Asch's line study Flashcards
What was the aim of Asch’s line study?(1950’s)
..To investigate the extent to which social pressure from a majority group could affect a person to conform.
What were the procedures of Asch’s line study?
..123 American, undergraduate students tested. A lab experiment. One naive participant was placed in a room with seven confederates, taking part in a line length guessing test. The participants were told that they were taking part in a vision test.
What were the findings of Asch’s line study?
That the naive participant gave the wrong answer 36.8% of the time. 25% of participants did not conform at all meaning that 75% conformed at least once.
What were the conclusions of Asch’s line study?
People do conform in order to fit in and not be rejected by the group.
How did group size affect the conformity?
Conformity increased with a group size of 3 but not further.
How did unanimity affect conformity rates?
Conformity decreased with a dissenter.
How did task difficulty affect conformity rates?
Conformity increased as the task got harder.
How did the presence of a dissenter affect conformity rates?
They reduced from 32% to 5%
What research disproves Asch’s line study findings?
Perrin and Spencer(1980) replicated Asch’s line study with science and engineering students
Only 1 student conformed in a total of 369 trials compared with 75% conforming at least once in Asch’s line study(1951)
