Minority Influence

• what factors affect minority influence?

  • consistency: more likely to occur when the minority members share the same belief and retain it over time
  • commitment: minorities sometimes engage in very risky or extreme behaviour in order to draw attention to their views
  • flexibility: more likely to occur when the minority is willing to compromise
• how did Moscovici investigate consistency in minority influence?

  • 172 female participants who were told they were taking part in a colour perception task
  • participants put into groups of 6 and shown 36 slides
  • 2/6 participants were confederates and in one condition (consistent) the two confederates said that all 36 slides were green
  • in the second condition (inconsistent) the confederates said that 24 of the slides were green and 12 were blue
• what did Moscovici find about consistency?

  • consistent condition: real participants agreed on 8.2% of the trials
  • inconsistent condition: real participants agreed on 1.25% of the trials
• how did Nemeth investigate flexibility in minority influence?

  • participants, in groups of four, had to agree on the amount of compensation they would give to a victim of a ski-lift accident
  • inflexible: when the minority argued for a low rate of compensation and refused to change their position
  • flexible: when the minority argued for a low rate of compensation but compromised by offering a slightly higher rate of compensation
• what did Nemeth find about flexibility?

  • inflexible condition: minority had little to no effect on the majority
  • flexible condition: majority members were much more likely to also compromise and change their view
• strength of minority influence

  • moscovici research supports idea of ISI. in one of his variations, participants were asked to write down their answers rather than say the colour of the slide out loud. it was found that agreement with the minority position was in fact higher suggesting that they had internalised the viewpoint as correct. moscovici suggests the majority was convinced of the minority's argument but found it easier to confess this privately
• limitations of minority influence (1)

  • criticised as being gynocentric since the results can't be generalised to males. also beta bias
  • biased sample of 172 female participants from America therefore unable to generalise the results to other populations. research often suggests females are more likely to conform and therefore further research is required to determine the effect of minority influence on male participants to improve the low population validity of this experiment
• limitations of minority influence (2)

  • breached ethical guidelines: deceived participants as they were told they were taking part in a colour perception task. therefore participants did not give fully informed consent. it is argued though moscovicis experiment required deception because had the participants known the true aims they are likely to display demand characteristics
  • methodological issues: task lacks mundane realism. in addition lab setting means a high control therefore research lacks external validity
• define minority influence

  • when a minority changes the attitudes, believes and behaviours of a majority