Group conformity, Opinion leaders and Peer Pressure

A group is 2 or more individuals who share a set of norms, have role relationships and display interdependent behaviours. A group can have an affect on what we learn and how we behave.

So why do we form groups?

If you break it down to its most basic function, people form groups in order to increase their chance of survival. Hunting, forraging for food, building and defending what is yours becomes much easier if you dont have to do it on your own.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wwt1ioiqMgQ

In modern society however, it is much more complex. Groups exist to fulfill a huge variety of needs and wants.



Maslow suggests that it is one of mans most basic needs to belong to a group, we are very social animals after all.

One of the reasons we establish groups is for social comparison theory. We look at the behaviour of others to provide a guide for ourselves. We normally choose a co-oriented peer (someone whom we view to have equivalent standing) to benchmark ourselves against.

Different groups form different expectations and rules. Behaviour that is acceptable in one group may be considered out of line in another. These norms of behaviour are one of the main influential factors of a group. An individual can comply, internalise and identify or counter confrom in reaction to the pressures of the group.

The power to make an individual conform to a group is based on importance of membership, fear of negative sanctions and the degree of support they receive from others. This peer pressure is often utilised in the marketing world to stimulate purchase.

It is natural for people to want to fit in with people around them, be it neighbours, colleagues or people who enthuse on the same subjects you do. This behaviour is strongly linked to social marketing as people will purchase items in order to achieve this.



The Pepsi challenge provides 2 perfect examples of this. First of all, most people drank coke. The challenge showed that despite the fact most people claimed to prefer coke, they actually preffered pepsi. This would suggest that taste is not the only factor influencing purchase but perhaps people choose to drink coke because it is more popular and by drinking it they are conforming. Further proof of this is that when people became aware that most people prefer pepsi, pepsi's sales increased dramatically and coke's sales fell, why? Well I don't know for sure, but I'd be willing to put a pretty substantial bet that it had something to do with wanting to conform to the new trend of prefering pepsi over coke.

Oh what a fickle species we are.

Opinion leaders are people who are frequently able to influence others due to their technical expertise, knowledge, social activity and high interconnectivity with the community. These people can be used for marketing purposes as consumers believe that if they are endorsing a product, it must be worth buying.



Hope you liked it, more blogs to be crammed in before monday.