social influence & social change

Question 1

social change

Answer 1

occurs when a whole society adopts a new belief or behavior which then becomes widely accepted as the ‘norm’ which was not before, result of minority influence

Question 2

lessons from minority influence research

Answer 2

• drawing attention:1950’s black and white segregation, civil right marches drew attention
• consistency: civil rights activists were a minority in America but they were consistent in their message
• deeper processing: activism meant many thought deeply
• augmentation principle: individuals risked their lives many times ‘freedom riders’ mixed racial groups who boarded buses challenging racial segregation on transport many were beaten but their risk indicates strong beleif
• snowball effect: activists martin luther king gradually got the attention of the USA government many backed the minority position
• social cryptomnesia: many dont remember the events

Question 3

lessons from conformity

Answer 3

-environmental and health campaigns exploit conformity processes by appealing to NSI by providing info about what others were doing e.g reducing litter by printing messages on bins

Question 4

lessons from obedience research

Answer 4

-zimbardo suggested obedience can be used to create social change through gradual commitment, once a small instruction is obeyed it becomes more difficult to resist a bigger one

Question 5

Evaluation (strength)

Answer 5

-research shows social influence processes do work, jessica nolan et al aimed to see change peoples energy use habits, messages hung on doors every week for a month saying most residents were trying to reduce their energy usage, control some had different messages asking to save energy, significant decrease in energy usage in first group showing conformity leads to social change

Question 6

weakness

Answer 6

-deeper processing may not play a role in how minorities bring about social change, some are supposedly converted because they think deeply about the minority’s view, Diane Mackie disagrees, majority influence create deeper processing if u dont share the view, we like to beleive other share our views when we find majority beleives something different we are forced to think long and hard about their views