SOCIAL CHANGE AND REAL
LIFE EXAMPLES
What is social change?
• A change in the social structure/behaviour,
beliefs and attitudes in society which may
occur through a majority or minority of
individuals
How do these social changes occur?
• These social changes can occur through a
number of factors, a few highlighted
important ones would be:
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Attention
Consistency
Persistency
Augmentation
ATTENTION
• By attracting attention to the minority group
draws attention to the views they are
addressing, by doing things such as:
• Protests
• Marches
• Strikes etc
CONSISTENCY AND PERSISTENCY
• Minority arguments can easily be dismissed
and rejected, however, if the minority is:
Consistent (doing the same thing again and again)
Persistent (doing it to the same standard each time
they repeat the process)
• Their position and points raised are taken
more seriously
AUGMENTATION
• Minorities frequently suffer for their views at
the hands of the majority, (even if it’s
unintentional).
• Their position may be reinforced because they
are willing to make personal sacrifices to bring
about social change
REAL LIFE EXAMPLES
• INDIVIDUAL: ROSA PARKS
• ACTION: First black woman to refuse to give up
her seat in the 1950’s which led to her being
arrested and taken away by the police
• CONSEQUENCE: Her action led to the boycott of
the Montgomery transit authority, in effect,
fought for equal rights between black and white
people
REAL LIFE EXAMPLES
• INDIVIDUAL: DR MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.
• ACTION: Led the boycott of the Montgomery
transit authority
• CONSEQUENCE: One of the most widespread
examples of social change ever experienced in
the USA
REAL LIFE EXAMPLES
• GROUP: THE ROSENSTRASSE PROTEST
• ACTION: A crowd of 200 women, mostly non-Jewish
German women, married to Jewish men gathered
outside Rosenstrasse 2-4, and began chanting, after a
couple of months, the crowd of 200 women had grew
to 1000 people (both men and women)
• CONSEQUENCE: Nazi propaganda minister, Joseph
Goebbels ordered the release of the intermarried Jews
held in the Rosenstrasse
REAL LIFE EXAMPLES
• INDIVIDUAL: MOHANDAS GANDHI
• ACTION: Peaceful, non-violent protest to
abolish the salt-tax
• CONSEQUENCE: Abolished the salt tax
EXAM QUESTIONS
• Q1) Explain how social influence research
helps us understand social change. (5 marks)
Q1. ANSWER
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Research into minority influence such as Moscovici et al helps us identify and highlight the
importance of certain factors; i.e. consistency and persistency into explain how minorities bring
about social change.
Moscovici et al conducted an experiment in which they were researching the effect of minority
influence on conformity levels, however, deceived participants and told them the research was on a
colour perception test.
172 individuals participated and were asked the colour of 36 slides; all slides were blue but differed
in terms of brightness. All these participants were split into groups of six; however, two of the six
participants were in fact confederates.
There were two conditions under which participants were tested; consistent condition (in which
the confederates called all slides green) and the inconsistent condition (in which confederates
called 24 slides green and the remaining 12 blue).
Participants in the consistent condition yielded to the minority on 8.4% of trials
32% participants said a slide was green at least once.
However, participants in the inconsistent condition only yielded on 1.3% of the trials.
Overall, Moscovici et al, alongside other psychologists help us identify and highlight the importance
of consistency and persistency in assisting minorities bring about social change.
EXAM QUESTIONS
• Q2) Explain the role of minority influence in
social change. (4 marks)
Q2. ANSWER
• Minorities can bring about social change over a prolonged
period of time considering they stay consistent and
persistent in what they want; i.e. the Suffragettes were a
group of women who wanted to see a social change in
which women would have the right to vote. They were
successful in doing so, as they brought attention to
themselves via protesting, marching etc, then kept this
consistent through doing the same actions over and over
again, and persistent throughout as they did it to the same
standard each time.
• Overall, they brought about social change by being
consistent and persistent over a period of time
EXAM QUESTIONS
• Q4) Outline and evaluate the role of minority
influence in social change. (12 marks)
Q4. ANSWER
• ASK MISS TO MARK YOUR ESSAY FOR A
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