Paper 1 PQs Flashcards
“Outline Asch’s research into conformity.” (4 marks)
not completed
“Outline and evaluate Milgram’s research into obedience.” (16 marks)
AO1
-obedience is a form of social influence whereby a direct order is followed by an individual.
-usually the person is issuing the order has authority and the power to punish.
-40 american males were recruited to take part in a study, a fixed draw was conducted which left the teacher as the participant and the learner to be Mr wallace (a confederate)
-mr wallace was strapped into a chair while the participiant was taken to a room with a shock generator containing 30 switches ranging from 15-450 volts
-learner had to remember word pairs, teacher had to deliver a shock with every error made
-participant was unaware mr wallace was faking feelng pain
-65% of participants continued delivering shocks until 450v
AO3
STRENGTH
-Milgram’s research can be praised for its ease of replication
-Milgram had full control over variables in an artificial environment and standardised procedure was used
-makes it easy for researchers to replicate his procedure in order to check the reliability and consistency of results
AO3
WEAKNESS
-research criticised the findings of milgrams study
-Orne and Holland argued that participants only obeyed and administered shocks as they didn’t belive in all aspects of the study
-provides evidence to suggest in Milgram’s research and that participants were not illustrating genuine or natural obedience
-questioning the validity of Milgram’s findings
extra evaluations;
WEAKNESS
-lacks generalisability
-Milgram only used male american participants in his research who were all recruited via volunteer sampling and putting an advertisement in a newspaper
-leaves it difficult to generalise Milgram’s findings to other popultions, cultures, nationalities and suggest that findings in relation to obedience would be the same
WEAKNESS
-ethical issues present, no protection from harm
-some participants ended up needing medical attention due to seizures from stress
-milgram did not fulfill his duty of care as a psychologist
“Outline and evaluate locus of control as an explanation for resistance to social influence.”
(8 marks)
AO1
-locus of control is our perception on the amount of control we have over events that happen in our lives
-people with internal locus of control believe that they are hugely responsible and in control of things that happen to them, they are most likely to resist social influence
- people with internal locus control have an individualistic culture: individuals are the most important element
-people with external locus of control believe that things that happen to them are completely out of their control (a matter of luck), unliely to resist to social influence
-people with external locus of control have a collectivistic culture: whole group/ togetherness as most important element
AO3
STRENGTH
-supported by research
-Holland repeated Milgram’s study and measured whether people had either an internal or external locus of control
-he found that 37% of internals did not continue to the maxiumum opposed to 23% in externals
-provides evidence to suggest people with internal LOC are more likely to resist to social influence/ pressure and disobey than those with external LOC
-increases the validity of this theory
AO3
WEAKNESS
-research by Twenge questions locus of control
-Twenge analysed obedience studies over a 40 year period and found that young Americns were increasingly believing that their lives were determined more by luck or powerful others as opposed to their own actions
-he showed that they became more external yet also more resistant to obedience
-therefore questions the study as even those with an external LOC can resist and obey
-incomplete explanation, doesn’t explain why both can disobey
-decreases validityof the theory
extra evaluation;
STRENGTH
-Spector also provides support for LOC as an ecplanation of resistance to social influence
-gave the LOC scale to university students and found that students with high external LOC did conform more than those with high internal LOC but only on tasks involving normative social influence rather than informational
-provides evidence to suggest that those with eternal LOC are more likely to give into social pressure and conform
-increases the validity of the theory
“Describe the working memory model” (4 marks)
“Explain one limitation of the working memory model” (3 marks)
“Apart from ethical issues, briefly evaluate the methodology of milgram’s reseach into obedience.”
(4 marks)
“Outline and evaluate how minority influence is able to lead to social change.”
(16 marks)
AO1
-minority influence is a form of social influence whereby a small amount of people persuades others to adopt their beliefs, attitudes or behaviours
-three main behaviours and processes involved in minority influence:
1.
consistency: minority must be consistent with their views’ keeping the same beliefs and behaviours over time
2.
commitment: minority is more powerful if dedication is shown towards their position
3.
flexibility: accepting the possibility of a compromise
AO3
STRENGTH
-role of consistency in minority influence has been supported by research
-moscovici found that during his study where participants has to state whether the coloured sliders were blue or green people conformed to the minority more when confederates were consistent with their answers (8% conformity rate) rather than when confederates were inconsistent with their answers (1.25% conformity rates)
-provides evidence to suggest that people conform more to the minority when consistency towars views/ beliefs is shown rather than inconsistency
-increases validity of the theory
CA: lacks generalisability, only females during study
AO3
WEAKNESS
-research investigating minority influence processes lacks ecological validity
-because many of the studies like Moscovici’s for example take place within artificial environments whilts using a trivial and artificial task
-a limitations as the research may not represent how minorities attempt to change the behaviour of majorities within real life social situations.
extra evaluations;
STRENGTH
-Wood et al carried out a meta-analysis (review of previous studies) of 100 similar studies to moscovici’s
-found that results across these studies also illustrated how consistency played an important rolde in influencing a majority viewpoint
-further emphasises the importance of consistency in persuading and influencing a majority
-increasing the validity of research findings into minority influence processes
WEAKNESS
-research has questioned the importance of certain influence processes
-Nemeth believed that consistency was not the most important factor in minority influence
-in her research, participants were asked to agree on the amount of compensation an individual in a ski-lift accident should get
-results indicated that when the minority was flexible, majority were much more likely to compromise and come to an agreement
-therefore suggests that consistency is infact not the most important/ successful minority influence but instead flexibility is
“Outline what psychological research has shown about short-term memory according to the multi-store model of memory.”
(4 marks)
-psychological research has shown that short-term memory in the multi-store model has limited capacity or 7+/-2 items as of the findings of millers digit span test where participants were asked to recall a total amount of digits after only being 4 at a time
-research of baddeley found that STM primarlt encodes infromarion acoustically, as participants had more difficulty recalling acoustically similar words compared to acoustically dissimilar ones
-research of peterson and peterson where a 3 letter triagram was flashed on a screen and then a 3 digit number which participants had to count backwards from, results indicated stm has a duration of 18-30 seconds
-without rehearsal, information in stm decays
