Chapter 9 - Social Influence Flashcards
- Define social influence and distinguish between conformity, compliance, and
obedience
Social Influence
The many ways people affect one another, including
changes in attitudes, beliefs, feelings, and behaviour
resulting from the comments, actions, or even the mere presence of others
Conformity
Acting differently due to the influence of others
Compliance
* Agreeing to the explicit request of another person
* Examples: agreeing to do
someone a favour, getting
people to donate to a charity
Obedience
* In an unequal power relationship, submitting to the demands of the person in authority
* Example: following the orders of a police officer
* Study of obedience heavily shaped by the influence of
Stanley Milgram (1933-1984)
- Describe the phenomenon of automatic mimicry and explain its function
Automatic Mimicry
* Some forms of conformity may be automatic
Chartrand & Bargh, 1999:
* Ps interacted with confederate who would either rub their face or shake their foot
* Ps would unconsciously imitate the behaviors of the
confederate
Reasons for Automatic Mimicry
* Ideomotor action: phenomenon whereby merely thinking about a behavior makes performing it more likely
Promotion of social interactions:
* Mimicry may facilitate empathy—our ability to
understand and share feelings of another person
* Mimicry may build social rapport and lead to pleasant
social interactions
* People like individuals who mimic them better than
those who don’t
* People who are mimicked engage in more prosocial
behavior afterward
* Mimicry is stronger for people with a drive to affiliate with others
- Distinguish between normative and informational social influence
a. Summarize research that demonstrates these two types of social influence
b. Be prepared to apply to examples
Normative Social Influence
* The influence of other people that comes from the
desire to avoid their disapproval and other social
sanctions (ridicule, barbs, ostracism)
Why?
* We have a deeply-held need to form and maintain
social connections, and to be well-regarded by others
(Baumeister & Leary, 1995)
-Example: line of different sizes test. Know the right answer, but still conform to group
Legacy of evolution: stronger social bonds=higher chance of survival. Ostracism=death
Public Compliance vs.
Private Acceptance
* Normative social influence leads to public compliance
but not necessarily private acceptance
* People may publicly agree with the group opinion in
order to avoid social disapproval but privately believe something different
Informational social influence:
The influence of other people that results from taking their comments or actions as a source of information about what is correct, proper, or
effective
● In an ambiguous situation (as in the Sherif study), other
people can serve as frame of reference
● Informational social influence is more likely when:
○ the situation is ambiguous or difficult
○ we feel low in knowledge or competence about the
topic
-Example: estimate of light movement converged when in groups
&Private Beliefs:
* Other people shape how we see the stimuli or issues before us, leading to internalization—the private acceptance of a proposition, orientation, or ideology
* Not just mimicking the group’s response—rather,
adopting the group’s perspective
* In Sherif studies, the newly emerged group norm
continued to influence participant responses when they were subsequently tested alone
Enduring effects:
* Effects of informational influence can be long-lasting
* Group norms influenced individual judgments a year
after individual was last tested (Rohrer et al., 1954)
* Norms can persist through several group
“generations” (Jacobs & Campbell, 1961)
- Identify the key factors that affect conformity
Group Size
* Conformity rates increase as group size increases, but
only up to a point
* True both in cases of informational social influence and
normative social influence
-Example: looking up Milgram, wrong answer Asch
Group Unanimity
* More conformity when group is unanimous
* One person is likely to conform to a group, but if they have at least one ally who breaks the unanimity, then conformity rates decrease dramatically
Anonymity
* Anonymity eliminates normative social influence and
therefore should substantially reduce conformity
* Unlike with informational social influence, there is no
internalization
* Public compliance vs. private acceptance
Expertise and Status
* High status or expert group members have more social
influence
* (Perceptions of) expertise and status often co-occur, but, generally:
* Experts exert more informational social influence
* High status exerts more normative social influence
-example math problem with pilot, navigator and gunner
Culture
* Interdependent vs. independent cultures
* Members of interdependent cultures are more
concerned about fitting into social context than
members of independent cultures
* Studies across cultures have found higher rates of
conformity in interdependent cultures
* Tight vs. loose cultures
* Some cultures are called “tight” because they have
very strong norms regarding how people should
behave, and members do not tolerate departure from
those norms
* Other cultures are “loose” because their norms are
not so strong, and their members tolerate more
deviance
Gender
* Differences in socialization of girls and boys
* Girls socialized to value interdependence
* Boys socialized to value independence
* Some studies find a small tendency for women to
conform more than men, but effect small and unreliable
* Knowledge on the subject matters, regardless of gender
- Describe the ways in which minority opinion can influence majority opinion
-instrumental
-say what others are thinking motivates
-majority wonders why minority insists,pay more attention
- Describe the methods for eliciting compliance
a. Define norm of reciprocity and explain how it can be leveraged to elicit
compliance
i. Provide research examples and be prepared to apply to real world
scenarios
a. Norm of Reciprocity
* Cross-cultural norm dictating that people should
provide benefits to those who have provided benefits to them (“you scratch my back, I scratch yours”)
* Emerges early in development—21-month-old infants more willing to help those who have tried to give them a toy (Dunfield & Kuhlmeier, 2010)
* May feel obligated to comply with later request if first given a favour—even if it’s something small that we
didn’t ask for
-example: coca cola favour
* Solicitations for donations more successful when gift included
* Hare Krishnas handing out small gifts in airports (Katz et al., 2003)
* Pharmaceutical drug reps and physicians
* A gift does not have to be big to exert influence (Cialdini, 1993)
- Describe the methods for eliciting compliance
b. Describe the door-in-the-face technique
i. Provide research examples and be prepared to apply to real world
scenarios
ii. Explain how reciprocal concessions may contribute to the effectiveness of this technique, and provide research evidence
supporting this explanation
b. * Door-in-the-face technique: A
compliance approach where the target request is preceded by a more extreme
request that is likely to be get rejected
(big request, person refuses, then smaller request, person is like ok, fine)
i. -zoo example: volunteer for 2 years vs. one afternoon
ii. * If effect is being driven by the perception that the
requester has compromised with you (obligating you to
compromise in turn), efficacy of the technique should be
diminished if a different person makes the second
request
-true!
- Describe the methods for eliciting compliance
c. Describe the foot-in-the-door technique
i. Provide research examples and be prepared to apply to real world
scenarios
c. Foot-in-the-door technique:
* People are more likely to comply with a larger request if they have already complied with a smaller initial request
* E.g., charities often first ask for very small donations, then later ask for bigger donations
i. -Study examining house. More likely to agree to full house examination if had already agreed 3 days before to answer questions about soap
-More likely to agree to put big ugly sign on yard if had already agreed to put sign in window
Why?
* Shift in self-perception
* After the initial favour, a person “may become, in his
own eyes, the kind of person who does this sort of thing,
who agrees to requests made by strangers, who takes
action on things he believes in, who cooperates with
good causes” (Freedman & Fraser, 1966)
- Describe the methods for eliciting compliance
d. Describe the effects of mood on compliance
- Both positive and (some) negative moods can increase
rates of compliance
Positive mood:
* Our mood colours how we
interpret events
* We are more likely to view
requests for favors as less
intrusive and less threatening when we’re in a good mood
* People want to maintain a positive mood so they agree more easily (mood maintenance)
* It feels good to say yes
-Example: when given gift, more likely to accept request. But declined as mood decreased.
* Inducing positive mood only effective at increasing
compliance with a request if the request is not incompatible with the positive mood state
* Isen & Levin, 1972
* Ps given cookies more likely to help experimenter by
serving as a confederate—but only if the task involves
helping, rather than hindering
Negative mood:
* Negative state relief
hypothesis: the idea that
people engage in certain
actions, such as agreeing to a
request, to relieve their
negative feelings and feel
better about themselves
* Strong positive association
between guilt and
compliance
- Describe the methods for eliciting compliance
e. Describe norm-based approaches for eliciting compliance and distinguish
between descriptive and prescriptive norms
Norm based appeals:
Letting people know what others are doing also can be
used to increase compliance
* Descriptive norms: the behavior exhibited by most
people in a given context
* Prescriptive norms: the way a person is supposed to
behave in a given context; also called injunctive norm
* If descriptive norm conflicts with prescriptive norm,
technique can backfire
- Describe the Milgram experiments
a. You do not need to memorize the minute details (e.g., the kinds of
vocalizations the participant gave at each voltage level), but you should be
able to describe the general procedures, the percentage of participants who went to the end (roughly), and the take-away message of the studies
b. Summarize the factors (identified in subsequent research) that made
disobedience more or less likely
c. Describe how ineffective disobedience, release from disobedience, and step-by-step involvement contributed to obedience in the Milgram experiments
65% reached 450 Voltz
- ”Normal” people can be made to commit harmful acts in
the name of obedience - Not blind obedience—Ps tried but failed to disobey
-Release from Responsibility
* Feeling of responsibility for one’s actions is transferred to
other people
* In the Milgram study, the experimenter stated that he
was responsible for everything that happened
* Provided a cover for their actions; for example, “It was his
fault; I was following orders.”
-Step-by-Step Involvement
* People can get caught on a “slippery slope” because of the
step-wise nature of demands
* In the Milgram study, each increment is only 15 volts, so
each one seems like a small step, but step by step it gets
to an extreme point
* In Nazi Germany, Hitler was democratically elected, and
the anti-Jewish laws were introduced a little at a time in a step-by-step progression toward the Holocaust
-Immediacy of the Victim
* Variations of the Milgram
experiment varied the proximity
of the learner * No visual or audio feedback;
audio feedback; same room
(visual and audio feedback);
and touch proximity
* As the learner became more
present (increased feedback
and proximity), the rate of
obedience (shocks delivered)
decreased
-Immediacy of the Experimenter
* Variations on the immediacy & social power of the
experimenter
* Experimenter gives orders over the telephone;
experimenter has lower status; experimenter is
contradicted by another experimenter
* As the immediacy & social power of the experimenter
decreased, rates of obedience decreased
- Describe reactance theory
For example, if you want to eat at restaurant A, but know your friend to be disagreeable, you may indicate that you prefer to eat at restaurant B. With their freedom being threatened, your friend would show reactance and choose restaurant A – the place of your choice – while believing that it was their choice
