ABSTRACT
Surprisingly, social psychologists typically think about social influence processes in a much more restrictive way. Although all our textbooks contain key sections on 'social influence' processes, what is discussed there is usually limited to dramatic illustrations of various forms of direct interpersonal influence, such as social facilitation effects, conformity, obedience, and persuasion. It seems that our fascination with these impressive demonstrations of direct influence in classic experiments by Sherif, Asch, and Milgram perhaps limited our interest in the much more general and pervasive aspects of influence processes.
