled “Seeing everyone else’s highlight reels: How Facebook usage is linked to depressive symptoms,” because Facebook users only view the positive of their friend’s life they become unhappy with their life and it can lead to becoming depressed and unhappy.
      2. Marissa Maldonado on psychcentral.com, concluded from recent studies that, “Facebook increases people’s anxiety levels by making them feel inadequate and generating excess worry and stress.”
      3. Facebook addiction is a serious issue, according to the article “Too much Facebook leads to anger and depression” found on cnn.com and written by Cara Reedy.
         1. Checking Facebook everywhere we go is a sign of addiction
         2. Not being able to deactivate your Facebook account.

Transitions: Many of you have probably never though as Facebook as a threat to your health, but we will now review how it can affect you as a college student.

3. Facebook negatively affects students.
   1. I often found myself on Facebook instead of doing schoolwork.
   2. I was constantly checking Facebook which takes away from study time.
   3. I also found myself checking Facebook while in class, which can lead to poor grades and getting in trouble with the professor.
   4. A study of over 1,800 college students showed a negative relationship between amount of Facebook time and GPA, as reported by Junco in a 2012 article titled, “Too much face and not enough books” from the journal Computers and Human Behavior.

Conclusion: In conclusion, next time you log on to Facebook try deactivating your account for a few day and see the difference. You will soon see how it can bring positive changes in your family relationships, will avoid future health problems, will help you sleep better, and will improve your school performance. Instead of communicating through Facebook try visiting or calling your close friends. Deactivating my account truly helped me, and I can assure you we all can survive without Facebook.

References

Junco, R. (2012). Too much face and not enough books: The relationship between multiple indices of Facebook use and academic performance. Computers in Human Behavior, 28(1), 187-198.

Maldonado, M. (2014). The anxiety of Facebook. Psych Central. Retrieved from http://psychcentral.com/lib/the-anxiety-of-facebook/

Postell-Zimmerman, L. (1995-2015). Facebook has become a leading cause in divorce cases. HG.org. Retrieved from http://www.hg.org/article.asp?id=27803

Reedy, C. (2015, March 2). Too much Facebook leads to envy and depression. CNNMoney. Retrieved from http://money.cnn.com/2015/03/02/technology/facebook-envy/

Steers, M. L. N., Wickham, R. E., & Acitelli, L. K. (2014). Seeing everyone else’s highlight reels: How Facebook usage is linked to depressive symptoms. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 33(8), 701-731. DOI: 10.1521/jscp.2014.33.8.701

Sample Outline: Persuasive Speech Using Monroe’s Motivated Sequence Pattern

Speech to Actuate: Sponsoring a Child in Poverty

Specific Purpose: to actuate my audience to sponsor a child through an agency such as Compassion International.

Introduction (Attention Step)

1. How much is $38? That answer depends on what you make, what you are spending it for, and what you get back for it. (Grabber)
2. $38 per month breaks down to a little more than $1.25 per day, which is probably what you spend on a snack or soda in the break room. For us, it’s not very much. (Rapport)
3. I found out that I can provide better health care, nutrition, and even education for a child in Africa, South America, or Asia for the $38 per month by sponsoring a child through Compassion International. (Credibility)
4. If I can do it, maybe you can too: (Bridge)

Thesis: Through a minimal donation each month, you can make the life of a child in the developing world much better.

Preview: In the next few minutes I would like to discuss the problem, the work of organizations that offer child sponsorships, how research shows they really do alleviate poverty, and what you can do to change the life of a child.

Body

1. The problem is the continued existence and effects of poverty. (Need Step)
   1. Poverty is real and rampant in much of the world.
      1. According to a 2018 report of the Secretary General of the United Nations, 9.2% of the world lives on less than $1.90 per day.
         1. That is 600 million people on the planet.
      2. This number is supported by the World Poverty clock of the World Data Lab, which states that 8% of the world’s population lives in extreme poverty.
         1. The good news is that this number is one third of what it was in 1990, mostly due to the rising middle class in Asia.
         2. The bad news is that 70% of the poor will live in Africa, with Nigeria labeled the “Poverty Capital of the World,” according to the Brookings Institute.
   2. Poverty means children do not get adequate health care.
      1. One prevalent but avoidable disease is malaria, which takes the lives of 3000 children every day, according to UNICEF.
      2. According to the World Health Organization, diarrheal diseases claimed 2.46 million lives in 2012 and is the second leading cause of death of children under 5.
   3. Poverty means children do not get adequate nutrition, as stated in a report from UNICEF.
      1. Inadequate nutrition leads to stunted growth.
      2. Undernutrition contributes to more than one third of all deaths in children under the age of five.
   4. Poverty means children are unlikely to reach adult age, according to the CIA World Fact Book quoted on the Infoplease website.
      1. Child mortality rate in Africa is 8.04% (percentage dying before age 5), while in North American is .64%
      2. Life expectancy in Sub-Saharan Africa is almost 30 years less than in the U.S.
   5. Poverty also means children are unlikely to receive education and be trained for profitable work.
      1. Nearly a billion people entered the 21st century unable to read a book or sign their names, states the Global Issues website on Poverty Facts.
      2. UNESCO, a part of the United Nations, reports that less than a third of adults in Sub-Saharan Africa have completed primary education.

Transition: Although in all respects poverty is better in 2019 than it has been in the past, poverty is still pervasive and needs to be addressed. Fortunately, some great organizations have been addressing this for many years.

2. Some humanitarian organizations address poverty directly through child sponsorships. (Satisfaction Step)
   1. These organizations vary in background but not in purpose. The following information is gleaned from each organization’s websites.
      1. Compassion International is faith-based, evangelical.
         1. Around since early 1950s, started in Korea.
         2. Budget of $887 Million.
         3. Serves 1.92 million babies, children, and young adults.
         4. Works through local community centers and established churches.
      2. World Vision is faith-based, evangelical.
         1. Around since the 1950s.
         2. Budget of far over $1 Billion.
         3. 60% goes to local community programs but more goes to global networks, so that 86% goes to services.
         4. World Vision has more extensive services than child sponsorship, such as water purification and disaster relief.
         5. Sponsors three million children across six continents
      3. Children International is secular.
         1. Around since 1936.
         2. Budget of $125 Million.
         3. 88% of income goes directly to programs and children.
         4. Sponsors children in ten countries on four continents
         5. Sponsors X across X continents
      4. Save the Children is secular, through…
         1. One hundred years of history, began in post WWI Europe.
         2. Budget of $880 Million.
         3. 87% goes to services.
         4. Sponsors 134 million children in 120 countries, including 450,000 in U.S.
      5. There are other similar organizations, such as ChildFund and PlanUSA.
   2. These organizations work directly with local community, on-site organizations.
      1. The children are involved in a program, such as after school.
      2. The children live with their parents and siblings.
      3. The sponsor’s donation goes for medicine, extra healthy, nutritious food, shoes for school, and other items.
      4. Sponsors can also help donate for birthdays and holidays to the whole family to buy food or farm animals.

Transition: Of course, any time we are donating money to an organization, we want to be sure our money is being effectively and ethnically used.

3. This concern should be addressed in two ways: Is the money really helping, and are the organizations honest? (Continuation of Satisfaction Step)
   1. The organizations’ honesty can be investigated.
      1. You can check through Charity Navigator.
      2. You can check through the Better Business Bureau-Charity.
      3. You can check through Charity Watch.
      4. You can check through the organizations’ websites.
   2. Secondly, is sponsoring a child effective? Yes.
      1. According to Bruce Wydick, Professor of Economics at the University of San Francisco, child sponsorship is the fourth most effective strategy for addressing poverty, behind water purification, mosquito nets, and deworming treatments.
      2. Dr. Wydick and colleagues’ work has been published in the prestigious Journal of Political Economy from the University of Chicago.
      3. He states, “Two researchers and I recently carried out a study (sponsored by the U.S. Agency for International Development) on the long-term impacts of Compassion International’s child sponsorship program. The study, gathering data from over 10,000 individuals in six countries, found substantial impact on adult life outcomes for children who were sponsored through Compassion’s program during the 1980s and ’90s…In adulthood, formerly sponsored children were far more likely to complete secondary school and had a much higher chance of having a white-collar job. They married and had children later in life, were more likely to be church and community leaders, were less likely to live in a home with a dirt floor and more likely to live in a home with electricity.”

Transition: To this point I have spoke of global problems and big solutions. Now I want to bring it down to real life with one example.

4. I’d like to use my sponsored child, Ukwishaka in Rwanda, as an example of how you can. (Visualization Step)
   1. I have sponsored her for five years.
   2. She is now ten years old.
   3. She lives with two siblings and both parents.
   4. She writes me, I write her back, and we share photos at least every two months.
   5. The organization gives me reports on her project.
   6. I hope one day to go visit her. G. I believe Ukwishaka now knows her life can be more, can be successful.

Transition: We have looked at the problem of childhood poverty and how reliable, stable nongovernmental organizations are addressing it through child sponsorships. Where does that leave you?

22. I challenge you to sponsor a child like Ukwishaka. (Action Step)
    1. Although I sponsor her through Compassion International, there are other organizations.
    2. First, do research.
    3. Second, look at your budget and be sure you can do this.
       1. You don’t want to start and have to stop.
       2. Look for places you “waste” money during the month and could use it this way.
       3. Fewer snacks from the break room, fewer movies at the Cineplex, brown bag instead of eating out.
    4. Talk to a representative at the organization you like.
    5. Discuss it with your family.
    6. Take the plunge. If you do.
       1. Write your child regularly.
       2. Consider helping the family, or getting friends to help with extra gifts.

Conclusion

1. In this speech, we have taken a look at the state of poverty for children on this planet, at organizations that are addressing it through child sponsorships, at the effectiveness of these programs, and what you can do.
2. My goal today was not to get an emotional response, but a realistically compassionate one.
3. You have probably heard this story before but it bears repeating. A little girl was walking with her mother on the beach, and the sand was covered with starfish. The little girl wanted to rescue them and send them back to the ocean and kept throwing them in. “It won’t matter, Honey,” said her mother. “You can’t get all of them back in the ocean.” “But it will matter to the ones that I do throw back,” the little girl answered.
4. We can’t sponsor every child, but we can one, maybe even two. As Forest Witcraft said, “What will matter in 100 years is that I made a difference in the life of a child.” Will you make a difference?

References

AGScientific. (2019). Top ten deadly diseases in the world. Retrieved from http://agscientific.com/blog/2016/04/top-10-deadly-diseases/

Compassion International. (2019). Financial integrity: The impact of our compassion. Retrieved from https://www.compassion.com/about/financial.htm

Children’s International. (2019). Accountability. Retrieved from https://www.children.org/learn-more/accountability

Global Issues. (2013, January 7 ). Poverty facts and stats. Retrieved from http://www.globalissues.org/article/26/poverty-facts-and-stats

Infoplease. (2019). What life expectancy really means. Retrieved form https://www.infoplease.com/world/health-and-social-statistics/life-expectancy-countries-0

Kharas, H., Hamel, K., & Hofer, M. (2018, Dec. 13). Rethinking global poverty reduction in 2019. Retrieved from https://www.brookings.edu/blog/future-development/2018/12/13/rethinking-global-poverty-reduction-in-2019/

Roser, M. (2019). Child and infant mortality rates. Retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/child-mortality

Save the Children. (2019). Financial information. Retrieved from https://www.savethechildren.org/us/about-us/financial-information

UNICEF. (2008). Tracking progress on child and maternal nutrition: A survival and development priority. Retrieved from https://www.unicef.org/publications/files/Tracking_Progress_on_Child_and_Maternal_Nutrition_EN_110309.pdf

UNICEF 2019. The reality of Malaria. Retrieved from https://www.unicef.org/health/files/health_africamalaria.pdf

United Nations. (2019). Poverty eradication. Retrieved from https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/topics/povertyeradication

World Vision. (2019). Financial accountability. Retrieved from https://www.worldvision.org/about-us/financial-accountability-2

Wydick, B., Glewwe, P., & Rutledge, L. (2013). Does international child sponsorship work? A six-country study of impacts on adult life outcomes. Journal of Political Economy, 121(2), 393–436. https://doi.org/10.1086/670138

Wydick, B. (2012, Feb.). Cost-effective compassion. Christianity Today, 56(2), 24-29.

Wydick, B. (2013). Want to change the world? Sponsor a child. Christianity Today, 57(5), 20–27.