Social Influence

Question 1

What is conformity?

Answer 1

• yielding to group pressure
• individuals change their attitudes, beliefs or behaviour in order to be more like the group.

Question 2

What 2 reasons did Deutsch and Gerard (1955) identify to why we conform?

Answer 2

1. Informational Social Influence
   2.Normative Social Influence

Question 3

What is Informational Social Influence?

Answer 3

• motivated by desire to be correct
• need to be right -> unsure of the answer -> need for information -> refer to social group who may be seen as the experts.
• this stems from people’s need to get it right. It comes into play when people are uncertain, in an ambiguous situation. Here people act as others do in a situation where there is no clear obvious answer because they feel that the group has more knowledge, expertise.
• more likely when decisions have to be made quickly or when a member is regarded as an expert.
• it’s associated with internalisation

Question 4

What is Normative Social Influence?

Answer 4

• motivated by desire to be accepted
• need for acceptance or approval -> power of social group to reward or punish -> conflict between self & group opinion/ behaviour
• occurs in unambiguous situations where there is a clear obvious answer. E.g. clothing fashion changes every year
• important with people you know rather than strangers because it is based on the need for approval.
• more likely in a stressful situation when people have the need for social support
• it’s associated with compliance

Question 5

What types of conformity did Kelman (1958)?

Answer 5

• compliance
• internalisation
• identification

Question 6

What is Compliance?

Answer 6

• there is public acceptance but private disagreement of the majority view
• it is motivated by the need for approval and so can be explained by normative social influence
• more likely in unambiguous situations
• it ceases when pressure ceases
  to exists

Question 7

What is Internalisation?

Answer 7

• genuine long lasting change in someone’s private beliefs and they are consistent with public behaviour
• it is motivated by the need for right and so can be explained by
  informational social influence
• more likely in ambiguous situations
• it continues even when pressure is removed

Question 8

What is Identification?

Answer 8

• we act the same way as the group because we want to be a part of it but may not necessarily agree with everything the group believes.
• it is motivated by the need to be with associated the group since the individual believes that the behaviours that they are adopting as right. So it has elements of both internalisation and .

Question 9

What are the shallowest to deepest types of conformity?

Answer 9

Shallowest: Compliance
Identification
Deepest: Internalisation

Question 10

What is a strength of Informational Social Influence?

Answer 10

A strength of Informational Social Influence is that there is research support. Lucas asked students to give answers to mathematical problems that were easy and more difficult. There was more conformity to incorrect answers when they were difficult than the easier ones. This was most true for students who rated their mathematical ability as poor.
Conclusion: This study shows that people conform in situations where they feel they don’t know the answer and have the need to be right. This is the outcome predicted by ISI explanation.

Question 11

What is a weakness of Informational Social Influence?

Answer 11

A limitation of ISI is that some research shows that there are individual differences in ISI as well. Perrin and Spencer found little conformity in science and engineering students so it does not affect everyone the same way. People who are more knowledgeable or confident are less influenced by the majority view.

Question 12

What is a strength of Normative Social Influence?

Answer 12

A strength of NSI is that there is research support. Schultz found that hotel guests exposed to the normative message that 75% of the guests reused their towels each day rather than requiring fresh towels reduced their own towel use by 25%. This study supports the NSI claim that people shape their behaviour out of a desire to fit in and avoid rejection.

Question 13

What is a weakness of Normative Social Influence?

Answer 13

A limitation of NSI is that some research shows that NSI does not affect everyone’s behaviour in the same way. For example, people who are less concerned about being liked are less affected by NSI than those who care more about being liked (nAffiliators- who have a need for being in a relationship with others). This implies that there are individual differences in conformity.

Question 14

What are weaknesses of Normative Social Influence?

Answer 14

Another limitation of NSI is that Normative social influence may not be detected by people as the cause of their own behaviour. People rely on beliefs about what should motivate their behaviour and therefore under detect the impact of NSI.

Question 15

What is a weakness of Informational Social Influence and Normative Social Influence?

Answer 15

A limitation of ISI and NSI is that the ‘two process approach is over- simplified. This approach states that behaviour is due to either ISI or NSI. Deutsch and Gerrard argue that behaviour is often influenced by both normative social influence and informative social influence working together. We can’t always be sure whether ISI or NSI is at work and casts serious doubt on the two processes operating independently in explaining conformity.

Question 16

What is an Aim of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 16

Solomon Asch conducted an experiment to investigate the influence of a majority view that was wrong on an individual exposed to this view.

Question 17

What is an Method of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 17

Asch used a lab experiment to study conformity, using the line judgement task of matching the length of a standard line with one of the 3 comparison lines, Asch recruited 123
American male students. Each naive participant was tested in a room with seven confederates. The confederates had agreed in advance what their responses would be when presented with the line task. The real participant did not know this and was led to believe that the other seven participants were also real participants like themselves. Each person in the room had to state aloud which comparison line (A, B or C) was most like the target line. The answer was always obvious. The real participant sat at the end of the row and gave his or her answer last. In some trials, the seven confederates gave the wrong answer. There were 18 trials in total and the confederates gave the wrong answer on 12 critical trials. Asch was interested to see if the real participant would conform to the majority view. It was an unambiguous task.

Question 18

What is an Results of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 18

The average rate of conformity was 32% with 74% conforming at least once. They conformed to avoid rejection which demonstrates normative social influence (compliance). They said that they continued to privately trust there own judgements but changed their public attitude.

Question 19

What is an Conclusion of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 19

People mostly conform because they want to fit in with the group and for they believe the group is better informed than they are. The study shows that people can change their own view to be more likely a majority that is wrong to fit in supporting normative social influence as an explanation for conformity.

Question 20

What is the evaluation of Sherifs auto kinetic effect study?

Answer 20

Used a very artificial situation and its not clear how his findings are relevant for everyday situations. Asch felt like that the task used by Sherif was ambiguous, it didn’t show how social or group pressure would affect tasks where there was an obvious right or wrong answer.

Question 21

What is a Strength of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 21

Ground Breaking Research: Asch’s results were very unexpected and striking. They stimulated lots of further research and are still being talked about (and taught to A level students) over 50 years.

Question 22

What is are Weaknesses of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 22

• Asch’s participants were all males. These were not representative sample and findings from such a sample cannot be generalised to women. Other research suggests women may be more conforming since they are more concerned about social relationships and being accepted.
• Asch’s particpants were all from the United States, which is an individualistic culture (people are concerned about themselves than
the social group). The findings may not generalise collectivistic cultures (where the social group is more important than the individual). In these collectivistic cultures conformity rates may be increased.
This shows that conformity levels are
sometimes even higher than Asch found.
• It is time consuming and uneconomical to test one participant so many times.

Question 23

What is another weakness of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 23

• Artificiality: Asch asked people to go into a room full of strangers (not similar to groups we are part of in everyday life) and make judgements about meaningless stimuli. He task of matching lines was trivial and
therefore no reason for why not to conform. Some critics have said that behaviour in artificial laboratory situation like this tells us nothing about behaviour in everyday situations. This is especially true where the consequences of conformity might be more important, and where we interact with other people in groups in a much more direct way. This means that studies may lack ecological validity.
• Some participants in Asch’s study mentioned that they were just going along with the experiment giving him the answers they guessed he wanted. So these participants could be displaying demand characteristics

Question 24

What is another weakness of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 24

Asch’s experiment only applies to a particular place and time and therefore lacks external validity. Asch was working in 1950’s USA, which was a very conformist society. Society has changed a lot since and so people are possibly less conformist now. Thus results could have been due to this situation. Perrin and Spencer repeated Asch’s original study with engineering students in the UK. Only one student conformed in 396 trials. It may be that the engineering students felt more confident about measuring lines than the original sample and therefore were less conformist. This is a limitation of Asch’s study since it means that Asch effect is not representative cross situations and may also not be consistent across cultures and so is not a fundamental feature of human behaviour.

Question 25

What are ethical issues of Asch’s line judgement task?

Answer 25

- Deception: use of confederates as well as regarding the true nature of the study. Participants were told they were participating in a study on perception. - Lack of informed consent - Protection from harm: Psychological stress and anxiety during the experiment may have felt foolish afterward when told it was a set up.

Question 26

What are factors influenced the level of conformity?

Answer 26

- size of group - unanimity - difficulty of task - giving answers in private

Question 27

How does the Size of Group influence the level of conformity?

Answer 27

• Asch found that conformity tends to increase as the size of the group increases. • However, there is little change in conformity once the group size reaches 4-5. • With one other person (i.e. confederate) in the group conformity was 3%, with two others it increased to 14 % and with three or more it was 32%. • Because conformity does not seem to increase in groups larger four, this is considered the optimal group size.

Question 28

How does the Unanimity influence the level of conformity?

Answer 28

• Unanimity means everyone agreeing - In this case every single one of the confederates giving the same wrong answer. It leads to an increase in conformity. • Lack of Unanimity: Asch used a variation where instead of all the confederates giving the same wrong answer, one of them always gave the correct answer agreeing with the participant. In this case having just one confederate decreased from 32% to 5%. Weakness: In another variation this "dissenter" later goes back to giving wrong answers then conformity increases again to 32%.

Question 29

How does the Difficulty of Task influence the level of conformity?

Answer 29

• When the (comparison) lines (e.g. A, B, C) were made more similar in length it was harder to judge the correct answer and conformity increased reflecting Asch's results. • When we are uncertain, it seems we look to others for confirmation. The more difficult the task the greater the conformity.

Question 30

How does the Giving Answers in Private influence the level of conformity?

Answer 30

• When participants could write their answers down rather while still being aware of the answers of the confederates, conformity decreased to 12%. • Conformity dropped in this variation because participants feel less judged and don’t care if they are right or not (no fear of rejection).

Question 31

More Factors affecting Conformity with further research evidence ?

Answer 31

- confidence - gender & public or private - culture

Question 32

What is the study had the effect on Confidence?

Answer 32

Furman and Duke (1988)

Question 33

What is Furman and Duke (1988)?

Answer 33

This study looked at how a lack of confidence in the given task may affect conformity. The students used as participants were either majoring in music or in another subject for their degree course. Students were asked to listen to two versions of a piece of music and to state their preference, individually then in the presence of confederates. Music majors were not influenced to change their already stated preferences. However, the publicly stated preferences of non-music majors were significantly affected by the preferences of the confederates.

Question 34

What is the study had the effect on Gender and Public or Private?

Answer 34

Eagly and Carli (1981)

Question 35

What is Eagly and Carli (1981)?

Answer 35

Eagly and Carli carried out a meta-analysis to examine whether the popular idea that women are more conforming than men is supported by research evidence. They found that, although women were more likely to conform than men, the size of the difference was very small. They also found that the difference between men and women appears most in group-pressure situations where conformity occurs in public; in private the difference virtually disappears. In other words, women are more likely to comply with the group opinion rather than internalise it.

Question 36

What is the study had the effect on Culture?

Answer 36

Smith and Bond (1998)

Question 37

What is Smith and Bond (1998)?

Answer 37

Smith and Bond also found that culture can affect conformity rates. Their meta-analysis of studies from a range of different countries found that the average conformity rate in collectivist countries was 37%, whereas individualist countries had the much lower rate of 25%. In collectivist cultures, members are socialised to value the collective goals of the group, while in individualist cultures, the emphasis is on personal achievement and independence.

Question 38

What is an Aim of Zimbardo's Stanford Prison study?

Answer 38

Zimbardo set up a mock prison in the basement of the psychology department at Standard University to test whether the brutality of prison guards was the result of sadistic personalities or whether it was created by the situation (conformity to social roles)

Question 39

What is a Method of Zimbardo's Stanford Prison study?

Answer 39

They recruited 24 emotionally stable male students. They had volunteered to take part in the study and were tested for their psychological "stability". They randomly allocated to two groups prisoners and prison guards. The prisoners were to spend two weeks locked in 'cells' in a wing of the university. The prison guards were there to look after the prisoners and to keep them under control but they were not allowed to use physical force. To increase realism- the prisoners were arrested at home (unexpectedly) and taken to the university. They were blindfolded, stripped, deloused and given a prison uniform and prisoner number. The prisoners wore a smock and stocking over their head and had no underwear. They worked shifts and went home at the end of their shift. The prisoners' daily routines were regulated. They had to follow rules, enforced by the guards working in shifts, 3 at a time.

Question 40

What are the Results of Zimbardo's Stanford Prison study?

Answer 40

The guards took on their roles with enthusiasm. Their behaviour threatened the prisoners' psychological and physical health. For example: 1. After the initial rebellion was put down, the prisoners became anxious and subdued 2. 3 prisoners were released early because they showed signs of psychological disturbance. 3. One prisoner went on a hunger strike, the guards tried to force feed him and put in in a tiny dark closet - the hole. 4. The experiment was called off after only 6 days instead of the intended 14.

Question 41

What is the Conclusion of Zimbardo's Stanford Prison study?

Answer 41

One explanation for why the participants' reactions were so extreme in this study could be that they conformed to social roles. A role is a part you play during your life. Each role requires different behaviour. If you are given a new role, e.g. when you start a new job, you change your behaviour to suit. In Zimbardo's study, the students were given new roles - prisoner or guard - and simply conformed to the behaviour of these roles. Deindividuation may also help to explain the behaviour of the participants; especially the guards. This is a state when you become so immersed in the norms of the group that you lose your sense of identity and personal responsibility. The guards may have been so sadistic because they did not feel what happened was down to them personally - it was a group norm. This shows the power of the situation to influence people's behavior.

Question 42

What is Deindividuation?

Answer 42

Deindividuation ( losing a sense of personal identity) was encouraged by - Giving the prisoners numbers- their names were not used The prison guards were given uniforms, including handcuffs, wooden club, keys and mirrored sun glasses. They were told they had complete power over the prisoners. E.g deciding when they could go to the toilet.

Question 43

What are the Strengths of Zimbardo's Stanford Prison study?

Answer 43

A Strength of the SPE is that the researchers had some control over the variables. The situation was very tightly controlled e.g. emotionally stable individuals were recruited and randomly allocated to the roles of guards and prisoners. Since the guards and prisoners had those roles by chance, their behaviour was due to the pressures of the situation and not their personalities. Having such control over variables a strength because it increases the internal validity of the study and this enables us to be more confident in drawing conclusions about the influence of pressures of the situation and roles on behaviour. - The study still had ecological validity because Zimbardo went to great extremes in making the study as true to life as possible, for example in the way that he had the prisoners arrested from their homes.

Question 44

What are the Weaknesses of Zimbardo's Stanford Prison study?

Answer 44

• The study can also be criticised for its unrepresentative sample. Since the experiment was conducted using 24 normal, healthy, male college students who were predominantly middle class and white lone was described as oriental), we have to be careful generalising the results to other people. • Zimbardo has also been accused of exaggerating the power of the situation to influence behaviour and minimising the influence of personality factors or dispositional factors. E.g. only 1/3rd of guards acted brutally and some even tried to help and support the prisoners. This suggests that Zimbardo's conclusion about participants conforming to social roles may be over stated.

Question 45

What are more Weaknesses of Zimbardo's Stanford Prison study?

Answer 45

• The partial replication of the study by BBC had different findings to Zimbardo. In this it was the prisoners who took control and subjected the guards to harassment and disobedience. This challenges Zimabardo's conclusions about conformity and social roles. • Another limitation of Zimbardo's research is that there were major ethical issues with the SPE. One issue that arose was that Zimbardo was both the lead researcher and also the prison superintendent. When a student who wanted to leave the experiment spoke to Zimbardo, he responded as a worried superintendent rather than a researcher. This limited Zimbardo's ability to protect his participants from harm because his superintendent role conflicted with his lead researcher role.

Question 46

What are more Weaknesses of Zimbardo's Stanford Prison study?

Answer 46

Importantly the study has been criticised for lacking ecological validity. For practical and ethical reasons the simulated prison could not be totally realistic. Many particularly unpleasant aspects of prison life were absent, such as involuntary homosexuality, racism, beatings and threats to life. Also, the maximum anticipated sentence was just two weeks • It is therefore possible that the study does not serve as a meaningful comparison to real prison environments. It has also been argued that the performances of the participants were based on their stereotypes of how prisoners and guards are supposed to behave. This could explain why the prisoners rioted- because they thought that was what real prisoners did. However, there is considerable evidence that the participants did react to the situation as though it was real. For example 90% of the prisoners' private conversations, which were monitored by the researchers, were on the prison conditions, and only 10% of the time were their conversations about life outside of the prison. The guards, too, rarely exchanged personal information during their relaxation breaks - they either talked about problem prisoners', other prison topics, or did not talk at alls The guards were always on time and even worked overtime for no extra pay. When the prisoners were introduced to a priest, they referred to themselves by their prison number, rather than their first name. Some even asked him to get a lawyer to help get them out.

Question 47

Who has Zimbardo’s study approved by?

Answer 47

Approval for the study was given from the Office of Naval Research, the Psychology Department and the University Committee of Human Experimentation. This Committee also did not anticipate the prisoners extreme reactions that were to follow.

Question 48

What deception was used in Zimbardo’s study?

Answer 48

The only deception involved was to do with the arrest of the prisoners at the beginning of the experiment. The prisoners were not told partly because final approval from the police wasn't given until minutes before the participants decided to participate, and partly because the researchers wanted the arrests to come as a surprise. However this was a breach of the ethics of Zimbardo's own contract that all of the participants had signed.

Question 49

What happened when Zimbardo realised that the p’s didn’t like the experience?

Answer 49

When Zimbardo realised just how much the prisoners disliked the experience, which was unexpected, the experiment was abandoned

Question 50

What was looked at to cause p’s less stress?

Answer 50

Alternative methodologies were looked at which would cause less distress to the participants but at the same time give the desired information, but nothing suitable could be found.

Question 51

What was held post experiment?

Answer 51

Extensive group and individual debriefing sessions were held and all participants returned post-experimental questionnaires several weeks, then several months later, then at yearly intervals

Question 52

What does Zimbardo argue in relation to the benefits gained?

Answer 52

Zimbardo also strongly argues that the benefits gained about our understanding of human behaviour and how we can improve society should out balance the distress caused by the study. However it has been suggested that the US Navy was not so much interested in making prisons more human and were in fact more interested in using the study to train people in the armed services to cope with the stresses of captivity.

Question 53

What are Strengths of Zimbardo’s study?

Answer 53

Real life applications - This research changed the way US prisons are run e.g. young prisoners are no longer kept with adult prisoners to prevent the bad behaviour perpetuating. Beehive-style prisons, where all cells are under constant surveillance from a central monitoring unit, are also not used in modern times, due to such setups increasing the effects of institutionalisation and over exaggerating the differences in social roles between prisoners and guards. Debriefing - participants were fully and completely debriefed about the aims and results of the study. This is particularly important when considering that the BPS ethical guidelines of deception and informed consent had been breached. Dealing with ethical issues in this way simply makes the study more ethically acceptable, but does not change the quality (in terms of validity and reliability) of the findings. The amount of ethical issues with the study led to the formal recognition or ethical guidelines so that future studies were safer and less harmful to participants due to legally bound rules. This demonstrates the practical application of an increased understanding of the mechanisms of conformity and the variables which affect this.

Question 54

What are Weaknesses of Zimbardo’s study?

Answer 54

Lacks ecological validity - The study suffered from demand characteristics. For example, the participants knew that they were participating in a study and therefore may have changed their behaviour, either to please the experimenter (a type of demand characteristic) or in response to being observed (participant reactivity, which acts as a confounding variable). The participants also knew that the study was not real so they claimed that they simply acted according to the expectations associated with their role rather genuinely adopting it. This was seen particularly with qualitative data gathered from an interview with one guard, who said that he based his performance from the stereotypical guard role portrayed in the film Cool Hand Luke, thus further reducing the validity of the findings Lacks population validity - The sample only consisted of American male students and so the findings cannot be generalised to other genders and cultures. For example, collectivist cultures, such as China or Japan, may be more conformist to their prescribed social roles because such cultures value the needs of the group over the needs of the individual. This suggests that such findings may be culture-bound! Ethical issues: Lack of fully informed consent due to the deception required to (theoretically) avoid demand characteristics and participant reactivity. However Zimbardo himself did not know what was going to happen, so could not inform the participants, meaning that there is possible justification for a breach of ethical guidelines. Psychological harm - Participants were not protected from stress, anxiety, emotional distress and embarrassment e.g. one prisoner had to be released due to excess distress and uncontrollable screaming and crying. One prisoner was released on the first day due to showing signs of psychological disturbance, with a further two being released on the next day. This study would be deemed unacceptable according to modern ethical standards.

Question 55

How did Zimbardo violate Informed Consent?

Answer 55

Informed consent was violated as the prisoners experienced deception as in the advertisement Zimbardo used the term 'study' which was misleading as it was a simulation and they didn't know what the 'study' would involve.

Question 56

What was Zimbardo's defence in relation to Informed Consent?

Answer 56

He couldn't tell them everything about the study because he wanted to get the most valid results as possible, to see real life conclusions. Participants wouldn't show demand characteristics.

Question 57

How did Zimbardo violate Deception?

Answer 57

He arrested 'prisoners' in their homes and delivered them to the 'prison'. They were blindfolded, strip- searched, deloused and issued a uniform and number.

Question 58

What was Zimbardo's defence in relation to Deception?

Answer 58

The prisoners weren't told because the final approval from the police wasn't given until minutes before the participants decided to participant and the researchers wanted the arrests to come as a surprise - be as real as possible.

Question 59

How did Zimbardo violate Right to Withdraw?

Answer 59

Because of the atmosphere, the prisoners were told and believed that they couldn't leave the experiment until their 'sentence' was completed (like real prisons)

Question 60

What was Zimbardo's defence in relation to Right to Withdraw?

Answer 60

The prisoners signed up voluntarily and were initially made of the right to withdraw. They did end up letting 3 prisoners leave early.

Question 61

How did Zimbardo violate Protection from Harm?

Answer 61

They weren't protected from harm as the prisoners became anxious and subdued, one prisoner went on a hunger strive and three prisoners were released early because they showed signed signs of psychological disturbance.

Question 62

What was Zimbardo's defence in relation to Protection from Harm?

Answer 62

The emotional and psychological disturbance experienced by the prisoners couldn't have been predicted from the outset. Other methods that would be less distressing were looked at but nothing suitable could be found. He got approved for the study by the Office of Naval Research, the Psychology Department, and the University Committee of Human Experimentation.