🟣 Social Influence - Conformity Flashcards
What is conformity
A change in a persons behaviour or opinions as a result of real or imagined pressure from a person or a group of people
What is majority conformity
Being influences by the views of a larger group
What is minority conformity
Being influenced by views of a smaller group
What are the 3 types of conformity
- Compliance,
- Identification
- Internalisation
Who suggested the 3 types of conformity
Herbert Kelman (1958)
What is compliance
When a person conforms publicly with the views or behaviours expressed by others but privately they disagree. This is superficial / temporary
What is internalisation
When a person takes on the views expressed by others and publically and privately conforms. The views become part of the persons own way f viewing or believing . Permanent type of conformity
What is identification
Individual accepts influence because they want to be associated with the group / person. They feel more part of the group by adopting attitudes or behaviours
Who developed the 2 process theory which proposes to main reasons why people conform
Deutsch and Gerard (1955)
What are the 2 explanations to conformity
Informational social influence
Normative social influence
What is normative social influence
- Wanting to be liked
- Based on fear of rejection
- leads to compliance
- temporary / public changes
- unambiguous situation (obvious/clearsituation)
What is informational social influence
- based on desire to be correct
- rely on others for information
- leads to internalisation
(Permanent /private changes) - ambiguous situation (not clear)
AIM of asch’s study (1951)
LAB EXPERIMENT : To see if participants would yield, conform, to majority social influence and give incorrect answers even when the correct answers were obvious
Procedure of asch’s experiment
- 7 male students looked at 2 cards. Test card showed 1 vertical line, the others showed 3 vertical lines on different lengths
- participants task was to call out which of the 3 lines was the same length as the line on the other card
- all participants bar 1 were accomplices of the experiment. Real participant was last but 1
- 18 trials, 12 critical
- asch used 123 male college students
Asch’s findings and conclusion
- conformed 36.8% of the time
- 75% conformed at least once
Experience normative social influence even when answer is obvious
3 Critics of asch’s study
- lack of population validity meaning cannot be generalized to a wider population because the sample used in the research is not representative.
- beta bias meaning differences between groups (often genders or cultures) are ignored or minimized
- lab experiment, lacks ecological validity
Perrin and Spencer (1980)
Carried out asch’s study 25 years later on science and engineering students and then youths on probation
Findings of Perrin and Spencer (1980)
- science and engineering students = 1/396 conformed
- but with youths, similar to asch’s results
What is time temporal validity
refers to how well the findings of a study remain relevant and applicable over time. A study lacks temporal validity if its conclusions are outdated due to changes in society, culture, or technology.
What is a study which supports ISI
Sherif (1935)
Aim of sherif 1935
To investigate whether people are influence by others in an ambiguous task
Method of sherif 1935
Used the autokinetic effect where a still point of light in the dark appears to move. Participants were shown a still point of light in the dark and estimated how far it moved. First on their own and then in groups
Results of sherif 1935
When alone participants developed their own stable estimates. In the group, judgements gradually became closer and closer until a group norm developed
Conclusion of sherif1935
Participants were influenced by the estimates of other people. Estimates converged because participants used information from others to help them
Individualistic culture vs collectivist culture in conformity
The lowest rate of conformity (14%) was found
with Belgian students, and the highest (58%)
with Indian teachers in Fiji
Asch’s findings to do with group size
The larger the group size, conformity increases
One confederate, group conformity was 3%
2 confederates group conformity was 13%
3 or more was 33%
What is the optimal group size for conformity to occur
4
3 of asch’s variations
Group size
Unanimity
Task difficulty
What occurred in unanimity variation
One confederate says correct answer, other still say wrong answer. Conformity drops to 5.5%
Another variation, confederate gives a different wrong answer, conformity 9%.
Shows if you break the groups unanimous position, conformity is reduced
What occurred in task difficulty variation
Comparison lines became closer, more similar lengths, harder to judge correct answer. No reported percentage but conformity increased because we were uncertain and we looked to others. Tested ISI
5 critics of asch’s study
- Perrin and Spencer showed 1950s were a conformist time, time temporal validity
- Artificial task, not resemble real life situation
- Limited application, only men from the US were tested
- Situational, people may want to impress strangers by being right
- Ethics, participates were deceived because they thought confederates were also participants
3 positives of conformity
- Maintaining social norms
- Promoting social cohesion
- Efficiency in decision making
3 negatives of conformity
- Suppression of individuality
- Potential for groupthink
- Ignoring personal beliefs or practices
