Social Influence and Social Change AO3

• +Psychologists can explain how minority influence brings about social change. Nemeth claims social change is due to the type of thinking that minorities inspire. When people consider minority arguments, they engage in different thinking. This type of thinking is broad: the thinker actively searches for information and weighs up more creative solutions to social issues. This shows why dissenting minorities are valuable; they stimulate new ideas and open minds in a way that majorities can't.
• -Deeper processing may not play a role in how minorities bring about social change. Mackie presents evidence that majority influence may create deeper processing if you don't share their views. This is because we like to believe that other people share our views and think in the same way as us. When we find that a majority believes something different, we are forced to think about their arguments and reasoning. This means that a central element of minority influence has been challenged, casting doubt on its validity as an explanation of social change.
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  +Research shows that social influence processes based on psychological research do work. Nolan aimed to see it they could change people's energy use habits. The researchers hung messages on front doors of houses in San Diego every week for a month. The key message was that must people are trying to reduce their energy usage. As a control, some residents had a message just asking them to save energy, making no reference to other's behaviour.
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  There were significant decreases in energy usage in the first group compared to the second. This shows that conformity (majority influence) can lead to social change through the operation of normative social influence. It’s a valid explanation.
• +-Some studies show that people's behavior isn't always changed through exposing them to social norms. Foxcraft reviewed social norms interventions as part of the Fold standard Cochrane Collaboration. The review included 70 studies where the social norms approach was used to reduce student alcohol use. The researchers found only a small reduction in drinking quantity and no effect on drinking frequency. Therefore it seems that using normative influence doesn't always produce long term social change.