1.1 Conformity

Question 1

What is conformity?

Answer 1

Conformity occurs when a person changes their belief or behaviour to align with the norms of a group.

Question 2

What can cause conformity?

Answer 2

There is no direct instruction for an individual to conform but a person may feel pressure to conform. This can be through bullying, persuasion, criticism etc.

Question 3

Does the group need to be present for an individual to conform?

Answer 3

The group does not need to be present, even an ‘imagined group’ of other individuals can make someone feel pressure to conform.

Question 4

What did Sherif (1935) test?

Answer 4

Sherif researched whether people are influenced by other when they’re doing an ambiguous task (one where the answer isn’t clear) and tested the effects of informational social influence.

Question 5

What was the method Sherif (1935) used?

Answer 5

This was a laboratory experiment with a repeated measure design. Sherif used a visual illusion called the autokinetic effect, where a stationary spot of light appears to move in a dark room. Participants were told that Sherif would move the light. They had to estimate how far it moved and in the first phase, they had to individually make repeated estimates. They were then put into groups of 3, where they discussed their estimated before being retested again individually.

Question 6

What were the results in the Sherif (1935) experiment?

Answer 6

When alone, participants developed their own stable estimates (personal norms), which varied widely between participants. Once the participants were in a group, the estimates tended to converge and become more alike. When they were retested on their own, their estimates were more like the group estimates than their original guesses.

Question 7

What conclusion did Sherif (1935) come to?

Answer 7

Participants were influenced by the estimates of other people, and a group norm developed. Estimates converged because participants used information from others to help them, they were affected by information social influence.

Question 8

What is the good evaluation of the Sherif (1935) research?

Answer 8

This was a laboratory experiment, so there was strict control of variables. This means the results are unlikely to have been affected by a third variable, so it should be possible to establish cause and effect. The method could be replicated. The repeated measures design meant that participant variables that could have affected the results were kept constant.

Question 9

What is the bad evaluation of the Sherif (1935) research?

Answer 9

The method is flawed because the participants were being asked to judge the movement of a light that wasn’t moving. This rarely happens in real life, so, because it created an artificial situation, the study can be criticised for lacking ecological validity. The sample used was quite limited, all the participants were male, so the results can’t be generalised to everyone. An ethical problem with this study was deception - the participants were told the light was moving when it wasn’t.

Question 11

What did Asch (1951) test?

Answer 11

Asch wanted to see whether people would conform to a majority’s incorrect answer in an unambiguous task (one where the answer is obvious) and looked at the effects of normative social influence.

Question 12

What method was used in Asch (1951)?

Answer 12

Asch carried out a laboratory experiment with an independent group design. In groups of 8, participants judged the lengths by saying out loud which comparison line matched the standard line. Each group contained only one real participants, the others were confederates. The real participant was always last but one so they heard other’s answers before giving theirs. Each participant did 18 trials. On 12 of these (critical trials) the confederates all gave the same wrong answer. There was also a control group, where the participants judged the line lengths in isolation.

Question 13

What were the results of Asch (1951) experiment?

Answer 13

In the control trials, participants gave the wrong answer 0.7% of the time. In the critical trials, participants conformed to the majority (gave the wrong answer) 37% of the time. 75% conformed at least once. Afterwards, some participants said they didn’t really believe their answers, but didn’t want to look different.

Question 14

What conclusion did Asch (1951) come to?

Answer 14

The control conditions showed that the task was easy to get right. However, 37% were wrong on the critical trials, they conformed to the majority due to normative social influence.

Question 15

What was the good evaluation of Asch (1951) study?

Answer 15

This was a laboratory experiment, so there was good control of the variables. This minimised the effects of extraneous variables. Strict control of variables also means that you could easily repeat the study to see if you get the same results.

Question 16

What was the bad evaluation of Asch (1951) study?

Answer 16

The participants weren’t in a natural situation, the study lacks ecological validity. Whether they were right or wrong didn’t really matter to the participants, they might have been less likely to conform if there answer had real-life consequences. In terms of ethics, the participants were deceived and might have been embarrassed when they found out the true nature of the study.

Question 17

What factors were Asch’s participants influenced by?

Answer 17

Situational factors

Question 18

What are situational factors?

Answer 18

Situational factors are due to the social situation a person is in.

Question 19

Evaluate group size as a situational factor.

Answer 19

Asch (1956) conducted his conformity experiment with different numbers of confederates as the majority. With only two confederates, the real participant conformed on only 14% of the critical trials. With three confederates, conformity rose to 32%. There was little change to conformity rates after that - no matter how big the majority group got. So, very small majorities are easier to resist than larger ones. But influence doesn’t keep increasing with the size of the majority.

Question 20

Evaluate unanimity/social support as a situational factor.

Answer 20

Asch conducted another version to test the effect of having a supporter in the group. Rather than the confederates forming a unanimous majority, one of the confederates agrees with the participant. Having a fellow dissenter (someone who disagrees with the majority) broke the unanimity of the group, which made it easier for the participant to resist the pressure to conform - the rate of conformity fell to 5.5%.

Question 21

Evaluate task difficulty as a situational factor.

Answer 21

When Asch made the task more difficult by making the lines more similar, conformity levels increased. People are more likely to conform if they’re less confident that they’re correct.

Question 22

What are dispositional factors?

Answer 22

Dispositional factors are due to the person’s internal characteristics.

Question 23

Evaluate confidence and expertise as a dispositional factor.

Answer 23

When Asch debriefed his participants, he found a common factor of confidence in the people who hadn’t conformed. If someone felt confident in their judgements, they were more able to resist group pressure.
Wiesenthal el al (1976) found that if people felt competent in a task, they were less likely to conform.
Perrin and Spencer (1980) replicated Asch’s study with participants who were engineering students. Conformity levels were much lower. This could have been due to the fact that engineers had confidence in their skills in making accurate observations.

Question 24

Evaluate gender as a dispositional factor.

Answer 24

Until the mid-1970s, the dominant view was that females conform more than males. Then Eagly and Carli did a load of research that suggests it might not be as simple as all that.
Eagly and Carli (1981) did a meta-analysis of conformity research, where they re-analysed data from a number of studies. They did find some sex differences in conformity, but the differences were inconsistent. The clearest difference between men and women was in Asch-like studies where there was group pressure from an audience.
Eagly (1987) argued that men and women’s different social roles explain the difference in conformity - women are more concerned with group harmony, so are more likely to agree with others. Assertiveness and independence are valued male attributes, so maintaining your own opinion under pressure fits with the perceived male social role.