What teens may not realize is that if they resist drugs or alcohol, they will make it easier for others to resist, too. An act of courage can bolster the resolve of others. One executive gave us an example of how he acts on this insight in his business. “When we have meetings, I typically have a ‘plant’ in the audience and give them a tough question to ask,” he said. “It’s always a question we know people are asking and talking about but afraid to actually bring to leadership. I do this to ‘pop the cork’ and show that it’s safe.” He’s right to be concerned about people staying silent: One study found that 85% of workers felt “unable to raise an issue or concern to their bosses even though they felt the issue was important.” His solution—the confederate with the tough question—is well supported by evidence. There’s a classic study, conducted by Charlan Nemeth and Cynthia Chiles, demonstrating that one act of courage supports another. Let’s say you are a participant in the study. You are matched with three other people, and a researcher shows your group a series of 20 slides. After each one is presented, the researcher pauses to ask each of you what color the slide is. It’s an easy task: All the slides are blue, and all four of you say “blue” all 20 times you’re asked. Then, that group breaks up and you are put into a new group of four. Same task. This time, though, the first slide is red. Oddly, all three of your group-mates call it “orange.” What will you call it? It certainly looks red, but could you be wrong? This happens 19 more times—your group-mates always call the slides “orange” and, each time, everyone looks at you to hear your answer. If you think you would stay strong in this situation, you might be right, but you’d be in the minority. Most people in the study caved. On average, they called 14 of the 20 red slides “orange,” conforming to the majority’s incorrect view. (The three people in the group who claimed all the red slides were “orange” were, as you might have guessed, confederates of the researchers.) Another set of participants were ushered through the sequence above but with one crucial difference: This time, the researchers also added a confederate to the first group (the one viewing blue slides). He was instructed to call all the blue sides “green.” Let’s call him the Brave but Wrong Guy. The other three (normal) participants were probably puzzled by his seeming color-blindness, but they easily stuck to their guns, calling all the blue slides “blue.” The striking change came in the second group. The participants were shown the red slides, and as described above, the three confederates continually called them “orange.” This time, though, the participants stayed strong! They defied the majority, labeling 17 out of 20 slides (on average) as red. Note that they were brave even though they hadn’t practiced courage themselves. They’d only witnessed it. Brave but Wrong Guy was willing to speak up for himself—even though he was mistaken about the color. That act of dissent bolstered the other participants’ resolve. As the researchers wrote, “exposure to a dissenting minority view, even when that view is in error, contributes to independence.” The bad news here is that our natural instinct is to cave to the majority opinion. If everyone says the red card is orange, we think we must be wrong, and we call it orange, too. The good news is that if even one person is brave enough to defy the majority, we are emboldened. We’re not alone anymore. We’re not crazy. And we feel we can call red “red.” In short, courage is contagious. From historic protests to everyday acts, from the civil rights movement to an employee asking a tough question, this is the lesson we’ve learned: It is hard to be courageous, but it’s easier when you’ve practiced, and when you stand up, others will join you. Think of it: Your moment of courage might be a defining moment for someone else—a signal to them that red is red, that wrong is wrong, and that it can be righted if we stand, together, against it.
We tend to follow the majority as our default mode. But “courage is contagious”. Whenever you feel like you are the only one in the room with your particular opinion, speak up! There might be many others that just need that push from you, and would be afraid to speak up otherwise.
