Social Influence (PAPER 1) Flashcards by freddy m

(AO1) What are the three types of conformity?

Compliance (public agreement, private disagreement), Identification (temporary internalisation), Internalisation (deep, permanent change in beliefs).

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(AO3) Which type of conformity is the strongest?

Internalisation — because it leads to permanent private attitude change.

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(AO1) What are the two main explanations for conformity?

Normative Social Influence (NSI) — desire to be liked; Informational Social Influence (ISI) — desire to be right.

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(AO3) What supports ISI?

Lucas et al. (2006): students conformed more to difficult maths questions — shows reliance on others for information.

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(AO3) What supports NSI?

Asch: participants conformed to wrong answers to avoid social rejection — especially when answers were spoken out loud.

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(AO3) What’s a limitation of the ISI/NSI explanation?

The two often work together — hard to isolate just one cause of conformity.

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(AO1) What was Asch’s conformity study?

Participants judged line lengths; confederates gave wrong answers to see if participant would conform.

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(AO1) What were the variables affecting conformity? Asch

Group size, unanimity, and task difficulty.

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(AO1) What % conformed at least once? Asch

75% conformed at least once.

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(AO3) What’s a limitation of Asch’s study?

Lacks ecological validity — artificial task, low real-life application.

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(AO3) What ethical issue applies to Asch’s study?

Deception — participants weren’t told the true aim.

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(AO1) What was the aim of Zimbardo’s study?

To examine how social roles influence behaviour (e.g., guard vs prisoner).

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(AO1) How long did the study last? Zimbardo

It was stopped after 6 days instead of 14 due to extreme behaviour.

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(AO3) What are major criticisms? Zimbardo

Ethical issues (psychological harm), and demand characteristics (participants may have acted based on stereotypes).

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(AO3) What’s a strength of Zimbardo’s study?

Realistic setting — high internal validity due to emotional involvement.

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(AO1) What % of participants went to 450V? Milgrim

65% gave the maximum shock.

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(AO1) What was the aim of Milgram’s study?

To investigate obedience to authority, even when it causes harm.

(AO3) What are the ethical issues? Milgrim

Deception and psychological distress (participants believed they were harming someone).

(AO3) What did the study show about obedience? Milgrim

Ordinary people will follow orders from authority even if it means harming others.

(AO3) What’s a strength of Milgram’s research?

High control and replicability — consistent results across variations.

(AO1) What 3 situational variables did Milgram investigate?

Proximity, Location, Uniform.

(AO1) What was the effect of changing proximity? Milgrim

Obedience dropped to 40% when learner was in the same room.

(AO3) What do these findings suggest? Milgrim variables

Obedience is heavily influenced by external situational cues.

(AO1) What was the effect of changing uniform? Milgrim

Obedience dropped to 20% when the experimenter wore everyday clothes.

(AO1) What is the agentic state?

When someone sees themselves as an agent executing another’s orders — not responsible for their actions.

(AO1) What is meant by legitimacy of authority?

We obey those who are socially recognised as having power (e.g., teachers, police).

(AO3) What real-world issue can agentic state and legitimacy of authority theories explain?

Obedience in war crimes — soldiers following orders (e.g., My Lai massacre).

(AO1) What is the authoritarian personality?

A personality type more likely to obey authority — rigid, conventional, respect for status.

(AO1) How is authoritarian personality measured?

The F-scale (Adorno et al., 1950).

(AO3) What is a limitation of the authoritarian personality explanation?

Can’t explain obedience of entire populations (e.g., Nazi Germany) — better explained by social factors.

(AO1) What are two explanations for resisting social influence?

Social Support and Locus of Control (LOC).

(AO1) What is an internal vs external locus of control?

Internal = believes they control their life, External = believes life is controlled by fate or others.

(AO3) What supports LOC?

Holland: Internals were less likely to obey in Milgram-style experiments.

(AO3) What is a real-life example of social support aiding resistance?

In Asch's study, conformity dropped when one confederate gave the correct answer.

(AO1) What 3 factors make minority influence effective?

Consistency, Commitment, Flexibility (Moscovici et al., 1969).

(AO1) What did Moscovici’s study show?

A consistent minority (saying blue slides were green) led some participants to conform.

(AO3) What’s a strength of minority influence research?

Demonstrates how social change can start — e.g., suffragettes.

(AO3) What’s a limitation of minority influence research?

Often artificial tasks (e.g., coloured slides) — may not reflect real-life influence.

(AO1) What are the stages in social change?

Drawing attention → consistency → deeper processing → augmentation principle → snowball effect → social cryptomnesia.

(AO3) What’s a limitation of social change research?

Change is often very slow — Moscovici may underestimate the role of conformity and majority influence.