Resistance to social influence Flashcards
What is resistance to social influence?
- Refers to the ability of people to withstand the social pressure to conform to the majority or to obey authority
- this ability is influenced by situational & dispositional factors
What are the two explanations for resistance to social influence?
Social support - situational
Locus of control- dispositional
What is social support?
- The presence of people who resist pressures to conform or obey can help others to do the same- act as models
Where was resisting conformity
present in Asch study due to social support?
- Asch’s line study (unanimity variation) - the confederate told to give correct answer on line judgement task
- conformity dropped from 32% to 5%
- enabled naive participant to be free to follow own conscience and acted as a model for independent behvaiour
Where was resisting obedience present in Milgrams study due to social support?
- Milgram variations > participant joined by disobedient confederates who refused to administer electric shocks
- obedience dropped for 65% to 10%
- disobedient model challenges LOA figure= easier to disobey
What is Locus of control?
- Proposed by Rotter
- Refers to how much a person believes they have control over events in our lives
What is internal LOC?
- People who believe that they have control over their own lives
e.g. if i do well in an exam it’s because i’ve studied hard if not it’s because i didn’t study hard
What is external LOC?
- People who believe they don’t have control over events in their life > controlled by external forces
Eg. if i did bad on exam it was bad luck if i did well it’s beacuse my teacher is the best
Why are people with high internal LOC more likely to resist pressures to conform or obey?
- tend to base their decisions around their own beliefs rather than opinion of others
- tend to be more self-confident, achievement orientated & intelligent
- have characteristics of leader>who have much less need for social approval
What research is there for the positive effects of social support?
- Albrecht et al evaluated Teen Fresh start USA»_space; programme to help pregnant adolescents resist pressure to smoke
- social support provided by a buddy (acted as a model)
- end of programme»_space; adolescents who had buddy less likely to smoke than control who did not have a buddy
- SS can help young people resist SI
What research support is their to support roles of dissenting peers in resisting obedience?
- Gamson et al- > researchers made up a situation where p’s told to produce evidence to help company run a smear campaign
- p’s were in groups so could discuss what they were told to do
- 29/33 groups of p’s rebelled to support the company.
- This shows that peer support is linked to greater resistance > undermines LOA figure
What evidence is their to support the link between LOC and resistance to social influence?
- Holland > repeated Milgram’s baseline study & measured whether participants were externals or internals
- 37% of internals did not continue to the highest shock level
- 23% of externals did not continue to highest shock level
- resistance related to LOC as internals more likely to resist pressures to obey
What contradictory research is there that challenges linked to between LOC and resistance ?
- Twenge et al (2004) analysed data from American LOC studies over a 40 Yr period
- data showed, over this time span people have become more resistant to obedience but also more external (LoC).
- If resistance were linked to an internal LOC» expect people to have become more internal
- LOC not a valid explanation
