RMG 200 Lecture Notes - Social Proof, Pluralistic Ignorance

• School: Ryerson University
• Department: Retail Management
• Course: RMG 200
• Professor: Marla Spergel

Document Summary

Of robert cialdini"s six fundamental persuasion principles explaining the predictabilities of humans" deeply rooted drives and needs, the principle of social proof was particularly interesting. Social proof states that we define what is correct or acceptable by exploring and mimicking the actions of others around us. This principle essentially dictates what constitutes correct behaviour , with the level of correctness correlating with the amount of others performing this given behaviour. The extent to which we use social proof as a decision maker can range from the simple laugh tracks played by television studios to the fundamental decision of life or death. This principle is evident in many situations because of its tendency to work fairly well; it generally results in fewer mistakes than when contradicting the given social behaviour. Because a large amount of people performing certain behaviour can translate into correct behaviour , many people do not guard against social proof therefore limiting the number of individual decisions.