Persuasive Presentation And Imagery In 12 Angry Men

After reviewing the movie 12 Angry Men I realized the impact that persuasive presentation, and imagery. This movie started with a court trial that twelve men had to decide whether or not a child was guilty of murdering his father. At first a majority of the jurors voted guilty; however, that thought changed after group think and persuasive presentation. The jurors, who originally pleaded that the defendant was guilty, used the proof that was given in the trial. Although there was proof a plethora of the proof, it lacked source credibility.

The first time the group took a vote to decide whether or not this child was guilty of murdering his father, the vote was eleven, who voted guilty, to one, who plead not guilty. This meant that they could

not convict the defendant guilty. The juror eight, who voted not guilty, used persuasive presentation, and imagery. According to Pearson, Nelson, Titsworth, and Harter (2013), “listeners who know or like logic respond positively to arrangements with evidence that constitutes proof” (p.333). Juror eight realized that the proof was not very strong, so he tried to disprove the proof that was presented. Juror eight also brought persuasive imagery to his defense. After listening to the other jurors stating that the weapon, which was used to kill the victim was so rare that no one else would have it, he pulled a replica of the knife out of his pocket. This disproved the statements that the jurors made about the defendant being the only person who had the murder weapon.
Along with juror eight using persuasion, there was also an abundance of group think in the decision of whether or not the defendant is guilty. Pearson, Nelson, Titsworth, and Harter state “Groupthink happens when the desire for cohesion and agreements takes precedence over critical analysis and discussion” (p.166). While being in a jury it is the juror’s responsibility to decide upon a verdict, which requires discussion and critical thinking.
A challenge for this case of jurors was to come to an agreement about the verdict to the trial, so the discussion and critical thinking was essential in the group think. The entire movie was about the twelve men discussing their opinion about the defendant. The jurors, who had to critically think the most, were the ones who said that the defendant was not guilty. This is because a majority of the jurors voted guilty, so the men who voted not guilty needed to critically think how to change the other’s opinion. The jurors who were persuading the other men to vote not guilty showed that the source credibility lacked.
Source credibility is a major key when using proof to convict someone of murder.

In the movie Twelve Angry Men, a juror stated that he questioned the credibility of a witness’s testimony. Source credibility “is the extent to which you perceive the speaker as competent or trustworthy” (p. 97) according to Pearson, Nelson, Titsworth, and Harter (2013). Toward the middle of the movie several jurors stated that the man who claimed to hear the boy say “I’m going to kill you” could not have possibly heard the boy say that. This is because the train that was going by the window was so loud that it would have roared over the boy’s voice. The credibility was lacking because the jurors used critical thinking, and decided that testimony was false. The other woman who testified stated that she saw the boy kill his father and then run down the stairs. This statement was also challenged by the jurors because they stated that the woman wears glasses, and people typically do not wear glasses to bed. The woman would not have had time to pick up her glasses and put them on in time to see what she said that she saw. The jurors believe that she saw someone else and assumed it was the son, because her vision would not be adequate; it was dark and she cannot see without

glasses.
The entire movie was a two-sided argument, and rebuttals.
The men either thought the boy was innocent or guilty, and throughout the movie they had the two-sided arguments and rebutted each other. A two-sided argument consists of two groups of people who have different views on a situation. In this case there were some jurors who thought that the defendant was guilty, and some who thought he was innocent. As they had the argument it consisted of rebuttals from each side. This was to try to prove the point of each side of the argument.
This movie directly related to Communications 1010. There is an abundance of different communication methods in this movie. The major communication concepts used in 12 Angry Men is source credibility, persuasion, group think, two-sided argument, rebuttals, and critical thinking. If the men had not used the communication that they did the verdict of the defendant may have changed. The most important communication concept that was used at the beginning pf the movie was the persuasive concept because the one man who said the defendant was not guilty had to persuade the other men to agree with him. As the movie continued, source credibility was the major communication concept because the men discussed that the testimonies lacked credibility, which was a major key in finding the defendant not guilty. The other concepts are very important, but they were used throughout the entire movie. Communication plays a role in everyday life and without these concepts there could have been a devastating consequence involving and innocent child.