Social Influences Flashcards
Describe Asch’s study.
Aim: To investigate group pressure in an ambiguous situation.
Method: 123 American men.
Two cards: standard line and three comparison lines.
12 critical trials where confederates gave the wrong answer.
Results: On critical trials the participants the wrong answer 1/3 of the time.
25% never gave the wrong answer.
Conclusion: People are influenced by group pressure.
Though many can resist.
Evaluate Asch’s study.
Child of the times:
Only reflective of conformity in 1950s America, much less conformity in 1980 UK study (Perrin and Spencer).
An artificial task:
Task was trivial and situation involved strangers so doesn’t reflect everyday situations.
Cultural differences:
Results can’t be generalised to collectivist cultures where rates are higher (Bond and Smith).
What are the social factors that affect conformity?
Group size:
Two confederates = 13.6% conformity, three confederates = 31.8%, more than three made little difference.
Anonymity:
Writing answer down is anonymous and conformity lower.
Task difficulty:
If comparison lines more similar to standard this makes task harder, conformity increases.
Evaluate the social factors of conformity.
Group size -> Depends on task:
When no obvious answer then no conformity until group 8+ people.
Anonymity -> Strangers versus friends:
If participants are friends or opinion is anonymous conformity is higher.
Task difficulty -> Expertise:
People with more expertise less affected by task difficulty.
What are the dispositional factors that affect conformity?
Personality:
High internal locus of control, conform less.
Burger and Cooper found internals less likely to agree with a confederate’s ratings of a cartoon.
Expertise:
More knowledgeable people: conform less.
Lucas found maths experts less likely conform to others’ answer on maths problems.
Evaluate the dispositional factors of conformity.
Personality -> Familiarity of situation:
Control is less important in familiar situations (Rotter).
Expertise -> No single factor:
Maths experts may conform in a group of strangers in order to be liked.
Describe Piliavin’s subway study.
Aim:
To investigate if characteristics of a victim affect help given in an emergency.
Method:
Male confederate collapsed on subway, 103 trials.
Victim appeared to be drunk or appeared to be disabled (had a cane).
Results:
Disabled victim given help on 95% of trials compared to 50% helped when drunk.
Help was as likely in crowded and empty carriages.
Conclusions:
Characteristics of victim affects help given.
Number of onlookers doesn’t affect help in natural setting.
Evaluate Piliavin’s subway study.
High realism:
Participants didn’t know their behaviour was being studied, so acted more naturally.
Urban sample:
Participants from the city so may be used to emergencies.
Qualitative data:
Observers noted remarks from passengers giving deeper insights into why.
What are the social factors that affect prosocial behaviour?
Presence of others:
The more people present the less likely someone will help.
Darley and Latané found that 85% on own helped person with seizure but only 31% in a group of four.
Cost of helping:
Includes danger to self or embarrassment.
Also costs of not helping e.g. guilt or blame.
Evaluate the social factors of prosocial behaviour.
Presence of others -> Depends on situation:
In serious emergencies response correlated to severity of situation (Faul et al.).
Cost of helping -> Interpretation of situation:
If it is a married couple arguing only 19%
intervened versus 85% intervened if attacker
appeared to be a stranger (Shotland and Straw).
What are the dispositional factors that affect prosocial behaviour?
Similarity to victim:
Help more likely if victim is similar to self, e.g. Manchester fans helping people wearing Man U shirt (Levine et al.).
Expertise:
People with specialist skills more likely to help in
emergencies, e.g. registered nurses helping a workman (Cramer et al.).
Evaluate the dispositional factors of prosocial behaviour.
Similarity to victim -> High costs:
High costs or ambiguous situation means help isn’t forthcoming.
Expertise -> Affects only quality of help:
Red cross trained were no more likely to give help
than untrained people, but gave higher quality
help (Shotland et al.).
Describe Milgram’s study.
Aim:
To investigate if Germans are different in terms of obedience.
Method:
40 male volunteers.
‘Teacher’ instructed by experimenter to give a shock if “learner’ answered a question incorrectly.
Results:
No participant (teacher) stopped below 300 volts.
65% shocked to 450V.
Extreme tension, e.g. three had seizures.
Conclusion:
Obedience related to social factors not disposition, e.g. location, novel situation.
Evaluate Milgram’s study.
Lacked realism:
Participants may not have believed shocks were real (Perry).
Supported by other research:
Sheridan and King found 100% females followed orders to give a fatal shock to a puppy.
Ethical issues:
Participants distressed, caused psychological harm. Such research brings psychology into disrepute.
Describe Milgram’s agency theory.
Social factors of obedience
Agency:
Agentic state: Follow orders with no responsibility.
Autonomous state: Own free choice.
Authority:
Agentic shift: moving from making own free choices to following orders, occurs when someone is in authority.
Culture - The social hierarchy:
Some people have more authority than others.
Hierarchy depends on society and socialisation.
Proximity:
Participants less obedient in Milgram’s study when in same room as learner, increasing ‘moral strain’.
Evaluate Milgram’s agency theory.
Social factors of obedience
Research support:
Blass and Schmitt showed students a film of Milgram’s study, they blamed the experimenter rather than participants.
Doesn’t explain all of the findings:
Can’t explain why there isn’t 100% obedience in Milgram’s study.
Obedience alibi:
Agency theory offer an excuse for destructive behaviour, potentially dangerous.
Describe Adorno’s theory of the authoritarian personality.
Dispositional factors of obedience
The authoritarian personality:
Some people have a strong respect for authority and look down on people of lower status.
Cognitive style:
Rigid stereotypes and don’t like change.
Originates in childhood:
Strict parents only show love if behaviour is correct. These values are internalised.
Scapegoating:
Hostility felt towards parents for being critical
is put onto people who are socially inferior.
Evaluate Adorno’s theory of the authoritarian personality
Lack of support:
Authoritarian personality measured on F-scale which has response bias.
Results are correlational:
Can’t say authoritarian personality causes greater obedience.
Social and dispositional:
Germans were obedient but did not all have the same upbringing. Social factors also involved.
Describe a study on deindividuation.
Zimbardo’s study: Aim:
To study the effects of loss of individual identity.
Method:
Female participants told to deliver fake electric shocks.
Individuated group wore normal clothes.
Deindividuated group wore large coat with hood.
Results:
Deindividuated more likely to shock person and held down shock button twice as long.
Conclusion:
This shows being anonymous increases aggression.
Evaluate a study on deindividuation.
Zimbardo’s study:
Not always antisocial:
Prosocial group norm (e.g. nurses) leads to less antisocial behaviour than antisocial group norm (KKK) (Johnson and Downing).
Real-world application:
Manage sporting crowds using video cameras to increase self-awareness.
Crowding:
Feeling packed together creates aggression to (Freedman).
Describe a case study of crowd and
collective behaviour.
Reicher’s study: Aim:
To investigate crowd behaviour to see if it was ruly or unruly.
Method:
Studied newspaper and TV reports.
Interviewed twenty people, six in depth.
Results:
Riot triggered by police raiding café which community felt was unjust.
Crowd threw bricks, burnt police cars but calmed when police left.
Conclusion:
Shows damage was rule-driven and targeted at police, reflecting social attitude of area.
Evaluate a case study of crowd and
collective behaviour
Reicher study:
Supported by research:
Football hooligans’ violence doesn’t escalate beyond a certain point (Marsh).
Issues with methodology:
Study is based on eyewitness testimonies so data may be biased.
Real-world application:
Increasing police presence doesn’t lead to a decrease in violence.
What are the social factors that affect crowd and collective behaviour?
Deindividuation:
Group norms determine crowd behaviour.
Social loafing:
When working in a group people put in less effort as you can’t identify individual effort.
Latané et al. found participants individually shouted less when in a group of six than when tested alone.
Culture:
Earley found Chinese people (collectivist culture) put in same amount of effort even if amount can’t be identified. Not true of Americans (individualist).
Evaluate the social factors of crowd and collective behaviour?
Deindividuation -> Crowding:
Being packed tightly together is unpleasant, may explain antisocial behaviour (Freedman).
Social loafing -> Depends on task:
On creative tasks, e.g. brainstorming, people individually produce more when in groups.
Culture -> Overgeneralised:
People belong to more than one culture so hard to make predictions.
What are the dispositional factors that affect crowd and collective behaviour?
Personality:
High locus of control enables individuals to be less influenced by crowd behaviour.
Morality:
Strong sense of right and wrong helps resist pressure from group norms.
Evaluate the dispositional factors of crowd and collective behaviour?
Personality -> Whistleblowing:
Personality made no difference (Bocchiaro et al.).
Morality -> Real examples:
Sophie Scholl sacrificed her life rather than following group behaviour.
