Social Influence - Asch Flashcards
What was the aim of Asch’s experiment?
How much will people conform to the opinion of others even when in a situations where the answer is unambiguous
What was the procedure of Asch’s experiment?
123 American male undergrads
Participants were showed 2 large white cards at a time, 1 was a standard line & the other 3 were comparison lines.
1 was the same length the others were very different
Participant was asked which of the 3 matched the standard
Each participant was tested in a group of 6-8 confederates (participant didn’t know) & took part in 18 trials & in 12 the confederates gave the wrong answer
First few trials the confederates gave the right answer & then started giving the same wrong one
What were the findings of Asch’s experiment?
Participant gave a wrong answer 36.8% of the time
25% didnt conform on any trials
75% conformed at lease once
When being interviewed they said they conformed due to NSI (wanted to avoid rejection)
What were the 3 variations of Asch’s experiment that he did?
Group size
Unanimity
Task difficulty
What happened in the group size variation & what were the findings?
He increased the size of the group by adding more confederates, conformity increased with group size but only up to a point & levelled off when the majority was greater than 3
What is unanimity?
The extent to which all the group members agree
What happened in the unanimity variation & what were the findings?
Introducing a dissenting confederate decreased conformity whether the answer was right or wrong & their presence enabled the participant to behave more independently suggesting that the influence of the majority depends to some extent of the group being unanimous
What happened in the task difficulty variation & what were the findings?
Asch made the task more ambiguous by making the lines more similar in length and found conformity increased in those conditions which suggests ISI plays a greater role when a task becomes harder
What are some limitations of Asch’s research?
Outdated -> 1950s (people in America were more conformist due to McCarthyism and then so it was established to conform in social norms)
Perrin & Spencer -> repeated experiment with a group of engineering students in the UK & found only 1 student conformed in 396 trials (may have felt more confident/less conformist)
Demand characteristics -> participants knew they were in a research study so could’ve gone along with what they thought was expected of them
Artificial task & situation -> little generalisability & low mundane realism
