Minority influence

Question 1

What is majority influence?

Answer 1

social pressure exerted by the greater part of a group on individual members and smaller factions within the group.

Question 2

What is the minority influence?

Answer 2

A form of social influence where members of the majority group change their beliefs or behaviours as a result of their exposure to a persuasive minorirty

Question 3

What happens when people converge to the minority position?

Answer 3

It is a deeper and longer lasting, as people have internalised the minority’s point of view

Question 4

What must be done in order to bring coversion to the minority influence what behaviourial styles must be adopted?

Answer 4

• Consistency
• Commitment
• Flexibility

Question 5

What usually happens when people are first exposed to the minority influence?

Answer 5

They are usually assume the minority influence is wrong

Question 6

What happens the the minority influence adopts a consistent approach?

Answer 6

Others come to reassess the situationa and consider the issue more carefully

Question 7

What did Wood et al. ( 1994) carry research out on?

Answer 7

97 studies of minority influence

Question 8

What did Wood et al. ( 1994) find in his studies

Answer 8

Minorities who were perceived as being especially consistent in expressing their position were paricularly influential

Question 9

Why is commitment important in the influence process?

Answer 9

It suggests certainty, confidence and courage in the face of a hostile majority

Question 10

What does Mugny (1982) suggest about flexibility?

Answer 10

Flexibility is more effective at changing majority opinion than rigidity of arguments

Question 11

What must minority do when the negotiating?

Answer 11

They mustn’t enforece

Question 12

What does Mugny distinguish between rigid and flexible negotiating?

Answer 12

Rigid minority that refuses to comprimise risks being perceived as narrow-mined
Minority too flexible and too prepared to compromise risks being seen as inconsistent

Question 13

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What was each group comprised of?

Answer 13

Four naive participants and a minority of two confederates

Question 14

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What were the participants shown?

Answer 14

Blue slides that varied only in intensity

Question 15

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What were the participants asked to do?

Answer 15

Asked to judge the colour of each slide

Question 16

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What happened in the ‘consistent’ experimental condition?

Answer 16

Two confederates repeatedly called the blue sliders ‘green’

Question 17

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What happened in the ‘inconsistent’ experimental condition?

Answer 17

The confederates called the slides ‘green’ on two thirds of the trials

Question 18

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What happened in the control condition?

Answer 18

Six naive participants and no confederates, participants calles the slides blue throughout

Question 19

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

Findings of the consistent minority?

Answer 19

The naive participant said green on over 8% of the trials

Question 20

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What happened in the inconsistent minority?

Answer 20

Very little influence, and did not differ significantly friom the control group

Question 21

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What happened when the main study was over?

Answer 21

Participants asked individually to sort 16 coloured discs into wither ‘blue’ or ‘green’

Question 22

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What were the results of the study after the study?

Answer 22

Individuals in the consistent groups- judged more discs as green than those in the inconsistent group

Question 23

Key study: Moscovici et al. (1969)

What do the results of the second study show?

Answer 23

Initial influence was more at a private than a public level

Question 24

Research support for flexibility

Answer 24

Nemeth and Brilmayer- simulated jury situation
- Group members discussed the amount of compensation to be paid to someone involved in a ski-lift accident
- When a confederate put his alternate idea and refused to change his position this had no effect
- But a confederate comprised, and showed some shift to majority did exert an influence
- Influence was only evident in those who shifted late in negotiations rather than those who shifted earlier
This sugests that flexibility is only effective at changing majority opinion in certain circumstances

Question 25

The real ‘value’ of minority influence

Answer 25

Nemeth (2010) argues that dissent, in the form of minority opinion, ‘opens’ the mind
- As a result of exposure to a minority position, people search for information, consider more options, make better decisions, and are more creative
- Dissenters liberate people to say what they believe and they stimulate divergent and creative thought even when they are wrong
This view is supported by the work of Van Dyne and Saavedra (1996), who studied the role of dissent in work groups, finding that groups had improved decision quality when exposed to a minority perspective

Question 26

Minority influence in name only

Answer 26

depite the evidence for higher quality decision-making, Nemeth (2010) claims it is still difficult to convince people of the value of dissent
- People accept the principle only on the surface
> They appear tolerant, but quickly become irritated by a dissenting view that persists
- They also fear creating a lack of harmony within the group by welcoming dissent, or be made to fear repercussions, including being ridicules by being associated with a ‘deviant pov
As a consequence, this means that the majority view persists and the opportunities for the innovative thinking associated with minority influence are lost