Social Influence Flashcards
1
Q
What is conformity and what are the 3 types?
A
A change in a person’s behaviour/opinions as a result of real or imagined pressure from others
- Compliance
- Identification
- Internalisation
2
Q
What is compliance?
A
- The most Superficial type of conformity
- The person conforms publicly but continues to privately disagree
3
Q
What is identification?
A
- Moderate level of conformity
- Changing their behaviour and attitudes to imitate a social role they admire - stops when social role/role model is no longer desirable
- Temporary change in opinion - when the person is no longer associated with the group, their opinion may revert
4
Q
What is internalisation?
A
- Deepest level of conformity
- When the views of the group are internalised → private & public change of behaviour is permanent
- Genuinely accept the group norms and see them as correct
5
Q
What are Deutsch and Gerald’s two-process theory explanations of conformity?
A
- Informational social influence: when someone conforms because they want to be right and they believe the group is competent and has the correct information, particularly when the task/situation is ambiguous + new unfamiliar situations (cognitive)
- Normative social influence: when someone conforms because they want to be liked and accepted by a group → occurs when a person wants to avoid disagreeing with the majority → also known as compliance (emotional process)
6
Q
What are the weaknesses of research into NSI/ISI? (A03)
A
- Individual differences in NSI: some people are greatly concerned with being liked by others - nAffiliators - McGhee and Teevan found that students who are n Affiliators are more likely to conform → NSI underlies conformity for some more than others
- NSI/ISI distinction may not be useful
- Ethical concerns: Asch’s research supporting NSI - involved deception & psychological distress raising ethical issues - ppts & were unaware of the true aim and might have felt distress when conforming to incorrect answers -> while these methods were necessary to study conformity, they raise questions about whether the findings justify the ethical costs
7
Q
What are the strengths of research into types and explanations of conformity? (A03)
A
- NSI research support: in Asch’s research, some ppts conformed as they felt self-conscious giving the correct answer & were afraid of disapproval. When ppts could privately write answers down on paper, conformity dropped to 12.5% →no normative group pressure
- Counter: Culture bias - Smith and Bond (1993) found higher conformity levels in collectivist cultures
- ISI research support: In Lucas et al’s research ppts had to solve easy & hard maths problems (given 3 confederate wrong answers) - conformed more often to incorrect answers when maths problems were difficult → harder problems = more ambiguous so relied on answers given, easier problems=knew their own minds - ISI is valid explanation
8
Q
What was Asch’s baseline procedure and aim?
A
- Aim: To measure the extent that people conformed to the opinion of others, even in a situation when the others’ answers were clearly wrong
- Lab study
- 123 American, male participants were tested individually, sitting last/next to last in a group of 6-8 Confederates
- They were shown 2 large cards, one was a ‘standard line’, the other were 3 comparison lines
- Each group member stated which of the 3 lines matched the standard
- There were 18 ‘trials’ with different pairs of cards + 12 of these (critical trials) the confederates all gave the same, clearly wrong answer
9
Q
What were the findings of Asch’s baseline study/
A
- The naïve participants conformed 36.8% of the time - a high level of conformity even when the situation is unambiguous
- 75% conformed at least once
- 25% of the participants never gave a wrong answer (never conformed)
10
Q
What are the 3 variables Asch manipulated and what were the effects?
A
- Group size: added more confederates, increasing size of majority → with 3 confederates, conformity rose to 31.8%, but the addition of more confederates made little difference
- Unanimity: Asch added a dissenting confederate - gave either a correct or incorrect answer→ presence of dissenting confederate reduced conformity by a quarter
- Task difficulty: conformity increased when task difficulty increased
11
Q
What were the conclusions of the 3 variables Asch manipulated?
A
- Group size: people are very sensitive to the views of others as 1 or 2 confederates was enough to sway opinion
- Unanimity: social support can reduce the pressure to conform and allows us to be independent
- Task difficulty: as tasks become more difficult, people tend to look to others for guidance and assume they are right
12
Q
What are the strengths of Asch’s research? (A03)
A
- Research support: from other studies found similar results for task difficulty effect on conformity - Lucas et al asked ppts to solve ‘easy’ and ‘hard’ maths problems - Ppts given answers from 3 other confederates were found to conform more when problems were harder
13
Q
What are the weaknesses of Asch’s research? (A03)
A
- Artificial situation & task: ppts knew they were in a research study - could have caused them to go along with what was expected of them (demand characteristics) + identifying lines was an insignificant task so no real reason not to conform + Fiske: Asch’s groups not very ‘groupy’ – didn’t resemble groups we tend to see in everyday life. -> can’t generalise
- Limited application: ppts were American men -> Neto - women more conformist than men possibly due to being more concerned about social relationships & being accepted + US is an individualist culture -> similar studies conducted in collectivist cultures e.g. China have found higher conformity rates -> tells us little about women and people from other cultures
- Ethical issues: Ppts were deceived (didn’t know the others were confederates) = ethical issue of deception
14
Q
What are social roles?
A
The parts people play as members of social groups, and the expectations that come with this
15
Q
What was the aim of Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment?
A
Do prison guards behave brutally because they are naturally sadistic, cruel and/or evil, or are they simply reacting to their situation?
16
Q
What was the procedure of the Stanford Prison Experiment?
A
- A mock prison was built in the basement of Stanford University
- A group of 21 male ‘emotionally stable’ university students volunteered and were randomly allocated to the role of prisoner or guard
- Prisoners were arrested at their homes, taken to the prison and searched, dressed in uniforms and were referred to as a number
- The guards were given uniforms, a baton and mirrored glasses (de-individuation) & instructed to keep their prisoners under control, but to use no physical violence
17
Q
What is de-individuation?
A
A loss of personal identity - more likely to conform to perceived social role
18
Q
What were the findings of the Stanford Prison Experiment?
A
- Within two days the prisoners rebelled and ripped off their numbers
- The guards took up their social roles and became a threat to the prisoners’ psychological and physical health
- Harassed prisoners + reminded them of their powerlessness e.g headcounts
- Prisoners rapidly became depressed, anxious & passive
- One prisoner went on a hunger strike
- 3 prisoners were released early for showing signs of psychological disturbance
- Guards became increasingly brutal and agressive
- The study was stopped after 6 days (it was supposed to last 2 weeks)
19
Q
What are the strengths of Zimbardo’s prison experiment? (A03)
A
- Zimbardo had control over some key variables - participant selection process - Emotionally stable individuals were assigned randomly into their roles of guard and prisoner → let them rule out individual personality differences as an explanation of the findings (if they behaved differently in these roles but they were assigned them by chance, we can assume it was the role itself that caused the behaviour) → degree of control over variables increases internal validity
20
Q
What were the weaknesses of Zimbardo’s prison experiment? (A03)
A
- Lacked realism of a true prison: Banuazizi & Movahedi (1975) suggested ppts were merely play-acting rather than genuinely conforming to a role -they think that ppts performances were based on stereotypes of how prisoners and guards should act (e.g. one of the guards had based his role on a brutal film character) - also explains why the prisoners rioted (this is what had been happening in real life)
- Exaggerates power of social roles (Fromm): only 1/3 guards actually behaved in brutal manner & 1/3 tried to apply the rules fairly - the rest tried to help & support prisoners → most guards were able to resist situational pressures to conform to a brutal role → Zimbardo may have overstated his findings & minimized the influence of dispositional factors (personality)
- Alternative explanation: Reicher and Haslam criticized Zimbardo’s explanation as it doesn’t account for/explain the behaviour of the non-brutal guards → instead used Social Identity Theory (SIT) to argue that the guards had to actively identify with their assigned roles to act as they did
21
Q
What is obedience?
A
Obedience is a form of social influence where an individual acts in response to a direct order from another individual, who is usually an authority figure
22
Q
What two things did Milgram want to find out?
A
- If the Germans were different – were they more obedient? (‘The Germans are different hypothesis’).
- How far would ordinary people go in obeying an instruction if it involved harming another person?
23
Q
How did Milgram collect his sample?
A
- He recruited 40 male ppts through newspaper adverts
- The advert said that the researchers were looking for ppts for a study about memory
- Ppts were aged between 20-50yrs old
- Offered $4.50 to take part
24
Q
Describe Milgram’s procedure?
A
- Rigged draw: A confederate always ended up as ‘learner’ and the naïve ppt as ‘teacher’.
- There was also an ‘experimenter’ (confederate) dressed in a lab coat
- Ppts were told they could leave the study at any time
- The learner was strapped to a chair in another room and wired to electrodes.
- Teacher was required to give learner an increasingly severe shock (fake) each time the learner made a mistake on a learning task
- The shock level ranged from 15V-450V (labelled ‘danger – sever shock).
- When the teacher got to 300V, the learner pounded on the wall and gave no response to the question
- At 315V, the learner pounded again on the wall and then gave no further response in the experiment
- Prods if teacher felt unsure: 1) ‘Please continue’ or ‘Please go on’, 2) ‘The experiment requires that you continue.’, 3) ‘It is absolutely essential that you continue.’, 4) ‘You have no choice, you must go on
25
What were the prods used if the teacher (ppt) felt unsure about continuing?
- Prod 1 – ‘Please continue’ or ‘Please go on’.
- Prod 2 – ‘The experiment requires that you continue.’
- Prod 3 – ‘It is absolutely essential that you continue.’
- Prod 4 – ‘You have no choice, you must go on.’
26
What were the findings of Milgram's study?
- No ppts stopped below 300V
- 12.5% of participants (5 participants) stopped at 300V
- 65% continued to the full 450V
- Qualitative data was also collected, e.g. observations that the ppts showed signs of extreme tension - sweating, trembling + some had ‘full-blown uncontrollable seizures’.
- All ppts were debriefed + assured that their behaviour was entirely normal→ sent a follow-up questionnaire, 84% reported that they felt glad to have participated
27
What are the strengths of Milgram's shock experiment? (A03)
- Good external validity: central feature of this situation was relationship between the authority figure (the experimenter) and the ppt - Milgram argued lab environment accurately reflected wider authority relationships in real life + Hofling et al studied nurses in a hospital ward & found that obedience levels to unjustified demands by doctors were very high (21/22 nurses) - generalisable
- Lab experiment
- Supporting replication: Le Jeu de la Mort, a French documentary about reality TV show, includes a replication of Milgram’s study - ppts believed they were contestants in a pilot episode for a new game show + were paid to give (fake) electric shocks – when ordered by the presenter – to other ppts (actors), in front of a studio audience→ 80% of ppts delivered max shock to an apparently unconscious man + identical behaviour to that of Milgram’s ppts – anxiety, nail-biting
- Counter: demand characteristics
- Quantifiable Data:
Milgram collected both qualitative & quantitative data, e.g. percentage of ppts who administered the max 450 volts & their observed signs of distress (e.g., sweating, seizures) - this combination of data types adds depth to the findings, supporting both statistical analysis & rich interpretation of ppts' behavior
- Standardised procedures: increases replicability
28
What are the weaknesses of Milgram's shock experiment? (A03)
- Alternative explanation (social identity theory) -> according to SIT, the key to obedience lies in group identification i.e. when ppts identified with science of the study, obedience was shown but when ppts identified with the victim, obedience levels fell -> Haslam & Reicher found that every time the 4th prod (“you have no choice, you must go on”) was used, ppts quit the experiment - 1st 3 prods, appeal to the science of the experiment (“the experiment requires that you continue”) which may be why ppts continued -> valid
- Ethical issues: Baumrind was critical of the way Milgram deceived his ppts - Milgram led ppts to believe the ‘rigged draw’ was real + shocks were real – Baumrind argued that this could damage the way ppts view psychologists and their research -> deception of ppts may make them less likely to volunteer for future research
- Beta bias: population validity
29
What is the difference between situational and dispositional variables?
Situational: factors in the environment that can impact an individual's level of obedience
Dispositional: an individual’s inherent characteristics and traits that influence their obedience levels
30
What were the 3 situational variables used in Milgram's variation?
- Proximity
- Location
- Uniform
31
What were the procedure and findings of the location variation of Milgram's study?
- Milgram altered the location from Yale University to a rundown building
- Obedience dropped: 47.5%
- Explanation: prestigious university gives the study legitimacy & authority + experimenter shares this authority
32
What were the procedure and findings of the proximity variation of Milgram's study?
- 1) In proximity variation teacher & learner were in the same room → obedience fell to 40%
- 2) Touch proximity variation (teacher had to force learners hand onto shock plate)→ obedience dropped to 30%
- 3) Remote instruction → obedience dropped to 20.5%
- Explanation: Decreased proximity allows people to psychologically distance themselves from the consequences of their actions
33
What were the procedure and findings of the uniform variation of Milgram's study?
- Experimenter was replaced by a confederate ppt, pretending to be a regular member of the public, dressed in everyday clothes → obedience dropped to 20%
- Explanation: uniform encourages obedience as they are widely recognised symbols of authority
34
What are the strengths of Milgram's situational variations of obedience study? (A03)
- Research support: Bickman field experiment in NYC had 3 male confederates dress in three different outfits - a jacket and tie, a milkman’s outfit & security guard’s uniform - each of the 3 confederates asked passers by to do things e.g. pick up a paper bag that had been thrown in the street, give them a coin for a parking meter -> passers-by were 2x as likely to obey the confederate dressed as the security guard than the one dressed in a jacket and tie
- Cross-cultural replications: Milgram’s findings replicated in other cultures: Meeus & Raajimakers replicated the study in dutch ppts instructing them to say stressful things to someone desperate for a job -> 90% obedience + Miranda et al. found over 90% obedience levels in Spanish students -> Milgram’s findings are not limited to American males but across cultures and to females too
- Smith & bond point out that most replications have taken place in Western, developed societies, culturally similar to the USA - spain is similar
- Milgram systematically manipulated 1 variable at a time (e.g., the authority figure’s proximity or the location) while keeping other factors constant - high level of control improves study’s internal validity -> easier to establish cause-&-effect relationships between situational factors & obedience
35
What are the weaknesses of Milgram's situational variations of obedience study? (A03)
- Lack of internal validity: Orne & Holland’s criticism of Milgram’s og study was that many ppts worked out that the procedure was ‘fake’ - even more likely in Milgram's variations due to added manipulation - in the variation where the experimenter is replaced by a ‘casually dressed confederate’, Milgram recognised this was so contrived that some ppts may have worked out the aim -> unclear whether the results are genuinely due to the operation of obedience or ppts saw through the deception and acted accordingly
- Obedience alibi - Milgram’s findings from his variations support a situational explanation of obedience - Mandel criticised this as he argues that it offers an ‘alibi’ for evil behaviour - says it's offensive to Holocaust survivors to suggest Nazis were simply obeying orders & were victims themselves of situational factors beyond their control -> socially sensitive - could be argued to take away accountability from the individual - wider repercussions in society
- Lack of temporal validity:
Milgram’s situational variations were conducted in the 1960s, a time when people were more likely to obey authority due to cultural norms -
modern attitudes toward authority may differ, limiting the temporal validity of the findings
36
What are the two situational explanations of obedience?
- Agentic state
- Legitimacy of authority
37
What is the 'agentic state' situational explanation of obedience?
- A mental state where we feel no personal responsibility for our behaviour because we believe we are acting on behalf of an authority figure
38
What is the agentic shift?
- The shift from autonomy to agency - occurs when a person perceives someone else as an authority figure
39
What are binding factors?
- Aspects of the situation that allow a person to ignore or minimise the damaging effect of their behaviour and reduce the moral strain they're feeling
40
What are the strengths of the agentic state situational explanation of obedience? (A03)
- Research support from Milgram: most of his ppts resisted giving shocks at some point & asked experimenter Qs about procedure e.g. "Who is responsible if Mr Wallace is harmed" & when experimenter replied "I'm responsible", ppts continued with no further objections - acted more easily as experimenter's agent once they perceived they were no longer responsible
41
What are the weaknesses of the agentic state situational explanation of obedience? (A03)
- Limited explanation: agentic shift doesn't explain many research findings - Rank & Jacobson's study → 16/18 nurses disobeyed orders from a doctor to administer excessive drug dose to a patient despite doctor being an obvious authority figure - almost all nurses remained autonomous like Milgram's ppts
- Obedience alibi revisited: Mandel described one incident in WW2 involving German Reserve Batallion 101→ these men shot many civilians in a small Polish town, despite not having direct orders to do so + could have been assigned to other duties if preferred→ behaved autonomously
42
What is the 'legitimacy of authority' situational explanation of obedience?
- Suggests we are more likely to obey people who we perceive to have authority over us
- This authority is justified by the individual's position of power within a social hierarchy
43
What are the strengths of the legitimacy of authority situational explanation of obedience? (A03)
- Useful account of cultural differences: many studies show that countries differ in how obedient civilians are to authority→ Kilham & Mann found only 16% of Australian women went to 450V in a Milgram style study but Mantell found 85% for German ppts - in some countries, authority is accepted as a legitimate + entitled to demand obedience → reflects the way that different societies are structured
44
What are the weaknesses of the legitimacy of authority situational explanation of obedience? (A03)
- Cannot explain all obedience: such as instances of disobedience where legitimacy of authority is clear & accepted → nurses in Rank & Jacobson's study as most were disobedient despite working in a rigid hierachal authority structure + Milgram's ppts disobeyed despite recognising the experimenter's scientific authority → tendencies to obey/disobey have greater influence
- Real-world crimes of obedience: even though Rank & Jacobson found nurses willing to disobey a legitimate authority figure, Kelham & Hamilton argue that a real-world crime of obedience such as My Lai massacre can be understood in terms of power hierarchy of US Army - Commanding officers operate within a clear legitimate hierarchy than doctors + greater power to punish
45
What are dispositional explanations of obedience?
Internal explanations, e.g. personality, of why people obey
46
What is Adorno's authoritarian personality?
- People who are highly obedient, submissive to those of higher status and dismissive of those inferior to them
- Believe we need strong leaders to enforce traditional values e.g. love of country
- No grey areas - either right or wrong
- People who are 'other' are responsible for the 'ills' of society
47
What are the origins of authoritarian personality?
- Adorno et al. concluded that it formed as a result of harsh parenting - strict discipline impossibly high standards, severe criticism of perceived failings + characterised by conditional love
- These experiences -> resentment & hostility in the child, -> the fears are displaced onto others who are perceived to be weaker - scapegoating
48
What was the procedure of Adorno et al's authoritaian personality study?
- Studied more than 2000 midde-class white American males & their unconscious attitudes towards other ethnic groups
- Developed F-scale to measure authoritarian personality
49
What were the conclusions of Adorno et al's authoritarian personality study?
- Tendency to be especially obedient to authority
- Extreme respect for authority & submissive
- Dismissive of those they perceive as having inferior social status.
- Highly conventional attitudes towards sex, race and gender
- View society as continuously deteriorating & believe we need strong leaders to enforce traditional values such as love of the country, religion & family.
- They are inflexible and see no ‘grey areas’ – absolutist thinking
50
What were the findings of Adorno et al's authoritarian personality study?
- Identified with ‘strong’ people & generally contemptuous of people they viewed as ‘weak’
- Very conscious of their own & others’ status, showing excessive respect, deference & servility to those of higher status
- Had a cognitive style where there were no distinctions between categories of people – they had fixed & distinct stereotypes about other groups.
- Strong positive correlation between authoritarian personality & prejudice
51
What are the strengths of the dispositional explanations of obedience? (A03)
- Research support: Milgram & Elms conducted post-experimental interviews with highly obedient ppts from original study & found obedient ppts scored higher on f-scale than comparison disobedient group→ also found that obedient ppts were less close to fathers in childhood + admired experimenter - opposite for disobedient ppts → adds concurrent validity
- Counter: methodological flaws of F-Scale: criticized for its design: the scale is susceptible to response bias, as all items are phrased in the same direction - ppt agreeing with statements might simply be social desirability rather than genuinely displaying authoritarian traits -> undermines validity
- Controlled, standardised procedure: Adorno et al. used structured interviews & questionnaires like the F-scale, which allowed for replication & ensured consistency in measuring authoritarian traits
- Counter: the F-scale is subject to response bias – all items are phrased in one direction, increasing the chance of acquiescence (tendency to agree with statements)
52
What are the weaknesses of the dispositional explanation of obedience? (A03)
- Limited explanation: an explanation in terms of individual personality will find it hard to explain obedient behaviour in majority of a whole population → pre-war Germany, millions displayed obedient & anti-semitic behaviour despite all having different personalities - unlikely they all have AP → alternative explanation of Social identity theory states they identified with anti-semitic Nazi state & scape-goated the outgroup of Jews
- Adorno et al. (1950) relied on correlational data, e.g. relationship between authoritarian personality traits (measured by the F-scale) & obedience - doesn't imply causation -> unclear whether authoritarian traits cause obedience or if other factors (e.g., upbringing, situational variables) are responsible - e.g. strict parenting may lead to both authoritarian traits & obedience, acting as a third variable
- Political bias: only measures tendency towards an extreme form of right-wring ideology - Christie & Jahoda argued this is a politically biased interpretation of AP + point out the reality of left-wing AP e.g Chinese Maoism + extreme right & left-wring ideologies have much in common – they both emphasise the importance of complete obedience to legitimate political authority → doesn't account for obedience to authority across whole political spectrum
- Flawed evidence: Greenstein - F-scale is ‘a comedy of methodological errors’ → every one of its items is worded in the same ‘direction’ - possible to get high AP by just ticking the same line of boxes down one side of the page→ people who agree with the items on F-scale aren't necessarily AP could just be ‘acquiescers’ & scale is measuring tendency to agree to everything - poor questionnaire design reduces validity
53
What is locus of control and what is the difference between internal LOC and external LOC?
- A measurement of an individual's sense of control over their lives
- Externals- believe behaviour is caused by luck/fate
- Internals- believe behaviour is caused by their own personal decisions and effort
- LOC is a scale
54
What are the two LOC explanations?
- High internal LOC: more able to resist pressures to conform or obey - if a person takes personal responsibility for their actions -> tend to base decisions on their own beliefs
- High internal LOC: more self-confident, more achievement-oriented & higher intelligence -> greater resistance to social influence
55
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
- Influenced by both situational and dispositional factors
56
What evidence is there for social support from conformity research?
- In Asch’s research, the dissenter doesn’t have to be giving the ‘right’ answer but simply the fact that someone else is not following the majority appears to enable a person to be free to follow their conscience - acts as a ‘model’
- Someone not following the majority = social support
- Also demonstrated that if this dissenter starts conforming again, so does the naïve participant
57
What evidence is there for social support from obedience research?
- In one of Milgram’s variations the rate of obedience levels dropped (65% -> 10%) when the participant was joined by a disobedient confederate.
- Disobedient person acted as a model for the ppt to copy which frees them to act from their own conscience
58
What are the strengths of resistance to social influence? (A03)
- Research for resistance to conformity (social support): evidence supporting the role of dissenting peers in resisting conformity - Allen & Levine found conformity fell when there was 1 dissenter in an Asch-type study → this occurred even if the dissenter wore thick glasses + said he had difficulty with his vision (clearly in no position to judge the length of the lines)
- Research support for LoC & resistance to obedience link: Holland repeated Milgram's study measuring whether ppts are internals/externals - found that 37% of internals didn't continue to highest shock level whereas 23% of externals didn't -> increases validity
- Scientific Measurement: LoC is measured using standardized questionnaires, e.g. Rotter's scale, which ensures consistency & replicability in research -these tools enhance findings' reliability
- Research for resistance to obedience (social support): supports the role of dissenting peers in resisting obedience - Gamson set up a situation in which ppts had to produce evidence that would be used to help run a smear campaign against a reputable oil company - found higher levels of resistance than Milgram → obedience dropped when ppts were in groups – 29/33 groups (88%) resisted obedience - peer support -> disobedience
- Real world research support: Albrecht et al Teen Fresh Start USA - pregnant teens matched with mentor to stop them from turning to smoking
59
What are the weaknesses of resistance to social influence? (A03)
- Contradictory research: Twenge et al. analysed data from American locus of control studies over a 40-year period (1960-2002) → showed that, over this time, people have become more resistant to obedience but also more external - if resistance were linked to an internal LoC, we would expect people to have become more internal
- Artificial Tasks & low ecological validity: most research (e.g., Asch, Milgram) used artificial tasks, such as line-judging or administering shocks - doesn't reflect real-world social pressures -> limits external validity of the findings
- Limited role of LOC: Rotter points out that LoC only comes into play in novel situations - little influence over our behaviour in familiar situations where our previous experiences will always be more important → people who have conformed/obeyed in specific situations in the past are likely to do so again, even if they have high internal LoC →only considering LoC as an influence on human behaviour is reductionist - other factors e.g. past experience, social learning etc
- Cause & effect: studies show only a correlation between factors like social support & resistance - Allen & Levine (1971) found that dissenting allies help people resist conformity, but other factors (e.g., personality) may also play a role
60
What is minority influence?
Refers to a form of social influence in which a minority of people persuade others to adopt their beliefs, attitudes of behaviours
61
What is consistency, why is it important for minority influence, and what are the two types?-
- Over time, consistency in the minority’s views increases the amount of interest from other people.
- Synchronic consistency: agreement between people in the minority group
- Diachronic consistency: consistency over a period of time
62
How did Martin Luther King Jr show synchronic & diachronic consistency?
Synchronic-
- Led the boycott of the bus service in Alabama.
- Leader of the civil rights movement
Diachronic-
- 381 day boycott of the city buses
- From 1957-1968, Dr. King traveled over 6 million miles, delivered over 2500 speeches, wrote 5 books.
- Continued to promote his causes despite being Jailed over 20 times, stabbed in the chest and his home being bombed
63
What is commitment and why is it important for minority influence? (give example)
- Sometimes minorities engage in quite extreme activities to draw attention to their views - demonstrates their commitment to the cause
- E.g. Vietnamese Buddhist monk set himself on fire to protest prosecution of Buddhists in Vietnam
64
What is flexibility and why is it important for minority influence?
- Members of the minority need to be prepared to adapt their point of view and accept reasonable and valid counter-arguments
- Nemeth argued that being extremely consistent and repeating the same arguments and behaviours again and again can be seen as rigid & inflexible
65
What was the procedure of Mosovici et al's minority influence study?
- 6 ppts viewed 36 blue coloured slides that varied in intensity
- They then had to state whether they were blue or green ( they were all blue)
- In each group there were 2 confederates
66
What were the findings of Mosovici et al's minority influence study?
Consistent minority:
- Ppts gave the same wrong answer on 8.4% of trials
- 32% gave same answers as minority at least once
Inconsistent minority:
- 1.25% agreement with minority
Control (no confederates)
- Wrong answer 2.5% of time
67
What are the 2 significant factors in the process of change in minority influence?
- Deeper processing: If you hear something which agrees with you already believe it doesn’t make you stop and think. But if you hear something new, then you might think about it → important in the process of conversion to a different, minority viewpoint
- Snowball effect: more and more people adopt the minority opinion until gradually the minority becomes the majority → happens once the minority begins to persuade people round to their way of thinking
68
What are the strengths of minority influence? (A03)
- Research support for consistency: Moscovici et al’s study → consistent minority opinion had a greater effect on others + Wood et al carried out a meta-analysis of almost 100 similar studies → found that minorities seen as consistent were most influential → presenting a consistent view is a minimum for influence of majority
- Research support for deeper processing: Martin et al demonstrated that there's a greater degree of internalisation of a minority view, compared to majority view - in his study, one group heard the opinion of a minority opinion whilst the second group heard the majority opinion →after both groups were exposed to an opposing opinion, those who heard the minority view were significantly less likely to change their views - a minority is more powerful as it holds risk (the augmentation principle) & forces the audience to reconsider their own views.
69
What are the weaknesses of minority influence? (A03)
- Artifical tasks: like Asch's line judgement task - Mosovici et al's task of identifying colour of a slide → research is far removed from how minorities attempt to change majority behaviours IRL - e.g. jury decision making, political campaigning etc., where the outcomes are vastly more important - lack external validity
- Limited real-world application - research studies usually make a clear distinction between the majority and minority but real-life social influence situations are much more complicated than this + more involved in the difference between a minority & majority than just numbers, e.g. majorities usually have a lot more power and status than minorities → minorities are very committed to their cause – but can also be tight-knit groups whose members know each other very well + often turn to each other for support → doesn't reflect complex nature of minority & majority groups in the real world
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What is social change?
Occurs when whole societies (rather than just individuals) adopt new attitudes, beliefs and ways of doing things
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What are the 6 steps in how minority influence creates social change?
1) Drawing attention through social proof
2) Consistency
3) Deeper processing
4) Augmentation principle
5) Snowball effect
6) Social cryptomnesia
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How did the Civil Rights movement demonstrate each step in how minority influence creates social change?
1) Drawing attention to proof: in the 50s, segregation applied all over America & civil rights marches drew attention to this – thus providing social proof
2) Consistency: civil rights activists represented a minority but remained consistent - millions took part in countless marches over several years
3) Deeper processing: many of those who had previously barely thought about it simply accepted the status-quo began to think deeply about the injustice of it all
4) Augmentation principle: brave individuals risked their lives numerous times, e.g. ‘freedom riders’: mixed ethnic groups who boarded buses in the south to challenge segregated transport
5) Snowball effect: activists such as MLK Jr gradually got the attention of the US gov + more & more people began to back the minority position until in 1964, the US Civil Rights Act prohibited discrimination - marked change from minority to majority support for civil rights
6) Social cryptomnesia: social change clearly did come about but some people have no memory of the events that lead to that change
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What is social cryptomnesia?
This is when people have memory of change occurring but don’t remember how it happened.
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What does conformity research show about how social change is brought about?
- Asch’s unanimity variation showed that a dissenting confederate could break the power of the majority + encourage others to do so too → such dissent has the potential to ultimately lead to social change
- NSI: social change is encouraged by drawing attention to what the majority are actually doing - e.g. reducing litter by printing normative messages on bins such as ‘Bin it – others do’.
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What does obedience research show about how social change is brought about?
- Milgram’s research demonstrated the importance of disobedient role models → in one of his variations a confederate teacher refused to give shocks to the learner - rate of obedience for the naïve ppts plummeted
- Zimbardo suggested how obedience can be used to create social change through the process of gradual commitment → once a small instruction is obeyed, it becomes much more difficult to resist a bigger one→ people ‘drift’ into a new kind of behaviour
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What are the strengths of social influence and social change? (A03)
- Research support for normative influences: Nolan et al (2008) aimed to see if they could change people’s energy-use habits - researchers hung normative messages on front doors of houses in San Diego, California every week for a month saying others were trying to reduce their energy usage - control residents had a message that made no reference to other
people’s behaviour -> significant decreases in energy usage for the experimental group -> conformity (majority influence) can lead to social change through the operation of NSI – valid explanation
- Minority influence explains change: Nemeth (2009) claims social change is due to the type of thinking that minorities inspire → when people consider minority arguments, they engage in divergent thinking - this type of thinking is broad & the thinker actively searches for info & weighs up more options → Nemeth argues this leads to better decisions and more creative solutions to social issues
- Useful in explaining gradual change: explains how social change tends to occur slowly over time – matching real-world patterns, e.g. the shift in attitudes towards smoking, LGBTQ+ rights, climate change
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What are the weaknesses of social influence processes on social change?
- Role of other variables ignored: real-life social change is affected by political, economic, & cultural factors too - studies may overestimate the role of minority influence alone
