social influence Flashcards
Compliance
Public but not private acceptance. Going along with majority influence to gain approval. Behaviour or opinions stop as soon as group pressure stops.
Identification
Public and private acceptance of majority influence in order to gain group acceptance. Don’t necessarily agree with everything group believes.
Internalisation
Public and private acceptance of majority influence through adoption of the majority group’s belief system
Informational social influence
When people look at the behaviour and opinions of others to help shape their own ideas. This generally occurs in unfamiliar situations where individuals aren’t sure what to do so we believe the majority is correct. We accept this as we want to be correct. (can lead to internalisation)
Normative social influence
Going along with the majority influence to gain acceptance from the group and because we want to be liked. (can lead to compliance)
Conformity
Change in behaviour/opinions due to group pressure (majority influence)
Research support for ISI
Lucas et al
Students answer easy/hard maths problems. Greater conformity to incorrect answers on difficult questions. This was most true with students who said their mathematical ability was poor. Shows people conform when unsure which is predicted by ISI.
Individual differences in NSI
NSI doesn’t affect everyone’s behaviour in the same way. People less concerned with being liked are less affected. Naffiliators have greater need to be in relationships with others. McGhee and Teevan found students in high need of affiliation more likely to conform. Individual differences in ways people respond.
ISI and NSI work together
Conformity reduced with one dissenting confederate in Asch’s experiment. NSI- dissenter provides social support, ISI- alternative source of info. Cant be sure which is due to. Casts doubt over view of ISI and NSI as 2 processes operating independently in conforming behaviour.
Asch- conformity
Participants shown lines and had to identify which were the same size. didn’t know others were confederates. Participant answered wrong 37% of the time. 75% conformed at least once.
Variations
Group size- up to 3 confederates, rose to 32%. Addition had no further effect so group size has an impact up to a certain point. No need for large majority.
Unanimity- Introduced a confederate who disagreed with the others. This dissenting confederate lead to reduced conformity, on average 25%. The dissenter enabled the participant to behave more independently. Suggests the influence of the majority depends on unanimity.
Task difficulty- made line judging more difficult. conformity increased. ISI plays greater role when task becomes harder. More likely to look to others for guidance to assume they’re right and we’re wrong.
Asch evaluation
Study repeated and only one participant conformed in 396 trials.Study carried out in 1950s america which was a very conformist time. Made sense to conform to established social norms. Society changed since then, not as conformist now. Hard to generalise across time and cultures.
Knew in study, demand characteristics, artificial situation and task. Findings don’t generalise to every day situations.
Only men tested by Asch. research suggests women may be more conformist, more concerned about social relationships. Men all from US (individualistic culture, people more concerned about themselves than social relationships). In collectivist cultures conformity has been found to be higher- more orientated to group needs. Conformity sometimes higher than Asch found, may only apply to american men as Asch didn’t take into account gender and cultural differences.
Conformity to social roles- Zimbardo
Set up mock prison where participants randomly assigned to role of guard or prisoner. Guards had complete power over prisoners.
Found participants quickly took up their roles. Behaviour because a threat to prisoner’s health so the study was stopped early. Prisoners ripped uniforms and swore. Guards constantly harassed prisoners and punished the smallest things to highlight the differences in social roles. Prisoners became depressed and anxious and some released early. This demonstrated the power of the situation to influence people’s behaviour.
Zimbardo evaluation
Some control over variables. Participants chosen/assigned randomly- attempt to rule out individual differences as reason for findings. Changes in behaviour due to situation. Higher internal validity.
Lack of realism- participants acting how they think they should due to stereotypes.
Ethical issues- Zimbardo’s dual roles in the study. Zimbardo spoke to a student who wanted to leave in his role of superintendent. The conversation was conducted as if the student was a prisoner asking to be released. Zimbardo didn’t act as a researcher with responsibilities towards his participants.
Obedience Milgram
Participants had to give an electric shock each time a learner made a mistake. Paid to take part. The ad said it was a study on memory. Draw for roles rigged. Experimented used phrases such as ‘please continue’, ‘you must go on’.
None stopped below 300 volts. 12.5% stopped at 300 volts. 65% continued to the highest of 450 volts. Qualitative data collected- signs of tension such as sweating, lip biting, seizures.
Milgram evaluation
Low internal validity. argued participants acted that way as they knew it wasn’t real. Milligram wasn’t testing what he wanted to. Recordings of the experiment show participants expressing their doubts over the shocks.
Good external validity. Milgram argued the lab environment accurately reflected wider authority relationships in real life. This is supported by Hofling who studied nurses and found high levels of obedience to unjustified demands. Suggests obedience to authority that occurred in Milgram’s lab study can be generalised.
Ethical issues- deception (memory study, shocks real, believed allocation was random). Protection from harm