Three experiments examined how change in minority size influenced information processing and attitude change. Experiment 1 showed that when strong rather than weak arguments were presented, a message attributed to an expanding rather than shrinking minority elicited more issue-relevant thoughts and more related attitude change in the argued direction. Experiment 2 showed more related attitude change in the argued direction when it was unlikely that expanding size was due to the shifting majority members’ self-interest. Experiment 3 replicated these findings. In addition, results indicated that change in size interacted differently with the majority than with minority status of the source: related issues remained largely unaffected in the case of majority support, whereas expanding minorities elicited more related attitude change in the argued direction.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Alvaro, E. M. , & Crano, W. D. (1997). Indirect influence: Evidence for leniency in source evaluation and counterargumentation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 72, 949-964.
2.
Asch, S. E. (1956). Studies of independence and conformity: A minority of one against a unanimous majority. Psychological Monographs: General and Applied, 70, 1-70.
3.
Baker, S. , & Petty, R. (1994). Majority and minority influence: Source-position imbalance as a determinant of message scrutiny. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 5-19.
4.
Brehm, J. W. , & Mann, M. (1975). Effect of importance of freedom and attraction to group members on influence produced by group pressure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 31, 816-824.
5.
Chaiken, S. (1987). The heuristic model of persuasion. In M. P. Zanna, J. M. Olson, & C. P. Herman (Eds.), Social influence: The Ontario symposium (Vol. 5, pp. 10-40). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
6.
Clark, R. D. (1998). Minority influence: The role of the rate of minority defection and persuasive arguments. European Journal of Social Psychology, 28, 787-796.
7.
Crano, W. D. , & Chen, X. (1998). The leniency contract and persistence of majority and minority influence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 1437-1450.
8.
De Dreu, C. K. W. , & De Vries, N. K. (1993). Numerical support, information processing and attitude change. European Journal of Social Psychology, 23, 647-662.
9.
De Dreu, C. K. W. , De Vries, N. K., Gordijn, E. H., & Schuurman, M. S. (1999). Effects of convergent-divergent processing on attitude change towards majority and minority supported arguments. European Journal of Social Psychology, 29, 329-348.
10.
De Vries, N. K. , De Dreu, C. K. W., Gordijn, E., & Schuurman, M. (1996). Majority and minority influence: A dual role interpretation. In W. Stroebe & M. Hewstone (Eds.), European review of social psychology (Vol. 7, pp. 145-172). Chichester, UK: Wiley.
11.
Eagly, A. H. , Wood, W., & Chaiken, S. (1978). Causal inferences about communicators and their effect on opinion change. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 4, 424-435.
12.
Kerr, N. L. (1981). Social transition schemes: Charting the group’s road to agreement. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 41, 684-702.
13.
Kerr, N. L. , MacCoun, R., Hansen, C., & Hymes, J. (1987). Gaining and losing social support: Momentum in decision making groups. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 23, 119-145.
14.
Kiesler, C. A. , & Pallak, M. S. (1975). Minority influence: The effect of majority reactionaries and defectors, and minority and majority compromises, upon majority opinion and attraction. European Journal of Social Psychology, 5, 237-256.
15.
Levine, J. M. (1980). Reaction to opinion deviance in small groups. In P. B. Paulus (Ed.), Psychology of group influence. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
16.
Levine, J. M. , & Ranelli, C. J. (1978). Majority reaction to shifting and stable attitude deviates. European Journal of Social Psychology, 8, 55-70.
17.
Levine, J. M. , Sroka, K. R., & Snyder, H. N. (1977). Group support and reaction to stable and shifting agreement/disagreement. Sociometry, 40, 214-224.
18.
Maass, A. , & Clark, R. D. (1983). Internalization versus compliance: Differential processes underlying minority influence and conformity. European Journal of Social Psychology, 13, 197-215.
19.
Mackie, D. M. (1987). Systematic and non-systematic processing of majority and minority persuasive communications. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 53, 41-52.
20.
Moscovici, S. (1980). Towards a theory of conversion behavior. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 13, 209-239.
21.
Petty, R. E. , & Cacioppo, J. T. (1986). The elaboration likelihood model of persuasion. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 19, 123-205.
22.
Prislin, R. , Limbert, W. M., & Bauer, E. (2000). From majority to minority and vice versa: The asymmetrical effects of losing and gaining majority position within a group. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79, 385-397.
23.
Wood, W. , Lundgren, S., Oullette, J., Busceme, S., & Blackstone, T. (1994). Minority influence: a meta-analytic review of social influence processes. Psychological Bulletin, 115, 323-345.
24.
Wood, W. , Pool, G. J., Leck, K., & Purvis, D. (1996). Self definition, defensive processing, and influence: The normative impact of majority and minority groups. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 1181-1193.
