Social Influence And Social Change

Question 1

What is social change?

Answer 1

When a whole society adopts a new belief or way of behaving which then becomes widely accepted as the ‘norm’.

Question 2

Minority influence processes leading to social change

Answer 2

1. Drawing attention - providing social proof
2. Consistency - Minority keeping same message and continuing with their campaign no matter the support
3. Deeper processing - people begin to deep the injustice of the issue.
4. The augmentation principle - Individuals showing their commitment - risking life’s
5. Snowball effect - change from minority to majority
6. Social cryptomnesia - People have memory that change has occurred but don’t know how

Question 3

Conformity and social change

Answer 3

• in Asch variation when one confederate gave correct answer, others start to break away from the dissent
• can lead to social change
• happens in environmental and health campaigns as they appeal to normative social influence by drawing attention to what majority are doing
• Example getting young people to stop smoking by informing them majority of younger people do not smoke.

Question 4

Obedience and social change

Answer 4

• Zimbardo suggested obedience can cause social change through gradual commitment
• Once small thing obeyed harder to disobey a larger one leading to slow change in behaviour.

Question 5

Strengths of process involved in social change

Answer 5

• Nolan - conformity leading to NSI - hung messages on the front doors of houses in San Diego every week for one month. The message stated that most residents were trying to reduce their energy usage. As a result, they found significant decreases in energy usage.

Question 6

Weaknesses of processes involved in social change

Answer 6

• Methodological issues in research that supports
• explanation of minority influence in social change is very limited - its role is limited - does not happen often and very slowly.