Minority Influence What attributes do you think these groups all shared to be successful?

What is the difference between the way that a minority and a majority influences others? Conformity? Social norms?

Behavioural Types for an effective conversion from majority to minority viewpoint Consistency- presses majority to look more closely at arguments. Commitment- certainty and confidence against hostility and great costs Flexibility- need to negotiate with powerful majority to avoid appearing dogmatic but without being inconsistent Explanation Real Life Examples Minority Influence- P32

Moscovici et al. (1969) Blue-Green Study Type of Experiment: Control Variable: Aim: Design: Moscovici et al. (1969) Blue-Green Study Aimed to investigate the effects of a consistent minority on a majority. Moscovici (1969) conducted a re-run of Asch’s experiment, but in reverse. Instead of one subject amongst a majority of confederates, he placed two confederates together with four genuine participants. The participants were first given eye tests to ensure they were not color-blind. Placed in a group consisting of four participants and two confederates. They were shown 36 slides which were clearly different shades of blue and asked to state the color of each slide out loud. In the first part of the experiment the two confederates answered green for each of the 36 slides. They were totally consistent in their responses. In the second part of the experiment they answered green 24 times and blue 12 times. In this case they were inconsistent in their answers. In condition one it was found that the consistent minority had an affect on the majority (8.42%) compared to an inconsistent minority (only 1.25% said green). A third (32%) of all participants judged the slide to be green at least once. A third (32%) of al participants judged the slide to be green at least once. Minorities can influence a majority, but not all the time and only when they behave in certain ways (e.g. consistent behavior style). The study used the lab experiments – i.e. are the results true to real life (ecological validity)? Also Moscovici used female students as participants (i.e. unrepresentative sample), so it would be wrong to generalize his result to all people – they only tell us about the behavior of female students. Findings about inconsistency: Findings about consistency: IV: DV: Conclusion: Evaliation:

Evaluation- Minority Influence One weakness is that the behavioural styles are too simplistic. This is because if we look at real life examples, they tend to be more about the size of the group and the level of oppression. This is an issue because it doesn’t offer an adequate explanation for real life examples such as… Perhaps a better explanation would be the snowball effect which suggests that… One weakness of Moscovici’s research is that Low Ecological Validity. This is because… This is a weakness because… On the other hand it could be considered a strength because.. One weakness is that some have argued that people only tolerate, don’t accept minority influence. Nemeth’10 found that people listen on the surface but eventually become irritated by the dissenters and don’t want the disharmony or ridicule of being ‘deviant’. This is an issue because… Therefore this challenges the success of minority influence.

Social Influences Processes in Social Change Minority influence 1 Majority influence 2

What is social change? Examples?

Change through minority influence Draw attention Cognitive Conflict Consistency Augmentation Principle Snowball Effect

Evaluation Very challenging, often gradual e.g. suffragettes Seen as deviant, e.g. gay rights 60s but the Communist Manifesto Very challenging, often gradual e.g. suffragettes Seen as deviant, e.g. gay rights 60s but the Communist Manifesto