Minority influence Flashcards
Outline what is meant by minority influence
This is a form of social influence in which a minority persuades a majority to adopt their belief/behaviour.
Minority influence is most likely to lead to internalisation – both public behaviour and private beliefs are changed in the process.
Outline consistency for minority influence
The minority’s views must be consistent in their opposition to the majority. Diachronic– consistency over time
“They have been saying this for a while, maybe they’ve got a point!”
Synchronic – agreement among members of the minority group
“They all think this way – maybe they’ve got a point!”
Outline commitment for minority influence
The minority is more powerful if they demonstrate their dedication to a cause.
Augmentation principle - perform action with element of risk.
“Wow they must really believe in what they are saying so perhaps I ought to consider their view.”
Outline flexibility for minority influence
Being completely consistent all the time may actually give the impression that the minority is rigid – which is undesirable.
e.g repeating the same argument – Hull KR are a better team than Hull FC
Members of the minority group need to be prepared to amend their views and accept reasonable counterarguments.
Explain the process of change
The majority is influenced by the minority gradually – the original opinion is new and different. Following consistency, commitment and flexibility the individual becomes ‘converted’
The Snowball Effect - the more people converted, the faster the rate of conversion. The minority view becomes a majority view.
What are the strengths of minority influence?
+ The findings of Moscovici’s colour experiment supports: In Moscovici’s experiment there were two confederates who stated that the slides were green, and pps agreed with them 8% of the time, even when is was the obvious wrong answer. In a separate condition where the minority view was inconsistent, it fell to 1%. Suggests presenting a consistent view is minimum requirement for persuading majority view to change.
+Evidence that deeper processing by the minority group is needed to change the view of the majority. Martin et al (2003) presented message representing certain viewpoint and measured pps agreement. One group of pps heard minority group agree with it and another heard majority group agree. Pps finally exposed to opposing idea and opinions measured. They were more likely to change their mind if listening to a majority view, suggesting deeper processing required by the minority.
+Supported by real world examples: suffragettes, BLM etc.
What are the weaknesses of minority influence?
- Counterpoint for Moscovici: agreement level still low at 8%- perhaps could be argued that minority influence is rare and not a useful concept.
- Counterpoint for Martin et al: studies such as these make clear distinctions between the majority and minority. Real world situations are more complicated. Irl minorities are consistent because they face hostility whereas in controlled settings the minority is defined simply as the smallest group. Means limited as does not tell us much about real world situations.
- Artificial tasks lack external validity, we cannot replicate how real-world minority influence takes place in a lab setting. (counterpointed by last strength on previous slide)
