Social influence Flashcards
Who were the participants in Asch’s study?
123 American male volunteer.
What were Asch’s participants told the study was on?
Visual perception
What was the Aim of Asch’s study?
To investigate the degree to which individuals would conform to a majority who gave obviously wrong answers.
What was the procedure of Asch’s study?
- Individuals seated around a table in groups of 6-8 confederates.
- Asked which comparison line was the same length as the stimulus line, with an obvious answer.
- Turns were taken, with the participant always answering near the end.
- for the first 6/18 trials, the confeds gave correct answers, and in the following 12 ‘critical’ trials they gave identical wrong answers.
Was there a control group in Asch’s study? What was it?
36 participants tested individually on 20 trials to test the accuracy of individual judgements.
What were the findings of Asch’s study?
- The naïve participant gave the wrong answer 36.8% of the time.
- 5% gave the wrong answer for all 12 trials.
What was the error rate of Asch’s control group?
0.04% , showing how obvious the correct answers were.
What did the post-experiment interviews find the three main reasons for conformity were?
- conforming publicly to avoid disapproval, but not changing privately.
- Participants believed their own perceptions were wrong.
- Doubts concerning own views so conformed.
What were Asch’s conclusions?
As most conformed publicly but not privately, it suggests they were motivated by normative social influence (conforming to avoid disapproval).
What is undermining evidence for Asch’s study?
Research took place during the period of McCarthyism, a strong anti-communist period where people were likely to conform. Perrin and Spencer (1980) repeated in the UK with science and engineering students and found that in only 1/396 trials did the majority unanimously give the wrong answer.
What is a weakness of Asch’s study to do with gender?
Asch only tested American males, and research has found that women may be more conformist.
What are the three variations of Asch’s study?
- Task difficulty
- Group Size
- Unanimity
What were the findings of Asch’s group size variation?
- Very little conformity with only one confederate.
- 31.8% conformity with three confederates.
- After that, increasing confederates led to little difference.
What were the findings of Asch’s task difficulty study?
With a negligible difference between the lines conformity increased due to informational social influence.
What were the findings of Asch’s Unanimity variation?
The presence of a dissenting confederate giving a different wrong answer increase conformity to 9%, and when they gave a different correct answer it was 5%.
What was Lucas Et Als. research?
- Found that when participants were given easy and hard maths problems, and found greater conformity to the other (fake) answers when the Q was hard. Participants with maths ability conformed less - suggesting issue is more complex.
What is the supporting evidence for the task difficulty variation?
Lucas et. al
What is a weakness of all of Asch’s variations?
They had to speak their answer aloud in a group of strangers, so would have wanted to impress leading to higher conformity, so findings lack external validity.
What is a weakness of all of Asch’s variations? (MR)
Unrealistic situation lacking mundane realism - trivial task, high disagreement, un-diverse group.
What is compliance?
We outwardly agree but privately disagree. Change only lasts as long as group monitors us.
What is identification?
Where we value the group, but don’t necessarily agree with everything they say. Agreement is public and sometimes private.
What is internalisation?
Where we agree privately and publicly because we accept the view as correct.
What is Normative social influence?
Where we agree in order to gain approval.
What is informational social influence?
Where we agree because we think the majority are correct and we want to be right.
What is undermining evidence for NSI?
People less concerned by being liked will be less influence by NSI.
What is undermining evidence for ISI?
Not everyone effected in the same way - those more confident in ability e.g. students will conform less.
What is supporting evidence for NSI?
When asked, participants said they gave a clearly wrong answer because they felt self-conscious. When participants could write down their answers, conformity fell to 12.5%
What are social roles?
The parts people play as members of various social groups e.g. parent, child.
What was Zimbardo’s aim?
Why prison guards act brutally, is it down to personality or circumstance?
What was Zimbardo’s procedure?
Mock prison experiment in the basement of Stanford Prison and assigned 21(tested as emotionally stable) men the role of prisoner or guard. Uniform was enforced, right to withdraw was made ‘applying for parole’ and guards were reminded of their power.
What were Zimbardo’s results?
Guards were quickly violent and aggressive. Played prisoners off against each other, with everyone shaming those on hunger strike. Woke prisoners at night to disorientate them.
When did Zimbardo have to end the study?
At 6 days instead of 14.
What was Zimbardo’s conclusion?
Social roles strongly influence people’s behaviour, and the roles were easily taken on.
What is the undermining evidence from the BBC prison study?
Richer and Haslam - Found that prisoners eventually took control of the mock experiment due to ‘social identity theory’, which suggests that because the prisoners could identify with a group, unlike the guards, they could rebel against the guards.
What is the supporting evidence from Abu Ghraib?
A prison in Iran where prisoners were abused by guards, which Zimbardo argued was due to the guards assigned power, suggesting his study, which shows the same effects, has high external validity.
What are the ethical issues with Zimbardo’s study?
Lack of informed consent, no protection from hard, right to withdraw made difficult.
How does Legitimacy of Authority work?
- identified as legitimate authority figure due to: location (office -> status), uniform (status), proximity (power to punish).
- People obey to fill their duty to the social hierarchy.
- If commands are potentially harmful, they have to be made within an institutional structure e.g. army.
How does Agentic State Theory work?
- Start in autonomous state.
- perceive legitimate authority figure and enter agentic state (see themselves as agent of the authority figure) so increased chance of obedience (agentic shift).
- Occurs in hierarchical social systems.
- People may enter agentic state to maintain positive self-image.
- Binding factors keep people in agentic state e.g. fear of losing job.
What happened at My Lai? (real world application of both theories)
War crime where 504 civilians killed by soldiers, with women gang-raped. Only one soldier found guilty, said he was just doing orders. - high external validity.
What is undermining evidence for the Agentic State?
Research suggests that Nazi behaviour cannot be explained by AS as there were no direct orders for many actions. Doesn’t explain obedience in every situation.
What is supporting evidence for legitimacy of authority?
Explains cultural differences in obedience, as studies show differences between countries e.g. Milgram.
What is a dispositional explanation?
Any explanation of behaviour which highlights the individual’s personality.
What is the authoritarian personality?
The type of personality which is particularly suspectable to obeying those in authority
What was the procedure of Adorno et als. study (1950)?
- Study of 2000 middle-class white Americans and their unconscious attitudes towards other ethnic groups.
- The F-Scale (potential-for-fascism-scale) was used to measure the authoritarian personality.
What is an example of an item on the F-Scale?
- ‘Obedience and respect for authority are the most important virtues for children to learn’
