Asch's Study AO1

Question 1

Describe Asch’s Study’s procedure?

Answer 1

• 123 male students were used
• they were brought into a room and given two cards one with standard line and the other with comparison lines
• out of those in the room only one wasn’t a confederate in the room told to answer incorrectly be the experimentor
• they would read out their answers and the real participants would always be almost last to give their’s

Question 2

What were the findings/conclusions drawn from Asch’s experiment?

Answer 2

• 33% always gave the wrong answer like the confederates
• 75% followed confederates at least once
• 25% never followed confederates
• Asch concluded that those who conformed likely knew the answer was wrong but followed the confederates (majority) because they didn’t want to appear foolish or recieve disapproval

Question 3

What variables were manipulated in further studies done by Asch?

Answer 3

1. Group size
2. Unanimated
3. Task difficulty

Question 4

Explain the affect of group size on social influence?

and asch’s experiment

Answer 4

by slowly increasing the number of confederates Asch found (by ploting it in a graph) that after 3 confederates, the affects didn’t increase much more than 30% conformity

Question 5

Explain the affect of unamity on social influence?

and asch’s experiment

Answer 5

• Asch added another non-conforming participant
• the presence of a dissenting confedarate led to reduced conformity from 33% to 5%
• this is because the participant was allowed to behave more independently

Question 6

Explain the affect of task difficulty on social influence?

and asch’s experiment

Answer 6

• Asch made comparison line more similar in length in order to increase the difficulty
• this is because the situation is more ambiguous
• according to Lucas et al this decreases a person’s self efficacy and therefore increases ISI