Resistance to social influence

Question 1

How does social support affect conformity?

Answer 1

• The pressure to conform can be resisted if there are other people present who are not conforming
• simply the fact that someone else is not following the majority is social support
• the majority is no longer unanimour

Question 2

How does social support affect obedience?

Answer 2

• The pressure to obey can be resisted if there is another person seen to disobey
• Milgram - obedience dropped from 65% to 10% when the genuine participant was joined by a disobedient confederate
• the disobedient model challenges the legitimacy of authority figure

Question 3

What is Rotter’s locus of control?

Answer 3

• some people have an internal locus of control. They believe the things that happen to them are largely controlled by themselves
• some people have an external locus of control. They tend to believe the things that happen are out of their control

Question 4

What is the LOC continuum?

Answer 4

• people are not either internal or external. It is a scale on which individuals vary their position.

Question 5

How does locus of control affect social influence?

Answer 5

• people with a high internal locus of control are more able to resist pressures to conform or obey
• if a person takes personal responsibility for their actions and experiences, they tend to base their decisions on their own beliefs
• high internal locus of control could mean more confident, more achievement oriented, higher intelligence, less need for social approval

Question 6

RWA - strength of social support

Answer 6

P: research evidence
E: Albrecht evaluated Teen fresh start USA, a programme to help pregnant adolescents resist peer pressure to smoke. Social support was provided through and older mentor.
E: Adolescents who had a mentor were significantly less likely to smoke than the control group
L: social support can help young people resist social influences

Question 7

Research support - strength of social support

Answer 7

P: research evidence to support dissenting peers
E: Gamson’s participants were told to produce evidence to help an oil company run a smear campaign
E: higher levels of resistance found than in Milgram’s study due to participants being in groups - 88% rebelled
L: peer support can lead to disobedience by undermining legitimacy of authority

Question 8

Research support - strength of LOC

Answer 8

P: evidence to support link between LOC and resistance to obedience
E: Holland repeated Milgram’s baseline study and measured whether pp’s were internals or externals
E: 37% of internals did not continue to the highest shock level whereas only 23% of externals did not continue
L: this shows resistance is related to LOC which increases its validity as an explanation

Question 9

Contradictory research - limitation of LOC

Answer 9

P: evidence that challenges LOC and resistance
E: Twenge analysed data from American LOC studies
E: over time, people became more resistant to obedience but also more external. We would expect it to be internal
L: suggests LOC is not a valid explanation