 A third way to characterize manipulation is to treat it as a kind of pressure to do as the influencer wishes. On this account, tactics like emotional blackmail and peer pressure are paradigm cases of manipulation, since they exert pressure on the target by imposing costs for failing to do what the manipulator wishes. One rationale for treating manipulation as a form of pressure is the observation that manipulation is neither rational persuasion nor coercion. It seems plausible, then, to suppose that there is a continuum between rational persuasion and coercion with regard to the level of pressure being exerted, with rational persuasion exerting no pressure, coercion exerting maximum pressure, and the middle region, manipulation, exerting pressure that falls short of being coercive. In this way, we might arrive at the idea that manipulation is a form of pressure that does not rise to the level of coercion.