Silliest quote for the month

At CNBC on September 8, 2018 there was an article by Elle Kaplan titled 8 simple ways public speakers overcome their own fears to impress and inspire that also was posted at Yahoo Finance. It had the following eight section headings:

1] Know what you’re walking into

2] Know your audience

3] Structure your speech

4] Focus just on your content and not yourself

5] Smile, and go on

6] Execute the right tone, volume, and pace

7] Eye contact

8] Practice

But the article failed to follow #4 and focus on the content. The very fourth sentence says:

“In a survey, public speaking is ranked as one of the top phobias for most Americans, according to the Chapman Survey on American Fears.”

The article referred to the web site for those Chapman Surveys, but Ms. Kaplan clearly had not checked on details for the 2017 survey. Their press release has a graphic showing the Top 10 Fears of 2017 – but public speaking isn’t there. It isn’t even in either the Top 20 or the Top 40. Their blog post has a list of fears showing public speaking really is ranked only #52 out of 80 fears! That is very far from the top, and not a phobia. (Back in 2011 I blogged about What’s the difference between a fear and a phobia?).

When you look at the survey methodology for the question, you will find it is also about fear rather than phobia – it is question qn23m on page 12:

“How afraid are you of the following? – Public speaking”

Back on October 26, 2017 I blogged about How can you make a public speaking coach run away like a scared zebra? Just tell them where public speaking ranked in the fourth Chapman Survey on American Fears. And on  October 14, 2017 blogged about What do the most Americans fear? The fourth Chapman Survey on American Fears, and being innumerate.

The graphic came from here at Openclipart.