conformity - asch baseline

Question 1

when was the baseline conducted

Answer 1

1951

Question 2

(baseline) aim

Answer 2

investigate extent to which social pressure from a majority group could affect a person to conform

Question 3

(baseline) procedure

Answer 3

• 50 males
• lab experiment
• line-judgement task
• naive participant & 7 confederates
• state aloud which comparison line (A,B,C) was most similar to standard line (X) –> sometimes confederates right, sometimes wrong (12/18)
• naive participant gave answer last

Question 4

(baseline) results

Answer 4

• ~32% conformed each trial
• 74% conformed on at least 1

Question 5

(baseline) conclusion

Answer 5

majority of naive participants conformed to fit in with majority which provides evidence for normative social influence & highlights compliance

Question 6

AO3 -) low ecological validity

Answer 6

E: line judgement task is very artificial which doesn’t reflect real-life conformity

T: unable to generalise results to other real-life situations (eg. people start smoking/drinking around friends) which limits results in practical application

Question 7

AO3 -) lacks generalisability

Answer 7

E:
- participants were 50 american males
- other research suggests women may be more conformist (eg. neto 1955)
- US is also an individualist culture & other studies conducted in collectivist cultures found conformity rates are higher (bond & smith 1996)

T: asch’s findings tell us little about conformity for women & those from collectivist cultures

Question 8

AO3 -) ethical issues

Answer 8

E: asch deceived participants by telling them they were taking part in a vision test suggesting he didn’t gather fully informed consent

T: his research doesn’t adhere to ethical guidelines

Question 9

AO3 +) reliable

Answer 9

E: standardised procedure was used where confederates consistently gave wrong answer

T: experiment could be easily replicated