How Social Influence affects group decision making

Problem Statement

In a group, people come with different opinions. At the end of the group interactions, the different opinions are aggregated into one opinion that members can subscribe to. How the different opinions are diffused to emerge with a one opinion for the group has been a concern to scientists. Different theories have emerged to explain the processes that accompany group decision making.  Social comparison theory, for instance, argues that in a group individuals are likely to make their choices in the context of what others perceived to be similar to themselves are doing. Scientists have summed these processes as social influence.

Hypothesis: social influence is directly related to group polarisation

Literature Review

In order to understand how groups end up with a concurrent opinion, most of the scientists have studied how groups come up with common decision in their natural interactions.  Rashotte (2007:4427) defines social influence as the “the change in individuals’ thoughts, feelings, attitudes, or behaviours that results from interaction with another individual or group”. The process occurs after individuals alters their feelings and behaviours after interacting with people whom they perceive to be similar, desirable or experts in the choice at hand.

Normative Influence

Most of the literature reviewed on social influence tends to crystallise around two main ideas that are either opposing or complimenting each other – normative influence or information influence. According to Myers (2009) normative social influence s conformity to a group’s decision based on one’s desire to fit in or conform to the group expectations and thus gain acceptance. According to the literature reviewed in this area, normative influence happens when individuals listen to one another express opinions about the available options. Like Wooten and Reedil, (1998) argues members in a group come to the group with pre-discussion opinions. Once these opinions are shared, the members learn from each other’s opinion and tend to follow unwritten rule and fits in.

Several research articles are available to support normative social influence.  Asch (1951), for instance, carried out an experiment to examine how often participants in a group conform to the majority view and the reasons leading to their conformity. From the experiment, Asch found out that majority of participants conform to the majority view. In answering the reason why they conformed, most subjects of the research said that they did not believe in their answers, but they had to go with the majority view for fear of being embarrassed or classified as peculiar.

Social comparison theory as advanced by Festinger also supports normative influence. According to this theory, individuals are driven by an inner desire to gain accurate self-evaluations. In one of the hypotheses of the theory, Festinger (1954) opines that “to the extent that objective and non-social means are not available, people evaluate their opinions and abilities by comparing respectively with opinions and abilities of others”. It is the conclusion of this theory that individuals want an accurate assessment of their opinions and performance. Other literatures have tracked jury decision making to a conclusion that the majority tend to convince the minority in what is interpreted as normative social influence (Myers, 2008).

Information Influence

Other literatures on social influence on groups have advanced the idea of information influence.  This literature agrees that social influence affects group decision making but differs with the normative approach on one ground. While in normative influence the literature propose that it is through learning the opinion of others that individuals make their decisions, in information influence it is through learning new information’s from the member’s opinion.  Information influence, according to the literature studied, occurs when people are faced with uncertain decision and look to others as they consider the decision of others more informed (Brauer, Judd and Gliner, 1995).  Supporters of information influence opine that it can occur under three different circumstances: one, is when information is stated by multiple sources to the extent that it gains credence in the minds of an individual (Lee, 2004); two, when faced by uncertainty about the correct conclusion; and three when individuals subscribe to the authority of others (Wooten and Reedil, 1998).

In one of the earlier research projects on information influence, Sherif (1935) carried out an experiment in which the participants were asked to give their answer on an ambiguous subject. In this experiment, the participants were giving the same answer since they were relying on each other to define reality. Burnstein and Vinokur (1977) advance the argument on persuasive arguments as they lead to group polarization. This literature supports information influence on the basis that when members in a group debate their opinions, those with persuasive argument tend to polarise the group thinking towards their line of thinking.  Research into how groups emerge more polarised at the end of decision making supports the idea of social information influence. According to the research, group polarisation occurs when the opinion held by individual group members become more extreme after holding a discussion (Brauer, Judd, Gliner, 1995)

Methodology

This research will employ both qualitative and quantitative research. The qualitative research will look at the available literature on the subject. On quantitative method, the research will propose a question that can lead to choice dilemma and present it to a group. How the groups come up with the answer will be analysed to understand the role of social influence n group decision making.

Conclusion

This literature, whether in support of normative influence or information influence, has some similar factors owing to the fact that individuals adopt either of the approach to fit in a group.  As such, all the literature will be utilised to gain a deeper understanding of how social influence affects group decision making.

References

Asch, S.E. (1951). Effects of group pressure on the modification and distortion of judgements, in H. Guetzkow (Ed.) Groups, leadership and men, pp 177-190. Pittsburgh: Carnegie Press

Brauer, M., Judd, C., Gliner, M., (1995) The Effects of Repeated Expressions on Attitude Polarisation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 68(6): 1014-1029

Burnstein, E., and Vinokur, A., (1977) Persuasive Argument and Social Comparison as Determinants of Attitude Polarisation. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Vol 13, pp315-332

Festinger, L. (1954) A Theory of Social Comparison Processes. Accessed on 30^th Nov. 2017 from <http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/001872675400700202>

Lee, K. (2004) The Multiple Source Effect and synthesised Speech” human Communication Research, vol. 30(2): 182-207

Myers, D.G. (2008) Social Psychology. New York: McGraw-Hill Companies

Rashotte, L. (2007). Social Influence. In A. Manstead et al (Eds), The Blackwell encyclopaedia of social psychology (pp.1-3). Cambridge: Blackwell Publishing

Sherif, M. (1935) A study of some social factors in perception. Archives of Psychology, Vol. 27: 187-196

Wooten, D. & Reedil, A. (1998) Information Influences and the Ambiguity of Product Experience: Order Effects on the Weighting of Evidence” Journal of Consumer Psychology, Vol. 7(1): 79-99