SP9 Norms and conformity Flashcards
What are social norms?
Rules that most group members agree on and they govern the behaviours, values and beliefs of the members
* Can be so strong that people confess to a crime (e.g. hitting the forbidden key on a keyboard)
Describe Sherif’s experiment with light in a dark room
- Participants sat alone in a dark room looking at a light, had to estimate how far the light moved (in reality it didn’t)
- The estimates differed a lot among participants
- Then combine 3 participants in the same room and their estimates keep getting closer to each others’, until it’s the same
- People are influenced by and often adopt the opinions of other group members
Criticism of Sherif’s study
Very ambiguous situation
* Asch showed that even in unambiguous situations people rely on others (…later)
How do social norms differ from attitudes?
Both are mental representations but attitudes are individual’s positive/negative evaluations, whereas norms reflect shared group evaluations of what is true/false, good/bad, appropriate/inappropriate
How do we categorize norms?
- Implicit (people do behaviours without any clear sign or rule, e.g. applause) vs Explicit (e.g. laws, syllabus)
- Injunctive vs Descriptive
What are injunctive norms?
- Rules about how people are supposed to behave
- Connote approval or disapproval by group
- Explicit (signs - do not park) and implicit (men shouldn’t wear dresses)
Descriptive norms
- How people actually behave
- Based on observations of people around you, no explicit instructions
- E.g. even if it’s forbidden, people still do it
Social roles
Shared expectations by group members about how particular people or sub-groups in the group are supposed to behave
Function of social roles (positive)
Clearly divided and defined social roles allow people to perform functions effectively
Make interactions predictive, easier, smooth
Negative of social roles
Are very restrictive and perpetuate inequlity sometimes
Why do we form social norms?
- Two perspectives:
1. Connectedness (belonging): societal-value perspective
2. Mastery: Functional perspective
What are the consequences on a person when there is disagreement in the group or he is not following group norms?
- Disagreement undermines the person’s confidence that we view reality correctly
- Not conforming to social norms undermines the secure social identity we derive from belonging to a group
- Threat of exclusion
How is the societal-value perspective reflected in society and its following of those social norms?
- they foster group cohesion
- norms are culturally relativistic (each society decides individually) and arbitrary
- arbitrary norms are established and internalised
- sanctions are established to reinforce norms
- e.g. cultural differences in greetings
Reference group
Those people accepted as an appropriate source of info for a judgment because they share the attributes relevant for making that judgment (e.g. visual judgments - choose people with good eyesight)
How do we treat in-groups as reference groups and why not out-groups?
- Expect to agree with in-group members
- Far more affected by social influence from in-group
- The info ingroups provide is usually important to me and mine - process systematically
- If motivation or opportunity not there - persuasion heuristics (‘‘If my group thinks this, it must be right!’’)
- Outgroup info - little impact, regardless of argument quality - superficial processing
What is the functional perspective? What is the pathway of norm persistence/dissapearence?
Content of norms is not arbitrary but confer survival advantage
Environment > Behavioural response > norm persistence/dissapearence:
* if adaptive: norm persists
* if not adaptive: norm goes away
What is an example of functional perspective of social norms?
Environment: see somone walking towards me
Behavioural pattern: shake hands
Adaptive: yes > Norm: shake hands again
BUT!
Adaptive: no! covid! > Norm: do not shake hands!
Are those two perspectives mutually exclusive? If yes, why? If no, why?
They aren’t mutually exclusive > Integrative perspective
* Norms emerge due to fundamental challenges to survival > persist after
* But manifestation of norms will differ by culture
* E.g. relationship status signal (ring/beard)
Norms = Functionality (mastery) + Group difference (belonging)
How do social norms form?
We are influenced by the ideas, emotions, and behaviour of other
* Interaction between individuals makes their ABCs more similar
How do norms develop within groups?
- Looking for compromise - happens if the group is divided on an issue but balanced
- The norm becomes more neutral
Group polarization
The process by which a group’s initial average position becomes more extreme following group interaction
E.g. Hiring a candidate because they seem perfect for the job even though initially they were regarded as a mediocre candidate
How does group polarization happen?
- Direction of polarisation depends on one’s initial inclination
-Their agreement becomes stronger through discussion supporting and encouraging the opinion - Group discussion then shifts initial inclination to the extreme
What does group polarization depend on?
- Superficial processing of initially revealed opinions: undecided and minority people adopt the majority consensus (superficial acceptance of descriptive norms - majority is probably right and want to represent group ideal)
- When motivation high > systematic processing: most arguments favour the majority; majority arguments are discussed more, seem more compelling and are presented persuasively
For which groups is group polarisation more likely?
For homogenous groups
