Tag: Social Influence

Egocentric Bias or Information Management? Selective Disclosure and the Social Roots of Norm Misperception

This paper examines systematic biases in group members’ inferences about collective support for group norms. While theories of “looking glass perception” suggest a tendency to project our own preferences onto others, this paper shows that observed biases may simply reflect flows of information through social networks. Members conceal their counter-normative behavior and divulge it disproportionately within confidence relations. This predicts structured inference, where members’ inferences depend on their social ties, and also pluralistic ignorance, where members generally overestimate collective support for existing norms. These predictions are evaluated in a field study of perceived normative consensus in five vegetarian housing cooperatives. Results fail to support the intrinsic bias argument, but demonstrate these forms of information bias. Also, by locating this structural effect only in large groups that facilitate private conversation, findings highlight the mechanism of selective disclosure. This source of normative inertia may account for the puzzling stability of broadly unpopular norms in groups.

Kitts, James A. “Egocentric Bias or Information Management? Selective Disclosure and the Social Roots of Norm Misperception.” Social Psychology Quarterly, 66(3): 222-237, September 2003.

Mobilizing in Black Boxes: Social Networks and Social Movement Organizations

Recent research has focused on the role of social networks in facilitating individuals’ participation in protest and social movement organizations. This paper elaborates three currents of microstructural explanation, based on information, identity, and exchange. In evaluating these perspectives, the paper compares their robustness to multivalence, the tendency for social ties to inhibit as well as promote participation. Considering two dimensions of multivalence – the value of the social tie and the direction of social pressure – this paper discusses problems of measurement and interpretation in network analysis of movement participation.

Kitts, James A. “Mobilizing in Black Boxes: Social Networks and Social Movement Organizations” 
Mobilization: An International Journal, 5(2): 241-257, October 2000.

Not in Our Backyard: Solidarity, Social Networks,and the Ecology of Environmental Mobilization

This paper explores the role of social networks in channeling individuals’ involvement in local activism. A case study of a grassroots environmental group examines variation in members’ levels of involvement, using three levels of explanation: individual attributes, strong and weak ties between members, and memberships in other organizations. After demonstrating that high- and low-level members are very similar in personal attributes, it focuses on social ties and organizational affiliations. As expected, the data suggest that an individual’s level of involvement is increased by strong ties to other members, structural similarity to other high-level members, and fewer ties to non-members. Extramovement organizational affiliations are often assumed to diminish actors’ structural availability, though empirical research in differential recruitment has generally revealed a positive effect on participation in social movements. This study addresses a microstructural explanation for the variation between competition and mutualism in a local multiorganizational field, as it shows how organizational goals condition the effect of outside affiliations on level of participation.

Kitts, James A.  “Not in Our Backyard: Solidarity, Social Networks, and the Ecology of Environmental Mobilization.” Sociological Inquiry, 69(4): 551-574, Fall 1999.