The Spiral of Silence theory suggests that when there is a dominant
opinion, other opinions are silenced. The theory was originally proposed by a
German political scientist Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann in the year 1974. It is
said to have five elements; first is the threat of isolation. It begins that in
order to maintain a structural society,
a collective cohesion of its members must be insured by a level of
agreement on values and goals, that in order to maintain the social order,
society tends to threaten isolation for the people who violate the
consensus. Second element is an
assumption that was based on experiment; the fear of isolation, because people
fear being isle and thus take measures to avoid consequences. Third element
would be the quasi-statistical sense where in it is described as an innate
ability to gauge the public opinion, the mass media play a large part in
determining what the dominant opinion is. The mass media can dramatically
people’s
perception about where their public opinion lies, whether it is factual or not.
The next element is the willingness to speak out; people tend to publicly
express their opinions when they believe their opinion to be dominant, on the
other hand, when people believe their opinion is less popular, they are less
likely to voice it in public. And lastly, the spiral effect; the tendency of
the individual to speak up and the other to be silent and the other individual
to be silent starts off a spiralling process which increasingly establishes one’s
opinion as the dominant one.
A perfect example of
this theory is its presence in social media, especially on Facebook. Especially
on the recent presidential elections in the United States. It’s either people
try to support the most popular candidate confidently or they do not give out
their opinions at all. A survey conducted by the Pew Research Center has found
that people were less willing to discuss one issue — according to the survey,
86% of Americans were more willing to have an in-person conversation regarding
the Political issues, but just 42% of the Facebook and other social media
platform users were willing to post their opinions online. “It
has been well documented since before the internet that a ‘spiral of silence’ descends
when people think their opinions are in the minority when compared to those
around them – they don’t want to speak out if they think they hold unpopular
views,” noted Prof. Keith Hampton, the author of the study. “This kind of
self-censoring can mean that important information is never shared. Some had
hoped that social media might provide new outlets that encourage more
discussion and the exchange of a wider range of opinions. But we see the
opposite – a spiral of silence exists online, too. If people did not think that
their friends and followers in social media agreed with them, they were less
likely to say they would state their views online.”
The spiral of silence
theory is also present in professional workplaces, in businesses. When a new
rule is set in an organisation, most of the employees usually do not complain. The minority who
want to protest also cannot do it due to the fear of isolation. This mostly
happens to the women in the business industry. Although there is a presence of
the spiral of silence, according to Andy Valeri, a researcher, businesses
replace the theory with a “virtuous spiral of
communication”. He said that “this is in order to avoid some of the most
negative consequences of spiral of silence effects, which can occur when upward
communication within an organisation is suppressed and management interprets
the silence that ensues as agreement with policies which may be detrimental to
the overall effectiveness of the organisation (Haufler, 2007). Assuming that
communication within a business structure, no matter its perceived popularity,
is essential to managing a profitable business environment.”
My last example would
be the presence of the theory in one of the best movies made, Schindler’s List, directed
by Steven Spielberg. During the Holocaust most media was channeled through
radio and newspapers, but Nazi Germany is one of the best examples in history
of how public opinion can be controlled. Because public opinion in Germany
during the Holocaust was so strong the hard core did not only risk isolation,
but persecution, incarceration and death. Schindler spent all of his money to
take hundreds of Jews and have them work in his factory to save then from the
horrible fate of the concentration camps. The Jews is the the end of the spiral
willing to speak out at any cost.
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