Social change

• How does a minority influence create social change?

  • Drawing attention.
  • Consistency.
  • Deeper processing:
  • The augmentation principle:
  • Commitment.
  • Snowball effect:
  • Social-crypto amnesia:
• Social Change AO3: Weakness:

  • One issue with social change is that it happens slowly and can take time for attitudes to change.
  • For example, Nemeth argues that the effect of minorities is indirect, this is because majorities are usually influenced by one matter at hand, rather than a central issue.
  • For example, hose pipe ban.
  • Furthermore, carrier bag ban.
  • Considered a limitation because its role in social influence is limited.
• Social Change AO3: Weakness:

  • Social change is often resisted.
  • Often people do not want to be associated with stereotypes that minorities bring.
  • Bashir et al (2013) found that people resist social change:
  • Feminists and Environmentalists.
  • Furthermore, this supports the role of minority influence as it demonstrates that minorities can never be influential unless they can attract the attention of the majority.
• Social Change AO3: Strength:

  • A strength of social change explanations is support from research into normative social influence (NSI).
  • This shows people often conform to fit in, leading to wider change.
  • For example, Nolan et al. (2008) found energy use dropped more when messages referenced others’ behaviour, supporting NSI’s role in change.
  • Alternatively, Foxtrot et al. argue social change is more effective when minority influence includes identification and consistency.
  • This highlights the value of combining NSI with minority influence, making the explanation more realistic and applicable.