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Serge Moscovici: 2 ideas worth knowing

2 ideas from Serge Moscovici, each explained in a minute and credited to the original work. Free on Savvy.

• Put like-minded people in a room to debate, and they leave more extreme, not less

  In 1969, Serge Moscovici and Marisa Zavalloni had French students discuss their attitudes toward their president and toward Americans, then compared opinions before and after. Disc…

  — Serge Moscovici & Marisa Zavalloni, The Group as a Polarizer of Attitudes

• Two people insisting a blue slide was green swayed a six-person group

  In a 1969 experiment, two confederates in a six-person group consistently called clearly blue slides 'green.' Participants judging alone almost never made that error, but with a pe…

  — Serge Moscovici, Elisabeth Lage & Martine Naffrechoux, Influence of a Consistent Minority on the Responses of a Majority in a Color Perception Task

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