Conformity: Asch Flashcards
What were participants asked to do in the study
One was ‘standard line’ other three were ‘comparison lines’
-
Asked which 3 lines matched comparison
-
One line clearly matched the others were wrong
Who were the participants
123 male American undergraduates
Who was in the groups
Gave right answer at first then started giving wrong answers at same time
How many ‘trails’ did each participant partake in?
18, 12 of which were ‘critical’ where confederates gave wrong answer
Findings?
25% of participants never conformed
What did participants say in interview after?
Conformed to avoid rejection (NSI)
What were the 3 variations of Aschs study
1) group size
2) unanimity
3) task difficulty
Findings of group size variation
With 3 confederates conformity rose to 32% but additional did little
Findings of unanimity variation
Dissenter who agreed with participant meant conformity dropped by 25%
Findings of task difficulty variation
Conformity increased
-
Suggests ISI plays greater role when task is ambiguous
How might the study have low temporal validity
Perrin and Spencer (1980) -
repeated task in UK with engineering students
-
Only 1/400 trials conformed
Explain it’s has low temporal validity
Possible that 1950 USA was especially conformist time - So made sense to conform to social norms - Society has changed since then so may be less conformist - Asch effect not consistent across time and situations, so not fundamental part of human behaviour
How might the study have low external validity
Task very trivial so no reason not to conform
-
‘Group’ did not resemble every day groups
-
Means can’t generalise
How might study have limited application of findings
Only tested men - From US a individualist culture - Conformity higher in collectivist culture such as China
