Social influence : key studies (asch) Flashcards
What was the aim of asch’s study?
-to discover if participants will conform to a group even of the answer is obvious
What was the sample of asch’s study?
-123 us male volunteers
What was the procedure of asch’s study?
-participants sit in a room with 7 confederates
-participant is given a line length judging task
-asked to say aloud which line matches line X
What did asch find from the study?
-naive participants agreed with confederates incorrect answered on 33% of trials
-75% conformed at least one
-25% never conformed
-most said they conformed to avoid rejection
What did asch’s study conclude?
-people conform to fit in (evidence for compliance and normative social influence)
What are some strengths to asch’s study?
-highly controlled lab study
What’s a negative to asch’s study?
-can’t be generalised (study done on US men)
-task and situation were artificial (don’t represent a natural task where conformity would occur) and deman characteristics (p’s knew they were in a study)
What were some of asch’s variations?
-number of confederates varied from 1-16 (conformity increased with higher presence of confederates).
-answers in private (conformity decreased to 12.5%)
-difficulty of task (conformity increased)