Introduction
Sociologists categorize social influence into two types: normative and informative. Normative influence involves acting to please the crowd to be liked or gain acceptance. On the other hand, informative conformity is when a person follows a group of people because they think the crowd knows more than they do. The main reason is that people tend to value ideas given by other people more than what their eyes and ears can tell them.
Examples of Normative and Informative Influence
Normative influence is all over the marketing industry; currently, advertisers use a term to describe the process of playing on normative social influence known as “fear of missing out” (FOMO). On television, audiences are persuaded to watch specific programs or miss those iconic moments everyone will discuss the following day. In addition, people are asked to check out an event, visit certain bars and restaurants, or risk being excluded from the group. If one does not attend a particular event or watch a certain television program, all their friends will have fun outside, and they will be isolated. Therefore, normative influence forces people to watch programs or visit some of these places because they want to be liked and accepted.
An example of informative social influence is that of a student who has just started college and is unfamiliar with the location of a psychology class. However, they happen to find another group of people discussing the subject outside and decide to follow them, assuming they know the location of the classroom. Informational influence plays a vital role here because the student uses evidence from the group to decide.
Conclusion
Conclusively, the paper has explored the two types of social influence: normative and informative. Informative influence involves listening to what other people say because one considers them more informed. It fits with the “people first” theme because people tend to make decisions based on what others say than what their ears and eyes tell them. On the contrary, normative influence involves doing something to be accepted by other people. However, the two types of situations increase susceptibility to informational influence.