A01

• Outline social influence

  The process by which individuals and groups change each other's attitudes and behaviours
• Outline social change

  Occurs when a society or section of society adopts new beliefs, attitudes or a way of behaving; a shift or adaptation in social norms
• State the three types of social influence which could lead to social change

  Conformity, obedience and minority influence
• Define conversion

  The process where the majority gradually adopt a new minority viewpoint or behaviour; this new belief or behaviour becomes accepted both publicly and privately (internalisation)
• State the processes involved in Moscovici's (1976) conversion theory

  - Drawing attention through social proof

  - Consistency

  - Commitment (augmentation principle)

  - Cognitive conflict / deeper processing

  - Group membership / identification

  - Snowball effect
• Explain the snowball effect

  The more people who 'convert' to the minority view the faster the rate of conversion, whereby the minority view becomes the majority view and change has occurred
• Explain what is meant by social cryptomnesia

  The process by which minority attitudes, behaviours and beliefs become majority held views; the new belief takes form without a conscious understanding of where it came from, or the processes involved
• Outline how social change can happen through conformity

  - Through appealing to normative social influences by providing information about what other people are doing

  - Through dissent whereby the power of the majority is compromised, which encourages others to behave similarly
• Explain social norms intervention

  An attempt to correct misperceptions of perceived normative behaviour to change the risky behaviour of a target population
• Outline how social change can happen by challenging obedience

  We need disobedient, positive role models to enable us to think independently and resist the gradual commitment to obey
• Explain gradual commitment

  Once a small instruction is obeyed it becomes more difficult to resist a bigger one; people 'drift' into a new kind of behaviour