Members' reactions to apparent group approval of a counternorm communication.

Abstract

“In a study of the use of one-way communications to change group-anchored attitudes, members of a college group listened to a recorded speech contrary to their norms. An audience that was heard to applaud the main points in the speech was described for some Ss (the members' applause Ss) as composed of members of the college group; for others (the outside applause Ss) it was composed of anonymous outsiders . . ‥ The members' applause Ss exhibited more immediate opinion change in the direction advocated by the speech than did the other Ss. The members' applause Ss also showed a greater tendency to misinterpret the speaker's point of view, judging it to be more similar to the college norms than did the outsider's applause Ss.” (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved)