Conformity - Asch Flashcards
What was Asch’s 1951 procedure?
- unambiguous task
- participants were asked to state aloud, in turn, which one of the 3 comparison lines matched the stimulus line
- 123 American male students placed into groups 7-9 with 6-8 confederates and 1 naive participant sat one from the end
- on 12/18 of the trials which were critical, all confederates gave the same wrong answer
6/18, confederates gave right answer - participants interviewed afterwards
What did Asch’s 1951 study find?
- Participants agreed with confederates wrong answer 37% on critical trials
- 75% conformed to majority at least once
- 25% - resisted conformity
-in the interview: please experimenter (demand characteristics), didn’t want to appear different, believed majority was correct
What was Asch’s conclusion
found that participants went along with something they knew to be wrong, evidence for compliance
compliance?
going a long with a belief/behaviour even if you don’t necessarily believe in it to fit in
what was the rate of conformity when another confederate sat in the 3rd seat always gave the correct answer
5%
did the rate of conformity increase or decrease when the participants had to write down to answer instead
decrease - private view
did the rate of conformity increase or decrease when there were 3 confederates instead of 7
same as the baseline study
did the rate of conformity increase or decrease when there were 2 confederates instead of 7
decrease - as there was no majority
did the rate of conformity increase or decrease when the task was more ambiguous
increase - due to ISI people looked for guidance as they lacked knowledge
what 3 factors affect conformity
- group size
- unanimity
- task difficulty
how does group size affect conformity
Asch found that with 3 confederates conformity rose to 31.8% and adding further confederates made little difference. suggesting that conformity will increase with group size but only up to a point, levelling off when majority greater than 3
how does Unanimity affect conformity
When Asch included a Confederate who disagreed with the majority, either giving the correct answer (5% ) or a different wrong answer (9%). the presence of a dissenting confederated decreases conformity enabling the participant to act individually.
how does task difficulty affect conformity
Asch made the judging line harder to distinguish from the comparison lines. He found under this condition, conformity increased, suggesting that ISI plays a greater role when the task becomes harder. The situation is more ambiguous so people are more likely to look for others for guidance
strengths of Asch’s study.
high internal validity
–> good control of EV: same stimulus, same distance, instructions same, same confederates
limitations of Asch’s study. 1/4
Demand characteristics, guessing the aims of the experiment so conformed to please the researcher
limitations of Asch’s study 2/4
Asch claimed to find compliance, but participants said they misunderstood what to do and questioned their eyes, not compliance but internalisation
limitations of Asch’s study 3/4
line-judging task was unusual and artificial, the cost of being wrong is insignificant.
participants had to answer out loud in front of a group of strangers and so conformity may have been higher than usual
limitations of Asch’s study 4/4
Lacks population validity
–>andocentric and ethnocentric and there’s evidence that conformity rates differ by culture and temporal changes
–> Smith and bond found large differences in culture. conformity higher in collectivist countries - 58% in India, 17% Britain
–> Eagly and wood: women conform more than men, lower status = increase in conformity
–> therefore Asch’s findings don’t reflect other populations
3 ethical issues with Asch
1) deception - not knowing true aims of experiments, thought it was a perception test and that confederates where also participants
2) informed consent - couldn’t give informed consent and they didn’t know true aims
3) protection from harm - other than feeling embarrassed no more harm that irl
