AO3

• Nolan


  • aimed to see if they could change peoples energy use habits - put messages on the front door of houses claiming that most residents are trying to reduce their energy usage
  • this led to a significant decrease in energy use compared to a control group
  • demonstrates conformity can lead to social change through NSI
• Moscovici et al 


  • 172 american women in groups of 6 (2 confederates)
  • shown 36 slides of different shades of blue and were asked to state the colour of the slide aloud
  • condition 1 - the 2 confederates answered green for all of the slides
  • condition 2 - the 2 confederates answered green 24 times and blue 12 times and were inconsistent with their answers
  • findings - condition 1 ppts gave the wrong answer 8.42% of the time, condition 2 ppts gave the wrong answer 1.25% of the time
  • HOWEVER, female ppts from america (gender and culture bias) it was found that women are more likely to conform
• Mackie 


  • disagrees with the deep thinking view from minorities
  • Majority influence creates deeper processing because we believe others think as we do
  • when the majority thinks differently to us it creates pressure to think about their view
  • consequently, a central element of minority influence has been challenged. This lowers the validity of social change
• Nemeth


  • suggests that the effects of minority influence may only be indirect and delayed
  • indirect because the majority is only influenced on matters related to the specific issue (e.g recycling) not the central issue (e.g global warming)
  • effects of minority influence are delayed because the effects may not be seen in society for some time
  • this suggests that minority influence has limited effect in the short term and genuine social changes caused by minority influence can only occur after long periods of time