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according to Moscovici what qualities do minorities need to show in order to achieve social change
consistenct, commintiment and flexibility
Minority influence definition
When an individual, or a small group, change the behaviour and/or attitudes of a larger group.
Opposite of conformity
Consistency
The minority will only be influential if they stick to their view over a period of time
Flexibility
The minority must show a degree of flexibility- being able to adapt and not rigidly stick to their attitude or behaviour in the light of contradictory information
Commitment (the augmentation principle)
If the supporters of the belief are willing to suffer for their views then they are taken more seriously by the majority- the impact of their belief on the majority is increased/augmented
Therefore they are likely to be more influential
Moscovici et al Blue green study aim
to investigate the effect of a consistent minority on a majority
Blue green study procedure
he conducted a re-run of Asch’s Study in reverse, instead of 1 subject among a majority of confederates he placed 2 confederates with 4 genuine participants
Sample- 172 female participants who were told they were taking part in a colour perception test
Shown 36 slides which were clearly different shades of blue and asked to state the colour of each slide out loud
Consistent condition- 2 confederates answered green for each of the 36 slides - consistent in their response
Inconsistent condition - answered green 34 times and blue 12 times- inconsistent
Results
Consistent minority
More than 8% conformity rate
32% said green at least once
Inconsistent minority- 1.25% conformity rate (did not differ significantly from control group)
Conclusion
Minorities can influence a majority, but not all the time, and only when they behave in certain way (e.g. consistent)
AO3- supporting research
P- there is supporting research for the importance of flexibility in minority influence
E- Nemeth and Brilmayer- studied the role of flexibility in a stimulated jury situation where group members discussed the amount of compensation to be paid to someone involved in a ski lift accident. When a confederate out forward an alternative point of view and refused to change their position, this had no effect on the other group members. A confederate who compromised, and therefore showed some degree of shift towards the majority, did exert influence over the rest of the group.
E- however, this was only evident in those who shifted late in negotiations (perceived as flexible) rather than those who shifted earlier (perceived as to have caved in to the majority)
l- Supports that genuine flexibility is an important factor in influencing majorities
AO3- issues with research
P- whilst their is research supporting the factors that affect minority influence, there are a number of issues with this research
E- firstly the artificiality of the tasks such as the green-blue study compared to the real issues minorities are campaigning for make it questionable about the extent to which conclusions can be drawn. Shifting the opinion about the colour of a slide does not equate to much more complex issues, such as equality, animal rights or climate change.
E- secondly, research does not take into account the struggles of real minorities against majorities in the wider world. Majorities in real life have power and status not just numbers
L- for these reasons the usefulness of research into minority influence such as Moscovici’s of Nemeth’s may be limited as they may in fact overestimate the power that minorities have in the real world
AO3- real world examples
P- perhaps considering minority groups that have been successful is more useful than artificially designed tasks when illustrating the process involved in exerting influence
E- e.g. considering the women’s rights movement you can see the importance of commitment, consistency and flexibility in shifting the majority that eventually led to women achieving the same voting rights as men in 1928.
E- commitment to the message: sacrificing their freedom when arrested and imprisoned, sacrificing their health and well-being during huger strikes.
Consistent: remained consistent to their message over time despite the negative repercussions.
Flexibility: right to vote for women was only for women over the age of 30 in 1918, it was not until 10 years later that women had equal voting rights
L- real life example of a minority that has successfully caused changes in society, suggesting minorities do have power, however it is not likely to be easy or rapid- only with the right strategies over a prolonged period of time can they be effective
cognitive dissonance
mental conflict that occurs when a person’s beliefs and behaviours do not align, people are motivated to reduce this conflict and think more deeply about the issues
Social cryptoamnesia
Describes our failure to give credit to minorities for their role in provoking social change
Snowball effect
when something grows in significance or size at an increasingly faster rate
why does minority influence often result in permanent change?
people internalise their message and truly believe it- as it likely to result from informational social influence
6 stages in social change
Drawing attention to an issue
Cognitive dissonance
Consistency of position
The augmentation principle
The snowball effect
Social cryptoamnesia
Stage 1- drawing attention to an issue
Minorities can bring about social change by drawing the majority’s attention to an issue. If their views are different to those held by the majority, this creates a conflict that they are motivated to reduce
E.g. the suffragettes used educational, political and militant tactics to draw attention to the fact that women were denied the same voting rights as men
Stage 2 - cognitive dissonance
If the minority view, or information they hold, leads to a conflict with the existing values of the majority, this may cause a shift towards the minority viewpoint to reduce the cognitive dissonance that will be experienced as a result of the message.
Majority will consider minority viewpoint more deeply- then move towards it or simply dismiss it
Stage 3- consistency of position
Moscovici’s research on minority influence suggested that minorities tend to be more influential in brining about social change when they express the arguments consistently over time
Stage 4- the augmentation principle
If a minority appears willing to suffer for their views, they are seen as more committed and so are taken more seriously than others.
Stage 5: the snowball effect
minority influence initially has a very small effect but this then spreads more and more widely at an increasingly faster rate as more people consider the issue being promoted, until it reaches a ‘tipping point’ which leads to wide scale change.
Initially people join minority to resolve their cognitive dissonance, and thus internalising the minority’s message. BUT later wider shift is more associated with NSI and compliance, the minority has now gained so much momentum and size that the remaining people conform to avoid social disapproval.
Stage 6- social cryptoamnesia/ the disassociation model
The majority group takes the views and ideas of the minority on board but either forget where they came from or deliberately disassociate themselves.
This is because minorities tend to have a negative image that members of the public do not want to be associated with, so whilst they become persuaded by the arguments of the negative minority, they seek to distance themselves from the source of the information
AO3- research evidence for social cryptoamnesia
P- there is research to support the phenomena of social cryptoamnesia in the process of social change
E- Bashier et al: Participants were less likely to behave in environmentally friendly ways because they did not want to be associated with stereotypical and minority environmentalists
E- they rated environmentalists and feminists in negative ways e.g. describing them as ‘militant’, ‘tree huggers’ and ‘man haters’ - this reduced people’s willingness to adopt social change behaviours that were advocated by activists
L- therefore to explain the recent shift to environmentally friendly behaviours becoming the norm, social cryptoamnesia must have occurred. Society must have forgotten the source of where the message came from in order for social change to happen
AO3 - evidence for role of majority influence
P- although social change is often initiated by minority groups there is evidence for the role of majority influence on social change
E- Nolan et al- hung messages on doors of houses in San Diego, California they either told them that most residents were trying to reduce energy usage or asked them to reduce their energy usage, but made not reference to other residents. Significant decrease in energy usage in first group only
E- Schultz- 75% of guests re-used their towels each day (rather than needing a new one) when seeing the message ‘most guests in this room reuse’
L- this implies that people are more willing to change their habits if they believed a majority of others had done so too,- demonstrates how majority influence can play a part in bringing about social change
AO3 -real world applications
P- as a result of research further minority groups can apply the processes to bring about further social change
E- Bashir’s advice to minorities hoping to create social change is to avoid behaving in ways that reinforce the stereotypes as this will always be off putting to the majority they want to influence.
E- one of the most significant examples of social change faced just this problem. The birth of communism owes much to the careful way in which a minority overcame a ‘deviant’ problem. To avoid being portrayed as deviants, communists made it clear in their communist manifesto that they had no interests separate from those of the majority (the working class). in fact the communist manifesto emphasised the fact that they were part of the working class and that the struggle was actually against the bourgeoisie . (I.r. They were saying we are not deviants we are just like you- the bourgeoises are against us all)
L- helpful in the real world
Note 
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