Conformity to Majority : Asch

Question 1

What was the aim of Asch’s study in 1951?

Answer 1

To see if participants would yield (conform) to majority social influence and give incorrect answers in a situation where the correct answers were always obvious.

Question 2

What were the procedures of Asch’s study?

Answer 2

-Used 123 male college students as genuine participant in first study.
-7 male students looked at 2 cards, one showing a vertical line, the other showing 3 of different lengths.
-Had to call out in turn which line was the same length as the test line.
-All participants, except 1, were accomplices - ‘confederates’. The genuine participant always gave answer second last.
-Accomplices gave unanimous wrong answer on 12/18 trials (critical trials)

Question 3

What were the findings of Asch’s study?

Answer 3

-Participants conformed in 32% of critical trials.
-74% conformed at least once.
-26% never conformed. Most experienced tension and doubt but managed to resist pressure from majority.
-During post-experimental interviews, some claimed to conform to avoid being ridiculed or excluded, others conformed because they thought they had inaccurate perception of the lines.

Question 4

What were the conclusions of Asch’s study?

Answer 4

-In ambiguous situations there still may be strong group pressure, especially if the group is a unanimous majority.
-People go along with views of others from different reasons.
-Some experience normative social influence - accepting mistaken majority and conform to avoid rejection.
-Some experience informational pressures - doubting their own judgement.

Question 5

What is a strength of Asch’s study?

Answer 5

Highly controlled lab experiment:
-A complex social situation reduced to elements in a lab.
-Controlled number of people present and use of confederates to ensure pressure could be applied and manipulated.
-Could manipulate independent variables (group size, difficulty, unanimity)
Allows Asch to establish cause and effect - most likely reason was presence of confederates with incorrect answer.

Question 6

What are 3 limitations of Asch’s study?

Answer 6

Used an artificial task and lacks ecological validity:
-Participants knew they were taking part - demand characteristics.
-Placed in groups of strangers, given a relatively trivial task - no reason to conform.
Findings don’t generalise to real life - normally takes place in groups with friends, colleagues etc - more direct interaction.

Criticised for lacking temporal/historical validity:
-Conducted in the 50s - conformist period at grip with McCarthyism - makes sense for participants to conform.
-Perrin & Spencer repeated with engineering students UK 1980 - only 1 conformed in 396 trials - may have felt more confident about measuring lines (engineering).
Asch effect not consistent across different situations and time - may not be a fundamental feature of human behaviour.

Population validity - ‘Beta-Biased’:
-Only used men, research suggests women might be more conformist - possibly more concerned about social relationships and being accepted.
-Suggested many studies are gender biased as focus on ‘masculine’ content - generally accepted that men are more knowledgeable of issue - would be expected to be less open to influence.
Women are not tested no represented in an accurate and valid way.