The Language Perfectionist: Will I Convince You… or Persuade You?

This one is tricky. Even I get confused!

For the language stickler, the words convince and persuade are not interchangeable. Here are two misuses:

• "How to convince your boss to let you work from home." (It should be persuade.)
• "We need to persuade [homeless children] that their lives are worth something, if only because we care about them." (It should be convince.)

What’s going on here? Why are the above examples incorrect? Here’s the explanation:

The word convince refers to belief. You convince someone of something or that something is true.

The word persuade refers to action. You persuade someone to do something. Thus, avoid the phrase "convince to."

[Ed Note: For more than three decades, Don Hauptman was a direct-response copywriter. He is author of the wordplay books Cruel and Unusual Puns and Acronymania, and is now writing a new book that also blends language and humor.]