Social Impact Theory Flashcards
What is social impact theory?
Made by latane- a theory of social influence that can be used to explain obedience.
What is the source and the target?
Source-the influencer
Target-the person being influenced.
What is social influence the result of?
Social forces-the likelihood that a person will respond
What 3 thing will social influence increase with?
Strength
Innediacy
Number
What is the strength in social influence?
How important the source is to the target (status, authority, age)
The more important the source is to the target the more of an influence they will have.
What is immediacy in social influence?
How close the target is to the source as the time of the influence attempt. This was can include both proximity and relation to the person.
What is number in social influence?
How many people there are in a social situation (sources and targets)
More people present, the more influence they will have on an individual.
What is psychosocial law?
The idea that the first source of influence as the most dramatic impact on people. But the second, third, etc sources generate less and less social source.
Supporting evidence of social impact theory
Berowitz , bickman and Milgram.
Studies if people would look up at the sky if they saw someone else do it.
1 confederate: 42% of passers stopped and looked up
15 confederate:86% of passers stopped and looked up.
Which each additional confederate, the increase of people got smaller.
Divisional affect of social impact.
The number of targets to be influenced affects the impact of the source.
This suggests an authority figure would have a diminished capacity to influence someone if that someone has an ally of group of allies.
Research supporting for strength in social influence
Milgram
Obedience was much higher in his study, when the experimenter was wearing a lab coat (65%)
Compared to one of the variation studies when the experimenter was wearing ordinary clothes (20%)
Thus demonstrated his stench to of the source affects obedience.
Research supporting for immediacy in social impact theory
Milgram
Obedience was higher in his original study when the experimenter was in the same room as the participant (65%)
Compared to in one of the variation studies when the experiment ordered over the telephone (22.5%) demonstrating how the immediacy of the source affects obedience.
Contrasting research
Agency theory
These theories highlight the fact that social impact theory cannot fully explain obedience and is therefore reductionist
How useful in social impact theory?
Quantifiable in that the principles can be observed in everyday behavour.
Research into conformity obedience (Milgram) and bystander behaviour (Latane) have all demonstrated that impact of strength, immediacy and number on human responses in social situations such as obedience.
Application for social impact theory?
Theory can help explain obedience in real ice atreocities such as the holocaust.
The nazi soldiers (target) obeyed hitler (source) because they were strong (uniform) in a large number of,more with high immediacy.
Understanding such atrocities means we can do our best to prevent them happening again, and therefore the theory has practical application to society.
Practical application of the social impact theory?
The theory is limited in the type of social situation it is able to explain. It cannot predict what might happen when two equal groups impact one another.
