Hey guys.
TheLoveDoc is here again with yet another article I’ve been wanting to write. This time around I’ll be delving into the bandwagon effect, consumer behaviors, and the spiral of silence. Why would I take a look into all of this? Because for the vast majority of people out there, it is a direct correlation of their opinions on movies. Now let’s dive on in and see what the Love Doctor has in store.
The bandwagon effect is described as “a psychological phenomenon whereby people do something primarily because other people are doing it, regardless of their own beliefs, which they may ignore or override. The bandwagon effect has wide implications, but is commonly seen in politics and consumer behavior...According to this concept, the increasing popularity of a product or phenomenon encourages more people to "get on the bandwagon" too. The bandwagon effect explains why there are fashion trends” Now before I jump into an analysis, let’s define consumer behavior, which is described as “the study of individuals, groups, or organizations and the processes they use to select, secure, use, and dispose of products, services, experiences, or ideas to satisfy needs and the impacts that these processes have on the consumer and society.”
So what does all of this mean Love Doc? It means that people will often conform to share a common consensus. People will actually ditch their original thoughts when they hear other people have a different opinion. So for fear of being different, they conform to an opinion and defend it. Heck, one of my good friends did the exact same thing with Batman v Superman (such reason is a heavy influence on the timing of this article). So before you know it there will be a majority opinion on something and only a particular fraction of that opinion will be original and honest. This happens in a variety of things, and for sake of this conversation : movies. As stated, one of the driving factors of consumer behavior is the bandwagon effect. The vast majority of people, and yes, maybe even you have fallen into the bandwagon effect. Why do you think you saw a surplus of “fans” of the Carolina Panthers and Denver Broncos this year? People naturally want to hop onto the winning side and have a winning majority opinion. It’s all about being a self proclaimed successful person. After all, when you go into a conversation isn't it easier to defend a majority opinion than a minority opinion?
Another thing to take into account here is that the loudest people in a conversation are the one’s strongly for or strongly against. This is a huge contributor to the bandwagon effect. You will constantly have people over exaggerating themselves whether its for attention or out of pure love of something. These people are the one’s most commonly hear and most definitely the one’s the media will cover. So what happens when an opinion is around you? Well according to the bandwagon effect you will adopt that opinion. This is exactly why loud people, such as the media, are so influential. Very few people naturally like to stand up for a non majority opinion, especially when they're not behind their keyboard.
Now let’s see all of this play out in real life with Batman v Superman: Batman v Superman is released and starts to get negative reviews. Those negative reviews get big press. People then assume the movie is bad without seeing it. More negative reviews from critics pour in, many of which are results of the bandwagon effect. More coverage on bad reviews. Audience reaction gets worse, and that's after they’ve seen the reviews.
Now mind me some people will genuinely dislike a movie. And that is their opinion; I have no problem with opinions, especially if they are genuine. But right now we are talking about people’s opinions that aren’t really their own. Batman v Superman is an example and in no way am I defending the movie, but rather am trying to display the bandwagon effect with a recent example. This happens in politics with every passing election. Just go online and look at the videos of people being interviewed about their favorite candidates and knowing next to nothing about their economic policies. Mind me people will usually know about social policies (because that’s all that matters in government, right?).
All of what I have previously mentioned feeds into the “Spiral of Silence”, which was “Originally proposed by German political scientist Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann in 1974,Spiral of silence is the term meant to refer to the tendency of people to remain silent when they feel that their views are in opposition to the majority view on a subject...stipulates that individuals have a fear of isolation, which results from the idea that a social group or the society in general might isolate, neglect, or exclude members due to the members' opinions. This fear of isolation consequently leads to remaining silent instead of voicing opinions. Media is an important factor that relates to both the dominant idea and people's perception of the dominant idea. The assessment of one's social environment may not always correlate with reality.”
The spiral of silence is another way of showing how some views are silenced for fear of being different. Whereas the bandwagon effect is also attributed to wanting to be “trendy”, the spiral of silence is nothing more than conforming out of a fear of isolation. The spiral model describes the phenomena perfectly, and can be seen in the four steps as follows:
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“We can distinguish between fields where the opinions and attitudes involved are static, and fields where those opinions and attitudes are subject to changes... Where opinions are relatively definite and static – for example, “customs” – one has to express or act according to this opinion in public or run the risk of becoming isolated. In contrast, where opinions are in flux, or disputed, the individual will try to find out which opinion he can express without becoming isolated.
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Individuals who, when observing their environments, notice that their own personal opinion is spreading and is taken over by others, will voice this opinion self-confidently in public. On the other hand, individuals who notice that their own opinions are losing ground will be inclined to adopt a more reserved attitude when expressing their opinions in public.
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It follows from this that, as the representatives of the first opinion talk quite a lot while the representatives of the second opinion remain silent, there is a definite influence on the environment: an opinion that is being reinforced in this way appears stronger than it really is, while an opinion suppressed as described will seem to be weaker than it is in reality.
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The result is a spiral process which prompts other individuals to perceive the changes in opinion and follow suit, until one opinion has become established as the prevailing attitude while the other opinion will be pushed back and rejected by everybody with the exception of the hard core that nevertheless sticks to that opinion.”
Does this model speak true to everyday scenarios and how people adopt opinions? I can think of countless times i have seen this happened, and I’d be lying if I said it’s never happened to me. Here’s a thought: Public opinion is never really public opinion. It is a [debatably and somewhat] large opinion that has caught on through the spiral of silence and the bandwagon effect. It’s a frightening statement really.
So here’s my call to action guys. Make your own opinion and stick to it. Don’t be silent or conform just because a bunch of loud bossy people think they’re right. Go out, get informed ( in this case go see the movie) and make your own original opinion. Several years ago I really stopped caring about what critics said and found my own, original taste in movies. It was a sigh of relief knowing my mission wasn’t to agree with everyone else, but to take a step back and agree with my own self. There will be factors that will try and bind you your whole life. Factor’s such as some guy saying Batman v Superman sucked and you don’t say anything because you’re hiding the fact that you actually kinda liked it. Be yourself people, not everyone else.
Cheers,
TheLoveDoc