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Oscar Hernandez

Professor Beadle

English 115

22 September 2019

How to Write an Effective Article using the Rhetorical Strategies:

A Case Study of the Works of Brooks, Hill and Lyubomirsky

In today’s modern world, many people are becoming less happy due to a variety of

factors such as an increase in the global population and an increase in the time spent using

electronic devices. The three authors, David Brooks, Graham Hill, and Sonja Lyubomirsky

provide their own arguments as to how one can be happier. Although their approaches to the

topic are different, they all use different rhetorical strategies to help support their argument. The

article titled “How Happy are You and Why” by Sonja Lyubomirsky presents the most effective

argument out of the three because she uses all rhetorical strategies effectively to support her

claim while Hill relies heavily on his personal experiences and Brooks lacks an emotional

connection to his audience.

Throughout her article, Lyubomirsky argues that some people tend to be happier than

others as genetics has a huge role in how happy one can be. She uses the rhetorical strategy of

Logos, which is evident in her use of Pie charts and bar graphs. In her pie chart she demonstrates

the factors that lead to happiness and how much of an impact they have on it. Meanwhile her bar

graph displays happiness in different generations which can help the reader gain a better

understanding of how happy people truly are. The data that she provides in her article is crucial
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in making her argument more effective as it shows that not only is she well informed about the

topic that she is discussing but she has evidence to back up her claim. Another rhetorical strategy

that she utilizes is Ethos which can also be seen through the data that she provides. The scientific

data that she uses helps establish credibility in her article as the sources of that data are credible

sources. For the bar graph, data is taken from Proper Insights & Analytics, and throughout the

rest of the article she provides more scientific discoveries taken from credible sources. The use

of Ethos in her article helps make her argument more effective as she has credible sources to

support her claim which makes her more credible which allows the readers to trust in what she

has to say more. Finally, she uses the rhetorical strategy of Pathos, which is evident in the use of

her case studies. In one of them she writes, “Randy endured a lot as a child. He lost two people

close to him to suicide, at age twelve his father and at age seventeen his best friend… today

Randy is one of those happy people that make everyone around them smile and laugh” (pp. 181).

This quote demonstrates how Lyubomirsky utilizes these personal stories to get the reader to

react in a more emotional way to her reading. By using the personal experiences in her article,

she can get the reader to relate to the people in her case studies which makes them trust agree

with her claim more. While Lyubomirsky uses all three rhetorical strategies to support her

argument, David Brooks does not use them all which causes his argument to be less effective.

In David Brook’s article titled, “What Suffering Does”, he argues that although there is a

negative connotation with suffering, it can be positive as it is valuable in shaping the way people

are. As the article begins, it is evident that Brooks uses the rhetorical strategy of Ethos in the first

lines, “Over the past few weeks, I’ve found myself in a bunch of conversations in which the

unspoken assumption was that the main goal of life is to maximize happiness…” (pp. 284). This

quote is important as Brooks describes how he has spoken to many people prior to writing the
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article to gain more information about the topic which makes him more credible. Even the

diction that is used throughout the article, the more advanced vocabulary that is used, as well as

the serious tone helps add to his credibility. Brooks also uses the rhetorical strategy of Logos as

he incorporates a variety of historical examples such as, “Abraham Lincoln suffered through the

pain of conducting a civil war, and he came out of that with the second inaugural. He emerged

with the sense that there were deep currents of agony and redemption…” (pp. 286). This quote

serves to show that Brooks’ use of Logos helps make his argument more effective as these

historical examples help support his claim and at the same time help establish his credibility.

Besides relying heavily on ethos, one of Brooks’ main flaws is that there in little to no use of

Pathos in his article. The lack of this rhetorical strategy means that he has no emotional

connection to his audience and that can lead to a less effective argument. His overwhelming use

of ethos in the article, such as the use of more sophisticated language and tone, leads to having a

certain audience, a more educated one, which means that his article is meant for a small group of

people whereas the articles of Lyubomirsky and Hill are for the general population. Like Brooks,

Hill also does not use the rhetorical strategies to their full potential leading to a less effective

article.

In his article, “Living with Less. A Lot Less”, Graham Hill argues that being less

materialistic leads to being happier. Hill uses the rhetorical strategy of Pathos throughout the

entirety of the article as he talks about his own experiences. This can make his argument more

effective as he relies more on his emotions and therefore can connect with his audience easier.

By talking about his own experiences with being materialistic, he is able to make his audience

relate with him more easily which can help strengthen his argument. Hill also uses the rhetorical

strategy of Ethos as he establishes his credibility through talking about how he has dealt with the
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issue he is writing about. Unlike Brooks, Hill uses more simplistic language which means that

more people can understand what he is trying to argue making his article more effective.

Although Hill did utilize Logos by providing facts such as how the size of American home had

increased drastically during the past sixty years, most of his article was dominated by his

experiences If he relied less on his own experiences and used more facts, then his article would

have been as effective as Lyubomirsky’s article. Another of his major flaws is that most of his

audience has never been in the same situation as him and for that reason they cannot relate with

him. Hill discusses how buying many products never made him happy but once he stopped, he

became more content with himself. The fact that he uses language that is simple and easy to

understand means that he is trying to appeal to a large audience, but they will not be able to

relate to him as many people have not been fortunate enough to be in a similar situation.

Sonja Lyubomirsky’s article was the most effective out of the three as she uses all the

rhetorical strategies in a perfectly balanced manner to help support her argument. To make an

argument more effective it is important that the rhetorical strategies are utilized especially in a

balanced way. If one was to rely heavily on one of the rhetorical strategies, they miss out on the

opportunities in making their argument more effective by utilizing the others. It is also very

important that one considers the audience, the audience should be able to relate with what the

reader is saying, as it will help the audience be interested in the subject matter of the article.

Hill’s mistake was that he relied to much on his own experiences whereas Brooks lacked an

emotional connection to his audience. The two of them made their own arguments less effective

due to the way they used the rhetorical strategies. Unlike those two, Lyubomirsky had the most

effective argument simply because of the way she wrote her article, all three strategies were

used, not relying on one, which allowed for her audience to better understand her claim.
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Works Cited

Brooks, David. “What Suffering Does?” Pursuing Happiness. edited by Matthew Parfitt and Dawn

Skorczewski. Bedford St. Martin 2016. Pp. 284-287.

Hill, Graham. “Living with Less. A Lot Less.” Pursuing Happiness. edited by Matthew Parfitt and Dawn

Skorczewski. Bedford St. Martin 2016. Pp. 208-313.

Lyubomirsky, Sonja. “How Happy Are You and Why?” Pursuing Happiness. edited by Matthew Parfitt and

Dawn Skorczewski. Bedford St. Martin 2016. Pp. 179-197.