Social influence Flashcards
What are the type of conformity
Compliance, identification, internalisation
What is compliance
Individuals go along with a group in order to gain their approval and fit in as it is seen as desirable. The persons private underlying attitude is not changed, only the views and behaviours they express in public
What is identification
When individuals accept influence because they want to be associated with another person or group. They accept the attitudes and behaviours as right and true (internalisation) but the purpose of this is to accepted as a member of a group (compliance).
What is internalisation
Individuals go along with the group because of an acceptance of their views. When exposed to other views individuals examine their own beliefs to determine if they are right. The groups position may change the views of the individual especially if they are trustworthy. The acceptance of the groups views are both public and private
What are the explanations for conformity
Normative social influence and informational social influence
What is normative social influence
Generally compliance. Involves going along with the majority to gain approval and acceptance. The individual must believe they are under surveillance by the group. The view is only public and is not internalised nor does it endure over time
What is informational social influence
Generally internalisation. When an individual accepts information from others as true. The individual wants to be correct so may rely on the opinions of other. It is more likely to occur in ambiguous situations or where other are experts. Both public and private views are changed
Research for normative social influence
Schultz et al. (2008) found that hotel guests exposed to the message that 75% of guests reused their towels reduced their own towel use by 25%
Research for informational social influence
Jenness (1932) had a glass jar filled with 811 white beans, participants had to estimate how many beans were in the glass (ambiguous situation), they would then discuss in groups and create a new guess, then alone again would make another guess. Nearly all participants changed their answers towards the guess of the group
What variables affect conformity
Group size, unanimity and task difficulty
Asch (1956) procedure
123 male US undergrad students. Asked to look at 3 comparison lines and a standard line. They took turn to call out which lines they thought were the same length as the standard line. The real participants answered second last. The correct answer was fairly obvious but on 12 of the 18 trials the confederates were instructed to give the same incorrect answer to determine if the participant would stick to their belief of what what was correct or conform to the pressure of the majority and go with the incorrect answer
Asch (1956) findings
The average conformity rate was 33%. 1/4 never conformed. 1/2 conformed on 6 or more critical trials. 1/20 conformed on every trial.
To ensure the correct answer was actually obvious Asch did a control condition without confederates. In this condition mistakes were made only 1% of the time.
In the post-experiment interviews majority who conformed privately trusted their own answer but changed their public behaviour to avoid disapproval (compliance)
Asch group size findings
Very little conformity when the majority was only 1 or 2 confederates. Conforming responses jumped to 30% under the pressure of 3 confederates, after this further group size increases did not increase conformity rate. Group size is important but only up to a point
Asch unanimity findings
When the real participant was given the support of another confederate who was giving the correct answer consistently the conformity level dropped from 33% to 5.5%.
Even if the confederate gave a different wrong answer conformity dropped to 9%.
Asch task difficulty findings
Asch made the differences between the line lengths much smaller so the correct answer was less obvious. The conformity level increased. Supports information social influence as the conformity increased when the situation was ambiguous
Evaluation of Asch
Culturally relative - The average conformity rate for individualist culture (like the US) was 25%. Whereas in collectivist cultures have a conformity rate of 37% as in collectivist cultures it is seen as a group so my conforming you are helping everyone as a whole.
Ecological validity - The line comparison task is very artificial and would not be completed in real-life. This means that the findings may not be able to be generalised to the real-world
Stanford prison experiment (1973) procedure
A mock prison was set up in the basement of Stanford university psychology department.
Males student volunteers were screened and the 24 most stable were randomly assigned “prisoner” or “guard
Prisoners were arrested from their homes, given an ID number, had their heads shaved, strip-searched and given a uniform
Guards were given uniforms, clubs, whistles, wore reflective sunglasses and told to refer to the prisoners by their ID number.
Zimbardo took the role of prison superintendent.
The study was planned to last 2 weeks
Zimbardo SPE (1973) findings
Over the first few days of the study the guards became more sadistic and violent towards the prisoners. They woke prisoners in the night to clean toilets with their bare hands or do role calls.
One prisoner asked for parole rather than asking to withdraw from the study as they were convinced it was real.
5 prisoners had to be released early because of their extreme reaction.
The study was terminated after 6 days because of the abuse the prisoners were facing
This demonstrated that both guard and prisoners conformed to their social role as guards were aggressive and prisoners were passive
Evaluation of Zimbardo SPE (1973)
demand characteristics - participants may have easily guessed the aim of the experiment so may have acted in a way that was expected from the roles of guard and prisoner (aggressive and passive) o the behaviour was not due to conformity to social roles
Ethics - the study should have been stopped as soon as abusive behaviour was identified and emotional distress was observed.
Differences in guards - guard behaviour varied greatly from fully sadistic too a few “good guards”. guards may have chosen how to behave rather than blindly conforming to their role
Milgram (1963) procedure
40 participants told they were in a study about how punishment affects learning
2 confederates: experimenter and another “volunteer participant”
the 2 participants drew rigged lots to see who was the learner and who was the teacher (the confederate was always the learner)
the learner was tested on word pairs and every time he got one wrong the teacher had to administer increasingly string electric shocks tarting at 15V going up to 450V
The learner (in a different room) gave mainly wrong answer and received (fake) shocks in silence until 300V where he pounded on the wall and did not respond to the next question this was repeated at 315V but after this he gave no responses
If the teacher asked to stop the experimenter had prods to repeat
Milgram (1963) findings
65% continued to the maximum 450V
All went to 300V
5 (12.5%) stopped at 300V
What are the situational factors in obedience
Proximity
Location
Uniform
Milgram proximity findings
teacher and learner in the same room
Obedience fell to 40%
Teacher required to put learners hand on shock plate
Obedience fell to 30%
Experimenter giving instructions on the phone
Obedience fell to 21%
Milgram location findings
Run-down office (instead of Yale university)
obedience fell to 48%
Explanations for obedience
Agentic state
Legitimacy of authority
Uniform effect on obedience
Uniforms are easily recognisable and convey authority
Bushman (1988) had researcher in either a police uniform, a business executive or a beggar
