Social Influence

Question 1

what is conformity?

Answer 1

a change in a persons opinion/behaviour as a response to real or imagined group pressure

Question 2

what are the three types of conformity?

Answer 2

compliance (the shallowest kind)
identification
internalisation (the deepest kind)

Question 3

define what is meant by compliance

Answer 3

a superficial type of conformity that involves publicly going along with a group whilst privately not changing your own behaviour or opinion

Question 4

what is identification?

Answer 4

a moderate type of conformity that involves the changing of behaviour to be part of a group, because there is something about the group that we value and we want to be a part of it

Question 5

what is internalisation?

Answer 5

a deeper type of conformity that involves a genuine change of private views to match those of a group.

Question 6

what are the two explanations for conformity?

Answer 6

normative social influence and informational social influence

Question 7

what is normative social influence

Answer 7

an explanation for conformity that theorises people comply to social norms because they want to be liked and gain approval

Question 8

what is informational social influence?

Answer 8

an explanation for conformity that details we comply because we are uncertain and want to be right in ambiguous situations

Question 9

what is a strength of the ISI explanation for cconformity?

Answer 9

there is supporting evidence = a researcher found that after asking students to answer difficult and easy maths problems, there was greater conformity to incorrect answers when the questions were difficult compared to when the questions were easy

Question 10

what is a strength for the NSI explanation for conformity?

Answer 10

supporting evidence = during Asch’s study, the majority of participants conformed at least once to an answer that was clearly incorrect, and later detailed this was because they were afraid of disapproval.

Question 11

what is a weakness of the NSI explanation of conformity

Answer 11

it ignores individual differences, as some people have a greater need to be liked than others and therefore are more affected by NSI

Question 12

who conducted research into the field of conformity?

Answer 12

Asch

Question 13

what was the aim of Asch’s study?

Answer 13

to see if participants would conform to majority social influence and give incorrect answers in a situation where the correct answer was always obvious

Question 14

what was the procedure of Asch’s study?

Answer 14

• Asch misinformed the participants of the true aim of the study, and told them they were taking part in a study on the perception of line length
• the sample consisted of 123 american male college students who volunteered to take part
• participants were split into groups of 6 or 7 and were seated about a table and asked to look at 3 lines of different lengths
• they took turns to call which of the three lines was the same length as the standard line
• the real participant always answered second to last, and the others were confederates
• confederates gave unanimous wrong answers on 12 of the 18 trials, these were called the critical trials

Question 15

what were the findings of Asch’s study?

Answer 15

• on the 12 critical trials, the mean average conformity rate was 33%
• 75% of participants conformed at least once
• to confirm that the task was unambiguous, Asch conducted a control group without the distraction of confederates giving incorrect answers, and participants only conformed 1% of the time

Question 16

what were the three variations of his study did Asch carry out?

Answer 16

• group size
• unanimity of the majority
• the difficulty of the task

Question 17

describe the procedure and findings of the variation of Asch’s study that involved changing the group size

Answer 17

three conditions were tested
- in condition one, there was one real participant and one confederate, conformity was 13%
- in condition two, there was one real participant and two confederates, conformity was 13%
- in condition three, there was one real participant with three confederates, conformity was 32%

Question 18

describe the procedure and findings for the variation of Asch’s study that involved changing the unanimity of the majority

Answer 18

• Asch broke up the unanimity of the group by introducing a confederate that gave the right answers on all the critical trials.
  Conformity fell from 33% in the original study to 5%
• then, when the confederate gave an answer that was both different from the majority and different from the correct answer, conformity fell to 9%

Question 19

describe the procedure and findings of the variation of Asch’s study that involved changing the difficulty of the task

Answer 19

• Asch made the differences in the line lengths much smaller, so the answer was less obvious, and under these circumstances, conformity increased.
• This suggests that when the answer is ambiguous, people are more likely to conform to ISI

Question 20

what is a strength of Asch’s study?

Answer 20

• was conducted in a lab, so extraneous variables can be controlled for, standardised procedure also used so can be replicated to increase reliability

Question 21

what are the weaknesses of Asch’s study?

Answer 21

• findings may lack temporal validity as study was conducted during a time in US history when conformity was high. Perrin and Spencer in the UK repeated the experiment in 1980 and found only 1 conforming response of 396 trials.
• p’s may have responded to demand characteristics as they were aware they were taking part in a study
  + task lacks mundane realism = identifying line lengths is a trivial task so there is no reason to not conform. task not representative of real life situations so lacks ecological validity
• used an all male sample from the united states = findings are ethnocentric and cant be generalised to other cultures and genders.

Question 22

who carried out research into conformity to social roles?

Answer 22

zimbardo

Question 23

what was the aim of the stanford prison experiment?

Answer 23

to investigate whether the brutality of prison guards was due to their sadistic personalities, or a result of the prison enviornment

Question 24

describe the procedure of zimbardos experiment

Answer 24

• set up a mock prison in the basement of the psychology department at Stanford University
• advertised for students who were willing to volunteer and selected those that were deemed emotionally stable after given personality tests
• sample consisted of 24 american men
• students were then randomly assigned the role of prisoner or guard and the ‘prisoners’ were arrested in their homes by the local authority and blindfolded, strip searched and issued a uniform and number
• the guards were also issued a uniform, complete with a wooden club, handcuffs, keys, and mirror shades
• the prisoners daily routines were heavily regulated and they had 16 rules they had to follow.
• guards worked in shifts, three at a time
• prisoners’ names were never used, only their numbers.
• guards were told they had complete control over the prisoners, even deciding when they could go to the toilet

Question 25

what was the result of the stanford prison experiment?

Answer 25

• the guards grew increasingly tyrannical and abusive towards the prisoners.
• after two days, the prisoners rebelled by ripping their uniforms and swearing at the guards.
• the guards put down the rebellion using fire extinguishers, after which the prisoners became depressed and anxious
• study was terminated after 6 days due to concerns that the study did not justify the abuse delivered to the participants

Question 26

what is a strength of the stanford prison experiment?

Answer 26

• application to modern day events as same conformity to social roles was evident in Abu Gharib, a military prison in Iraq that held Iraqi prisoners that were tortured and abused by US soldiers in 2003 and 2004

Question 27

what are the weaknesses of the stanford prison experiment?

Answer 27

• ethical issues = right to withdraw: on one occasion a student spoke to zimbardo as he wanted to leave the study, however zimbardo responded as a superintendent instead of a researcher and convinced him to stay
  protection from harm = five of the prisoners left the study early because of their adverse reactions to physical and mental torment.
• demand characteristics = as participants knew they were being observed, they may have been merely play-acting instead of genuinely conforming to the role. research supports this as two researchers presented the details of the study to a group of students that didnt know about it, and the vast majority correctly predicted the guards would act in a hostile way and the prisoners would be saddened.
• reliability = reicher and haslam conducted a modern-day replication of the original study in the UK and found very different results. in this variation, the prisoners took control of the mock prison and harassed the guards.
• sample = only consisted of amerian men so not representative of other cultures and of women

Question 28

what are the three explanations for obedience?

Answer 28

• agentic state
• legitimacy of authority
• authoritarian personality

Question 29

what is the agentic state explanation for obedience?

Answer 29

a mental state where you are more likely to obey an order because you see yourself as having no personal responsibility for your behaviour as you are acting for an authority figure as their agent.

Question 30

what is the opposite of being in an agentic state?

Answer 30

an autonomous state (when you believe you are responsible for your actions)

Question 31

what is the shift from autonomy to the ‘agent’ called?

Answer 31

the agentic shift

Question 32

what is the legitimacy of authority explanation for obedience?

Answer 32

when we obey out of fear of the consequences delivered by a legitimate authority figure, such as the police, our parents, or people in uniform, who typically have the power to punish

Question 33

what is a strength of the agentic state explanation for obedience?

Answer 33

supporting evidence from milgram
- during a variation of his original study, when the researcher and the participant were in different rooms and the order to deliver a shock were delivered over the phone, obedience fell from 65% to 20.5%, as without the presence of an authority figure, participants shifted back into the autonomous state.

Question 34

what is a weakness of the agentic state explanation for obedience?

Answer 34

there is research evidence to show that obedience is not always due to being in an agentic state. one researcher recalled when nazi soldiers chose to shoot civillians in a small town in poland despite not having direct orders to do so.
this suggests that dispositional (personality) factors also play a role in explaining obedience.

Question 35

what is a strength of the legitimate authority explanation for obedience?

Answer 35

supporting evidence from milgram
- during one of the variations of his original study, where the research setting was changed from a prestigious setting like yale university to seedy offices, obedience fell from 65% to 47.5%.

ALSO when researcher wore regular clothes vs a lab coat obedience fell from 65% to 20%

Question 36

who is the researcher that carried out an experiment into obedience?

Answer 36

milgram

Question 37

what was the aim of milgrams obedience experiment?

Answer 37

to investigate whether ordinary americans would obey an unjust order from a person in authority

Question 38

what was the procedure of milgrams obedience experiment?

Answer 38

• 40 male volunteers were recruited by a newspaper ad, and paid $4.50
• participants were told the study was a test of the role of punishment and learning. the genuine participant always had the teacher role and the confederate always played the learner, who’s job was to memorise word pairs
• the teachers were deceived to believe they were giving real electric shocks, and their role was to administer a shock each time the learner made a mistake
• the teacher watched the learner being strapped into a chair with electrodes attached to his arms . the teacher also received a practice shock
• the shocks started at 15 volts and increased in 15 volt increments up to 450 volts each time the learner made a mistake
• the experiment continued until either the teacher refused to continue, or until 450 volts had been administered and given four times
• participant was then debriefed

Question 39

what were the findings of milgrams obedience study?

Answer 39

• all participants went up to at least 300 volts on the shock generator
• 65% of participants went up the maximum of 450 volts which was marked XXX

Question 40

what is a strength of milgrams obedience study?

Answer 40

supporting replications
- one researcher carried out a statistical analysis of all of replications of the study from 1961 to 1985 and the obedience levels remained consistent = temporal validity

Question 41

what are the weaknesses of milgrams obedience study?

Answer 41

• unrepresentative sample= only male participants from america, so gender biased and culture biased (ethnocentric)
• demand characteristics = some researchers have argued that the participants guessed that the shocks were not real and this is why they administered such high voltages, so study may lack internal validity
• low ecological validity as was conducted in a lab AND the task of administering shocks is not representative of the type of task somebody would be asked to obey in everyday life = lacks mundane realism
• ethical issues = participants were harmed psychologically when they were led to believe they were electrocuting somebody. they were also deceived about the true aims of the study and the fact that the learner was actually a confederate.

Question 42

name the three variables that milgram changed in his original study

Answer 42

1. the location
2. the proximity
3. uniform

Question 43

describe what happened when the location was changed in milgrams original study?

Answer 43

• experiment was moved from prestigious Yale university to run down offices
• obedience fell from 65% to 47.5%

Question 44

when the proximity was varied during milgrams study, what three things changed?

Answer 44

• the proximity of the victim
• the touch proximity of the victim
• the proximity of the authority figure

Question 45

describe what happened when the proximity of the victim was changed during milgrams obedience study, and the percentage change in obedience levels

Answer 45

the teacher and the learner were placed in the same room, and obedience fell when the participants were forced to see the distress caused by their actions

65% to 40%

Question 46

describe what happened when the touch proximity of the victim was changed during milgrams obedience study, and the percentage change in conformity levels

Answer 46

the teacher had to force the learners hand onto the electrified plate to receive the shock.
- obedience fell when participants had to physically touch their victim

65% to 30%

Question 47

describe what happened when the proximity of the authority figure was changed during milgrams obedience study

Answer 47

the experimenter left the room and gave the instructions over the phone
obedience fell as participants could no longer remain in the agentic state

65% to 20.5%

Question 48

describe what happened when the variable of uniform was changed during milgrams obedience study

Answer 48

in the baseline study, the experimenter wore a grey lab coat as a symbol of authority. in this variation, the experimenter wore everyday clothes, and obedience fell due to the lack of a legitimate authority figure

65% to 20%

Question 49

what is a weakness of the situational variables

Answer 49

• they ignore the effect of internal factors such as disposition on personality
  for example, research has shown that people with an authoritarian personality are more likely to show blind obedience to those who they perceive to have a higher status than themselves

Question 50

what is the authoritarian personality explanation for obedience and who was it devised by?

Answer 50

a personality type especially susceptible to obeying people in authority
- adorno

Question 51

what type of explanation for obedience is the authoritarian personality?

Answer 51

a dispositional explanation as suggests that obedience is caused by internal mental factors such as personality, rather than cues in the environment and the situation

Question 52

what are three characteristics of people with an authoritarian personality?

Answer 52

• extremely respectful and submissive to those in authority
• believe that strong powerful leaders are needed to enforce traditional values
• are hostile to people of inferior status such as ethnic groups.

Question 53

what did adorno believe was the cause of someone developing an authoritarian personality?

Answer 53

• believed it is formed during childhood, mostly as a result of harsh parenting (parenting styles such as extremely strict discipline, high standards and severe criticism of perceived failings)

Question 54

who carried out research into the authoritarian personality?

Answer 54

adorno

Question 55

describe the procedure of adorno’s authoritarian personality research

Answer 55

• attitudes towards racial minorities were measured in 2000 middle class white americans
• the F scale (fascism scale) was also used to measure the different components that make up the authoritarian personality

Question 56

what were the findings of adornos authoritarian personality research

Answer 56

• those with an authoritarian personality scored high on the F scale
• they were contemptuous of those they thought to be ‘weak’
• they were conscious of other peoples’ status
• they had fixed stereotypes about people

Question 57

what is a strength of the authoritarian personality explanation for obedience?

Answer 57

• there is supporting evidence
• elms and milgram found that that when 20 obedient participants from milgrams original study were questioned using the f scale, they scored higher in authoritarianism
  this supports the findings of adorno that people with an authoritarian personality are more likely to obey

Question 58

what are the weaknesses of the authoritarian personality explanation for obedience?

Answer 58

• ignores external causes of obedience. evidence from milgrams study shows that situational variables have a greater effect on obedience than disposition. eg levels of obedience dropped considerably when the researcher gave the orders over the phone rather than in person
• methodological issues. whilst milgram carried out a lab study, adorno measured personality type using an attitude scale. attitude scales are criticised as they are subject to social desirability and questions can also be misunderstood. this is a weakness as questionnaires may not be a valid measurement of personality, reducing the internal validity of the authoritarian explanation

Question 59

what are the two explanations for resistance to social influence?

Answer 59

• social support
• locus of control

Question 60

explain the social support explanation for resistance to social influence

Answer 60

• pressure to conform is strongest when a group is unanimous
• however, if at least one member of the group resists the pressure to conform (known as a dissenter) they can help others do the same
• these people act as models to show others that resistance to social influence is possible, and demonstrate the possible rewards or consequences of resisting

Question 61

what is a strength of the social support explanation for resistance to social influence?

Answer 61

• supporting research
  asch found that when one of the confederates became a dissenter and gave a different answer, the conformity rate dropped from 33% to 5%

Question 62

what is locus of control?

Answer 62

the extent to which people feel they have control over the events that happen in their lives

Question 63

what do those with an internal locus of control believe?

Answer 63

that they have control over the events that happen in their lives, and what happens to them is a consequence of their own ability, effort and actions. they are more likely to resist social influence

Question 64

what do those with an external locus of control believe?

Answer 64

that they have no control over what happens to them, and that what happens to them is a result of ‘luck’ and other external factors. they are less likely to resist social influence.

Question 65

what is a strength of the locus of control explanation for resistance to social influence?

Answer 65

there is supporting evidence
- one researcher conduced an experiment similar to Asch’s and measured whether participants had an internal or external locus of control. he found that those with an internal locus of control conformed less than those with an external locus of control. similarly, one researcher repeated milgram’s baseline study and found that those with an internal locus of control were more likely to refuse to go to the highest shock level than those with an external locus of control. this is a strength as these findings clearly demonstrate a link between resistance to social influence and locus of control

Question 66

what is a weakness of the locus of control explanation for resistance of social influence?

Answer 66

• investigating the link between locus of control and resistance to social influence relies on correlation evidence. this type of evidence fails to establish cause and effect, and doesnt acknowledge that there may be other variables aside from locus of control that cause defiance, such as personality. this is a weakness as this explanation may lack validity.