Public vs Private Opinion Influence

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Public opinion can heavily influence individuals to conform to the group norm, even if it contradicts their true private opinion. In public, individuals are more likely to go along with the group consensus and discredit the dissenting view, while in private they are more likely to acknowledge the dissenting view as the most accurate.

There are several ways to define pluralistic ignorance, and that’s because it’s kind of a brain twister when you try to put it into words. On certain issues, most people people believe that most people believe what, in truth, few people believe. Or put another way, it is the erroneous belief that the majority is acting in a way that matches its internal philosophies, and that you are one of a small number of people who feel differently, when in reality the majority agrees with you on the inside but is afraid to admit it outright or imply such through its behavior. Everyone in a group, at the same time, gets stuck following a norm that no one wants to follow, because everyone is carrying a shared, false belief about everyone else’s unshared true beliefs.

Deborah Prentice’s Website

Robb Willer’s Website

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How Minds Change

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