Conformity

Question 1

conformity - basics

Answer 1

• acting at own believes/perception because of pressure (real or imagined)
• allows us to live in our culture/the way we approach our daily life in society
• in collectivist culture it lies in their nature to conform
  -> we prefer uniformity; therewith are likely to conform (it is in our nature)

Question 2

6 types of social power (different ways to make people conform)

Answer 2

1. rewards power; rewarding conformity (money (tangible) or intangible (ex. liking) -> more powerful)
2. coercive power; punishment tangibly or intangible
3. legitimate power; person has certain power/ability which you like to follow
4. referent power; want to be like someone (identify with them)
5. expert power; trusting someone is specific field
6. informational power; use others to see how to behave in certain situation (when people are confused about the ongoings)

-> persons role and trust into it from
the other person are relevant

Question 3

2 influences on conformity & 3 types of conformity

Answer 3

Normative influences (non-ambiguous situations):
- want to fit in, do avoid rejection from others -> pressure (can lead to dissonance)

1. compliance; someone having power over you makes you conform (long endurance)
2. identification; wanting to identify with someone to be liked by him (social power) (lasting as long as identification to this person lasts)

informational influences (ambiguous situations):
- comforting to people which seem to know what is going on (highly situation specific)

3. pluralistic ignorance

Question 4

outcome of dot moving experiment, an ambiguous situation (long term effects investigated) [Sherif]

Answer 4

• conversion in group (average inches of movement over rounds) (there is no right answer since it is a kinesthetic affect)
• ones norms are established people stick to it, even when they are alone
• confirming to group norm, therewith pressure, even a year later (turned into informational influence)
  -> seeking information from others in ambiguous situations

Question 5

outcome of how long is the line experiment (non ambiguous situation) [Asch]

Answer 5

• participants conformed to group at least ones (conformity)
  -> did not want to embarrass themselves when giving other answer than the group (normative pressure)

Question 6

can and should we reduce conformity?

Answer 6

• reducing normative pressure (line experiment; as long as someone gives a different answer one sees that nothing bad happens and is eager to also answer in own way -> no conformity anymore)
• can be reduced by giving anonymity in decision making

Question 7

Reason for obedience (Milgram) - what helps against it

Answer 7

• proximity of the victim (the closer you are to the person, the other to cause harm to him)
  -> script (what learner says) is not important to predict obedience
  -> physical proximity has impact (physical presence of victim matters; seeing the suffering person)
• proximity to the experimenter -> obedience decreases when experimenters is on the phone (distance if authority reduces social power)
• with peers and seeing that they get out you also want to get out (don’t wanna look foolish to them) -> people don’t see this factor though and say it does not influence them
  -> informational; seeing it is possible to get out (minimizes coercive social
  power of experimenter)
  -> normative; do not want to be disliked by peers for continuing
• diffusion of responsibility
• contrarily; peers obedience enhances experimenters social power

Question 8

Legitimacy of Milgrams experiment

Answer 8

• location does not influence legitimacy
• random assignment of learner and teacher (participants point of view) -> fairness is ensured
• aggression is also not found as reason; everyone obeyed eventually