To create a more sustainable society, changing unsustainable social conventions is crucial. But when are small groups of people most effective at triggering social tipping necessary for convention change? Literature suggests non-conformist minorities exert more influence over individual attitudes of majority members when they oppose the majority convention consistently. However, social change requires not just individual attitude change among some majority members but that the entire society, over time, tips from one convention to a new one. Using a multi-round group experimental paradigm, we empirically examine whether minorities trigger social tipping more successfully when being consistent in their choices. In line with past theorising, we find that consistent minorities are perceived as more confident, which promotes tipping. We also find that consistent minorities are perceived as uncompromising, which surprisingly impedes rather than promotes tipping. Future research building on our work may ultimately provide practical guidance for activists: projecting as much confidence as possible through consistency while occasionally conceding to avoid appearing uncompromising may turn out to be an ideal cocktail when it comes to promoting tipping.
Mlakar et al. (Tue,) studied this question.