social influence- conformity Flashcards
what is conformity
changing what we do in response to the influence of real/imagined pressure
summarise asch’s research
-tested conformity by showing participants 3 different length lines, with another card showing a line which matched the length of one of the first lines
-the correct option was always obvious
procedure of asch’s research (4)
-123 american, male undergraduates individually tested in a group of 6-8 confederates
-naive participant isn’t aware of the confederates
-initially, confederates gave the right answers but then started making errors
-all confederates gave the same wrong answer
findings from asch’s research
-36.8% of naive participants said the wrong answer
-25% did not conform on any trials
-75% conformed at least once
what is a dissenter
someone who disagrees with the majority
group size variable of asch’s research (4)
he wanted to test if the size of the group is more important than the agreement of the group
-varied number of confederates from 1-15
-with 3 confederates, conformity to the wrong answer was 31.8%
Adding more confederates made little difference
unanimity variable of asch’s research (4)
he wanted to see if the presence of another non-conforming person would affect the participant’s conformity
-conformity reduced by 25% when the majority were unanimous
-dissenter enabled the naive participant to behave more independently
The influence of majority depends upon the group being unanimous
task difficulty variable of asch’s research
he made the line task more difficult by making the stimulus line and the comparison line more similar in length
-conformity increased
INFORMATIONAL SOCIAL INFLUENCE plays a bigger role when the task gets harder as the situation is more ambiguous. We are more likely to look to other people for guidance and assume they are right and we are wrong
what is compliance
conforming publicly but privately disagreeing
-shallowest form of conformity
-superficial change
what is identification
publicly changing behaviour in a group to be accepted, but privately disagreeing
-moderate form of conformity
-temporary change
what is internalisation
private and public change of behaviour
-strongest from of conformity
-permanent change, as attitudes have been internalised
what is normative social influence (4)
-when we want to be liked/accepted by the majority group so we publicly change our behaviour even if we don’t agree
-emotional process
-often leads to compliance
eg. a person starting to smoke because they are surrounded by other people who smoke
what is informational social influence
-when we look at the majority group for information as we don’t know how to behave
-cognitive process
eg. a person following the direction of the crowd in an emergency, even though they don’t know where they are going
describe zimbardo’s procedure (2)
-mock prison for 21 male student volunteers who were emotionally stable
-randomly assigned roles of guard/prisoner
findings of zimbardo’s study (5)
-in 2 days prisoners rebelled against harsh treatment of guards
-guards constantly harassed prisoners- shows difference in social roles
-prisoners became subdued, depressed, anxious
-guards increasingly identified with their role of the guard
-study ended after 6 days instead of the 14 that was planned
