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Social influence
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Social influence occurs when an individual's thoughts or actions are affected by other people. Social influence takes many forms and can be seen in conformity, socialization, peer pressure, obedience, leadership, persuasion, sales, and marketing. Harvard psychologist, Herbert Kelman identified three broad varieties of social influence.
- Compliance is when people appear to agree with others, but actually keep their dissenting opinions private.
- Identification is when people are influenced by someone who is liked and respected, such as a famous celebrity or a favorite uncle.
- Internalization is when people accept a belief or behavior and agree both publicly and privately.
Morton Deutsch and Harold Gerard described two psychological needs that lead humans to conform to the expectations of others.
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Encyclopedia
Social influence occurs when an individual's thoughts or actions are affected by other people. Social influence takes many forms and can be seen in conformity, socialization, peer pressure, obedience, leadership, persuasion, sales, and marketing. Harvard psychologist, Herbert Kelman identified three broad varieties of social influence.
- Compliance is when people appear to agree with others, but actually keep their dissenting opinions private.
- Identification is when people are influenced by someone who is liked and respected, such as a famous celebrity or a favorite uncle.
- Internalization is when people accept a belief or behavior and agree both publicly and privately.
Morton Deutsch and Harold Gerard described two psychological needs that lead humans to conform to the expectations of others. These include our need to be right (informational social influence), and our need to be liked (normative social influence). In terms of Kelman's typology, normative influence leads to public compliance, whereas informational influence leads to private acceptance.
Types
Charisma
Social influence can also be described as power - the ability to influence a person/group of people to one's own will. Usually people who possess beauty, significant sums of money, good jobs and so on will possess social influence on other, "ordinary" people. So even if the person doesn't possess any "real" or political power but possesses the things listed above (good looks, money, etc.), he could persuade other people into doing something. However, good looks are not solely why attractive people are able to exert more influence than average looking people, e.g. confidence is the by-product of good looks. Therefore, the individual's self-esteem and perceived Persona is the critical factor in determining the amount of influence one exerts.
Reputation
Those perceived as experts may exert social influence as a result of their perceived expertise.
This involves credibility, a form of social influence from which one draws upon the notion of trust. People believe an individual to be credible for a variety of reasons, such as perceived experience, attractiveness, etc.
Bully pulpit
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".
Another example would be movie stars, who do not usually possess any political power but are familiar to many of the world's citizens and therefore possess social status. They get a lot of media coverage and they have many enthusiastic fans.
Peer pressure
In the case of peer pressure, a person is convinced to do something (such as illegal drugs) which they might not want to do, but which they perceive as "necessary" to keep a positive relationship with other people, such as the friends.
Social trends
In his book, The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell discusses the way new ideas are transmitted by social influence. New products or fashions are introduced by innovators, who tend to be creative and nonconforming. Then early adopters join in, followed by the early majority. By this time, a substantial number of people are using the idea or product, and normative and informational influence encourages others to conform as well. The early majority is followed by a second group that Gladwell calls the late majority, and then finally by the laggards, who tend to be highly conventional and resistant to change.
See also
Further reading
- Cialdini, Robert B. (2001). ‘‘Influence: Science and practice (4th ed.)’’. Boston: Allyn & Bacon. ISBN 0321011473.
- Hogan, Kevin (2004) The Science of Influence: How to Get Anyone to Say "Yes" in 8 Minutes or Less! (ISBN 978-0471670513 ).
External links
- , Robert Cialdini's official web site, and in the United Kingdom
- Article is on a Canadian politics website.
- A webpage written by a professor at University of Southern California, devoted to social influence.
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