Chapter 7 Part 3 Flashcards
Compliance
a change in behaviour in response to a direct request from another person. (ex/ letter from charity asking for money)
3 main methods of obtaining compliance from someone
1) door in the face
2) foot in the door
3) lowballing
what is a reciprocity norms
a social norm by which the receipt of something positive from another person requires you to reciprocate or behave similarly in response
how does door in the face technique of compliance invoke reciprocity norms?
reciprocity norm s invoked when the person backs down from an extreme request to a smaller one.
we feel as if the requester is doing us a favour by changing his position,tring o meet us half way because of the reciprocity norm, we then feel obliated to retune the favour and appear reasonable too.
disadvantage of door in the face
short lived. Once people have agreed to the smaller request, they have met their obligation by meeting the requester half way. THEY ARE less likely to do it again.
T/F Foot in the door invokes the reciprocity norm
false. it triggers a change in self perception. By agreeing to the small request, people come to view themselves as the kind of person who helps others. Once this self image is in place, it makes people ore likely to agree to the larger request in order to maintain this type of positive self image.
Lowballing
an unethical strategy whereby a salesperson induce a customer to free to purchase a product at a very low cost, and then subsequently raises the price. Frequently, the customer will still make the purchase at the inflated price.
3 reasons as to why lowballing works
1) there is an illusion of irervocability; even though you could legally back out of the deal, you don’t want to break a social contract
2) there is an anticipation of an exciting event
3) the actual (raised) price “might not be that bad”– its probably only slightly higher than other dealerships
- “oh what the heck, I’m already here and filled out the forms, why wait”
2 reasons why you may use strategic anticonformity (reverse psychology)
1) to elicit behavioural compliance from another person
2) to elicit affirming messages from another person. By saying “oh you don’t need me” you’ll probably get the other person to say “ of course I need you”
Obedience
conformity in respons to the commands of an authority figure.
T/F: a specific group of people are more likely to conform than others
false. Milgrams obedience experiments show that obedience occurs “across the board”
participants ranged from ages 20-60, and included blue collar, white caller and professional workers.
There was an 80% rate of obedience.
Role of normative social influence on OBEDIENCE
social norms make it harder to resist an authoritative figure.
- command like “ it is absolutely essential that you continue” maes it hard to go against
- if the authority figure is in close proximity to you, it is harder to resist than if someone is giving orders over the phone.
- if you have anyone else disobey, its easier for other people to disobey
role of informational social influence on OBEDIENCE
people might obey because they see the authority figure as a source of information
- in the milgram shock experiment, the researcher told the participants that the learner would not be affected too much by the shocks. Many of them said this was the reason why they kept going
- in an alternative situation, the researcher did not tell the person how much of a shock to give, and left the room, leaving behind some random person to “baby sit.” this random person then suggested “hey maybe should increase the shocks every time the person gets him wrong” BUT OBEDIENCE DECREASED– they didn’t see this random baby sitter as an informational source.
Other reasons why we might obey
1) we are on auto pilot and didn’t realize that the social norm we are following is inappropriate because the situation is too fast placed (ie/ it is possible that if the participants in the milgram experiment were given a 15 minute break, they would’ve dropped out sooner)
2) self justification: in order to mitigate cognitive dissonance, we just keep justifying our obedience.
T/F Obedience may be just about aggression
false. in alternatives to the milgram experiment, where participants were allowed to give any level of shock they wanted to the participant, almost all elected to give the smallest shock.
People do not choose to be aggressive. Many studies demonstrate that social pressures can combine in insidious ways to make humane people act in an inhumane manner.
