Willingness to express one's opinion in a realistic situation as a function of perceived support for that opinion

We examined how people's willingness to speak their opinions in a real situ ation varied as a function of perceived support for those opinions. When gi ven a list of six potential topics to discuss with a real group of people, the participants reported a greater willingness to discuss a topic if they perceived greater support for their own opinions on that topic. The relatio nship we observed was much larger than the average correlation reported in a recent meta-analysis (Glynn, Hayes, and Shanahan I997). Methodological an d psychological explanations for the discrepancy are discussed.