Social Influence Flashcards
What was the aim, process and findings of Milgram’s shock study?
Aim - to see how obedience to authority could explain a person’s ability to conform to actions as awful as how German soldiers conformed in the holocaust
Process - 40, 20-50 year old men were randomly selected from a newspaper article. Each participant was instructed by the confederate (professor) wearing a lab coat to ask questions to the other confederate (student) who the participant believed was also a participant. The student would deliberately get questions wrong, which meant that the participant was instructed to give them an electric shock which was increased by the participant after every wrong answer the student gave. the electric shock wasn’t real but the student acted as if they were being harmed. The professor would use cues such as “it is vital that you continue” and “you must continue” when the participant questioned their actions
Findings - all of the participants administered a 300 volt shock. 65% of the participants gave the maximum 450 volt shock which was labelled as fatal
Milgram’s shock study AO3
- lacks ecological validity (was performed in a lab)
- gender bias (only men were used in the study)
- gives explanation for events like the holocaust
- standardised experiment (repeatable and falsifiable)
- extremely unethical (deception and protection)
- the high levels of stress lead to some participants having a seizure
- Milgram did however perform a debrief and follow up check to ensure no psychological harm was done
Define agentic state
a state of mind in which a person acts as an agent to a authority figure, and becomes obedient to their requests. This makes the person believe that the authority figure is responsible for their actions, not themselves
What were the variations of Milgram’s experiment?
Uniform - the levels of obedience fell to 20% when the professor confederate wore plain clothes instead of a lab coat
Location - levels of obedience fell to 45% when the experiment took place at run-down flats rather than Yale university
Proximity - obedience fell when the participant was in the same room as the student, was not near the professor confederate, or had to physically move the student confederates hand onto the electric plate
Define legitimacy of Authority
How ‘real’ a person believes the authority of an authority figure is. Real authority means that person will rank higher than them in a social hierarchy. Figures such as police, teachers, etc are understood to have higher social power than the average person
What is Locus of control and who created it?
Created by Rotter, it is a scale showing how much a person believes they are in control of what happens in their life
What are the two locus of control?
Internal - actions = effect (studying = good grades)
External - destiny = effect (luck = good grades)
What was the aim, procedure and findings of research by Moscovici?
Aim - to see if consistency affects minority influence
Procedure - a group of female participants are split into groups of 2 participants and 2 confederates. The groups were tasked to order 36 blue slides from light to dark shades. half of the group’s confederates said that all 36 of the slides were actually green, while the other half only said that 24 of the 36 were green
Finding - when the confederates consistently said all of the slides were green, 8% of the participants agreed that the slides were green. Compared to the 1% of participants who agreed with the inconsistent minority
What are the 2 types of consistency?
Diachronic - consistent over time
Synchronic - consistent between members
What are the 3 ways to achieve minority influence?
Consistency = constant, repeated showing of belief Commitment = showing sacrifice for your belief Flexibility = making a compromise with the majority
Outline research performed by Bickman
Tested how legitimacy of authority affected how people responded to being asked to pick up litter. Bickman found that people obeyed rarely to a member of the public, somewhat to a milkman, and regularly to a police officer
What is the Authoritarian Personality?
When a person is dispositioned to have a greater respect for people with power, meaning they are much more likely to obey to teachers, police officers, etc
Outline research performed by Adorno
Adorno established the f-scale (fascist scale). This was done by taking a survey of 2000 white Americans understanding and belief about other cultures. Adorno found that there was a strong positive correlation between prejudice and fascism, which enabled Adorno to create the survey which can be used to asses the level of fascism within a person
What is social support as an explanation for disobedience of authority?
When a role model is seen to dissent or shows a refusal to obey an authority figure, this makes it more socially acceptable to become non-obedient, making it more likely to happen
Outline Milgram’s research into social support
One variation of Milgram’s study involves a support confederate, who aims to convince the participant to refuse to shock the student confederate. The results showed that obedience fell to 10% when a support confederate was present
