AO1 - Minority Influence

• Minority influence refers to situations where one person or a small group, influence the beliefs or behaviours of others.
• Minority influence is most likely to lead to internalisation, where someone changes both their public and private beliefs.
• Moscovici et al (1969) studied minority influence using blue and green coloured slides.
• Consistency is one factor; the minority must be consistent in their views to change other people's opinions.
• Flexibility is another factor; a minority must be willing to accept other views but sticks to their own consistent view.
• Commitment is another factor; a minority must demonstrate commitment to their cause (augmentation principle) through actions.
• Commitment is more effective if people demonstrate sacrifice to the cause.
• Moscovici (1969) conducted a re-run of Asch’s experiment, but in reverse.
• Moscovici (1969) instead of one real participant amongst a majority of confederates, he placed two confederates together with four genuine participants.
• In Moscovici's study participants were shown 36 slides which were clearly different shades of blue and asked to state the colour of each slide out loud.
• Moscovici showed that the consistent minority had an effect on the majority (8.42%) compared to an inconsistent minority (1.25%). A third (32%) of all participants incorrectly judged the slide to be green at least once.