ABSTRACT
Successful salespeople, lawyers, teachers, and speakers know that effective public speaking, of course, is about informing, entertaining, or persuading listeners. Tailoring speeches to audiences involves managing both content and relationships. This chapter discusses the demographic and psychological features of listeners, how to find out about the audience, and how to use what they learn to select materials, organize and word the speech, and manage the interactive process that Richard Jenkins called "identification" in that opening quotation. Demographic analysis is the study of observable characteristics in groups of people. Variations in age are, of course, variations in life experiences and world experiences. Beliefs are convictions about what is true or false. Attitudes are tendencies to respond positively or negatively to people, objects, or ideas. Values are the basic concepts organizing one's orientation to life.
