To test whether verbal choices in a persuasive setting would show less diversity and more qualification than those in a nonpersuasive setting, a study involving 24 college students was undertaken. The subjects were divided into five groups and each group was asked to role play two situations: one calling for the subjects merely to be conversational and the other requiring them to be persuasive. "Diversity" was operationalized with type-token ratios (TTR) and mean word length (MWL). "Qualification" was operationalized with noun-verb/adjective-adverb (NV/AA) ratios and verb/auxiliary verb (VAV) ratios. Significant TTR and directional MWL results supported the prediction of decreased diversity, and significant VAV ratio results supported the prediction of increased qualification. However, directional NV/AA ratio results were contrary to prediction. The NV/AA ratio results were interpreted as indicating that subjects coped with the conflicting demands of the persuasive situation by reducing their use of adjectives and adverbs while increasing their tentativeness through verb selection (VAV). (Author/FL)