The Psychology of Manipulation: The Impact of Language Power On Perceived Credibility

This study examined the psychological mechanisms of interpersonal manipulation, specifically focusing on how the "power" of linguistic style influences an individual's perceived credibility. Undergraduate students (N=51) were presented with transcripts of a legal testimony where the independent variable-the "powerfulness" of the speaker's language-was manipulated. One group received a "powerless" version containing hedge words (e.g., "sort of"), intensifiers (e.g., "very"), and fillers (e.g., "you know"), while the other group received a "powerful" version devoid of these markers. We predicted that participants would rate the powerful speaker as significantly more credible than the powerless speaker. Results indicated a strong correlation between linguistic style and perceived authority, consistent with previous findings that social manipulation often operates through subtle, covert cues that bypass strategic reasoning (Franke & van Rooij, 2015). This suggests that credibility is frequently a byproduct of linguistic style rather than factual accuracy.I.