minority influence

• Minority influence is a form of social influence where an individual or small group influence the beliefs/behaviours/ideas of others. Minority influence causes to internalisation.
• Moscovici (1969) got a group of ppts to look at a set of 36 blue coloured slides that changed in intensity. Ppts had to say if the slides were blue or green. This group had 2 confederates who consistently stated that the slides were green. Real ppts gave the same answer in 8.42% of the trials. A 2nd group of ppts were exposed to an inconsistent minority, the real ppts said that the slides were green in 1.25% of the trials. A 3rd group, control group, said that the slides were green 0.25% of the time. Consistent minorities influence the majority.
• There are three main processes in minority influence. These are consistency, commitment and flexibility.
• Consistency is when the same beliefs are held for a long time and shared by all people in the minority. Synchronic consistency: all people in the minority share the same view. Diachronic consistency: people have the same belief for an extended period of time.
• Commitment is when people make personal sacrifices to show the dedication they have to their views. The minority engage in different activities to help draw attention to what needs to be changed. Personal risk shows that their beliefs are strong and helps reinforce the message that change is needed. The augmentation principle.
• Flexibility is when people are open to compromising. If people are too consistent it can be off-putting and stop people from making a change. The minority should adapt their views and consider other viewpoints.
• Minority influence AO3:

  • research support: Moscovici. When the minority was consistent the majority changed. HOWEVER, only female ppts took part. Gender bias.
  • artificial stimuli. Supporting research used artificial stimuli. Findings lack mundane realism and cannot be applied to real behaviour.
  • evidence of deeper processing. Martin et al (2003) gave ppts a message and either heard a majority or minority agree with them. People who heard the minority = less likely to change to the other view. Increases validity.