Pathos

Pathos (/ˈpeɪθɒs/, US /ˈpeɪθoʊs/; plural: pathea; Greek: , for "suffering" or "experience"; adjectival form: 'pathetic' from παθητικός) represents an appeal to the emotions of the audience, and elicits feelings that already reside in them. Pathos is a communication technique used most often in rhetoric (where it is considered one of the three modes of persuasion, alongside ethos and logos), and in literature, film and other narrative art.

Emotional appeal can be accomplished in a multitude of ways:

In Rhetoric, Aristotle identifies three artistic modes of persuasion, one of which is "awakening emotion (pathos) in the audience so as to induce them to make the judgment desired." In the first chapter, he includes the way in which "men change their opinion in regard to their judgment. As such, emotions have specific causes and effects" (Book 2.1.2–3). Aristotle identifies pathos as one of the three essential modes of proof by his statement that "to understand the emotions—that is, to name them and describe them, to know their causes and the way in which they are excited (1356a24–1356a25). Aristotle posits that, alongside pathos, the speaker must also deploy good ethos in order to establish credibility (Book 2.1.5–9).

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