The Role of Social Influence Processes in Social Change

social change

= occurs when a whole society adopts a new belief or behaviour which then becomes widely accepted as the "norm"

minority influence

internal locus of control

disobedience of authority

... all contribute to social change

1. drawing attention

= you must draw attention to the situation/issue as to provide some sort of social proof of the problem

2. consistency

= you must be consistent and unwavering in the message you present and the intent of your cause

3. deeper processing

= people cannot simply accept a new viewpoint, they need to begin to think about it

4. the augmentation principle (commitment)

= if risks are involved in putting forward a point of view (e.g., prison sentence, abuse), then those expressing those views will be taken more seriously, thus strengthening their position

5. snowball effect

= the point in which there is a turn, often where a law is changed and the minority becomes the majority

--> rapidly increases in pace as more and more join the new, once minority view

6. socio crypto amnesia

= people may have a memory of the change but they don't remember how it happened

... social change occurred but it has become such the norm that people do not have memory of the events that led to that change

suffragette movement

= consistent in their view and persistently used educational and political arguments to draw attention to female rights

... remained consistent for many years despite opposition and continued protesting until they convinced society that women were entitled to vote

= commitment, made personal sacrifices for their cause

... many risked imprisonment, others risked death, went on hunger strikes, making influence more powerful

= group membership to convince other women to join their cause to expand influence and membership

... spread influence using deeper processing until it led to the snowball effect of social change and gained right to vote

rosa parks

= refused to give up her seat to a white male passenger in the 1950's, arrested for violating US laws

--> helped trigger civil rights movement to end racial segregation laws in US

...Sacrifice of being arrested and commitment to cause = more influential

(6 marks) explain the role of social influence processes in social change with an example

- Social change = change that occurs in society

- Minorities bring about social change through consistency, flexibility, and commitment

... social crypto-amnesia and the snowball effect can gradually turn the minority into the majority

- Governments/lawmakers bring about social change due to NSI and ISI

... conformity and obedience

- Members of minorities are more likely to have a strong locus of control and their disposition may make them more likely to influence social change

- Smoking, laws to prevent smoking in public places

- Suffragettes

AO3 - WEAKNESS: ineffective

P

= However, it could be argued that minority influence is only indirectly effective.

EX

= Social changes happen slowly as it takes time for attitudes to shift and for the minority view to become the majority view.

EV

= Nemeth (1986) argues that the effects of minority influence are likely to be mostly indirect and delayed because the majority focuses more on the source of the message rather than the message itself and the effects may not be seen for some time.

EXT

= Furthermore, the status quo supports the idea that social change cannot be relied on to bring long standing change as humans often conform to the majority position, keeping the status quo rather than enforcing social change.

LB

= These could be considered as limitations of using minority influence to explain social change because it shows that its effects are fragile and cannot be relied on to bring long standing changes.

A03 - STRENGTH: evidence

P

= There is supporting evidence for how the augmentation principle and 3 conditions of minority influence can create social change.

EV

= The suffragette movement used consistency and commitment to win the right to vote after 50 years. The suffragettes kept the same views and continued to fight for their cause despite it taking a long time and suffered personal sacrifices such as being arrested in order to draw attention to their cause.

EX

= This strengthened their position as a group and made people take their views more seriously, which consequently led to deeper processing and social change.

EXT

= In addition to this, Rosa Parks bus boycott movement also showed how commitment and the augmentation principle can create social change. Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white passenger, unwavering in her beliefs, and faced social backlash as well as a prison sentence. Her behaviour gained black rights by expressing her minority view.

LB

= Both of these examples provide real-life application of these processes as well as prove how minority influence can cause social change.

AO3 - WEAKNESS: NSI supports

P

= Nolan et al. (2008) research into social influence can also be used to support social influence as an explanation for social change.

EV

= They investigated whether hanging messages on the front doors of house with the key message being that the majority of residents were trying to reduce their energy usage would directly lead to the reduction of energy consumption in a community in California.

EX

= Nolan et al found significant decreases in energy usage within the community, suggesting that conformity can lead to social change through the operation of normative social influence.

C

= However, it could be argued that Nolan's study is culture bound as it was only conducted on residents in San Diego, California. Had the experiment taken place in another country or state, the results may have varied significantly as the residents may have conformed more or less depending on the strength of the community and individual differences.

LB

= Nevertheless, Nolan's study provides evidence for the role of NSI and how it can lead to social change within a community, using a realistic situation that can be applied to real life.