Social Influence Flashcards
Normative Social Influence: AO1.
The desire to be liked and accepted. Linked with compliance. Individuals must believe they are under surveillance.
Normative Social Influence: AO3.
Linkenbach and Perkins: message that the majority of age peers did not smoke, consequently less likely to smoke.
Schultz et al: hotel guests told 75% of guests reuse towels, reduced their own use by 25%.
Nolan et al: believed neighbours behaviour has the least impact on their energy conservation, actually had the strongest impact.
Informational Social Influence: AO1.
The desire to be right.
Rely on objective tests, or the opinions of others.
More likely if the situation is ambiguous.
Linked with internalisation.
Informational Social Influence: AO3.
Wittenbrink and Henley: participants led to believe negative views about African Americans later reported negative beliefs about a black individual.
Fein et al: judgements of performance can be influenced by reactions saw believed reactions which led to shifts in judgements.
Some judgements cannot be made using objective criteria, and instead must come from social consensus.
Asch: AO1.
All but one confederates. Asked to estimate the length of a line. Participants may conform and give the same wrong answer or resist to give the correct answer. Average conformity of 33%. 1/4 participants never conform. Half conform on 6/12 trials. 1/20 conformed on all trials. Control condition, wrong answer 1% of the time.
Asch: AO3.
Sherif asked individually and as a group to estimate width of a beam of light. More similar as a group.
Lacked ecological validity. Confederates may not have acted convincingly. McCarthyism.
Group size: less conformity in smaller groups.
Unanimity: right answer 5.5%, other wrong answer 9%.
Difficulty: harder, more conformity.
Markus and Kityama: collectivist cultures favour conformity.
Perrin and Spencer: 30 years later, 1/396 conforming responses.
Zimbardo: AO1.
Stanford Prison Experiment: 24 participants, half prisoners, half guards. Labelled with numbers, deindividuation. All white, males, middle class.
Guards instructed to do whatever necessary to maintain order. Prisoner #8612 showed acute emotional distress.
Stopped after 6 days.
Zimbardo: AO3.
Reicher and Haslam: 5 groups of 3: one guard, two prisoners. 8 days.
Prisoners worked together, guards failed to identify with their roles, collapsed system.
Lack of informed consent. Other ethical issues. Banuazizi and Movahedi: participants only play acting, demand characteristics.
Application to real world.
Milgram: AO1.
40 males, deceived ‘a study for memory’, drew fixed lots with Mr Wallace. Volunteer is the teacher, Mr Wallace is the learner. Answering a question wrong leads to an electric shock. His responses were scripted and recorded. Given verbal prods. 65% went to 450 volts, 100% went to 300 volts. Psychiatrists said only 1% would go to 450 volts, any higher than 120 volts would suggest psychopathy.
Milgram: AO3.
Proximity: same room 40%, forces hand onto shock plate 30%, by phone 20.5%, experimenter is a member of public 20%.
Location: run down office 47.5%.
Uniform: Birkman - 3 males gave requests, guard 80%, milkman/civilian 40%. Bushman - parking meter, uniform 72%, beggar 52%, executive 48%.
Ethical issues. Lacks validity. Gender bias.
Perry: participants were sceptical.
Mandel: Reserve Police Battalion 101, ordered to kill Jews, did not take up other offer.
Historical validity, findings still apply today.
Agentic State and Legitimacy of Authority: AO1.
Agentic state: acting as a representative of someone in authority, easier to deny responsibility. Opposite - autonomous state. Maintains positive self image. Emotions and behaviour are binding factors.
Legitimacy of Authority: power that individuals have to give orders. Extent to which demand is reasonable.
Agentic State and Legitimacy of Authority: AO3.
Lifton: German doctors working at Auschwitz. Capable of carrying out lethal orders.
Both positive and negative consequences of legitimacy of authority. Responding to police but also a basis for harming others.
Tarnow: in a crash, there is excessive dependence of the pilot’s authority.
Authoritarian Personality: AO1.
Adorno: F scale. High scores, parented in an authoritarian style. Hostile, rigid, conventional.
Altermeyer: shocked themselves for mistakes on a task. The higher the Right Wing Authoritarianism, the higher the level of shock.
Mao: refugees, authoritarianism came from school.
Elms and Milgram: 20 obedient, 20 defiant from the original study. MMPI scale and Californian F Scale. Little difference in personality, higher levels of authoritarianism in obedient. Healthy upbringing.
Authoritarian Personality: AO3.
Suspicion about whether shocks were fake or real. Variations in context had more effect than personality.
Middendorp and Meloen: less educated, more authoritarian.
Left wing views gave lower levels of obedience than right wing views.
Bégue etc al: game show replication of Milgram, left wing views gave lower shocks.
Social Support and Locus of Control: AO1.
Social Support: conformity reduced by a dissenting peer to 5.5%, even if dissenter had vision problems and wore glasses [Allen and Levine].
Obedience reduced by a disobedient peer to 10%, higher resistance in groups [Gamson et al].
Locus of Control: internal believe they are responsible for what happens to them, more likely to resist conformity/obedience.
External believe things happen outside of their control.
