Social Influence Flashcards

Question

Agentic state evaluation AO3

Answer 1

PRO: - research support. Blass and Schmitt (2001) showed a film of Milgram’s study to some students and asked them who was responsible for harming the learner Mr Wallace. The students blamed the experimenter rather than the participant. The students also indicated that the fact that the experimenter was a scientist – at the top of the hierarchy thus had authority – the participants were merely agents - pps in milgrams study were less likely to shock Mr Wallace when they were in the same room as they could see the consequences of their actions (no buffers). This supports the idea of an agentic state. Being in close proximity and seeing Mr Wallace in pain would have prevented some participants from going into an agentic state Cons: - does not explain many other research findings such as why some of the pps did not obey the authority figure in Milgrams study. It also does not explain why one of nurses in Holfling’s study did not give the drug prescribed by the doctor who is higher up in the hierarchy than a nurse whereby a nurse is merely the agent. - research evidence has refuted the idea that the behaviour of the Nazi’s can be explained in terms of the agentic state. One incident involved German Reserve Police Battalion 101 where men obeyed orders to shoot civilians in Poland even though they weren’t directly told to shoot yet police preferred it

Answer 2

Most societies are structured in a hierarchical way. This means that people in certain positions hold authority over the rest of us such as parents, teachers, police. Also, from early childhood, we are socialised to obey certain legitimate authority figures We are taught that we should obey such people with legitimate authority because we trust them, or because we fear punishment. However some people are granted the power to punish others. For example, in society we accept that the police and the courts are allowed to punish criminals. Legitimate authority is increased by visible symbols of authority (e.g. uniform). Legitimate authority is dependent on setting, order, system and location (e.g. the military or a prison), especially if the commands are potentially harmful or destructive.

Answer 3

PROS: - We need to have legitimate authority figures in a well-functioning, ordered society thus a strength of this explanation is it explains the functioning of a civilised nation. For example, legitimate authority figures such as the police help prevent crime – without the police, society would not function well. - explains cultural differences in obedience – for example, Kilham and Mann (1974) replicated Milgram’s study in Australia and found 16% went to the full voltage. However, Mantell (1971) who replicated Milgrams’s study in Germany found an 85% obedience rate. Both these studies show the cultural differences in perceived legitimacy of authority and how different cultures have different upbringings thus strengthening the legitimacy of authority explanation - hofling study, doctor was an authority figure so nurses followed orders - bickman study, picked up litter after being told to from a guard (authority figure), more likely to listen compared to milkman or regular civilian CONS: - not all legitimate authority figures should be obeyed. Sometimes we will obey a legitimate authority figure because of their status even if we disagree with their order. Milgram’s study showed that people will obey a legitimate authority figure even if obedience led to harm to another person. - legitimate authority doesn’t explain why some people are able to resist the order of authority figures. 35% of people in milgrams study refused to obey the experimenter, even though there was a legitimate authority figure - In real life there have been examples of legitimate authority figures who have abused their power. Harold Shipman, as a doctor, was a well known example; because he was a trusted, justified authority figure he was able to kill over 200 patients without suspicion.

Answer 4

Adorno (1950) proposed a dispositional explanation of obedience. Dispositional explanations of behaviour claim that individuals’ personality characteristics determine their behaviour, not situational influences in the environment. Adorno argued that authoritarian personalities are more likely to obey authority figures. Authoritarian personalities have a collection of traits which make them more obedient. These include; ➢ servile towards people of perceived higher status, ➢ hostile towards people of lower status, ➢ preoccupied with power, ➢ inflexible in their beliefs and values, ➢ conformist and conventional (e.g. rule following), ➢ likely to categorise people as ‘us’ or ‘them’, ➢ dogmatic (intolerant of ambiguity). Adorno (1950) thought that people developed these personalities due to receiving extremely harsh discipline from their parents during their upbringing, usually involving physical punishment. This creates feelings of hostility which are directed towards weaker others who cannot fight back and are therefore safe. They cannot take out their anger on their parents because they fear them, so instead they act in a submissive way towards them. They then extend this submissive behaviour to all authority figures.

Answer 5

Adorno (1950) developed a questionnaire to measure authoritarian personalities called the F (Fascism) scale. Participants are asked to rate how much they agree with statements Adorno tested more than 2000, middle-class white Americans and their unconscious attitudes towards other racial groups and found that there was a relationship between authoritarian personality and scoring high on the F scale

Answer 6

PROS: - there is research support for a link between being obedient to authority and having an authoritarian personality (measured through the F scale). Milgram (1966) got 20 obedient pps from his study (shocked all the way to 450v) and 20 disobedient pps and asked them to do the F scale questionnaire and saw a link between scoring high and being more obedient - Another study to support the authoritarian personality was carried out by Miller (1975) who found individuals who scored high on F scale were more likely to obey an order to hold some electric wiring whilst completing a test. This study shows that you will obey authority even if harming yourself suggesting that this must be due to your personality. Altemeyer 1981 ordered pps to give themselves increasing levels of electric shocks when th3y made a mistake on a learning task. There was a significant correlation between those willing to shock themselves and High scores on the f scale CONS: - saying that the reason why we obey authority is due to our authoritarian personality is a very limited explanation since it does not explain why the majority of the population in a country such as Germany are very obedient but not all Germans can possess an authoritarian personality. An alternative to this explanation is the Social Identity Theory which is a more relevant explanation of obedience - A limitation of the authoritarian personality explanation is that it is based on flawed methodology. For example, Adorno introduced the F- scale questionnaire to measure the obedient personality. There are many problems with the questionnaire itself. For example, each item on the questionnaire is worded in the same direction meaning it is fairly easy to get a high score on the authoritarian personality. Also closed qs don’t allow for explanations - situational variables may be more important than dispositional ones. Milgram (1974) has conducted several variations of his original experiments with vastly different results. Obedience was 100% when Mr Wallace made no noise (e.g. no screams or requests to leave). However, the obedience rate was 0% when there were two authority figures who disagreed with each other (one wanted the teacher to continue, the other wanted them to stop). Dispositional explanations cannot explain obedience in entire societies, because authoritarian personalities are not common. Far fewer than 65% of people have authoritarian personalities, so it cannot be the only explanation for the level of obedience found in the original Milgram (1963) study.

Answer 7

One reason that people can resist the pressure to conform or obey is if they have an ally – someone supporting their point of view. Individuals who have support for their point of view no longer fear being ridiculed, allowing them to avoid normative social influence the pressure to conform can be reduced if there are other people present who are not conforming. In Asch’s variations, conformity rates dropped to 5.5% when there was one correct dissenter in the group, furthermore if the dissenter was incorrect then conformity rates dropped to 9%. the pressure to obey can be reduced if there is another person who is seen to disobey. For example, in one of Milgram’s variations the rate of obedience dropped from 65% to 10% when the real participant was joined by a disobedient confederate.

Answer 8

PROS: - There is research to support the idea that social support can reduce social influence – for example, in Asch’s study in terms of the one dissenter reducing conformity to 5.5%. Similarly in Milgram’s study when the real participant was joined by a disobedient confederate who refused to give the shocks, obedience rates went down to 10% - Another strength of social support studies is that they can be applied to real life – for example, Gamson’s study had high ecological validity as the pps were unaware that they were participating in a psychological study so would not show demand characteristics. CONS: - The Social Support explanation is strong for explaining with you have a group size of under 10 people then one dissenter can influence non conformity or disobedience. However, in the real world, group sizes are massive (e.g. 100s) and having one dissenter in a big group will not have any influence on the majority. Can’t represent group sizes in real world In the asch and milgrams study some participants were able to resist social influence and refuse to conform/obey, even though they had no social support. This means that social support is not a complete explanation of resistance to social influence, other factors, such as personality traits, also play a part in allowing people to refuse to conform/obey.

Answer 9

Gamson and his colleagues wished to set up a situation in which pps were encouraged to rebel against unjust authority. The researchers placed an advert in local newspapers in a town in Michigan, USA asking for volunteers to take part in a paid group discussion on ‘standards of behaviour in the community’. Those who responded were asked to attend a group discussion at a local Holiday Inn. When they arrived they were put into groups of nine and met by a consultant from a fictional human relations company called MHRC. The consultant explained that MHRC was conducting research for an oil company, which was taking legal action against a petrol station manager. They argued that the manager had been sacked because his lifestyle was offensive to the local community. In contrast the manager argued that he had been sacked for speaking out on local TV against high petrol prices. Pps were asked to take part in a group discussion about the sacking and this was filmed. As the discussion unfolded, it became apparent that the pps’ own views were irrelevant and that MHRC wanted them to argue in favour of the sacking. At a number of points during the discussion, the cameraman stopped filming and instructed different members of the group to argue in favour of the oil company’s decision to sack the manager. Finally the pps were asked to sign a consent form allowing the film to be shown in a court case. Of the 33 groups tested by Gamson, 32 rebelled in some way during the group discussion. The pps established a strong group identity in which the members agreed that the demands of the authority were unreasonable. This could be seen by the way in which they addressed the MHRC coordinator, saying that ‘we don’t want to go on record, even pretending that we agree with what we’re saying. We don’t. All three of us feel the same way’. In 25/33 groups, the majority of group members refused to sign the consent form allowing the film to be used in court. Nine groups even threatened legal action against MHRC. Gamson’s study clearly shows the notion of social support and the power of it when resisting obedience to authority.

Answer 10

Locus of Control was proposed by Julian Rotter (1966) ● This refers to a person’s perception of the degree of personal control they have over their behaviour. ● Those people with a high external locus of control see their future and their actions as resulting largely from factors outside their control such as luck or fate. ● Those people with a high internal locus of control feel a stronger sense of control over their lives than people with an external locus of control. They are also more active seekers of information, rely less on the opinion of other, and are more likely to resist pressure from others. This means they are more likely to show resistance to social influence people with a high internal LOC tend to be more self-confident, more achievement orientated, have higher intelligence and have less need for social approval. These personality traits lead to greater resistance to social influence.

Answer 11

PROS: - Holland (1967) repeated Milgram’s baseline study and measured whether participants were internal or external. He found that 37% of internals did not continue to the highest shock (showed resistance). However 23% of externals did not continue. Research support of this nature increases the validity of the LOC explanation - Oliner and Oliner (1988) interviewed two groups of non-Jewish people who had lived through the Holocaust and Nazi Germany. They compared 406 people who had protected and rescued Jews from the Nazis and 126 people who had not done this. found that the group that rescued the Jews had scores demonstrating an internal locus of control, LIKELY TO ACT THAN LEAVE TO FATE CONS: - conflicting research evidence. For example, Twenge (2004) analysed data from American obedience studies over a 40 year period (1960 to 2002). The data showed that, over this time span, people have become more resistance to obedience but also show a more external locus of control - rotters questionnaire measuring a persons LOC lacks temporal validity as it was devised in 60s where society had diff views Williams and warchal 1981 found that conformers were less assertive than non-conformers but that the two groups did not score differently on a test to determine their locus of control. This suggests that assertiveness is more important than locus of control in determining whether or not a person will refuse to conform/obey.

Answer 12

Minority influence is a type of social influence that motivates individuals to reject established majority group norms. Moscovici (1985) considered minority influence to lead to conversion. Conversion is when individuals change their private beliefs and views because of minority influence.

Answer 13

Consistency - minority influence will be persuasive if the minority is consistent (unchanging) with its opinion/behaviour, show confidence in its beliefs, and appears unbiased Commitment - is important in the influence process because it suggests certainty, confidence and courage in the face of a hostile majority. The augmentation principle explains how minorities can change the majority because if the minority is doing something quiet risky but shows commitment then the majority will pay more interest Flexibility - minorities are powerless so must negotiate rather than enforce their position upon majority. Minority too flexible can be seen as weak and dogmatic. If they negotiate and compromise the majority will listen to rue minority point of view and take their argument more seriously

Answer 14

His sample consisted of 172 female participants who were told that they were taking part in a colour perception task. The participants were placed in groups of six and shown 36 slides, which were all varying shades of blue. The participants had to state out loud the colour of each slide. Two of the six participants were confederates and in one condition (consistent) the two confederates said that all 36 slides were green; in the second condition (inconsistent) the confederates said that 24 of the slides were green and 12 were blue. Moscovici found that in the consistent condition, the real participants agreed on 8.2% of the trials, whereas in the inconsistent condition, the real participants only agreed on 1.25% of the trials.

Answer 15

Xie found that you need about 10% of the minority population to influence the majority. They developed computer models of social networks, with individuals free to ‘chat’ with each other across networks. Each individual held a ‘traditional view’ but were also open to other views. Then they added some committed individuals representing an alternative point on view, which they expressed consistently. If the listener held a different belief to the speaker, he would listen and consider it and move on to talk to another speaker. If the next speaker also held the new belief, the listener adopted it (also known as the snowball effect).

Answer 16

Participants, in groups of four, had to agree on the amount of compensation they would give to a victim of a ski‐lift accident. One of the participants in each group was a confederate and there were two conditions: 1) When the minority argued for a low rate of compensation and refused to change their position (inflexible). 2) When the minority argued for a low rate of compensation but compromised by offering a slightly higher rate of compensation (flexible). Results: Nemeth found that in the inflexible condition, the minority had little or no effect on the majority; however, in the flexible condition, the majority members were much more likely to also compromise and change their view.

Answer 17

PROS: - Research evidence - There is ‘real value’ of research into minority influence since Nemeth (2010) argues that the dissent in the form of the minority group opens the mind and as a result, people search for information, consider more options and make better decisions and are more creative. This then allows researchers to understand the means and processes for social change which can be linked to minority influence as was shown in many studies. CONS: - Low ecological validity. Task carried out in experiments would never happen IRL such as comparing colours of slides in Moscovicis study - Although minority influence research has real value, it may not apply to real life situations which can be much more complicated. For example, Nemeth (2010) claimed that it is still difficult to convince people of the value of the dissent since people may accept the minority opinion on the surface but may become irritated by this view fearing lack of harmony and as a result we attempt to belittle the dissenting view to contain it Samples of studies into minority influence are gender biased. For example, Moscovici (1969) only used women. As a result, we cannot conclude that male participants would respond to minority influence in the same way. Research often suggests that women are more likely to conform than men, therefore further research is needed to determine the effect of minority influence on male participants. The samples of studies into minority influence are also culturally biased because all of the participants were from America. As a result, the findings cannot be generalised to other populations. Studies into minority influence have been criticised for deceiving participants. In Moscovici’s (1969) study participants were told that they were taking part in a colour perception test. This also means that Moscovici did not gain participants informed consent. Although it is seen as unethical to deceive participants, Moscovici’s experiment required deception in order to achieve valid results. If participants were aware of the true aim of the experiment, they might have displayed demand characteristics

Answer 18

Social change is when a society adopts new beliefs/ways of behaving, which then becomes the norm. It commonly is a result of minority influence- when an individual or small group of individuals impact upon the majority. One example of social change is attitudes towards homosexuality. Although it was a imprisonable offence in the UK until 1967, public attitudes have changed over time and most people now regard being gay as a normal variation of human behaviou

Answer 19

1. Drawing Attention to the Issue - Minorities can bring about social change by drawing the majority’s attention to an issue. 2.Consistency of position - Minority groups are more influential when they express arguments consistently, over time and with each other. 3.Deeper processing – other people not part of the minority start to pay attention to the minority by thinking about what the status quo is and perhaps the unjustness of it 4. The augmentation principle - If a minority appears willing to suffer for their views, they are seen as more committed and are taken more seriously – for example, doing something ‘wow’ which will catch the majority’s attention – this supports the minority influence characteristic of commitment 5. The snowball effect - Minority influence initially has a relatively small effect but this then spreads more widely, as more and more people consider the issue being raised, until it reaches a tipping point, where the minority becomes the majority and there is wide-scale social change. This is when conformity will occur either through Normative Social Influence or Informational Social Influence and everyone will follow each other. 6.Social cryptoamnesia – the majority knows that a social change has occurred but the source of the change and the message itself has become disassociated through the process of social cryptoamnesia and they do not recall how it happened.

Answer 20

+ There is research evidence for the role of normative social influence in bringing about social change. Nolan (2008) investigated whether social influence processes led to a reduction in the consumption of energy. He hung messages on the door of houses in San Diego every week for one month. The key message was that most residents were trying to reduce their energy usage. A control group had a message not referring to other residents instead just to save energy. It was found that the group that referred to other residents had shown a decrease in energy usage. Thus stating that conformity can lead to social change through normative social influence. - The problem with studying in the process of minority influence in social change is that Nemeth (1986) argues that the effects of minority influence are likely to be mostly indirect and delayed. They are indirect because the majority is influenced only on the matters at hand, not the central issues itself. They are delayed because the effects may not be seen for some time. However, this could be seen as a limitation of using minority influence to explain social change because it shows that its effects are fragile and limited. Furthermore, this then makes it difficult to test and measure in a scientific setting because social change does not happen straightaway. - Also, there may be barriers to social change as investigated by Bashir et al. (2013) who found that participants were less likely to behave in environmental friendly ways as they did not want to be associated with environmentalists who were stereotyped as ‘tree huggers’. Thus social change can only happen if the minority influence is not associated with negative and extremist stereotypes which can be very difficult to shift. This means that studying social change is even more difficult when there are barriers to social change in general