Data and information have become one of the most important tools of this era. However, they cannot be used in their raw forms. When they have processed, their impacts on human life are humongous. One of the things that has the biggest impact on data and informational social influence is our behavior.
The information we see everywhere is affecting our psychology and ultimately in making our decisions. One of the reasons for this is that we involve technology and this information so much in our life. This increased involvement is causing certain effects, some of which are positive while others are negative.
What is Informational Social Influence?
Informational social influence describes a situation when an individual is influenced and make decisions based on the information and data available, believing it to be more credible and worth. The individual accepts that those presented the information has the expertise and thus change their thinking or behavior accordingly.
Here we will be elaborating on the informational social influence on our behaviors and lifestyles.
Do we pay attention to the information about certain events in our lives?
The first thing is to pay attention to the information. Well, yes! Paying attention to the information about all the things and events happening around us seems so fascinating. Whether the event relates to our life or not, most of us will be looking to get more and more details of information about it.
How has the internet affected the "information" part of our lives?
If we look at the root cause of us looking for all the information all the time, it will only be the internet. In the older times, the main source of information was books or research papers. Those tools took time to develop, so people paid great attention to the authenticity of the information they were providing. In this way, the audience only got the true information.
On the other hand, what happens these days is that anyone can upload anything on the internet. There are hundreds of platforms that allow users to upload information without checking if the information is correct or not.
At the same time, users from all around the world can easily see that piece of information the moment it is online. This easy internet has the following effects relating to the information social influence.
- The internet has made it very easy to share anything and count it as information.
- People can take anything from the internet and make themselves believe that it is a part of true information.
- It is almost impossible to control this sharing and access to information that is causing behavioral effects on several people in many ways.
How does this informational social influence affect our behavior?
As we were discussing above, anyone can take the information from the internet and perceive it as they want. It is one of the worst things happening because of the information. However, there are positive and negative effects of information social influence. For example, people are sharing their lavish lifestyles on the internet. Millions of users get to see their posts.
Well, someone has the choice to take those as motivational posts. In this way, he or she will develop a positive attitude. On the other hand, someone can take those as hate or jealousy as well. It will cause no damage to the person posting, but the negative behavior will affect the personal and social life of the negative audience by a huge factor.
The same is the case with the information that is spread across the internet. You can use it for your benefits, and you can use it for your destruction, and it depends on you.
Informational social influence is a huge factor in marketing.
When it comes to informational social influence, the first effective thing for our behaviors is marketing. Whenever we look for a product, we either are going to buy it or recommend it to someone else. Information plays a huge role here in changing our behavior towards the product and other people as well.
When we are provided with the full information about the product, we develop an interest in getting that product. At the same time, access to information makes us a person who can recommend that product to others in a positive way.
Now consider that everything is the same except there is no information or a lack of information. In this way, the overall perspective will be a lot different. So, in this way, informational social influence becomes a huge factor in product marketing.
The information helps in setting the expectations high.
Whether it is having a baby or buying a new computer for ourselves. Most users are looking to get all of the information beforehand. But why? Well, this is because having the information about what you are getting helps in setting the expectations high.
When the thing we are looking to get comes in the same or a better way, positive behavior is easy to observe. On the other hand, seeing negative and toxic behavior towards others and self is very common when expectations shatter.
The impact of false information.
One of the biggest and the worst informational social influences that we are facing in this era is due to spreading false information. However, the internet is an amazing platform for sharing information. Sharing false information is not a difficult thing as well. People who are looking to spread hate and demotivation use it as their opportunity to spread false information.
As everyone across the world is getting to see that information, their behaviors get the effect of this false information.
Social media has all types of different impacts.
Social media is the group of platforms that plays the most part in the informational social influence of this time. Whether you are looking to spread positivity or negativity, you can use it as your primary platform, and the results will be unbelievable in both cases.