Social influence
Social influence comprises the ways in which individuals adjust their behavior to meet the demands of a social environment. It takes many forms and can be seen in conformity, socialization, peer pressure, obedience, leadership, persuasion, sales, and marketing. Typically social influence results from a specific action, command, or request, but people also alter their attitudes and behaviors in response to what they perceive others might do or think. In 1958, Harvard psychologist Herbert Kelman identified three broad varieties of social influence.[1]
- Compliance is when people appear to agree with others but actually keep their dissenting opinions private.[2]
- Identification is when people are influenced by someone who is liked and respected, such as a famous celebrity.
- Internalizationis when people accept a belief or behavior and agree both publicly and privately.
Types
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Social influence is a broad term that relates to many different phenomena. Listed below are some major types of social influence that are being researched in the field of social psychology. For more information, follow the main article links provided.
Kelman's varieties
There are three processes of attitude change as defined by Harvard psychologist Herbert Kelman in a 1958 paper published in the Journal of Conflict Resolution.[1] The purpose of defining these processes was to help determine the effects of social influence: for example, to separate public conformity (behavior) from private acceptance (personal belief).
Compliance
Compliance is the act of responding favorably to an explicit or implicit request offered by others. Technically, compliance is a change in behavior but not necessarily in attitude; one can comply due to mere obedience or by otherwise opting to withhold private thoughts due to social pressures.[4] According to Kelman's 1958 paper, the satisfaction derived from compliance is due to the social effect of the accepting influence (i.e., people comply for an expected reward or punishment-aversion).[1]
Identification
Identification is the changing of attitudes or behaviors due to the influence of someone who is admired.
Internalization
Internalization is the process of acceptance of a set of norms established by people or groups that are influential to the individual. The individual accepts the influence because the content of the influence accepted is intrinsically rewarding. It is congruent with the individual's value system, and according to Kelman the "reward" of internalization is "the content of the new behavior".[1]
Conformity
Conformity is a type of social influence involving a change in behavior, belief, or thinking to align with those of others or with normative standards. It is the most common and pervasive form of social influence.
Minority influence
Researchers have been studying social influence and
Self-fulfilling prophecy
A self-fulfilling prophecy is a prediction that directly or indirectly causes itself to become true due to positive feedback between
Social contagion
Social contagion involves the spontaneous spread of behaviors or emotions through a group, population or social network. Social contagion consists of two categories, behavioral contagion and emotional contagion. Unlike conformity, the emotion or behavior being adopted may not represent a social norm.[9]
Anxiety is a problem some have social however in this case it can be economic relating to social contagion,[10] also depression deteriorates many making confidence lower as it important to stay up to date on the science and issues mental health has on so many,[11] are two examples of social contagion as behaviors can spread through the population especially similarly effecting those in the same economic status.
Reactance
Reactance is the adoption of a view contrary to the view that a person is being pressured to accept, perhaps due to a perceived threat to behavioral freedoms. This phenomenon has also been called
Obedience
Obedience is a form of social influence that derives from an authority figure, based on order or command.[14] The Milgram experiment, Zimbardo's Stanford prison experiment, and the Hofling hospital experiment are three particularly well-known experiments on obedience, and they all conclude that humans are surprisingly obedient in the presence of perceived legitimate authority figures.
Persuasion
Persuasion is the process of guiding oneself or another toward the adoption of an attitude by rational or symbolic means. US psychologist Robert Cialdini defined six "weapons of influence": reciprocity, commitment, social proof, authority, liking, and scarcity to bring about conformity by directed means. Persuasion can occur through appeals to reason or appeals to emotion.[15]
Psychological manipulation
Psychological manipulation is a type of social influence that aims to change the behavior or
Social influence is not necessarily negative. For example, doctors can try to
Abusive power and control
Controlling abusers use various tactics to exert power and control over their victims.
Abuse in power is unfortunately a reoccurring problem in some countries, with Venezuela being a key example.[19] The article I linked is relating to the abuse of power from Chaves is Venezuela where drugs have run the borders and nation for a while now.
Propaganda
Propaganda is information that is not
Hard power
Hard power is the use of
Antecedents
Many factors can affect the impact of social influence.
Social impact theory
Social impact theory was developed by Bibb Latané in 1981. This theory asserts that there are three factors which increase a person's likelihood to respond to social influence:[22]
- Strength: The importance of the influencing group to the individual
- Immediacy: Physical (and temporal) proximity of the influencing group to the individual at the time of the influence attempt
- Number: The number of people in the group
Cialdini's "weapons of influence"
Robert Cialdini defines six "weapons of influence" that can contribute to an individual's propensity to be influenced by a persuader:[15][23]
- Reciprocity: People tend to return a favor.
- Commitment and consistency: People do not like to be self-contradictory. Once they commit to an idea or behavior, they are averse to changing their minds without good reason.
- Social proof: People will be more open to things that they see others doing. For example, seeing others compost their organic waste after finishing a meal may influence the subject to do so as well.[24]
- Authority: People will tend to obey authority figures.
- Liking: People are more easily swayed by people they like.
- Scarcity: A perceived limitation of resources will generate demand.
Unanimity
Social Influence is strongest when the group perpetrating it is consistent and committed. Even a single instance of dissent can greatly wane the strength of an influence. For example, in Milgram's first set of obedience experiments, 65% of participants complied with fake authority figures to administer "maximum shocks" to a confederate. In iterations of the Milgram experiment where three people administered shocks (two of whom were confederates), once one confederate disobeyed, only ten percent of subjects administered the maximum shocks.[25]
Status
Those perceived as
Those with access to the media may use this access in an attempt to influence the public. For example, a politician may use speeches to persuade the public to support issues that he or she does not have the power to impose on the public. This is often referred to as using the "bully pulpit." Likewise, celebrities do not usually possess any political power, but they are familiar to many of the world's citizens and, therefore, possess social status.
Power is one of the biggest reasons an individual feels the need to follow through with the suggestions of another. A person who possesses more authority (or is perceived as being more powerful) than others in a group is an icon or is most "popular" within a group. This person has the most influence over others. For example, in a child's school life, people who seem to control the perceptions of the students at school are most powerful in having a social influence over other children.[27]
Culture
Culture appears to play a role in the willingness of an individual to conform to the standards of a group. Stanley Milgram found that conformity was higher in Norway than in France.[28] This has been attributed to Norway's longstanding tradition of social responsibility, compared to France's cultural focus on individualism. Japan likewise has a collectivist culture and thus a higher propensity to conformity. However, a 1970 Asch-style study found that when alienated, Japanese students were more susceptible to anticonformity (giving answers that were incorrect even when the group had collaborated on correct answers) one third of the time, significantly higher than has been seen in Asch studies in the past.[13]
While
Emotions
Emotion and disposition may affect an individual's likelihood of conformity or anticonformity.[12] In 2009, a study concluded that fear increases the chance of agreeing with a group, while romance or lust increases the chance of going against the group.[31]
Social structure
Social networks
A
However, important flaws have been identified in the contagion model for social influence which is assumed and used in many of the above studies.[37][38][39] In order to address these flaws, causal inference methods have been proposed instead, to systematically disentangle social influence from other possible confounding causes when using observational data.[40][41]
Global approach to the phenomenon of influence
Provisional introduction
As described above, theoretical approaches are in the form of knowledge clusters. A global theory of influence is missing for an easy understanding and an education to protect from manipulators. A first tentative was published in 2012.[42] The first pages of Influence & Systems explain why a global approach is necessary.
See also
References
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- ^ a b Aronson, Elliot, Timothy D. Wilson, and Robin M. Akert. Social Psychology. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2010. Print.
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- ^ Moscovici, S. and Nemeth (1974) Minority influence. In C. Nemetn (ed.), Social psychology: Classic and contemporary integrations (pp. 217–249), Chicago:Rand McNally
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- ^ Daniel, Eisenburg (2010). "Social contagion of mental health: Evidence from college roommates" (PDF). www.personal.umich.edu. Retrieved November 13, 2023.
- ^ a b Brehm, J. W. (1966). A theory of psychological reactance. Academic Press
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- ^ "Venezuela: Concentration and Abuse of Power Under Chávez | Human Rights Watch". 2012-07-17. Retrieved 2023-11-13.
- ^ Smith, Bruce L. (17 February 2016). "Propaganda". britannica.com. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Archived from the original on 20 April 2020. Retrieved 23 April 2016.
- ^ a b Daryl Copeland (Feb 2, 2010). "Hard Power Vs. Soft Power". The Mark. Archived from the original on 1 May 2012. Retrieved 26 April 2012.
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- ^ "What are the 6 principles of influence?". conceptually.org. Archived from the original on October 26, 2017. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
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- S2CID 18309531. Archived from the original on 2012-07-17. Full-text PDF. Archived June 11, 2011, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Ivory Tower Unswayed by Crashing Economy Archived 2016-11-14 at the Wayback Machine. New York Times.
- ^ C. Mugny; L Souchet; C Codaccioni; A Quiamzade (2008). Social Representation and Social Influence. 53 (2), pp. 223–237.
- ^ Blass, T. (2004). The man who shocked the world: The life and legacy of Stanley Milgram. New York: Basic Books.
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- ^ Sistrunk, Frank; McDavid, John W.; Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 17(2), Feb, 1971. pp. 200–207.
- ^ EurekAlert. (2009). Fear or romance could make you change your mind, U of Minnesota study finds Archived 2012-09-27 at the Wayback Machine.
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- ^ Kolata, Gina (22 May 2008). "Gina Kolata, "Study Finds Big Social Factor in Quitting Smoking," The New York Times, May 22, 2008". The New York Times. Archived from the original on October 19, 2015. Retrieved February 23, 2017.
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- ^ Frezal, B et J-C; Leininger-Frezal, C; Mathia, TG; Mory, B, Influence & Systems: Provisional Introduction to the Theory of Influence and Manipulation (PDF), translated by Leslie, Wendy (1st English ed.), archived (PDF) from the original on 2023-02-04, retrieved 2019-06-16
External links
- Media related to Social influence at Wikimedia Commons