As a majority view gained the support of more members, individuals holding an opposite viewpoint were less able to influence the group. The number of members within a group expressing a minority opinion also affects the level of influence that they are able to exert on the remaining members. Gordijn et al found that a minority was less influential when the number of members expressing an opinion remained constant or decreased, compared to when members perceived the minority to be increasing in numbers.
This may explain the snowball effect of minority influence, whereby individuals are attracted to a viewpoint on the basis that they believe it is becoming more acceptable, and is gaining popularity amongst other members.
A final observation regarding minority influence is that, after being successfully persuaded by a minority, people tend to forget the origins of their new views. This phenomenon, known as social cryptomnesia , often occurs when a person held negative views of the minority whose views they adopted. Instead of identifying with the minority group, individuals will dissociate the minority views from the people who promoted them.
Whilst minority influence has led to their internalisation of environmentalist ideas, they reject the notion that the group was responsible for their new recycling routine and maintain a negative view of the minority group.
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How can the colors around us affect our mood? A new study claims that appreciation of black humor is a sign of intelligence. How ingratiation techniques are used to persuade people. A look at common defense mechanisms we employ to protect the ego. Learn to interpret body language signals and better understand people's emotions. He wanted to see if a consistent minority could influence a majority to give an incorrect answer, in a colour perception task.
His sample consisted of female participants who were told that they were taking part in a colour perception task. The participants were placed in groups of six and shown 36 slides, which were all varying shades of blue. The participants had state out loud the colour of each slide. Two of the six participants were confederates and in one condition consistent the two confederates said that all 36 slides were green; in the second condition inconsistent the confederates said that 24 of the slides were green and 12 were blue.
Moscovici found that in the consistent condition, the real participants agreed on 8. This shows that a consistent minority is 6. Note: It is important to note that consistency and commitment are linked. If a minority is consistent in their view then they also are showing commitment to their cause.
Another way a minority can show commitment is through sacrifices, which will be examined in the next section. Moscovici used a bias sample of female participants from America. If the minority can get the majority to discuss and debate the arguments that the minority are putting forward, influence is likely to be stronger Nemeth, A number of researchers have questioned whether consistency alone is sufficient for a minority to influence a majority.
They argue that the key is how the majority interprets consistency. If the consistent minority are seen as inflexible, rigid, uncompromising and dogmatic, they will be unlikely to change the views of the majority. However, if they appear flexible and compromising, they are likely to be seen as less extreme, as more moderate, cooperative and reasonable.
Some researchers have gone further and suggested that it is not just the appearance of flexibility and compromise which is important but actual flexibility and compromise. This possibility was investigated by Nemeth The experiment was based on a mock jury in which groups of three participants and one confederate had to decide on the amount of compensation to be given to the victim of a ski-lift accident.
When the consistent minority the confederate argued for a very low amount and refused to change his position, he had no effect on the majority. However, when he compromised and moved some way towards the majority position, the majority also compromised and changed their view. This experiment questions the importance of consistency.
The minority position changed, it was not consistent, and it was this change that apparently resulted in minority influence. People tend to identity with people they see similar to themselves. For example, men tend to identify with men, Asians with Asians, teenagers with teenagers etc. Research indicates that if the majority identifies with the minority, then they are more likely to take the views of the minority seriously and change their own views in line with those of the minority.
For example, one study showed that a gay minority arguing for gay rights had less influence on a straight majority than a straight minority arguing for gay rights Maass et al. The non-gay majority identified with the non-gay minority.
They tended to see the gay minority as different from themselves, as self-interested and concerned with promoting their own particular cause. 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. Procedure : They were then 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. Would the responses of the two confederates influence those of the four participants? In other words, would there be minority influence? Results : In condition one it was found that the consistent minority had an affect on the majority 8. Conclusion : Minorities can influence a majority, but not all the time and only when they behave in certain ways e.
Criticism : The study used the lab experiments — i. Also Moscovici used female students as participants i. Most of the research on minority influence is based on experiments conducted in laboratories.
This raises the question of ecological validity. Is it possible to generalize from the findings of laboratory research to other settings? Edward Sampson is particularly critical of laboratory research on minority influence.
He makes the following points. The participants in laboratory experiments are rarely 'real groups'. More often than not they are a collection of students who do not know each other and will probably never meet again.
They are also involved in an artificial task. As such they are very different from minority groups in the wider society who seek to change majority opinion.
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