social influence Flashcards
What is conformity?
A change in a person’s behaviour, opinions, or beliefs as a result of peer pressure from others
What are the 3 types of conformity?
Compliance, identification and internalisation
What is compliance?
Going along with the group, publicly agreeing but privately disagreeing
What is identification
When we want to be accepted and liked by the groups so we publicly agree even if we privately disagree
What is internalisation
Genuinely accept an value the norms and values of the group, publically and privately agree, permanent change
What are the 2 explanations for conformity?
ISI and NSI
What is NSI?
Normative social influence
We copy behaviour because we want to be liked/ accepted by the rest of the group, we want to fit in
What is ISI
Informational social influence
There is a need to be right, when we are in a situation that is ambiguous, we copy the majority and assume that they are correct
What is a study that supports ISI?
Jenness 1932
Explain the Jenness study
- Conducted one of the earliest studies into conformity
- used ambiguous situation involving counting a glass bottle with 811 white beans
- 101psychology students , individually estimated how much was in the glass
- Then divided into groups of 3, were asked to discuss their estimates in a group, and then do another individual estimate a second time
Findings of Jenness
Jenness 1932
- Found that nearly all P had changed their answers, shows that conformity levels rise specifically when placed in an ambiguous situation
What is the study for NSI?
Asch 1951
Aschs aim?
Extent to which social pressure from a majority group can affect a person to conform
Aschs prodecure?
- Lab experiment
- 123 male students particapated in a “vision test”
- 1 naive particapents in a room with 7 confederates
- Real P was deceived, P didnt know that the C had already pre planned their answers
- Each person had to say their answer out loud , real P sat at the end and said their answer last
- 18 trials , C gave wrong answer 12 times , called critical trials
Aschs results ?
On average, 1/3 (32%) conformed
- Over the 12 trials , 75% conformed at least once
- When asked to write answers on paper, conformity rates fell by 12.5%
What were the 3 variations Asch undertook to see which would affect conformity more?
Group size
Unanimity
Task difficulty
Group size?
Number of C varied between 1-15
Findings - 1 C - 3 %
2 C - 13%
3 C - 32%
Found that adding more C didnt make a difference
Unanimity ?
Added truthful C and a C who was dissenting but inaccurate
Findings - dissenting C reduced conformity
Correct answers. - Dropped 5%
Different but incorrect - Dropped 9%
Shows that if you break the unanimity position, conformity levels are going to drop even if the answer is incorrect
Task difficulty
Made line judging task harder , by making stimulus line and comparison line more similar
Findings - Conformity increased when task was more difficult, bc of ISI, situation is more ambiguous, so we are more likely to look to others for guidance
Disadvtange of aschs study
P- may not be true anymore, sa the research took place at a time when conformity was high
E - US affected by McCarthy at the time, so people were scared to go against the majority
E - Perrin and Spencer (1980) replicated Aschs study, only had 1 conforming response in 386 trials
L- suggests that conformity levels change over time and that his research could be considered as “child of its time” rather than universal phenomenon
Disadvtange of Aschs study
P - study could be criticised for lacking population validity , as no woman were included and participants were only from US
E - matters because Neto found woman conform more than men as they value social relationships more
E - Pps were only from USA , an individualist culture, smith and bond (1998) suggests that conformity rates are higher in collectivist cultures which are more concerned with group needs
L - suggests that conformity levels may sometimes be even higher than what Asch suggested, as his findings are limited to only American men
Advtange of aschs study
P - support from other studies on the effect of task difficulty
E - e.g Lucas et al (2006) asked their pps to solve easy and hard maths problems
E - PPs were given answers from 3 other students (not real students), found that pps conformed more often when the problem was harder
L- shows that Asch was correct in. claiming that task difficulty is one variable which effects conformity levels
what are social roles?
The parts people play when they are apart of a social group
what’s the difference between conforming to a majority and conforming to a social role
Majority - to avoid rejection or to be right
Conforming to a social role - to conform to the expectations people have of us
What did zimbardo believe that caused him to create the study?
Believed that it wasn’t dispositional factors that caused violence but situations factors
Zimbardos aim?
Do people behave in a negative way because of their personality, or is it the situation that makes the behave that way?
Zimbardos procedure
21 male us students
tested and found to be mentally/phsycially healthy
randomly appointed role of guard/prisoner
- P was arrested by local PD, stripped and thrown in prison, called by numbers rather than names
- Guards were given uniform, handcuffs, reflective shades
- guards instructed to run prison w/o violence
- set to run for 2 weeks
Zimbardos findings
- Initially, prisoners rebelled, guards then relatilated by harassing prisoners and punishing them
- had to be stopped on day 6 instead of intended 14 days , because of many of the prisoners exeperiencing psychological issues
disadvantage of zimbardo sfe
P - ethical issues arose during study
E - zimbardo was both lead researcher and prison superintendent
E- student spoke to zimbardo, wanted to leave, zimbardo responded as superintendent, worried about the running of his prison, rather then the lead researcher
L - shows that that his dual roles conflicted with each other, also shows that the goals of research was put before the safety of pps
Disadvtange of zimbardo
P - sample not representative , using volunteer sampling means that a certain type of person can apply
E - + use of only males, findings lack population validity , can’t be generalised to females
E - as zimbardo tried to generalise his findings for just males to everyone , could be criticised for being androcentric
L - meaning that any varying levels of conformity in females maybe seen as adverting from the “norm”
Disadvtange of zimbardo
P - lacking validity
E - argued that most pps were acting, some even said that performance was based of stereotypes and movies they’d seen “cool hands luke “
E - playa acting could explain why prisoners rioted at the start
L - suggests that zimbardos conclusions may be less robust and not reflect human behaviour
Milgrams aim
- wanted to see if ordinary people would obey horrific orders from an authority figure
- because of horrific actions from holocaust
milligrams procedure
-40 males aged 20-50
-recruited through newspaper advert, thought it was abt memory
-naive pps - teacher
- conf - learner
-naive- instructed by experimenter in white lab coat to give what they thought was genuine electric shocks of increasing voltage from 15-450v to learner for every wrong answer they gave
-learner would bang on walls and scream to show his distress, when pps would try to leave, given series of verbal prods, by experimenter to continue with study
milgrams findings
100% of pps gave shocks up to 300v
60% of pps continued to highest (450v)
qualitivatve data collected, showed that ppts demonstrated tension e.g nail biting, sweating and uncontrollable seizures
