Asch - AIMS AND CONTEXT Flashcards
what is conformity?
choosing a course of action which is favoured by the majority of group members or what is socially acceptable
what is the opposite to conformity?
Deviating
what is deviating?
when the person chooses to behave in a way that isnt socially acceptable or that the group doesn’t favour
what is majority influence?
this is when an individual is often influenced by the way the majority think or act. However, just because a person goes along with the majority in public; this doesn’t mean that they have changed their private beliefs.
what is public compliance?
someone who only alters their behaviour to conform
what is private acceptance?
someone who alters both their behaviour and their beliefs
what did Jenness (1932) do and find?
Asked students to guess how many jelly beans there were in a jar. They were given the opportunity to discuss their estimates and then they were asked individually to give their estimates again. Jenness noticed that individual estimates would transform into a group norm.
What studies did Asch look at?
Jenness (1932) and Sherif (1935)
Were the studies conducted by Jenness and Sherif in ambiguous or unambiguous situations?
Ambiguous- this means it would make sense for us to look to others for help to determine our behaviour and attitudes.
What did Sherif (1935) do and find?
Used the autokinetic effect (where a spot of light is projected onto a screen in a dark room and it appears to move about). All of the participants were initially asked to estimate how far they think the light moved. He then seperated the participants into groups of three. After their discussion, they were asked to give individual estimates again, Sherif found that they had the tendency to conform to group norms.
What did Asch suggest about conformity in ambiguous situations?
Asch suggested that conformity was likely to happen in ambiguous situations as there are no clear answers.
What were Asch’s aims of his study on conformity?
His aim was to study the effects of group pressure on individuals in unambiguous situations. He wanted to find out whether individuals would conform or give an individual response (deviate) even when confronted with an obviously incorrect answer.
What did Asch think of Jenness and Sherif’s research?
He thought that they weren’t very relative to conformity as they tended to measure the formations of group norms in ambiguous situations where it is obvious that we turn to others to make decisions on our behaviour etc.
What was the purpose of Jenness and Sherifs research in the beginning? What did they look at?
they looked at the ways in which individuals in groups formed their own opinions
