Divergence vs. ambivalence: effects of personal relevance on minority influence

Abstract

According to the literature on social influence, a minority source can induce two main cognitive processes: validation and divergence. The aim of the present study was to determine if the two processes are jointly or alternatively activated. We hypothesized that the process stimulated by the minority source would be different according to the personal relevance of the issue for the participants. Specifically, we predicted that a minority would induce more validation (i.e. ambivalent thoughts about the issue) in the low relevance condition rather than in the high relevance condition. On the other hand, the minority would produce more divergence (i.e. alternative proposals) in the high relevance condition rather than in the low relevance condition. Two experiments in which the participants were exposed to a counter-attitudinal message of a minority or a majority supported these predictions. Moreover, in Study 1 evidence has also been found that a minority source fosters more pertinent (but not more original) proposals in the high relevance condition rather than in the low relevance condition, whereas in Study 2 ambivalence (other than divergence) appeared to be correlated with, but not a significant mediator of, indirect influence. The implications of these findings for minority influence theory are discussed.

Minority influence: the role of ambivalence toward the source

“…Specifically, research has to ascertain whether the effects we found are mainly associated to an implicit form of attitude, namely an ambivalence ''introspectively unidentified'' (Greenwald & Banaji, 1995, p. 5), or rather associated to subjective ambivalence (Priester & Petty, 1996). In both of our studies, ambivalence was negatively related to self-confidence, a result that is consistent with the findings of other previous studies inside ( Mucchi-Faina & Cicoletti, 2006) and outside social influence area (Bassili, 1996;Jonas et al, 1997). Therefore, we are inclined to believe that the source obtained an impact because it was uncomfortable to be aware of mixed thoughts (i.e., like dissonance, Newby-Clark et al, 2002).…”

“…In Study 1, we found evidence corroborating the assumption that indirect influence is fostered not only by the ambivalence toward the minority message (Mucchi-Faina & Cicoletti, 2006), but also by the ambivalence toward the source. To interpret this result, we speculated that, when people are exposed to the unexpected message of an unknown source on an important issue, the information regarding that source and its message are processed together on-line.…”

“…For instance, Trost et al (1992) found that the minority advocacy was highly influential when the issue was of low relevance for recipients, while no influence was found when the issue was of high relevance. Similarly, Mucchi-Faina and Cicoletti (2006) found that the minority obtained a (marginally) higher impact in low relevance (vs. high) relevance condition. On the contrary, Kerr (2002), De Dreu andDe Vries (1996), and Martin et al (2007) found similar minority influence in high and low relevance conditions.…”

“…First of all, students were asked to read and evaluate a proposal advocating a final comprehensive examination in the major areas of study to graduate on a scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 21 (strongly agree) ( pre-test measure). This proposal has been consistently found to be highly counterattitudinal among Italian students (e.g., Mucchi-Faina & Cicoletti, 2006). Participants were then informed that a preliminary survey on the issue had been already carried out with a sample of students from different Departments.…”

Indirect influence and divergent thinking as a function of member status and task structure in small groups

“…Of interest, we found no effect for status or task structure on public, direct influence. Group members conveyed equivalent ascriptions of the confederate's contributions to the problem solving process whether the confederate was of higher-or lower-status, and on open-and closed-structured tasks (although we note that we used a measure of perceived public influence that was assessed after task completion rather than during the course of group problem solving; see Crano, 1997, andCicoletti, 2006, for other examples when the majority has not produced direct influence). Consistent with the findings on minority influence, the influence resulting from contact with lower status group members was indirect and occurred only in private and on a separate task (cf.…”