Role of Social Influence Processes in Social Change (AQA AS Psychology)

Role of social influence process in social change

• Social change is a shift or adaptation in social norms

• Social change is not sudden; it takes place gradually, sometimes without people realising that change is happening, e.g.:

  • The move towards recycling at home began with people using communal recycling hubs (e.g. huge brown bins to deposit bottles)

    • people began to install their own green/brown/blue bins both outside and inside their homes for different recycled items

    • separating and recycling waste is now simply part of everyday life, something that was not in evidence even 30 years ago 

  • Spending time in a nightclub, restaurant or even cinema in the 1970s would have left people overwhelmed by cigarette smoke

    • public health campaigns over the decades helped to raise awareness of the dangers of smoking which eventually translated to official government policy (in the UK)

• Often minority influence is the driving force behind social change, e.g. gay rights:

  • The right to marry someone of the same sex is something that - decades ago - would not have been considered possible

  • Drawing attention to the inequalities of heterosexual/homosexual experience (e.g. through campaigns such as Stonewall and celebrations such as World Pride Month) meant that discussions around gay rights could begin properly

  • By maintaining a consistent message and showing commitment to the cause, gay rights campaigners were able to show that this was a serious issue that warranted serious attention and consideration

  • Taking a flexible approach (e.g. using humour as a 'weapon'; avoiding a rigid and inflexible argument) helped the gay rights cause to reach a wider audience and to find support from various sectors of society

    • being flexible can enable people from outside the minority to engage in deeper processing of the issue

  • Harvey Milk was the first openly gay politician to be elected in California

    • Milk sponsored a bill banning homosexual discrimination in hotels, housing and jobs

    • he was assassinated because of his commitment to the cause (the augmentation principle)

  • The snowball effect can be seen in the year-on-year traction that was made by the gay rights movement

    • this bit-by-bit erosion of opposition and winning over the majority culminated in gay marriage becoming legal in the UK in 2013

  • Gay marriage is now not regarded as unusual in many countries

    • TV shows such as Ru Paul's Drag Race, It's A Sin and Queer Eye highlight the phenomenon of social cryptomnesia

    • a specific social change is woven into the fabric of a society to the extent that it becomes difficult to remember a time when things were different

    • thus, what was once regarded as deviant, unusual, and strange becomes such a familiar part of life that it is often a struggle to recall that once upon a time things were very different

Evaluation of the role of social influence processes in social change

Strengths

• The processes of social change are supported by Dickerson et al. (1992):

  • Participants who had made a prior commitment (signing a poster on saving water and answering a questionnaire on their use of water) spent less time showering than participants who had not done so

  • Thus, prior commitment to prosocial behaviour results in positive behaviour change

• There are positive implications for the economy when it comes to social change:

  • Accepting minority rights (e.g. women's rights, civil rights, gay rights) means that the workplace is open to more diverse attitudes and practices

    • this in turn can boost productivity and creativity

Limitations

• Social change happens slowly and is not without setbacks

  • This slow pace means that it is difficult to track the progress of social change accurately and to know what the exact drivers of the change initially were

• There are negative implications for the economy too, when it comes to social change:

  • Recycling waste by separating it into categories means different bin collections followed by several processes to convert/transform the waste, all of which are expensive

  • Women being more active in the workplace means that maternity leave and pay must be factored into the costs of employing a woman of child-bearing age