As a columnist for the Washington Post, Esther J. Cepeda writes on a wide variety of topics, yet she consistently uses certain strategies to persuade her readers. Whether she is writing about heritage months or Lady Doritos, Cepeda employs several rhetorical techniques that capture her readers' attention and ensure they listen to her message. A few of the more notable strategies Cepeda applies include problem-solution organization, supporting research, personal anecdotes, and reasonable counterarguments.
At the beginning of each column, Cepeda discusses a specific issue and follows it with her universal and surprisingly simple solution. This problem-solution organizational strategy allows Cepeda to detail the underlying severity of a problem
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The optimal column to showcase this strategy is in "Parents: Save A Kid Brain - Get Off Your Phones!" Since the audience for this piece is parents of small children, one of the most effective strategies to persuade them is to logically show how their current actions may have a bad influence on their children. In this piece, Cepeda does just that to convince readers that their technology addiction is more serious than they thought by bringing in scientific and psychological research. By way of illustration, she includes two separate studies and discusses their results that technology negatively impacts child development and how these studies apply to the lives of the readers. Citing two separate studies allows Cepeda to rely more on the facts persuading her readers than her own opinions. For many people, this logic-based approach is highly effective because the supporting evidence is stable and unbiased, as opposed to Cepeda's emotional beliefs. Moreover, including these scientific studies that enhance her argument builds her reputation as a logical and trustworthy author. If readers view her as trustworthy, they are more likely to listen to her message because they feel her opinions are rooted in facts, thus reinforcing the effectiveness of her