Social Influence - Asch Flashcards
What were Asch’s findings?
36.8% of participants conformed at least once
25% didn’t conform once
75% conformed at least once
What term is used to describe Asch’s findings?
The Asch Effect
Why did participants conform?
Because of NSI
What are Asch’s variations?
Group size
Unanimity
Task difficulty
What did Asch find when he increased the group size?
When there was a majority of more than 3, conformity rose to 31.8%
There was little increase after this
What did Asch find when he researched Unanimity?
Conformity dropped by 1/4 when a dissenter was introduced who gave the correct answer.
He allowed the participant to behave more independently.
What did Asch find when researching Task Difficulty?
He found conformity increased when the lines were closer together because of ISI
Give 4 criticism of Asch’s research
A child of its time
Artificial situation and task
Limited application of findings
Ethical issues
What is meant by a child of its time?
Perrin and Spencer (1980) repeated the experiment in the UK on engineering student. Only 1 student conformed in 396 trails.
This suggests 1950s America was very conformist time and it made sense to conform to establish social norms.
The Asch effect is not consistent across time
What is meant by artificial situation and task?
Participants knew they were in a study and may have been affected by demand characteristics.
The task was trivial and gave them no reason not to conform.
What is meant by limited application of findings?
Only men were tested by Asch. Women tend to be more conformist as they value social relationships more (Neto 1995)
This means the results cannot be generalised.
What is meant by ethical issues when related to Asch?
The participant was deceived and this is considered unethical
What did Asch do?
Researched conformity by asking participants to state which lines are the same length
