Toastmaster speech 7 – The Art and Science of Influence Part 3
This is my third speech on the art and science of influence.
The third rule of influence is called “social proof”. We determine what is correct by find out what other people think is correct.
Have you ever wondered why there is laugh tracks during sitcoms? Who finds them annoying? Have you ever wondered the reason behind them? Well, the reason is, they work very well.
We loosen our guard when watching TV, where the canned laughter simply triggers in us the desire to follow the herd, and laugh ourselves.
There are two conditions where social proof works the best.
The first condition is uncertainty. We look for other’s actions to follow when we are uncertain, which is well demonstrated in the following story.
It’s the story of Catherine Genovese. She lived in Queens in New York City. She was killed in a late-night attack on her street as she returned from work on March 13th 1964 starting at 3:15am and ending with her death at 3:50am.
Her assailant had chased and attacked her in the street three times over a period of 35 minutes before he finally killed her. 38 of her neighbors watched from the safety of their apartment windows with no one calling the police.
New York Times published a front page story on March 27th by Martin Gansberg, two weeks after the murder with the headline “Thirty-Eight Who Saw Murder Didn’t Call the Police”. People were outraged. How could 38 “good people” fail to act? When interviewed, these witnesses simply responded with “I don’t know, I just don’t know”.
The prevailing theory at the time was people simply don’t care, that Americans were becoming a nation of selfish, insensitive people.
Two New York based psychologist, Bibb Latane and John Darley had another theory, they hypothesized the reason for the inaction was precisely because 38 people witnessed the event. It’s significant in two ways. One is that with several potential helpers around, the personal responsibility of each individual is reduced. Secondly, because the situation was ambiguous, in time of uncertainly, people look at others for answers. Because the observers can see the other observers, and see them not taking action, they interpreted it as a non-emergency as well.
This begs the question, in an emergency, what’s one’s best course of action?
The best course of action is to reduce the uncertainties of those around you concerning your condition, and their responsibilities. For instance, in a medical emergency, you should point to a stranger in the crowd and say “you, sir, in the blue shirt, I need help, call an ambulance.”
The reverse is true as well. When presented with a situation which is ambiguous, don’t shy away from the responsibility. Ascertain the situation, and be the man of action.
Another condition where social proof works the best is similarity. Social proof works the best when we are observing the behavior of people just like us. That’s why there are so many TV ads featuring testimonial from ordinary people on the street.
Another curious fact is that after a suicide has made front-page news, airplanes – private planes, corporate jets, airliners – begin falling out of the sky at an alarming rate. It’s generally referred to as the “Werthers Effect”.
UC San Diego professor David Phillips is a leading authority in this area. Examining the suicide statistics in the US between 1947 and 1968, he found that within two months after every front-page suicide story, an average of 58 more people than usual killed themselves. He also found that this tendency for suicides to beget suicides occurred principally in those parts of the country where the first suicide was highly publicized. He observed the wider the publicity given the first suicide, the greater the number of the later suicides.
By his resonating and later proven by data, the increased airplane crashes simply resulted from people electing to kill themselves in this crashes to protect their reputations, to spare their families the shame and hurt, or to allow their dependents to collect on insurance policies.
[Refer to the diagrams.]
Here is a set of data resulting from Dr. Phillips research.
As you can see, the worst time to travel is 3-4 days after a widely publicized suicide and then a few days after that.
One implication of this condition is when trying to influence your kids’ behavior, seeking a role-model of similar age and background is much more effective than selecting one who differs greatly.
So how to detect if someone is using social proof on you?
There are two types of social proof situations. One kind is when social evidence has been manufactured. We need to learn to recognize these situations, and punishing the perpetrator for their deeds. For instance, never buying product from companies that uses the “average-person-on-the-street” tactic in their ads.
Another could be innocent mistakes. When uncertain, we depend on the collective knowledge of the crowd. Thus we need to be aware that other’s actions should not be the sole reason for our actions.
In summary, social proof is the third rule of influence. When applied in uncertain situations and by people similar to us, it wields great influence.