Week 9: Social Influence

Question 1

What are the 6 principles of successful social influence?

Answer 1

1. Reciprocation: Hari Krisna’s
2. Liking (likable people are more persuasive)
3. Authority
4. Commitment and consistency (eg signing petition –> consistently aligned w cause in future)
5. Scarcity
6. Social validation

Question 2

In 1976, Kuntz & Woolcott sent out 578 christmas cards to strangers. How many cards did they receive in return?

Answer 2

117

Question 3

Our sense of obligation has a future orientation. What does this mean?

Answer 3

We will perform an action even if there is no immediate benefit

Question 4

In 1971, Regan executed a study that participants were told was an exercise in art appreciation. In one condition, the confederate bought participants a coke. What was the effect of this on how many raffle tickets they sold, varying by how liked they were by the participant?

Answer 4

When the coke was bought, the participant bought more raffle tickets. However, if the participant liked the confederate and weren’t bought a coke, they bought more raffle tickets than if they didn’t like the confederate and were bought a coke. The degree to which they like the confederate did not affect how many raffle tickets they bought when a coke was given to them.

Question 5

The manipulator asks for an unreasonable donation, one they know you will not agree to. When the subject doesn’t agree, a smaller donation is suggested. The subject agrees to this smaller amount. What is this technique called, and how does it work?

Answer 5

Door in the face.

It works because the subject believes that the manipulator has made a concession for them, the subject then feels obliged to return this favour.

Question 6

What is the halo effect?

Answer 6

Physically attractive people are assumed to possess other qualities

Question 7

In Langer, Blank, & Chanowitz (1978) study, this request received 94% compliance
“Excuse me, I have 5 pages. May I use the photocopier because I’m in a rush?”

When a similar request was made, stating only “because I need to make some photocopies”, how did the compliance compare?

Answer 7

93% compliance

Question 8

in Regan’s (1971) study where a confederate went to an art gallery with am experimental subject, how did the buying of a coke effect the sales of raffle tickets, compared to the control condition?

Answer 8

In the control condition, people bought more raffle tickets if they liked the confederate, but when the can of coke was bought, they bought raffle tickets regardless

Question 9

A change in an individual’s attitudes, behaviour, or beliefs as a result of external pressure can also be described as a result of what type of influence?

Answer 9

A change in an individual’s attitudes, behaviour, or beliefs as a result of external pressure is the result of social influence

Question 10

Why does Caldini believe that reciprocation is an automatic response?

Answer 10

Caldini believes that reciprocation is an automatic response because it makes evolutionary sense (sharing of resources etc)

Question 11

Given that reciprocation is often of unequal value, how much return did the confederate make on the coke by selling an average of 2x raffle tickets to participants?

Answer 11

a 500% return

Question 12

Concessions are part of which social influence technique?

Answer 12

Concessions are part of the door-in-the-face technique eg I’ll make a concession by asking for a smaller amount, then the requestee will make a concession also

Question 13

How did Cialdini, Vincent, Lewis, Catalan, Wheeler, and Darby (1975) gain increased compliance (17-51%) for their request to chaperone juvenile delinquents to the zoo?

Answer 13

They made a larger request (volunteer as councellor for 2 hours every week for 2 years) and then made a concession, the actual desired request (chaperone to the zoo)

Question 14

An alternative explanation to the success of the door-in-the-face technique is the Contrast Principle, what does this mean?

Answer 14

The contrast principle suggests that our judgement is affected by context eg a cold bucket of water will feel warmer after an iced bucket of water

Question 15

Kenrick & Gutierres (1980):
Males rated the attractiveness of women while watching Charlie’s Angels, watching TV, or not watching anything.
Female students rated as less attractive by males if they were watching “Charlie’s Angels”. What is this an example of?

Answer 15

The contrast principle

Question 16

What are these examples an example of?

Buying clothes: salespeople usually ask you if you want a belt or tie AFTER you have purchased the expensive suit

Buying a car: optional extras are offered after the price for a new car has been negotiated

My Sheriff’s Office example: the request to donate $25 seemed reasonable because the initial $50+ request was so much bigger

Answer 16

The contrast principle

Question 17

The ________________ technique may be vulnerable to requester characteristics
Race
Legitimacy
Clothing

Answer 17

The door-in-the-face technique may be vulnerable to requester characteristics
Race
Legitimacy
Clothing

Question 18

Frenzen & Davis (1990):

When deciding whether or not to buy a product, __________________ was twice as important as opinion about the products

Answer 18

Frenzen & Davis (1990):
When deciding whether or not to buy a product, liking for the hostess was twice as important as opinion about the products

Question 19

Four factors influence whether or not we like someone:
Physical attractiveness​
Similarity​
Contact and co-operation​
Conditioning and association

Describe each factor

Answer 19

Physical attractiveness is linked to the halo effect, people assume attractive people have other qualities

Question 20

Give 2 bias attributions for physically attractive people

Answer 20

If an attractive person does something good it’s because they’re a good person. If they do something bad it’s because they’re in a bad situation.

Question 21

In Kurtzburg et al.’s (1968) attractiveness and prison study, how did rehab effect those who had or hadn’t had plastic surgery?

Answer 21

Rehab had no effect. Those who had had plastic surgery were less likely to return to prison within one year.

Question 22

What did Stewart’s 1980 study show about attractiveness and sentencing?

Answer 22

Attractive men were just as likely to be found guilty, but twice as likely to avoid jail and were given significantly lighter sentences if they were sentenced.

Question 23

How were participants affected by similarity when they were asked to edit an 8 page essay of the confederate who claimed to have the same birthday as them?

Answer 23

The participant was almost twice as likely to edit the essay if the confederate claimed to have the same birthday as them

Question 24

What is the chameleon effect Chatrand & Bargh (1999)?

Answer 24

Study participants unconsciously mimicked the behaviour of confederates, and also claimed to like the confederate more if they had mimicked the participants behaviour

Question 25

In Guadagno & Cialdini’s (2007) study, participants were assigned to interviewing confederates about a pre-graduation exam after receiving fake personality analysis results showing that they were either similar or different to the confederate.

What was the interaction effect which was found in regards to liking of the exam?

Answer 25

‘Similar’ personality, and control condition: Participants had a more favourable opinion about the exam if they conducted a face-to-face interview than in email

Dissimilar condition: More favourable opinion about the exam during an email interview than in person

Question 26

What is the Mere Exposure Effect described by Zajonc in 1968 and replicated over 200 times?

Answer 26

The more we are exposed to something, the more preference we show for it

Question 27

Why is it adaptive to prefer familiar things?

Answer 27

Stranger danger, eating known food rather than experimenting with poison, etc

Question 28

How did Zajonc research the mere exposure effect?

Answer 28

He used subliminal exposure of meaningless objects. People were more attracted to those which they had been more exposed to. The effect is stronger when subliminal.

Question 29

Conditioning and association: We like (and are more willing to comply with) people who are associated with positive feelings or events.

What type of conditioning is this reminiscent of?

How is this used in advertising?

Answer 29

Liking something which is associated with a desired object is reminiscent of Pavlovian conditioning; the bell is associated with the food.

eg hot models showing off cars

Question 30

What is the luncheon technique?

Answer 30

Liking (eg of a political statement) will be increased if people are eating when it is presented to them

Question 31

What is a heuristic process or method?

Answer 31

A heuristic process or method is one which allows someone to learn themselves as they’re going along

Question 32

How did Sherman (1980) demonstrate consistency and commitment in their door-to-door charity worker experiment?

Answer 32

If a confederate was sent a few weeks beforehand to ask how likely the inhabitant was to donate their time to collect money for a charity, there was a 700% increase in those willing than in the control condition where no prior ‘commitment’ was made (they were 7x more likely to agree).

Question 33

How is consistency and commitment related to the foot-in-the-door technique?

Answer 33

When people agree to smaller requests, they want to seem consistent and agree to the larger request

Question 34

How does cognitive dissonance relate to commitment and consistency?

Answer 34

We want to appear consistent so we bring our attitudes in line with our actions.

Question 35

Why did the foot-in-the-door technique cease to work in the Ukraine and Poland in 2013?

Answer 35

The social context has changed; there’s been too much market research and no-one is excited about it anymore, they’re not as gullible

Question 36

How does door-in-the-face work through reciprocity?

Answer 36

Door-in-the-face works via reciprocity because when the asker offers a ‘concession’ (smaller request) the askee feels an obligation to oblige by also make a concession (agreeing to smaller request)

Question 37

In Eastwick & Gardner’s (2009) online world FITD & DITF experiment, what were the results of each technique, and what was the result of the race manipulation?

Answer 37

In Eastwick & Gardner’s (2009) online world experiement, FITD and DITF were equally successful (75% compliance) compared to the control (55%).

However, if the requester was black, there was a decrease in compliance in the DITF technique, and increase if the requester was white (75% was in fact an average of the two).

Question 38

What is the low ball technique, as part of consistency and commitment?

Answer 38

Step 1. Requester gets compliance

Step2. Requester reveals hidden costs, but commitment has already been made

Question 39

in Milgrim’s famous obedience study, how many participants wouldn’t give and intense shock? An extreme shock? How many continued and delivered the lethal shock?

Answer 39

1 in 4 participants refused to give an intense shock, whereas a further 1 in 8 wouldn’t give an extreme shock.

However, 65% continued and delivered the lethal shock

Question 40

How did the instructions-by-phone manipulation affect the results of compliance to authority in the Milgrim experiment paradigm?

Answer 40

When instructions were given by phone, compliance for the lethal shock dropped from 65 to 25%

Question 41

How many nurses obeyed instruction by telephone from an unknown doctor to give a particular patient 20mg, 2ce the daily recommended dose of Astrogen, an uncleared drug in Holfling’s 1966 experiment?

Answer 41

95% of nurses obeyed

Question 42

How does the passing of time affect our compliance to information given by more of less authoritative figures?

Under what circumstances are these effects most reliable?

Answer 42

When we first hear a message, we discredit an unreliable source. However, over time, we disassociate the source from the message, therefore we may be vulnerable to that message from an unreliable source.

Also, we will discredit a reliable source over time, since we can’t remember the source, the attitudes lose their impact.

These effects are most reliable when you learn of the source after receiving the initial message. It won’t work if you’re reminded of the source before being asked your position.

Question 43

In Worchel et al.’s (1975) study, which cookies did participants rate as more delicious? Cookies from a jar containing 2 cookies or 10 cookies? Which principle does this demonstate?

Answer 43

Participants rated cookies from a jar with only 2 cookies as tastier. This demonstrates the principle of scarcity

Question 44

In Worchel et al.’s (1975) study, which cookies were rated the very best of all? Which 2 principles were in play?

Answer 44

The cookies rated the very best of all were cookies from a 2-cookie jar that had been replaced following the initial presentation of a 10-cookie jar. Participants were told the jar needed to be replaced due to demand for cookies from other experiment participants.

This condition demonstrates both social validation and scarcity