Because humans don’t just process the truth-aptness of natural-language statements?
Have you ever had to comfort a crying child, calm an animal, or put a nervous person at ease? What you say is often less important than how you say it, and what you do. Tone of voice, body language, behavioral scripts...these things have a direct influence on cognition and emotion. It may be the channel through which a lot of squicky things operate (what many LWers call “The Dark Arts”), but it’s also a channel for more benign forms of interaction and influence as well.
I worked in a daycare center for a while and kissing the bandage after mending a scraped knee was just something we adults did. It has no medical value, but it’s a comforting gesture—it makes the child feel better. So does talking in a calming voice before you wash it with an antimicrobial wipe, which is going to sting a bit.
Why would it render them more tractable if it doesn’t convince them?
Because humans don’t just process the truth-aptness of natural-language statements?
Have you ever had to comfort a crying child, calm an animal, or put a nervous person at ease? What you say is often less important than how you say it, and what you do. Tone of voice, body language, behavioral scripts...these things have a direct influence on cognition and emotion. It may be the channel through which a lot of squicky things operate (what many LWers call “The Dark Arts”), but it’s also a channel for more benign forms of interaction and influence as well.
I worked in a daycare center for a while and kissing the bandage after mending a scraped knee was just something we adults did. It has no medical value, but it’s a comforting gesture—it makes the child feel better. So does talking in a calming voice before you wash it with an antimicrobial wipe, which is going to sting a bit.