Final Study Guide Spiral of Silence Theory SST Elisabeth Noelle Newman 1974 Goals 05 14 2014 o To predict how perceived public opinion can influence individual opinion expression o To explain how a dominant public opinion develops based on people s perceptions of what others think Assumptions Guiding SST o 1 Society threatens deviant individuals with isolation o 2 This fear of isolation causes individuals to try to asses the climate opinion at all times through Personal observation The media o 3 Public behavior is affected by public opinion assessment SST Concepts o Three meanings of Public Public that is open to everyone ex public space To the concerns of people ex public duty of a journalist The social psychological side of people ex people adjust their behaviors according to their observation of public views o Opinion level of agreement of a particular population Public opinion attitudes or behaviors one must express in public if one is not to isolate oneself It provides norms that people should obey with o The Hard Core The silent minority may rise up Hard Core a person who is not affected by social pressure and does not fear isolation from the crowd They hold a strong and unchanged opinion o A Quasi statistical Sense People s ability to dodge the strength s of the opposing sides in a debate o Pluralistic Ignorance o Media s Influence Ubiquity Cumulativeness Consonance Media sets the agenda for the public Media frames a topic in a certain way Fear of Isolation o The Asch Experiment Group of people are looking at lines and they are asked which line matches the others in size only one of the people in the group are actually being tested All other people choose the wrong line to see if the one person being tested will conform to what the whole group is saying People will go along with the whole group even if the group is wrong because people will choose to conform The Train Test o Tests the spiral of silence o An assessment of the extent people will speak out with their own opinion o An example suppose that you have a long train ride ahead of you and a person sits next to you and starts to discuss the problems of food safety Would you talk or not talk about the topic to the person o The train test is a clear testable and replicable test Evaluation of SST o Critiques Logical consistency Fear of isolation is not tested Over emphasis on media influence Cross cultural application The effect of ego involvement and selective exposure o Positives Heurism It has been applied to many topics The Persian Gulf War of the 90s Computer mediated communication People don t make real choices People perceive the majority side and perceive Defines Communication Metatheoretical Assumptions o Ontological the majority climate Individual Context doesn t matter o Epistemological Empiricism o Axiological Value free On the Spectrum Social Scientific Face Negotiation Theory FNT Stella Ting Toomey 1988 Goal of FNT Assumptions of FNT Key Concepts of FNT o Face o To explain how members of different cultures manage conflict o Face is important in interpersonal interactions individuals negotiate Face differently across cultures o Certain acts face threatening acts threaten ones projected self image i e face or predicament Face saving actions efforts to avoid embarrassment Face restoration strategies used to preserve autonomy and avoid loss of face ex offering excuses An extension of self concept a metaphor for public image we want to display Socially situated identity identity people conjointly define during social interactions Roommates A universal concept o Facework The specific verbal nonverbal behaviors that aims at dealing with ones and or the others face wants People make whatever they are doing consistent with their face Happens when our the others face are expected to be threatened o Culture o Conflict Culture is interpreted along many dimensions What we focus on in this theory is how people from different cultures value personal vs group needs The perceived and or actual incompatibility of values expectations processes or outcomes between two or more parties over substantive and or relational issues Can damage peoples face Face Concern Face Need o Two types 3 Types of Facework praise Explanation in FNT o Tact Facework respect for another s autonomy avoid directives confrontation o Solidarity Facework accept the other as an in group member emphasize commonalities o Approbation Facework minimizing blame and maximizing o Culture variability face needs and concerns conflict o Individualistic culture self face concern and negative face Dominating behaviors using influence authority or strategies needs dominating expertise You have to do whatever I say because you are influencing my lifestyle o Collectivistic cultures other face concern and positive face needs avoiding obliging compromising integrating Avoiding staying away from disagreement Obliging satisfy the needs of others Compromising middle road Integrating find a solution to a problem higher degree of concern for yourself and others compared to compromising Individualistic vs Collectivistic Culture o Individualistic Culture Focus is on individual needs preferences and identity Ex US Great Britain Canada Self face concern Negative face need desire to be autonomous and free from others o Collectivistic Culture Focus is on group needs preferences and identity Ex China Japan Latin America Mexico Other or mutual face concern Positive face need desire to be like and admired by others Some Research Findings o Americans use more dominating o Taiwanese use more integrating o Chinese and Taiwanese use more obliging o Chinese use more avoidance and compromising Evaluation of FNT o Good Heuristic Scope and boundaries are clear Parsimoniously stated Logically consistent o Bad Validity The culture dimension of individualism collectivism may not fully explain cultural differences Other issues pertaining to face needs may exist but are not identifies positive and negative face is too general Defines Communication o Needs to be correspondence Metatheoretical Assumptions o Ontological They can choose Human experience basically social experience Context matters Knowledge arises through social interactions o Epistemological o Axiological Value free doesn t matter what scholars explain Middle between Scientific and Humanistic Traditional Rhetorical Theory Aristotle Definitions of Rhetoric o Aristotle Finding all the available means of persuasion Oral rhetoric or
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