Psychology Paper 1 - Social Influence Flashcards
What is conformity?
A change in a persons behaviour or opinion due to pressure from a person or multiple people.
What is compliance?
A type of conformity.
This refers to instances where a person may agree in public with a group of people, but the person privately disagrees with the group’s viewpoint or behavior. The individual changes their views, but it is a temporary change.
What is internalisation?
A type of conformity.
Publicly changing behavior to fit in with the group while also agreeing with them privately. An internal (private) and external (public) change of behaviour. This is the deepest level of conformity were the beliefs of the group become part of the individual’s own belief system.
What is Identification?
A type of conformity.
Identification occurs when someone conforms to the demands of a given social role in society. This type of conformity extends over several aspects of external behaviour. However, there still be no changed to internal personal opinion. It is a temporary change.
What is Normative Social Influence?
Normative social influence is where a person conforms to fit in with the group because they don’t want to appear foolish or be left out. Normative social influence is usually associated with compliance. This means any change of behaviour is temporary. This is an emotional process.
What is a weakness of NSI?
Does not predict conformity in every case:
-Some people are nAffilators
-They’re greatly concerned with being liked by others
-They’re more likely to conform
-NSI affects people more than others
-People are individually different.
What is a strength of NSI?
Research to support:
-Asch’s research
-They felt self-conscious about giving the right answer
-Without individuals there conformity dropped
-Fear of being rejected
-Complying
What is Informational Social Influence?
Informational social influence is where a person conforms because they have a desire to be right, and look to others who they believe may have more information.
This type of conformity occurs when a person is unsure of a situation or lacks knowledge and is associated with internalisation. This is a cognitive process.
What is a weakness of ISI?
Dont know if its ISI or NSI:
-Asch’s research
-More dissenter provides more support for participant
-Dont know if its due to NSI or ISI
-Hard to separate the two.
-Work together
What is a strength of ISI?
Research to support:
-Lucas et al. research
-Given difficult maths questions
-Hard questions so the situation became ambiguous (unclear)
-Participants didnt want to be wrong so they conformed
-ISI predicted the results
What was Asch’s study investigating?
To what extent would people conform to the opinion of others
What was the prodecure of Asch’s study?
-123 American men
-A group of people in one room all shown lines
-A B and C were the 3 comparison lines
-One line is the same length as X and others are more wrong
-Each participant has to say out loud which letter matches with X.
-18 trials in total and confederates gave the wrong answer on 12 trails
What was Asch’s findings?
-75% of the participants conformed at least once
-The participant gave the wrong answer 36.8% of the time
-When interviewed after, participants said they wanted to avoid rejection
What was Asch’s conclusion?
Asch concluded that he had demonstrated the powerful effect of a majority influence on the conforming behaviour of individuals
Ppt knew they were giving the wrong answer but still did so to fit in with the group. The study demonstrated compliance and NSI.
