Social Influence 1: Majority Influence Flashcards
what is the ‘autokinetic effect’?
sherif 1936 - an illusion where a light shown in a dark room on a dark screen appears to move when it doesn’t. a group of male participants were asked to determine how much the dot had moved. the findings showed that our perception of ambiguous physical reality is greatly influenced by other’s judgements
what was Asch’s paradigm and what were the findings?
participants were presented with 3 lines, 2 of which matched in length. they were asked which ones matched. 37% of responses were incorrect when there were confederates saying the wrong answer (majority influence)
but -
63% were correct, and 95% of participants gave a correct response at least once despite the majority of the group giving wrong ones
when do people conform?
- asch showed that increasing the group size increased the conformity up to a certain point. group size has more influence on ‘tastes’ and ‘trends’- the bigger the group the more conformity
- people are more likely to conform when the majority is unanimous, when the majority is not unanimous there is a drop in conformity
- the degree of conformity varied between cultures: highest conformity was found in collectivist cultures
how do people conform?
distortion of perception (conforming without awareness)
distortion of judgement (doubting themselves)
distortion of action
why do we conform?
deutsch and gerard 1955:
informational social influence - accepting the majority as right, wanting to make an accurate judgement
normative social influence - compliance without acceptance, need for approval
turner 1982:
referent informational influence - conformity dependent on social position/group. if majority is in the ‘ingroup’ = conformity. if majority is in ‘outgroup’ = non conformity
what did abrams 1990 find?
in private, conformity was similar with majority ingroups and outgroups, but in public we are more likely to conform with in groups and a lot less likely to conform with outgroups
