Variables affecting conformity Flashcards
Who studied the variables affecting conformity?
Solomon asch in 1956
Summarise the aim of asch experiment on conformity
Asch asked student volunteers to take part in a visual discrimination task, although unbeknown to these volunteers, all but one of the participants were really confederates of the investigator. The real purpose of the study was to see how the lone real participant would react to the behaviour of the confederates
Describe the procedure of asch study
123 male undergrads were tested, participants were seated around a table and asked to look at 3 lines of different lengths. They took turns to call out which out of the 3 lines was the same length as a standard line, with the real participant being asked second to last. Although the solution to the task was obvious, on 12 of the 18 trials the confederates were all told to say the same wrong answer. Asch was interested if the participants would stick to their original answer or conform to the pressure of the majority.
Describe asch findings of the experiment
- Out of the 12 critical trails the conformity rate was 33% ( a third) and he discovered individual differences in conformity rates. One quarter of the participants never conformed on any critical trails, half conformed on six or more of the trials and one in 20 conformed on all 12 of the trials
He conducted an interview afterwards, and discovered majority of participants who conformed privately trusted their own perceptions and judgements and changed their public behaviour giving incorrect answers to avoid dissaproval from other members
Describe how group size posed as a variable affecting conformity
- Asch found there was very little conformity when the majority consisted of only one or two confederates. However under the pressure of a majority of 3 confederates, the proportion of conforming responses jumped up to about 30%
-Further increases in the size of the majority did not increase the level of conformity substantially indicating group size is significant up to a point - Campbell and fairey suggested that group size may have a different effect depending on the type pf judgement being made, for example if the answer to the questions are subjective the size of the group may have a larger impact on the level conformity as the person may want to fit in, however if the person is more concerened with being correct, the answers to the questions being objective may make a person less likely to conform
Describe how the unanimity of the majority posed as a variable affecting conformity
In the original study, all the confederates had the same wrong answer, and if this unaminity was disturbed would this change levels of conformity?When the participant was given the support of another confederate who had been instructed to give the right answers throughout, conformity levels dropped significantly reducing levels from 33% to 5%
If the lone dissenter gave an answer that was both different from the correct answer and the majority the conformity rate dropped to 9% This meant Asch concluded that breaking the groups unanimous position was the major factor in conformity reduction
How does the difficulty of the task pose as a variable affecting conformity?
In one variation, Asch made one of the lines smaller so the correct answer was less obvious and the task alot more difficult . Under these circumstances conformity increased alot
Lucas et al investigated this relationship and they found the influence of task difficulty is moderated by the self efficacy of the individual, when participants were presented with maths problems the people with higher self efficacy remained more independent and less likely to conform than the low efficacy participants. This shows situational differences are both important in determining conformity
Give a limitation of research in conformity ( Bond)
There may be problems with determining the effect of group size, a limitation of research in conformity is that studies have only used a limited range of majority sizes. Asch had concluded that a majority size of 3 was a sufficient number for maximal influence and therefore most subsequent studies using the Asch procedure used 3 as the majority size. Bond also points out that no studies other than asch have used a majority size greater than 9 and other studies the range of majority sizes used is much narrower between 2 and 4. Bond suggests we know very little about the effect of larger majority sizes on conformity levels
Give a limitation of Asch research into conformity( independent)
In asch study, only one third of the trials where the majority unanimously gave the same wrong answer produced a conforming response, in other words in two thirds of these trials the participants resoultley stuck to their original judgement despite being faced with an overwhelming majority expressing a totally different view. Asch believed that his study had actually demonstrated a commendable tendency for participants to stick to what the participants thought to be the correct view, showing independent behaviour
Give a validity limiation of Asch study and how this was overcome
