What can social influence do?
Social influence is the science of influence, persuasion, and compliance.
Social influence is the change in behavior that one person causes in another, intentionally or unintentionally, as a result of the way the changed person perceives themselves in relationship to the influencer, other people and society in general.
Three areas of social influence are conformity, compliance and obedience.
Conformity is changing how you behave to be more like others. This plays to belonging and esteem needs as we seek the approval and friendship of others. Conformity can run very deep, as we will even change our beliefs and values to be like those of our peers and admired superiors.
Compliance is where a person does something that they are asked to do by another. They may choose to comply or not to comply, although the thought of social punishment may lead them to compliance when they really do not want to comply.
Obedience is different from compliance in that it is obeying an order from someone that you accept as an authority figure. In compliance, you have some choice. In obedience, you believe that you do not have a choice. Many military officers and commercial managers are interested only in obedience.
A knowledge of social influence can help you when you need to move someone to adopt a new attitude, belief, or action. It can also help you resist the influence attempts of others. Here are some examples that demonstrate social influence in use.1. A physical rehabilitation group was increasingly frustrated by their clientele's low compliance rates. For some reason, patients were not following the exercise regimes recommended by the therapists. An influence consultant quickly increased patient compliance by more than 30% by having therapists make a single change . . . in office decor!
2. N.A.T.O. convoys in Somalia were frequently looted. To curb this, military commanders broadcast authoritarian commands--to little effect. After consulting the influence literature and revising their messages appropriately, PsyOps discovered that the insertion of a single phrase implicating the self-concept was able to nearly eliminate looting.
3. A state government wished to increase statewide recycling. To accomplish this, they contracted with an influence research team to create a series of TV advertisements that played on social norms to increase recycling behaviors. The ads won an ITVA award, but more importantly, they significantly increased recycling behaviors.
4. A health care organization planned to advertise nationally for the first time, but had been disappointed with the results of past advertising campaigns. They hired influence consultants to provide an overall strategy and message that would be maximally effective with the target audience, and then turned the ideas over to creative talent. Their returns on advertising dollars spent were dramatically increased.
5. Influence consultants are increasingly sought by political campaign managers to provide a range of services, from psychological analyses of the electorate to the creation of speeches, advertisements, and strategies.
6. Local convenience stores had problems with teenagers "hanging out" in their parking lots. The stores wanted teens' business, but not the fights and drug-dealing that sometimes accompany late-night loitering. An influence expert recommended that store owners purchase several samples of a certain kind of music, and play that music through loudspeakers in the parking lot. Upon hearing the music, the teenagers voluntarily left--and stayed away from--the parking lot. The music did not affect sales to teenagers, however, as music was not played inside the stores.
The above examples demonstrate a few situations in which a knowledge of social influence can make the difference between success and failure.
What It Means To Be Young
Youth is not a time of life, it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips, and supple knees; it is a matter of the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions; it is the freshness of the deep springs of life.
Youth means the predominance of courage over timidity, of adventure over the love of ease. This often exists in a man of sixty more than in a boy of twenty. Nobody grows old merely by a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals.
Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, doubt, self-distrust, fear and despair - these bow the heart and turns the spirit back to dust.
Whether sixty or sixteen, there is in every human being's heart the love of wonder, the sweet amazement at the stars and the starlike things, the undaunted challenge of events, the unfailing child-like appetite for what-next, and the joy of the game of living.
You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear; as young as your hope, as old as your despair.
Feelings lead to attitudes, attitudes become beliefs, and beliefs become the basis for actions.
it is how you feel, how you think,
and what you do that is important.
To quote Satchel Paige, "How old would you be if you didn't know how old you was."
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