minority influence and social change

• minority influence...


  a form of social influence, where a minority of people (/just one person) persuades the majority to adopt their beliefs, ideologies, attitudes, behaviours - this eventually leads to internalisation
• what are the two types of consistuency?

  diachronic and synchronic
• what does diochronic mean?


  where a person maintains a consistent position over time
• what does synchronic mean?


  where there is an agreement members of the minority group
• how does consistency relate to minority influence? 


  the minority's view must be consistent in their opposition to the majority
• how does commitment relate to minority influence?


  the minority is more powerful if they demonstrate their dedication to a cause
• the augmentation principle...


  if somebody performs an action when there are known constraints, their motive for acting against is considering stronger
• how does flexibility relate to minority influence?


  minority groups must be prepared to amend their views and accept reasonable counter-arguments
• what is the "snowball effect"?


  the process of change - gradually the majority is influenced by the minority

  following consistency, commitment and flexibility, the majority are "converted" - the more people that have converted, the faster the rate of conversion
• who was the experimenter in the "blue slide, green slide" study?

  sergei moscovici (1969)
• what was the process for the blue/green slide study?


  participants were shown different slides which clearly showed different shades of blue - then asked to state the colour out loud

  1st part of the study - 2 confederates answered green for each slide consistently

  2nd part of the study - 2 confederates answered green 24 times, and blue 12 times

  control group (not including confederates) was used for comparison
• what were the results of the blue/green slide study?


  only 0.25% of the control group's answers were green - the rest blue

  when confederates gave inconsistent answers - 1.25% of the participants answers were green

  when confederates gave consistent answers - 8.42% of the answers were green
• what was the conclusion of moscovici's study?


  suggested that minorities can influence majorities

  this influence is much more effective when the majority is consistent with their answers

  when the minority gave inconsistent answers - they were largely ignored by the majority
• martin et al (2008)...


  gave participants a message supporting a particular viewpoint and measured their support

  one group heard a minority group endorsing the same view, whereas the other group heard a majority group endorsing the view

  participants were then exposed to conflicting views and their support was measured again

  people were less willing to change their views if they had listened to the minority group - suggests that the minority message had been more deeply processed and had a more enduring effect
• what is social change?


  when society adopts a new belief/way of life or behaving - this then becomes widely accepted as the norm
• what are the six steps of social change?


  1. drawing attention to an issue
  2. constituency
  3. deeper processing of an issue
  4. the augmentation principle
  5. the snowball effect
  6. social crypromnesia
• drawing attention to an issue...


  can include protests, marches, production of leaflets/posters, information shared online - provides social proof of the problem
• constitency...


  when minorities express their arguments again and again, they are taken more seriously - the same message and intent
• deeper processing of an issue...


  the attention brought to an issue means that many people who had previously accepted the status quo begin to think about how injust it is
• the augmentation principle...


  can include examples of when people have risked their life for their cause in order to bring more attention to it
• the snowball effect...


  the change from minority to majority support
• social cryptomnesia...


  people have a memory that change has occurred but don't remember how it has happened - some have no memory of the events that led to the change
• asch found that...


  with a dissenter, the majority group were more likely to drop in conformity - such dissent has the power to create social change
• what do environmental and health campaigns do?

  exploit conformity processes by appealing to NSI and providing information on what other people are doing - example = advertising recylcing by showing other people doing it correctly
• gradual commitment...


  making somebody agree to do terrible things gradually, building it up until you get the person to do what you want

  for social change to occur - needs to be disobedient, positive role models (dissenters) for individuals to be able to resist the gradual commitment to obey
• holfling et al...


  21/22 nurses obeyed, demonstrating blind obedience - doctors and nurses education now includes psychology, with more regourous 21/22 nurses obeyed, demonstrating blind obedience - doctors and nurses education now includes psychology, with more rigourous signing off now being practiced better
• nolan et al (2008)...


  investigated the effects of normative influence of energy consumption - hung different types of posters on people's houses for a month

  one group mentioned other people doing things to help energy consumption, the other didn't - nolan found significant decrease in energy from the group that was influenced by other people

  shows that NSI can influence social change
• schultz et al (2008)...


  found that hotel guest were much more likely to reuse their bath towels when shown a message that "75% of other guests" do the same - normative messages can lead to a change in behaviour
• nemeth (1986)...


  found that the effects of minority influence were indirect and delayed

  it has taken a long time to change views about smoking and drinking - showed that the effects are fragile and slow, limiting the role of minority influence
• basir et al (2013)...


  found that people may be less likely to be influenced by minority groups that could be associated with being "too radical" - such as feminists and environmentalists

  research has shown that individuals rate these groups in negative ways

  "better" to not act in ways that may reinforce these stereotypes
• what do explanations of social change rely on heavily?


  the research from experimenters - moscoivi, asch, milgram - they are all lab studies and so suffer critisms
• what are some of the criticisms that lab studies face?


  lack of internal validity

  artificial setting

  deception of participants and lack of protection from psychological harm

  possibility of demand characteristics

  exaggerated results