Aschs Study Flashcards
Why was Asch’s study carried out?
To asses to what extent people would conform to the opinions of others even when the answer is unambiguous
Explain the baseline study of Asch
-123 white American men, each in a group with other apparent pp’s.
-each group saw 2 white cards on each trial, one with 1 stimulus line and the other had 3 comparison lines labelled ABC.
-the pp’s had to select one line from the 3 that matched the line on the separate card. there was always one clear answer and the other two were substantially different
-on each trial the pp’s had to say aloud their answer
Explain the physical arrangements of pp’s in Asch’s study and types of pp’s
pp’s were in groups of 6-8. Only one ppt was a genuine, naive ppt, the rest were confederates of Asch The naive ppt was always seated last or second to last in the group. The confederate pp’s gave scripted answers that were purposely wrong, the naive ppt didn’t know this
Explain the findings of Asch’s research
on average, the naive pp’s agreed with the confederates 36.8% of the time. 25% of pp’s never conformed.
What 3 variables did Asch change in his study?
Group size
Unanimity
Task difficulty
How and why did Asch manipulate group size? What were the results?
Wanted to know whether the size of the group would be more important than the agreement of the group. Varied the number of confederates from 1-15. Found a curvilinear relationship between size and conformity, as conformity increased with group size but only up until a certain point. With 3 confederates conformity rose to 31.8%. This suggests that most people are very sensitive to the views of others as even with only a group size of 2-3, people still conformed
How and why did Asch manipulate unanimity? What were the results?
Investigated if the presence of a non conforming person would affect the naive pp’s conformity. Added a confederate that disagreed with the other confederates. One variation saw the confederate giving the right answer but the other saw the confederate give a different wrong answer. The results found that the naive ppt conformed less in the presence of a dissenter. Rate of conformity decreased to less than a quarter of the level it was when all confederates gave the same wrong answer. Suggests that the influence of the majority depends on the extent of unanimity and non conformity is more likely to occur when there are differing views
How and why did Asch manipulate task difficulty? What were the results?
Investigated whether making the task harder would affect the degree of conformity. He increased the difficulty by making the stimulus line and comparison lines more similar to each other in length so the naive ppt couldn’t see the differences as clearly. He found that conformity increased when the task is more ambiguous and difficult as the answer is unclear. In these circumstances, it is natural to look for others for guidance and assume they are right
explain one limitation of Asch’s study (EV)
One limitation of Aschs research is that the task and situation were artificial therefore it has low ecological validity. The task didn’t represent everyday life and experience and the study took place in a lab so pps may have been demonstrating DCs and gone along with other pp’s and gave an incorrect answer as that’s what they believed the researcher was expecting. This is a limitation as it Means findings can’t be generalised and doesn’t actually tell us about important consequences of conformity in the real world.
Explain a limitation of Asch’s study (PV)
One limitation is that the study has low population validity. This is because all of Asch’s pp’s were white American men. Other research surrounding conformity suggests women are more likely to conform, as they are more concerned about social relationships than men. Also, the US is an individualist culture, but alternate research tells us conformity rates are higher in collectivist cultures such as China. This is a limitation as it means that Asch’s research tells us little about conformity in groups other than American men.
What is a strength of Aschs study? (Research support)
One strength is support from other studies relating to the effect of task difficulty. For example, in one study pps were asked to solve ‘easy’ and ‘hard’ maths problems and were given three answers from students who weren’t actually real. The pps conformed more often when the problems were harder. This is a strength because it shows that Asch was correct in claiming that task difficultly is a variable which affects conformity
