Abstract
In an attempt to find a sufficient condition of minority influence, Kitayama (1979) proposed a concept of (a majority's) “Readiness for ackowledgement of other views as alternatives to one's own (Ralt) ” . In the present study, as a determinant of a majority's Ralt, the presence of an outgroup (OG) was examined. It was predicted that: (1) When an ingroup (IG) had a distinctiveness, Ralt of majority members in the IG would be lowered; and, (2) when it had no distinctiveness, their Ralt would be enhanced. Subsequently, (3) a minority in the IG would be more influential when the majority's Ralt was high than when it was low. It was further predicted that when the drive to maintain and enhance one's self-esteem of majority members in the IG was activated, IG Distinctiveness would have more effects on minority influence. OG's evaluation to IG's result of a previous task (psoitive/negative) was manipulated in order to vary the activation of that drive: It was considered that the drive of IG majority members would bemore (less) activated when the evaluation was negative (positive).
In the experiment, following the prior task, male high school students, in each of two sevenperson groups, discussed what guiding principle (Punnishment/Love) to take to correct a juvenile delinquent by written letters. Each of them was led to belive that he belonged to a majority in each group, and that two minority members who argued for the purport that both Punishment and Love were necessary were in his group. To test the above-mentioned hypothesis, IG Distinctiveness (High/Low) was manipulated in addition to Evaluation. The results showed that, although the manipulation of Evaluation failed, concerning IG Distinctiveness, as predicted, the minority members were more likely to be selected as a group representative in Low (64%) rather than in High IG Distinctiveness condition (39%).
