The Social Apprach to Psychology Flashcards
What experiment did Asch carry out in 1951?
The effects of group pressure on judgement. The 3 lines experiment.
What did Asch do in his experiment of the 3 lines?
Hr arranged groups of 7 students to take part in a line judgement task. Each person in turn was asked to identify which line matched the standard line. Only one student however was a genuine participant and the others (confederates) were instructed to give the wrong answers. The naive participant always answered last or 2nd to last.
What were the findings and conclusions of Aschs experiment eith the 3 lines?
The naive participants gave wrongs answers to conform with the group on 36.8% of the trials. Overall, 75% conformed at least once. In conclusion, a proportion of people conformed with the majority to avoid rejection by the group. However, most of the time the responses from the naive participants were correct meaning we can resist conformity.
Give some positives and some negatives of Aschs experiment with the 3 lines…
+it was carried out in lab conditions meaning he could control variables
+the fact it was carried out in a lab means it could also be repeated to find the same results
-he only had adult male participants meaning it cannot be generalised
-the fact it was carried out in a lab also means that it cannot be generalised to real life situations
What is normative social influence?
Humans have a need to feel accepted and approved by a group and so in order to gain this acceptance we conform to the behaviour of others so that we are not rejected by the group.
What is informational social influence?
Humans have a need to evaluate their behaviour against others to make sure they are correct. Individuals will then conform to others because they genuinely believe them to be right.
What is identification?
We privately change some of our views as well as publicly but we only conform as long as we are apart of that group.
What is internalisation?
we agree with the group so we both privately and publicly change our opinions. We then continue to conform when the group members are no longer present or if we aren’t apart of that group anymore.
What is compliance?
we go along with the group but we do not change our opinions privately. we no longer conform with that group when they are no longer present as the pressure has been removed.
