resistance to social influence

Question 1

conformity

Answer 1

social support can help people resist conformity . pressure to conform can be reduced when a dissenter is introduced .
ascots research also showed if the non conform starts conforming again so does the naive participant .

Question 2

obedience

Answer 2

social support can help people to resist obedience .
the pressure to obey can be reduced if another is seen to disobey .
one of milgrams variation the rate of obedience dropped 65% to 10% when the genie participant was joined by a disobedient confederate .
disobedient person acts as model for the participant to copy that frees him to act from his own conscience .

Question 3

locus of control

Answer 3

Julian rotter 1966
internal locus things that happen to them are largely controlled by themselves
external locus have a tendency to believe that things happen without their own control

Question 4

continuum

Answer 4

people differ in the way they explain their successes and failures but isn’t simply a matter of being internal or external . there is a continuum with high internal LOC at one end and high external LOC at the other end of the continuum with low internal and low external lying in between.

Question 5

resistance to social influence

Answer 5

people who have an internal LOC are more likely to resist pressures to conform or obey . high internal LOC tend to be more self confident , achievement oriented , higher intelligence and less need for social approval . personality traits lead to greater resistance to social influence .

Question 6

research support conformity
strength

Answer 6

Allen and Levine 1971
conformity decreased when there was a dissenter in an Asch type study this even occurred when the dissenter wore thick glasses and said he had problems with his vision
dissenter = frees someone from pressure of group

Question 7

research support obedience
strength

Answer 7

gamson et al 1982
found higher levels of resistance in their study than milgram this was because in gammons study participants were in groups .
in gammons study 29/33 groups of participants so 88% rebelled. peer support linked to greater resistance

Question 8

condictatory research
weakness

Answer 8

twenge et al 2004
analysed data from American LOC studies over a 40 yr period 1960-2002
the data showed that over this time span people have become more resistant to obedience but more external . if resistance was linked to internal LOC we would expect more people to be more internal .
this challenges the link to resistance and internal LOC .

Question 9

limited role of LOC
weakness

Answer 9

the role of LOC in resisting social influence may haven been somewhat exaggerated
rotter 1982
points out that LOC only comes into play in novel situations , it has very little influence over our behaviour in familair situations where our previous experiences will always be more important , people who conformed or obeyed in a specific situation in the past are more likely to do so again even if they have a high internal LOC