How is the influence of minorities managed in social networks?

We analyzed the power of the underrepresented within the 2.0 world.

And she asked him: What is your name?

And he said to him: My name is Legion, for we are many.

-Mark 5:9

In society there have always been different ways of understanding the world, even though the majority option imposes the the choice of the majority imposes the social norm of the moment.. However, there have been historical contexts in which these small movements have managed to influence and change the course, such as the feminist revolution or the sexual revolution. It is the process of influence of minorities.

Today, however, minorities have a new factor: they have no spatio-temporal limits. In the past, minorities suffered from visibility limits; without the Internet, it was rare to see people with different values, let alone to see them coming together to form a solid group. But today, the high connectivity in which we live allows us to contemplate different value models.. Thus, animal, environmental and pro-independence movements are inextinguishable voices of social networks.

But how are these minority groups formed? And how does a minority impose itself on the regime of the majority? These questions have been the focus of attention in the Group Psychology for decades, but nowadays a new one is added: how is a minority managed in social networks?

How are minorities formed?

We will begin by answering the first of these questions: how are minorities formed?. To start the process of influence, any minority group must start from a base structure with specific characteristics, which we will summarize as (Doms and Moscovici, 1984; Levine and Levine, 1984).We will summarize them as (Doms and Moscovici, 1984; Levine and Russo, 1987):

• Consistency. One of the most relevant features is how the group presents itself in society. Due to the low number of members that define it, a minority group must maintain the union and coherence of the acts of its members. Likewise, it is also necessary to be persistent in its actions, in its manifestation to society. It could be summarized as "going all together", maintaining two key consistencies:
  • Diachronic consistency.between the members.
  • Synchronic consistencyin time.

• Heterogeneity. This factor is often not respected, but it is key to be accepted and validated by the majority. Being constituted as a group that includes people with very different traits sends a clear message to society: "we are not motivated by the interests of a few". It is crucial to show this message in order to avoid the disqualifications of the majority who, out of inertia, insist on maintaining their position. Referring back to the 15M movementMany of the arguments against it focused on conveying that it was a movement particular to one sector of society.

• Distinctiveness and appropriateness to the context. These two variables mark a tension due to the duality they present. On the one hand, the minority group must represent an alternative to the model proposed by the majority, and on the other hand, it must be a proposal that is coherent and adequate to the conditions of the moment. Not getting lost between both extremes is delicate, but necessary to present the proposal as innovative but achievable, without posing utopian impossibilities.

• Resistance to peer pressure. Being a minority implies a deviation from the social norm. As any element that leaves the established boundaries, it will suffer from forces that try to return to the normativity of the moment as a movement of homeostasis, back to the initial equilibrium. Therefore, if the goal is to initiate a process of influence, the group must be prepared for external peer pressure.

How does the minority influence?

To understand how the minority influences, it is necessary to understand that its functioning is different from that of the majority, developing different influence processes (Moscovici and Personnaz, 1980). These different forms of management are what initiate a process of influence by conversion (Perez, 1994). (Perez, 1994).

• Majority: normative influence. The advantage of the majority is part of its own disadvantage: having a large number of members makes it difficult for the group to be unanimous, since it does not rain to everyone's liking. Therefore, the functioning of the majority is centered on interpersonal dealings. It initiates processes of social comparison, observing what each of its members values positively in order to promote proposals with which they all feel identified. They try to avoid losing members by maintaining a positive public image, so they need to pay attention to what their members consider "positive".

• Minority: informational influence. By the very fact of being a minority, they do not have the support of many people who support the proposal. Therefore, the process of influence cannot be focused on interpersonal relationships, since if we go for numbers, the minority would lose out. In this case, the important thing is the treatment of information. The majority has to control what each of its members value positively, so what if the minority alternative starts to be considered positive? Therein lies the core, managing the proposal so that it is truthful and possible; that it is evident to people without posing impossibilities.

• Conversion process. It is characterized by provoking indirect and latent changes. But at the street level, the conversion manifests itself in the gaining of support, gaining members who accept the proposal. This leads to the first consequence, a break in the unanimity of the majority. This develops in the form of a snowball effect, gradually increasing as the loss of majority members shows deficits in its internal consistency. That is, as the minority receives more support, it is revealed that the majority is not as consistent, and that part of it accepts and supports the alternative. Members begin to question more and more the veracity of the proposal, because "those who think like me begin to accept it".

In this way the minority progressively chooses to become a necessity in society. As movements such as animalism or environmentalism are associated with positive traits, people tend to develop a need to include them in their daily lives. If concern for animals or the ecosystem is well regarded in society, each person wants to be accepted by society, so including these values is adaptive and provokes a feeling of consonance and well-being..

How is this influence managed in social networks?

So far, we can understand how they work, but in the cyber age, we constantly observe different minorities. However, very few of the readers have been live in Tordesillas, or are inhabitants of Catalonia, as to know the anti-bullfighting or pro-independence movement movement in first person. However, they have not been barriers for minorities to try to exert their influence; why?

• Social stratification. In social networks, messages are distinguished by sources that vary in their degree of formality and legitimacy, with "majority" and "minority" corresponding to different social strata. A message posted by a neighbor is not received in the same way as one posted by the president of the government. This is because majorities, as the origin of the social norm, are translated into legislation and laws; the voice of the majority is normalized and legitimized. This fact leaves minorities as the voice of ordinary people as a counterpart. Therefore, representing oneself as a minority implies presenting oneself as the voice of the people, I understand its proposal as a need that current politics -majority- does not satisfy. It is appropriate to take into account both the level of content and the form of the messages: to mediate between formality/informality since, depending on the initiatives, it will be convenient for them to be promoted by people with different technical/professional levels, depending on whether it is in pursuit of supporting objectivity or promoting empathy. In this sense, the minority has objectives corresponding to the "voice of the people" and expresses itself in the "language of the people". It should be taken into account that the minority's thinking is "we are not them, but we want to reach them".

• Objectivity. The above premise conflicts with the informative treatment of minorities. Let us bear in mind that in social networks there is no spatio-temporal context, i.e. messages can be issued/received regardless of geography and time. Therefore, attention should be paid to the fact that a reality can be made known to people who do not live it in their own skin, and what is more, the objective is to make them participants in that reality. Because of this, presenting oneself as "the voice of the people" can be a source of one's own disqualification, as it can be very subjective. In other words, if it is implied that the proposal comes from the neighbor, we all know that the neighbor can be wrong and that this is his opinion, one of many. Thus, it is necessary to give objective evidence, to show that what the minority believes is not a fact that is being invented, but that their opinion has a truthful basis. To state that the proposal is not an opinion, but its background reality.

• Management as Mass Media. Let us not forget that social networks are a means of communication. Therefore, it is important to focus on how to manage information, how to relay ideals. Regarding temporality, the publication of several messages in a short period of time causes a noise and overload effect: the information overlaps one on top of the other and collapses people, like a murmur from which nothing is clear. The same happens with quantity: an excess can serve to emphasize specific premises, but it can also give the impression of not contributing anything new and be repetitive. Concise information, clear premises, objective data and messages focused on the objectives, being consistent and coherent with the alternative ideals of the minority.

Some conclusions

With the above description of the process, we can understand how, little by little, minorities strive to gain social legitimacy, to make the majority see the need to include them in their discourse and thus open ways of negotiation. It will then be necessary to modulate the forces and pressures of both sides, in order to reach a common agreement that is in tune with both extremes.

However, networks mark a new framework in which these processes of influence must be adapted, networks mark a new framework in which these processes of influence must be adapted to the needs of both sides.. Not only to achieve their own objectives, but also to promote the communicative health of the Internet and not to promote it as a means of decommunication. means of decommunication. The debate on the correct management in the networks is open; is Catalan independence a movement of the people or does it translate into a political proposal? Where are the reins of independence, in the citizens or in politicians? In Tordesillas who were attacked, lanceros or animalists? Was the thematic center the aggression to the animal or to its defenders? Does constituting itself as an attribute of social tribes favor the objectives of ecologism and vegetarianism? Is the vegetable plate photographed by followers or by contribution to the ecosystem?

Bibliographical references:

• Doms, M. and Moscovici, S. (1984). Innovation and minority influence, in S. Moscovici (ed.): Social Psychology I: Influence and attitude change. Individuals and groups. Barcelona : Paidós, 1985.
• Levine, J. M. and Russo, E. M. (1987). Majority and minority influence, in C. Hendrick (ed.): Review of Personality and Social Psychology: Group Processes, Vol. 8, Newbury Park, CA: Sage.
• Mosovici, S. and Personnaz, B. (1980). Studies in social influence V: Minority influence and conversion behavior in a perceptual task, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 16, 270-282.
• Perez, J. A. (1994). La influencia social, in J. F. Morales (coord.): Psicología Social. Madrid: McGraw-Hill.