conformity Flashcards
what are the 3 types of conformity
Compliance, identification, internalisation
What is conformity
A types of social influence where an individual does what someone else wants them to do at their request
What is compliance
Compliance is temporary. They socially change however the idea is not internalised
What is identification
It is temporary change. In public they change their public and private beliefs in the presence of a group they wish to fit in with
What is internalisation
Is a permanant change. The person takes on the ideas as fact and changes socially and privately taking the ideas as their own
What is aschs conformity study
Seeing whether people still conform when the task is unambiguous, differing to sheriffs study in 1935
What happened in Aschs study
He got 7 participants in each group to decide the lengths of lines in comparison to a separate line. They had to say which one was the same length as the the original line. Stooges firstly answered correctly to the question as did the participants. After the stooges all gave the wrong answer they compared to see whether the participants would still give the correct answer. The study showed that there was a 33% change of conformity if all confirmed but if one stooge gave the correct answer, conformity dropped to 13%
What are the types of conformity
Normative social influence and informational social influence
What is normative social influence
Where a person conforms in order to be accepted and belong to a group
What is informational social influence
Where a person conforms as they believe in the groups competency and think they must be right
what is the aim for Aschs study?
To see how rate of conformity is impacted when the task is unambiguous unlike in sheriffs study in 1935
What was the procedure of Aschs study
Asch showed participants 2 cards, of a standard line and the other of comparison lines. They had to match the standard line with the comparison line. There was one naive participant and the others were actors. First they all told the truth but after 7 cards they started the line to see what the naive would do. They could that conformity was at 33% when everyone lied but if one told the truth, conformity dropped to 13%
Pros and cons of Aschs study
Pros:
. The task was unambiguous which meant that conformity could be measured in an objective way
. The task being harder meant that there is a higher chance of conformity
Cons:
. Unethical as participants were stressed due to stooges giving the wrong answer. They were also deceived, breaking 2 ethical issues
.cross culture studies shows people in western cultures are less likely to conform to people in on western cultures
What are the factors effecting conformity
Size of majority, unanimity, task difficulty
What is size of majority
Aschs experiment method allowed him to manipulate the size of groups. He found that conformity was very low when there was 1 stooge and 1 naive it was only 3%. When there was 2 stooges and 1 naive it was increased to 13%. Stang 1976- found conformity was at its highest with 3 to 5 person majority.
What is unanimity
Asch made the person in front of say the correct answer to break the chain of unanimity. When this is done conformity is dropped to 5.5%.
What is task difficulty?
Nature of task influences on conformity. In difficult tasks, we lose confidence in our own judgement. asch made the lines closer in size which increased conformity.
What is the aims of zimbardos experiment
He aimed to investigate the extent to which people would conform to the roles of gaurd and prisoner in a role playing simulation of real life.
He also aimed to see if prison violence as either due to sadistic nature of gaurds or due to brutal conditions of the prisons.
The procedure of zimbardos experiment
A newspaper articles was put out and 75 male university students responded. The volunteers would get $15 a day for the full 2 week experiment. 21 students were picked, 10 gaurds, 11 prisoners. zimbardo played the role of the prison superintendent. Based in Stanford prison and they got arrested by local police and and taken there. They were dehumanised by giving people nylon caps and chained their ankles up. 9 prisoners placed into 3 cells and a regular routine of shifts.
The findings of zimbardos findings
All settled in very fast to their roles. There was a prisoner rebellion with aas quickly crushed. Gaurds became more sadistic and prisoners became more submissive and unquestioning. After 36 hours one prisoner was released because of fits of crying and rage. 3 more prisoners developed similar symptoms and were released. 5th prisoner had a severe rash when parole was denied. Scheduled to run for 14 days however only lasted for 6 days.
Conclusion to zimbardos experiment
Situational hypothesis is favoured over the dispositional hypothesis as the environment of the prison is causing people to act out of character.
