Using Research as Support

Learning Objectives

  1. Define the term "support".
  2. Understand three reasons we use support in speeches.
  3. Explain four criteria used to evaluate support options.

Why We Use Support

In public speaking, the word "support" refers to a range of strategies that are used to develop the central idea and specific purpose by providing corroborating evidence. Whether you are speaking to inform, persuade, or entertain, using support helps you create a more substantive and polished speech. We sometimes use the words "support" or "evidence" synonymously or interchangeably because both are designed to help ground a speech's specific purpose. However, "evidence" tends to be associated specifically with persuasive speeches, so we opt to use the more general term "support" for most of this chapter. In this section, we are going to explore why speakers use support.

To Clarify Content

The first reason to use support in a speech is to clarify content. Speakers often choose a piece of support because a previous writer or speaker has phrased something in a way that evokes a clear mental picture of the point they want to make. For example, suppose you're preparing a speech about hazing in college fraternities. You may read your school's code of student conduct to find out how your campus defines hazing. You could use this definition to make sure your audience understands what hazing is and what types of behaviors your campus identifies as hazing.

To Add Credibility

Another important reason to use support is because it adds to your credibility as a speaker. The less an audience perceives you as an expert on a given topic, the more important it is to use a range of support. By doing so, you let your audience know that you've done your homework on the topic.

At the same time, you could hurt your credibility if you use inadequate support or support from questionable sources. Your credibility will also suffer if you distort the intent of a source to try to force it to support a point that the previous author did not address. For example, the famous 1798 publication by Thomas Malthus, An Essay on the Principle of Population, has been used as support for various arguments far beyond what Malthus could have intended. Malthus's thesis was that as the human population increases at a greater rate than food production, societies will go to war over scarce food resources.

For this reason, it is important to evaluate your support to ensure that it will not detract from your credibility as a speaker. Here are four characteristics to evaluate when looking at support options: accuracy, authority, currency, and objectivity.

Accuracy

One of the quickest ways to lose credibility in the eyes of your audience is to use support that is inaccurate or even questionably accurate. Admittedly, determining the accuracy of support can be difficult if you are not an expert in a given area, but here are some questions to ask yourself to help assess a source's accuracy:

  • Does the information within one piece of supporting evidence completely contradict other supporting evidence you've seen?
  • If the support is using a statistic, does the supporting evidence explain where that statistic came from and how it was determined?
  • Does the logic behind the support make sense?

Authority

The second way to use support in building your credibility is to cite authoritative sources—those who are experts on the topic. In today's world, there are all kinds of people who call themselves "experts" on a range of topics. There are even books that tell you how to get people to regard you as an expert in a given industry.

So what truly makes someone an expert? Bruce D. Weinstein, a professor at West Virginia University's Center for Health Ethics and Law, defined expertise as having two senses. In his definition, the first sense of expertise is "knowledge in or about a particular field, and statements about it generally take the form, ‘S is an expert in or about D.'… The second sense of expertise refers to domains of demonstrable skills, and statements about it generally take the form, ‘S is an expert at skill D'".

As a novice researcher, how can you determine whether an individual is truly an expert? Unfortunately, there is no clear-cut way to wade through the masses of "experts" and determine each one's legitimacy quickly. However, Table 8.1 "Who Is an Expert?" presents a list of questions based on the research of Marie-Line Germain that you can ask yourself to help determine whether someone is an expert.

Table 8.1: Who Is an Expert?

Questions to Ask Yourself Yes No
1. Is the person widely recognizable as an expert?
2. Does the person have an appropriate degree/training/certification to make her or him an expert?
3. Is the person a member of a recognized profession in her or his claimed area of expertise?
4. Has the person published articles or books (not self-published) on the claimed area of expertise?
5. Does the person have appropriate experience in her or his claimed area of expertise?
6. Does the person have clear knowledge about her or his claimed area of expertise?
7. Is the person clearly knowledgeable about the field related to her or his claimed area of expertise?
8. When all is said and done, does the person truly have the qualifications to be considered an expert in her or his claimed area of expertise?

Currency

The third consideration in using support to build your credibility is how current the information is. Some ideas stay fairly consistent over time, like the date of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor or the mathematical formula for finding the area of a circle, but other ideas change wildly in a short period of time, including ideas about technology, health treatments, and laws.

Although we never want to discount classic supporting information that has withstood the test of time, as a general rule for most topics, we recommend that information be less than five years old. Obviously, this is just a general guideline and can change depending on the topic.

Objectivity

The last question you should ask yourself when examining support is whether the person or organization behind the information is objective or biased. Bias refers to a predisposition or preconception of a topic that prevents impartiality. Although there is a certain logic to the view that every one of us is innately biased, as a credible speaker, you want to avoid just passing along someone's unfounded bias in your speech.

As with the questions in Table 8.1 "Who Is an Expert?" about expertise, you don't have to have all "no" or "yes" responses to decide on bias. However, being aware of the possibility of bias and where your audience might see bias will help you to select the best possible support to include in your speech.

Table 8.2: Is a Potential Source of Support Biased?

Questions to Ask Yourself Yes No
1. Does the source represent an individual's, an organization's, or another group's viewpoint?
2. Does the source sound unfair in its judgment, either for or against a specific topic?
3. Does the source sound like personal prejudices, opinions, or thoughts?
4. Does the source exist only on a website (i.e., not in print or any other format)?
5. Is the information published or posted anonymously or pseudonymously?
6. Does the source have any political or financial interests related to the information being disseminated?
7. Does the source demonstrate any specific political orientation, religious affiliation, or other ideology?
8. Does the source's viewpoint differ from all other information you've read?

To Add Vividness

In addition to clarifying content and enhancing credibility, support helps make a speech more vivid. Vividness refers to a speaker's ability to present information in a striking, exciting manner. The goal of vividness is to make your speech more memorable. One of the authors still remembers a vivid example from a student speech given several years ago. The student was speaking about the importance of wearing seat belts and stated that the impact from hitting a windshield at just twenty miles per hour without a seat belt would be equivalent to falling out of the window of their second-floor classroom and landing face-first on the pavement below. Because they were in that classroom several times each week, students were easily able to visualize the speaker's analogy and it was successful at creating an image that is remembered years later. Support helps make your speech more interesting and memorable to an audience member.