Conformity And Obedience Flashcards
Conformity
changing one’s behavior (or beliefs) in response to explicit or implicit pressure from others.
Compliance
changing behaviour following the explicit request of another person.
Obedience
submitting to the demands of someone who is higher in the social hierarchy than oneself.
different types of social influence –
Conformity
Compliance
Obedience
Compliance is about public…
agreement and outward change in behaviour, but is it internal?
•Persists only while behaviour under surveillance
Conversion
- Conversion: private agreement, acceptance/internalisation
- True internal change that persists in absence of surveillance
- Not based on power, but subjective validity of social norms (Festinger, 1950)
- Confidence and certainty that norms are correct, valid and appropriate
Conformity
INFORMATIONAL influence
objective/external sources of information conversion
Deutsch & Gerrard, 1955
Social Influence: Conformity
NORMATIVE influence
conforming to the expectations of others = behavioural compliance in group contexts
Classic studies on conformity:
Sherif (1935): individual vs. group condition in ‘moving light’ Asch (1952): line comparison experiment, conflicting perceptual information and social pressure
Sherif (1935)
autokinetic experiment
•Took it in turns to call out their estimates (in group)
•Tendency for estimates to converge
Social Influence: Conformity
Asch (1952): group influence on unambiguous judgments
Results: •Average conformity was 33% •5% conformed on all trials •50% conformed at least once •25% remained independent •Compared to 0.7% errors in control Estimation of line lengths by individual in group comprising experimenter’s confederates
Asch (1956)
Self reported reasons for conformity
Some thought the group was right, others knew they weren’t. Independents were certain what they saw
Asch’s experiments have been largely misunderstood (Hodges & Geyer, 2006)
•Asch intended to show that people don’t just simply conform
•Results could be interpreted as
(i) low levels of public conformity (only 1/3 of time), and
(ii) almost no private persuasion
•Group pressure only enough for public show of consensus, but participants were not actually persuaded
➢Most people, most of the time did not even publicly conform and almost no one was persuaded!
Conformity and Uncertainty/
Perceived Pressure
Source: Deutsch & Gerard (1955)
Social Identity & Conformity
•Referent informational influence is where social identity shapes individual behaviour to be consistent with salient group identity (Turner, 1991)
- even in low ambiguity situations with no social sanctions people comply with group responses
- the more identification with group, the more influenced
- Influences public responses, but also private responses are shaped by group membership.
Factors Influencing Conformity
Bond and Smith (1996) Meta-analysis of 133 Asch-style conformity experiments:
–Focus on visual judgments rather than opinion, (measure of compliance rather than internalisation).
–Conformity increases with level of ambiguity, size of groups (e.g. majority), among females, and when majority are not out-group members.
–Conformity is higher in collectivist countries.
–Conformity has generally declined over time.
Factors Influencing Conformity
Group unanimity
Anonymity
Group unanimity
greater conformity rates when group is unanimous.
Anonymity
- conformity decreases when decisions can be made anonymously.
- Although as we see from Deutsch & Gerard’s (1955) results this does not eradicate conformity entirely!
Factors Influencing Conformity
•Expertise and status:
- High status or expert group members have more social influence
- Experts exert more informational social influence
- High status exerts more normative social influence
- Expertise and status often go hand in hand.
Factors Influencing Conformity
•Explanations for behavior:
- Conform less when we understand the reasons for other people’s behaviors.
- When we have obvious explanation for why we may have a deviant opinion.
- We know they are acting out of bias or self-interest.
Factors Influencing Compliance
•Cialdini & Goldstein (2004) reviewed research and argued there are 3 underlying motivations to explain compliance:
- Accuracy – interpreting and responding correctly to situational demands.
- Affiliation – we act to seek out others’ approval due to motivation to be liked/respected.
- Positive Self-Concept – we want to be consistent with prior attitudes, beliefs, and behaviours.
Factors Influencing Compliance
•Cialdini & Goldstein (2004) these motivations interact in subtle ways to enhance compliance in respond to explicit (and implicit) requests:
•Imagine a ‘Composting at Home’ campaign…
- Accuracy – injunctive norms (i.e., what is typically approved) & descriptive norms (i.e., what is typically done).
- Affiliation – how will other people see me if I engaged in composting?
- Positive Self-Concept – have I behaved (or shown any interest) in environmental issues before?
Minority Influence
- Most conformity studies have focused on the individual’s response to social influence (c.f. Sherif & Asch’s studies).
- Moscovici (1976) – how do small minority groups create social change?
- Less power < influence over the majority
- Key question – do minorities exert their influence through the same social processes?
Moscovici (1976) – Genetic Model of Social Influence:
•Assumption that there is conflict within groups and social influence affects how people respond:
- Conformity: majority influence persuading minority to adopt majority viewpoint
- Normalisation: mutual compromise leading to convergence
- Innovation: minority creates and accentuates conflict to persuade majority to adopt their viewpoint
- Moscovici (1976) – Genetic Model of Social Influence:
- To create social change, minorities actively create, draw attention to and accentuate group conflict.
- In some situations it is easy to dismiss or discredit the minority opinion.
- BUT… not when:
- The minority group’s message is consistent across time and context
- Demonstrates investment in their cause (e.g., personal & material sacrifice)
- Acts out of principle (not self-interest)
Moscovici, Lage & Naffrechoux (1969)
Minority Influence
Experimental condition
(type of minority influence
on private judgment)
Minority Influence
Moscovici (1980) – Conversion Theory:
cognitive foundation to underpin his earlier theorising.
Majority influence
enacted through public compliance –reasons of both normative & informational dependence.
Minority influence
enacted through indirect, often private change in opinion due to the resolution of cognitive dissonance (i.e., process of informational influence).
Conversion effect
sudden and dramatic change in attitude of the majority due to minority influence.
Minority vs. Majority: Critical Review
•Issue of ethics when studying real attitudes
•Use of any sort of persuasive message?
•Controversial topics and counter-attitudinal positions
•Way in which minority/majority manipulated
•‘Minority’ adopt position on real world issues, but what about history of this debate outside the lab?
•Does it override participants’ own knowledge/experience?
•Attitudes/judgments may be influenced, but it’s different from how behaviour is influenced:
Distinction between ‘signal conformity’ and ‘action conformity’ (Milgram, 1964) -> how social influence can bring about actual behaviour?
Milgram (1963):
●Classic but controversial
study of compliance and obedience
●Ways in which authority (= ‘expert’ experimenter) can influence subordinates
●Near lethal electric shocks applied to ‘stooge’ connected to apparatus in mock learning study
Milgram (1974)
●explained that subjects felt under pressure but did not believe that the experimenter would allow harm to come to ‘stooge’
‘Nothing is bleaker than the sight of a person striving yet not fully able to control his own behaviour in a situation of consequence to him’ (Milgram, 1974, pp. xiii)
Milgram’s studies
Sample to participants at 45 Volts
•75V: Ugh!
•150V: Get me out of here! My heart’s starting to bother me!
I refuse to go on! Let me out!
•180V: I can’t stand the pain!
•220V: Let me out! Let me out!
•270V: Agonised screams
•300V: Refuse to answer and agonised screams
•315V: Intensely agonised screams
•345V: Silence
Throughout: if the participant was hesitating,
the experimenter told him/her to go on.Results
100% up to 255 volts
70% full votes
Prediction was 0%
●Milgram conducted 23 different versions to examine factors contributing to obedience vs resistance
●Replicated in both male and female groups
●Replicated in many countries:
•Spain and Holland = 90% compliance rate (Meeus & Raaijmakers, 1986)
•Italy, Germany, Austria = 80% (Mantell, 1971)
•Australian men = 40%, Australian women = 16% (Kilham & Mann, 1974).
High levels of aggression rather than obedience to authority?
●Exp 11: participants chose own shock level
●Absence of authority instructions
●Should rapidly gravitate towards the maximum 450V if aggression based
●But only 3 participants went beyond 135V, only 1 went to 450V
When free choice, administered levels of shocks are considerably lower
Factors Influencing Obedience
- Closeness (immediacy) of authority
- Legitimacy of authority
- Proximity of shock equipment
Immediacy is an influential factor
- Unseen and unheard: 100% compliance
- Pounding on the wall: 62.5%
- Visible during experiment: 40%
- Holding hand to electrode: 30%!
Legitimacy of power – type of authority:
●Yale University, lab coated experimenter
●Reduction when the experiment was conducted in ‘industrial setting’
Commitment to an action difficult to overturn:
1.To disobey means rejecting competence / authority
2.Obedience to that point means willing participation in legitimate experiment
•Subsequent disobedience challenges this self-definition (e.g. role of willing volunteer and helpful participant)
•If stop, need to consider that what done so far is questionable and less worthy (c.f. effort justification)
•If continue to obey, just follow legitimate commands, and avoid painful realisation that previous actions misguided
Obedience & Agentic State
●Internal change as a shift from autonomy to an agentic state
●Person no longer views himself as acting out of own purposes but rather as an agent executing others’ orders
●Directions from higher-order not assessed against internal standards/morals
●No longer responsible for own actions, as defines himself as instrument carrying out other’s wishes
●Acting within hierarchical structure
●Evolutionary benefits: coordinated accomplishments, threat defense, conflict reduction
Blass, 1999
Levels of conformity symptoms of time and culture?
over time conformity rates decreased
Gergen, 1973
increasing awareness of Milgram’s findings may make people less susceptible, but is rarely measured
levels of obedience varied massively (28 – 91%),
so there may be other factors at work
Obedience because experimenter is…
authority (e.g. in charge) or an authority (e.g. an expert)?
Russell & Gregory (2011) careful review of Milgram’s experiment
● Development of ‘strain-resolving mechanisms’
●Features designed into experiment that reduce strain/tension to maximise high levels of obedience
●Provide participants with a rationale for inflicting pain transformed ‘evil’ action (= shocking) into something ‘good’ (=advancing learning)
●What about overarching rationales in real life?
(e.g. ideology)
Haslam & Reicher (2011) social identity account:
● Focus on behaviour rather than on processes that govern obedience is problematic
●Why – through what process – contextual variations affected levels of obedience (0% - 100%)?
● Agentic state: no evidence that people enter such state
●Can variations in this state explain variation in obedience?
● Paradigm addresses participants being torn between competing demands -> not in a passive state
Haslam & Reicher (2011) social identity account:
● Obedience is predicated upon perceptions of shared identity with experimenter
●Salient: both teachers, both engaged with science
●Physically: same room, learner not visible
● Instructions to continue adhered to because consistent with identity/group norm
●Requests and scientific rationale prompts adhered to as basis for shared social identity,
●But command/ order (no choice) less adhered to as emphasises lack of shared social identity
➢ when requests are framed as orders, people do not obey!
Haslam, Loughnan & Perry (2014, p.4
re-analysed Milgram’s data from 21 conditions of his obedience study.
Codes referred to (a) role or (b) relationship between roles.
Meta-Milgram (2014):
Obedience rate across 21 conditions was 43.6% (323/740 participants).
= predicted likelihood that teachers would continue to 450V
Burger’s (2009) Replication
- Replication of Milgram’s Experiment 5
- 70 participants – 20-81 years old, mean (SD) 42.9 (15.67)
- Thorough screening process:
- People who had taken 2 (or more) psychology courses were excluded.
- People with history of mental health conditions excluded
- People who passed these 2 checks had in-person interview with clinical psychologist.
Burger’s (2009) Replication
- Experiment terminated at 150V
- Critical point – 79% of Milgram’s subjects who delivered 150V continued to the end.
- Random assignment to base condition OR modeled refusal condition
- Base condition resembled Milgram’s Exp.5.
- Confederate is the learner and reveals heart condition.
- Script based on Milgram’s original … “you must continue”
- After 150V, learner yells “get me out of here”
- Experiment ended if participant goes to read the next item
Burger’s (2009) Replication
•Modeled refusal condition:
- Similar to base condition with these minor exceptions:
- 2 confederates – 1 learner role & 1 first teacher role
- Participant is assigned to second teacher role.
- Experimenter instructs that first teacher will go first.
- After 90V first teacher expresses doubt and eventually refuses to continue (and leaves room).
- Experimenter asks participant to take over.
Burger’s (2009) Replication
Results
- 70% participants in base condition went to continue past 150V
- This was not significantly lower than in Milgram’s original – 82.5%
- 63.3% participants in modeled refusal condition went to continue
- This was not significantly different from rates in base condition!
- No significant differences in obedience rates between the conditions for men and women.
- 66.7% men & 72.7% women went to continue past 150V in base condition.
- Mixed and inconsistent results on personality:
- No difference in empathetic concern between stoppers and continuers in either condition
- In base condition, stoppers higher in desire for control, but this was not replicated in modeled refusal condition.
Dolinski et al. (2017) Replication
- Would Milgram’s results still be replicated 50 years later in 2015?
- First replication in Central Europe
- Post-WWII historical conditions made strict obedience to authority (Soviet rule) mandatory.
- Limited attention to whether the same results would occur if the learner (confederate) was a woman.
- Used Burger’s (2009) replication procedure.
- 80 participants – 40 men & 40 women recruited
- 18-69 years old, mean (SD) 27.36 (11.07)
- Same pre-screening procedures as in Burger (2009)
- Method modeled closely after Burger’s (2009) replication – did not use modeled refusal condition.
Dolinski et al. (2017) Replication
Results
- Obedience rate of 90% - participants willing to go past 150V.
- No significant effect of gender of the learner.
- Trend – participants 3x more likely to refuse if female learner, but it was not significant.
The presence of others may lead to
behavioural compliance due to a desire to avoid disapproval (normative influence) or belief that others know how to act in that context (informational influence).
Minority groups can bring about social change (& deep-seated attitude change) when their message is
consistent and they are seen to be invested in their cause.
Given the right circumstances, we have the potential to
obey commands blindly even at great cost. This effect does not seem to have diminished over time.
Power as the basis of …
(Moscovici, 1976)
Compliance
Conversion and surveillance
Internalisation means that behaviour persists even when not under surveillance
Deutschland Gerard 1995
Informational
Objective and external
