Social influence

Question 1

Social influence

Answer 1

The process by which our thoughts, feelings and behaviors are influenced by other people

Question 2

Conformity

Answer 2

The process whereby people change their beliefs, attitudes, actions, or perceptions to more closely match those held by groups to which they belong or want to belong or by groups whose approval they desire

Question 3

Informational social influence (ISI)

Answer 3

The want to be right about things. This can turn into us copying other people’s behaviors because you think they know more than you. E.g. when you don’t know which end of the line to queue at you would look to see where the people in front of you are queuing.

Question 4

Normative Social influence (NSI)

Answer 4

The want to be liked and accepted by others. We may change our normal behaviour to fit into a particular group of people.

Question 5

Social factors affecting conformity

Answer 5

Task difficulty, group size, anonymity

Question 6

Task difficulty

Answer 6

The more difficult a task the more likely we are to conform (ISI)

Question 7

Group size

Answer 7

The more people or the larger the group size the more likely we are to conform. (ISI)

Question 8

Anonymity

Answer 8

The more anonymous we are the less likely we are to conform (NSI)

Question 9

Dispositions factors affecting conformity

Answer 9

Personality and expertise

Question 10

Personality

Answer 10

The less positive a self esteem and IQ a person has will increase the amount they are likely to conform

Question 11

Expertise

Answer 11

The more expertise we have the less likely we are to confrom

Question 12

Locus of control

Answer 12

The sense we each have about what directs events in our lives

Question 13

Aim of Asch’s study

Answer 13

To investigate the extent to which social pressure from a majority, could affect a person to conform

Question 14

Participants of Asch’s study

Answer 14

123 American Male students

Question 15

Procedure of Asch’s study

Answer 15

There was 1 naive participant in each group. The rest of the people in the group were confederates.The confederates were told to give incorrect answer in 12/18 trials, namely critical trials The question was which line (A, B, or C) matched with line X. The naive participant was always last or close to answer, providing him with pressure to conform.

Question 16

Findings of Asch’s study

Answer 16

76% of people conformed at least once
37% of people conformed during all 12 critical trials
24% of people didn’t conform at all

Question 17

Conclusion of Asch’s study

Answer 17

People conform to fit into a group, even when they know they’re right. However, various factors affect conformity and some people are able to resist it.

Question 18

Weaknesses of Asch’s Study

Answer 18

Weakness -> generalisability -> all men and all students, not applicable to general society
Weakness -> low ecological value -> artificial and lab experiment, not applicable
Weakness -> validity -> tells more about the culture of 1950s america, more conservative, no one could have their own thoughts

Question 19

Internal Locus of Control

Answer 19

When people believe they are mostly responsible for what happens to them

Question 20

External Locus of control

Answer 20

believe it is mainly a matter of luck or outside forces

Question 21

Obedience

Answer 21

a type of social influence where someone acts in response to a direct order from a figure with percieved authority.

Question 22

agent

Answer 22

a person who acts on behalf of others

Question 23

milgrams agency theory

Answer 23

an individual will obey a figure of authority when they believe that the authority will take responsibility of the consequences of their actions
- Milgrams ppts believed the experimenter would take the responsibility and so did as they were told

Question 24

automous state

Answer 24

when you behave according to your own principles and feel responsible for your own actions

Question 25

agentic state

Answer 25

a mental state where we feel no responsibility for our behaviour because we believe ourselves to be acting to an authority figure

Question 26

agentic shift

Answer 26

change happens after an authority figure has been identified and an individual feels as they need to follow their commands

Question 27

how does proximity affect obedience?

Answer 27

the closer one is to an authority figure the more likely we are to obey them

Question 28

Fascism

Answer 28

a way of organizing a society in which a government ruled by a dictator controls the lives of the people and in which people are not allowed to disagree with the government.

Question 29

Liberism

Answer 29

political doctrine that takes protecting and enhancing the freedom of the individual to be the central problem of politic

Question 30

people high on the f-scale

Answer 30

• have exaggerated respect for authority
• more likely to obey
• look down on inferior social status

Question 31

Style of thinking from authoritarian

Answer 31

A rigid cognitive style - black in white thinking. For
example: they prefer to believe in rigid stereotypes that all men are bullies and all women are emotional.

Question 32

authoritarian

Answer 32

favoring or enforcing strict obedience to authority, especially that of the government, at the expense of personal freedom.

Question 33

Disadvantages of the f-scale

Answer 33

based on flawed questionaire
data correlation -> cant establish cause and effect. maybe other factors
millions of germans were obidiant cant all have ap
demand characteresitst

Question 34

How does an authoritarian personality develop?

Answer 34

When a child experiences overly strict parenting - their parents exert strong discipline over their children and are very critical of their child’s behaviour. The child would internalise these values and expect all people to behave like it.

Question 35

Scapegoating

Answer 35

People with authoritarian personalities need to displace their anger on someone else, someone inferior, in order to relieve their anxiety and hostility.

Question 36

Prosocial

Answer 36

beneficial to other people and may not necessarily benefit the helper

Question 37

Bystander behaviour

Answer 37

when individuals are compelled not to act in an emergency situation if other people are present

Question 38

bystander intervention

Answer 38

when a bystander does help the person in need

Question 39

bystander apathy

Answer 39

when a person doesn’t help the person in need

Question 40

diffusion of responsibility in terms of the bystander effect

Answer 40

the more bystanders that witness an incident, the less likely one of them will help

Question 41

pluralistic ignorance

Answer 41

When in situations, we often look at others and reacts based on what other people are doing. So, if no one is helping, we assume the event is not an emergency.

Question 42

Social factors affecting the bystander effect

Answer 42

the prescence of others
the cost of helping

Question 43

dispositional factors affecting the prosocial behaviour

Answer 43

similarity to the victim
expertise

Question 44

social factors affecting collective behaviour

Answer 44

social loafing
deindividuation
culture

Question 45

social loafing

Answer 45

putting less effort into doing something when you are with others doing the same thing

Question 46

deindividuation

Answer 46

when an individual loses their personal identity and takes on the group identity of the people around them

Question 47

collective behaviour

Answer 47

behaviour that emerges when a group of people join togehter. The group may behave in a way that is different from the way individuals might have behaved on their own. The group creates its own identity.

Question 48

Milgrams study aim

Answer 48

find out if ordinary American citizens would obey an unjust order from an authority figure and inflict pain on another person because they were instructed to

Question 49

Milgrams study procedure

Answer 49

40 male American Volunteers aged 20-50 paid $4.50 for participating at Yale University

Via a rigged draw, the subjects were chosen to play the role of learner or teacher. ppt was always teacher.

The learner was strapped into a chair and had electrodes attached to him, to prove the equipment was working, ppt received an initial 45 volt shock

Play word game and every mistake the learner made he would receive a shock increasing 15v each time

To standardize the learner unknown to the ppt played a recording of the screams

After 300 volts there was silence from the learner

To encourage the ppt (teacher) 4 standardized prods were used.

After the experiment finished, the teacher was fully debriefed about the true nature of the study & reintroduced to the learner, who had come to no harm

Question 50

milgram study results

Answer 50

100% went to 300V, 65% went to max 450V

Question 51

milgram study conclusion

Answer 51

people will obey a perceived authority figure to carry out harmful actions against other people

Question 52

Weaknesses of milgrams study

Answer 52

Generalisability, participants were all American males. So we can only generalise with caution to other cultures and genders about how they might behave when asked to carry out a sadistic act by an authority figure.
- puppy follow-up study

Ethics
- Deception was used-rigged draw therefore Milgram didn’t gain fully informed consent
- Right to withdraw was made difficult
- Psychological harm some ppts experienced seizures as they believed they were harming the learner
- Milgram carried out a debrief to ensure that ppts suffered no long lasting effects, he even changed the debrief by
allowing the teacher to see the learner again

Question 53

Advantages of milgrams study

Answer 53

Reliability Because Milgram used standardised procedures like a rigged draw and recorded screams it means that other researcher can check to see if they achieve the same results making the research replicable

Validity, because Milgram used deception it is argued that the ppts thought they were giving real shocks, this therefore lowers the chance of demand characteristics making his results of whether people are obedient more valid.

Applicable-Milgram’s results were eye opening for the world attempting to explain why people in say WW2 carried out such horrific acts like the final solution

Question 54

Extraneous variables of milgrams study

Answer 54

Yale University - a prestigious school in which people are more likely to obey figures with percieved authority