TY - JOUR
T1 - Hesitation in communication : does minority status delay responses?
AU - YEUNG, Victoria Wai Lan
AU - LAU, Ivy Yee Man
AU - CHIU, Chi Yue
PY - 2013/9
Y1 - 2013/9
N2 - Past studies indicated that people in a minority (vs. majority) position are slower to express their public/political opinion, and the larger the difference between the size of the two positions, the slower the response. Bassili termed this the minority- slowness effect (MSE). In the current study, two experiments were conducted to demonstrate that MSE extends to people's understanding of utterances and explored the cognitive basis for this. Participants were asked to judge if an utterance is a ` direct' or an ` indirect' expression. The results show that participants in the minority (vs. majority) took longer to respond, and the larger the difference between the size of majority and minority, the longer the response latency (Study 1a). Furthermore, participants were aware of their own minority position (Study 1b). In Study 2, when participants were deprived of cognitive resources, MSE disappeared, presumably because participants lack the cognitive resources required to conform to utterance interpretation as favoured by the majority.
AB - Past studies indicated that people in a minority (vs. majority) position are slower to express their public/political opinion, and the larger the difference between the size of the two positions, the slower the response. Bassili termed this the minority- slowness effect (MSE). In the current study, two experiments were conducted to demonstrate that MSE extends to people's understanding of utterances and explored the cognitive basis for this. Participants were asked to judge if an utterance is a ` direct' or an ` indirect' expression. The results show that participants in the minority (vs. majority) took longer to respond, and the larger the difference between the size of majority and minority, the longer the response latency (Study 1a). Furthermore, participants were aware of their own minority position (Study 1b). In Study 2, when participants were deprived of cognitive resources, MSE disappeared, presumably because participants lack the cognitive resources required to conform to utterance interpretation as favoured by the majority.
KW - comprehension
KW - inhibition process
KW - minority‐slowness effect
KW - utterance directness
UR - http://commons.ln.edu.hk/sw_master/454
UR - https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84880327282&doi=10.1111%2fajsp.12028&partnerID=40&md5=ba667d2839c125adf374ca5235b36be9
U2 - 10.1111/ajsp.12028
DO - 10.1111/ajsp.12028
M3 - Journal Article (refereed)
SN - 1367-2223
VL - 16
SP - 238
EP - 248
JO - Asian Journal of Social Psychology
JF - Asian Journal of Social Psychology
IS - 3
ER -