EOTO #2 - Spiral of Silence

     The Spiral of Silence, is a theory that was first introduced by German communication researcher Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann in the 1970's. The theory shows if people will change their opinion on a controversial issue based on how the public views it. 

    Neumann first came up with the idea for the theory during the 1965 German election and found that the two parties, Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Social Democratic Party (SDP), had an even amount of voter representation 45% for both.

    For months the two parties were in a stalemate but one day, only a few weeks before the election, more voters said they were starting to vote in favor of the Christian Democratic Union. Now it was more than 50% compared to less than 40% in favor of the CDU. 

    What caused the sudden swing in voters was, as time went on more-and-more voters started to believe that the CDU would become victorious. Instead of voting for the SDP, voters changed who they were going to vote for simply based on public opinion.

    It was not only those that were voting for the SDP that changed their minds, but people who were unsure of who they were going to vote for also switched to the CDU simply because of public opinion.

    The main reason for the public believing that the CDU would win has a lot to do with Queen Elizabeth II visiting Germany while being accompanied by the CDU chancellor, Ludwig Erhard. Voters saw this and began to believe that this meant the CDU was the more popular party and changed their view on the election. 

    This led to voters from the SDP party to believe that they were in the minority and their votes would end up not meaning much, in return they either switched who they would vote for or did not end up voting at all. 

    In conclusion, Noelle-Neumann found that SDP voters were discouraged from publicly talking about their views on certain issues because they felt that there was no purpose because the CDU would win easily. 

    The overall takeaway that Noelle-Neumann had after the survey was finished and proved her theory to be correct was people have a fear of being isolated by others if their opinions are not similar to the rest of the public. 

    Instead of voicing their opinions on a specific topic, people will choose to not say anything at all, or they will side with the popular opinion all because of the fear that they will be an outcast or even receive verbal threats.    

    This was a theory that I found to be extremely interesting because it is something that is becoming more prevalent in today's society. People on both sides of the political aisle feel that they can no longer speak out on issues that they believe to be true out of fear.

    As time goes on, we have started to see that people become much more vocal about their political beliefs and have even started to become aggressive towards those that do not share these same beliefs. An example of this would be the surrounding the topic of abortion, both sides have very obvious opposing viewpoints. Instead of talking about these different opinions they start to verbally and maybe even physically attack one another.

    If this continues and starts to become more frequent in our society it will do more harm than good and it is best if we stay away from this kind of thing. How do people think countries will improve if they can no longer have multiple political parties have a civil conversation?