In all friend groups, we have those that make
the plans, those who straight up say they cannot come, those who say they are
coming and actually show up and then those that say they are coming but bail
(usually last minute) So how do you get people in the last category to fulfil their commitments? Here is a personal example:
Since the beginning of term, one of my flat
mates has been trying to arrange a night out where all 8 of us are present. For
some reason or the other, one or two people would bail and she would go back to
square one arranging another night when everyone was available. It started off
with my flat mate approaching each of us individually at different times and
getting verbal commitments – 4 out of 8 people stuck to their commitment. Since
this proved to be ineffective she moved on to writing about a plan in our group
chat on WhatsApp – 5 out of 8 people stuck to their commitment. Finally, she
made a Facebook group inviting around 20 people and 8 out of 8 members of the
flat stuck to their commitment. Why?
There’s a simple explanation. A commitment is
either a private or a public decision to act. When done more privately, for
example, my flat mate asking us one to one in person or over private text
messages, an individual does not feel as obligated to fulfil that commitment
because he/she does not feel any fear of being socially rejected or the threat
of cognitive dissonance when breaking the commitment is less. (Knox & Inkster,
1968) However, as the plans were written and started becoming more public, the
number of individuals who stuck to their commitment increased till a 100% of
the people came through. The Facebook group idea involved 20 people and since
individuals saw that 18 people were going, they were under more pressure to fulfil the commitment and the fear of missing out was higher.
Therefore, if you want people to commit, make
the plan public or written. Also make sure that it will cause them more
dissonance for them to break the commitment than to fulfil it.
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