Chapter 12

This chapter is called "Social Psychology" which is defined as "the scientific study of a how a person's thoughts, feelings, and behavior are influenced by the real, imagined, or implied presence of others.

So the question that I'm going to answer is, What is compliance and what are the 4 common ways to gain compliance?

Compliance is when someone changes their behavior resulting from other people directing or asking for the change. Also, there is a difference between compliance and obedience in the sense that obedience includes a figure of authority (asking for the change) while compliance doesn't involve anyone with real authority.

There are 4 common techniques for gaining compliance. The first is called the foot-in-the-door technique and this is when someone asks for a small commitment and then asking for a bigger commitment once the first one was achieved. For example, your neighbor could ask you to watch their house for the weekend and you agree thinking that it isn't a large task. If your neighbor wanted to take advantage of this technique, they would then ask for something larger such as the watering of their plants.


The second technique is called the door-in-the-face technique and this is just the opposite of the foot-in-the-door technique except that the first (and larger) request gets denied. Back to the example, if your neighbor wanted to use this technique, they would ask for something that might be considered too much, such as watching their kids for the weekend. Once denied, your neighbor would ask for something considered smaller such as watering plants.

The third technique is called the lowball technique. This is when a commitment is gained, the the cost of committing is raised. For your neighbor to use this, they could ask you to water their plants. You agree thinking it is an easy task but you come to figure out that they have 300 plants throughout their house.

The last technique is called the that's-not-all technique, the best example of this is any of the one million infomercials on TV; they claim to give you more than they originally "planned" to.