Majority Influence-Conformity

Question 1

definition of conformity

Answer 1

yielding to group pressure

Question 2

What are the 3 types of conformity

Answer 2

Compliance, identification, internalisation

Question 3

What is compliance

Answer 3

A person who conforms to other people’s behaviour or attitudes despite not believing they are correct

They comply publicly but their private opinion does not matter(temporary)

Question 4

What is Identification

Answer 4

Individuals adjust their behaviour and opinions to those of the group as membership of the group is desirable

Both private and public as there is something we value in the group

often temporary

Question 5

What is internalisation

Answer 5

The individual accepts the group view to be correct

so conforms to the other people’s beliefs publicly and privately in the genuine belief they are correct(permanent)

Question 6

What are the two reasons we conform

Answer 6

Informational Social Influence and Normative Social Influence

Question 7

What is Informational Social Influence

Answer 7

People have a need to be seen as in the right. So we look to others for information because we believe that they have more knowledge(Occurs in ambiguous scenarios)

Question 8

What is Normative Social Influence

Answer 8

People need to fit in with the norms of the group. So will conform to gain social approval

Question 9

What was the aim of Asch’s study

Answer 9

To see how group pressure affects group tasks with an obvious answer

Question 10

How did Asch set up his experiment-method

Answer 10

8 male students were arranged round a table with only 1 being a real participant and the rest confederates. The task was to identify which of the 3 lines was the same length as the test line. They were to speak out loud with the participant being placed in a position where he was to answer after a few confederates have given a wrong answer to see if he would also give a wrong answer to fit in with social norms

Question 11

What were the results of Asch’s study

Answer 11

75% of the participants conformed at least once

Question 12

What was the conclusion of Asch’s study?

Answer 12

Even in an ambiguous situation, there is a strong group pressure to conform, especially if there is a unanimous majority

Question 13

What were the strengths of Asch’s study

Answer 13

Real world applications, conducted in a lab

Question 14

What were the weaknesses of Asch’s study

Answer 14

Does not take into account individual differences e.g. personality

Not generalisable to different groups of people as all members of the study were white, American males with similar backgrounds and ages.

Artificial environment

Question 15

Which factors did Asch say would Increase/ decrease conformity

Answer 15

Group size, unanimity, Difficulty of task

Question 16

Which Psychological factors decrease/increase conformity

Answer 16

Gender, Mood, culture

Question 17

What did Asch find out happened after he changed his study to writing answers down instead of saying out loud

Answer 17

conformity fell to 12.5%

Question 18

What did Perrin and Spencer find about conformity

Answer 18

Asch’s experiment was limited to its time as they repeated the experiment and only 1/396 conformed

Question 19

What are nAffiliators

Answer 19

People who are greatly concerned with being liked by others

Question 20

What is a dissenter

Answer 20

When someone does not agree with the whole group(reduced conformity to 5%)

Question 21

When was the Stamford Prison Experiment

Answer 21

1971

Question 22

What was Zimbardo’s aim of the study

Answer 22

To see whether guards behaved brutally due to personality factors or situational factors

Question 23

Why did the guards wear uniform

Answer 23

To give them more authority and to make it more realistic to the participants so they conform to roles easier

Question 24

Where did Zimbardo’s sample come from

Answer 24

He put an ad offering to pay 15$ a day for 1-2 weeks and 70 people applied but only 24 were included

Question 25

What happened on the Second morning of the experiment in Stanford prison

Answer 25

The prisoners barricaded themselves inside the cells, stripped their uniforms and ripped off their numbers due to brutality of the guards

Question 26

What were the strengths of Zimbardo’s experiment

Answer 26

High in mundane realism- validity of findings, Real world applications- Abu Ghraib

Question 27

What were the weaknesses of Zimbardo’s study

Answer 27

Lots of ethical guidelines broken, Reliability as Zimbardo himself was part of the study, Generalisability as sample group was all similar

Question 28

What ethical guidelines did Zimbardo break

Answer 28

Failure to protect Ps from harm- 416 and 819 had to be released due to psychosis and mental deterioration, prisoners were abused and deprived of sleep, food and were forced to do press ups until they no longer physically could

No right to withdraw- prisoners did not withdraw as they felt they could not e.g. 416 did not leave despite psychosis as he said when questioned that he was not able to

Deception- Participants were not aware of what they were signing up for as Zimbardo did not tell them