Social influence Flashcards
(61 cards)
What is conformity
A change in behaviour or opinion due to real or imagined pressure from a person or group
What are the 3 types of conformity?
-Compliance
-identification
-internalisation
What is compliance?
Conforming publicly to get approval/avoid disapproval,but continuing to privately disagree
What is identification?
We act the same as the group because we share their values and we want to be accepted. This change of belief or behaviour is often temporary and stops when the person is no longer a member of the group
What is internalisation?
A person conforms publicly and privately because they have internalised and accepted the views of the group. It is permanent and will exist even when the person is no longer a member of the group
who developed a 2 process theory which proposes why people conform
deutsch and gerard (1955)
what are the two reasons why people conform according to deutsch an gerard
- they need to be right
- they need to be liked
what is normative social influence
what is informational social influence
-normative social influence is conforming to the majority to avoid rejection or being seen as an outcast, driven by a desire to be liked and gain social approval
- informationl social infulence is an explanation of conformity which says we agree with the opinion of the majority because we believe it is correct
when does informational social influence occur
-in new situations
-in ambiguous situations
-when there’s a expert present
-when there’s a crisis and a decision needs to be made quickly
when would normative social influence likely to occur
-situations with strangers where you feel concerned about rejection
-stressful situations when we have the need for social support
what is aschs study about
asch conducted a series of line studies that demonstrated the effects of social influence on conformity
state the procedure asch used and the findings in his study
- study involed 123 male college students
-the participants were tested one at a time
-they were seated at a table with 6 other men (confederates)
-real participants were seated at the end of the table so they were always last when giving answers
-participants were shown 3 comparison lines and one standard line
-they were asked to say which of the 3 comparison lines are the same as the 1 standard line
-the men had to give their answers out loud
-the real participants was always last or second to last to answer - there were 18 trials and 12 were critical trials where the confederates all gave the wrong answer . the test was to see if the real participants would also give the wrong answer in these trials
-aschs study showed a significant degree of conformity because 75% of participants conformed atleast once whilest 5% conformed every time and the overall conformity rate in the critical trials was around 32%
what happened when Asch increased group size
- Asch varied the number of confederates from 1 to 16
- when there was only 1 confederate the conformity rate was 3%
-when there was 2 confederates the conformity rate increased to 13% - when there was 3 confederates conformity jumped significantly to 33%
-conformity rate stays steady after 3 confederates, the conformity remained 31% at 16 confederates
this suggests the presence of a small group has a strong social pressure but beyond a certain point group size does not proportionally increase this pressure
how does unanimity affect Asch study
Asch placed a confederate second to last before real participant to give an correct answer , however the rest of the confederates were told to say incorrect answers out loud
-Asch found that conformity rates dropped to 5.5%
-suggests the presence of a dissenter provides social support and reduces conformity
how did task difficulty affect Asch study
- Asch repeated the the experiment with smaller difference between the line lengths , making task more ambiguous
-in this more difficult condition the rate of conformity increased
-Asch argued this was due to participants being more uncertain about their judgments
evaluate aschs study
- a limitation of aschs study is Sample bias: Asch used all American, all male, undergraduates. This is a weakness
because it is not representative of the whole population for example it does not tell
us about women. Other research suggests that women might be more conformist,
possibly because they are more concerned about social relationships than men. which means it lacks gerelisability
-another limitation is It has low temporal validity. Asch’s study has been criticised as it represents 1950s America which was
a time of particular conformity (Mccarthyism). This is a weakness because it does
not tell us about conformity in a more modern time. Perhaps Asch’s findings were
simply a product of the time. For example, Perrin and Spencer (1980) reproduced
Asch’s study with British students. Their study found considerably less
conformity. 1 conforming response in 396 trials. This is a limitation because the
results from Asch’s study is not consistent with time
-however a final limitation is Ethical issues: Asch deceived the participants about the true aim of the study. They believed that
the study was about visual perception, whereas in fact it was about conformity.
This is a weakness because the participants were not able to give their informed
consent. It is also argued the experiement involved psychological harm, with
participants put under stress through disagreeing with others.
what is Zimbardo’s research about
Zimbardo’s research is about people conforming into their social roles he researched this by assigning participants roles as prisoners or guards
how was Zimbardo’s research conducted and what was his findings (AO1)
-Zimbardo converted a basement of the Stanford University psychology building into a mock prison
-He advertised for students to play the roles of prisoners and guards
-he did an emotional stability check on these participants and randomly assigned them the roles of guards and prisoners.
-those who were assigned the roles of a guards wore khaki uniform and reflective sunglasses
-whilst those who were assigned the role as prisoner’s were arrested at the middle of the night and handcuffed and put into a cell where they got stripped, searched and deloused and got given to wear schmocks which had nothing but their ID number
-guards were told to exert authority but not use any physical harm
zimbardoes research found that every participant conformed to their social role
evaluate Zimbardo’s research (A03)
-An limitation in zimbardoes research is it lacks reliability due to (Reicher & Haslam 2006): They conducted a study very similar
to Zimbardo’s prison experiment assigning men to the role of guard or prisoner in a
prison setting. The key finding of this study was that participants did not conform
automatically to their assigned roles. The guards failed to identify with their role
which made them reluctant to impose their authority on the prisoner. which means its also ungeneralizable due to cultural factors
-another limitation is Ethical issues: the prisoners were exposed to what most people would regard as an unacceptable amount of humiliation and distress. Zimbardo acknowledges that perhaps the prison study should have been stopped earlier as so many participants were experiencing emotional distress
-a strength is the study is well controlled: because Zimbardo picked participants that were “emotionally stable” which means he was able to control individual differences as an extraneous variable in his study and he randomly assigned participants to their social roles which means he didn’t biasedly place those with confident personality as the role of the guard to suit the hypothesis of his study. this is an strength because it increases internal validity because we can be confident that findings were influenced by roles themselves rather than individual differences
what is Milgram’s study about?
Milgram conducted a study to see whether people would obey a legitimate authority figure when given instructions to harm another human beings. he done this via making participants electric shot the confederate (learner) when the learner gave the wrong answer.
how was milgrams study conducted and what where his findings (A01)
-Milgram wanted to investigate what caused the individuals to obey a perceived authority figure especially those who obeyed Hitlers orders in WW2
-Milgram advertised his obedience experiment as a memory study and picked 40 male participants
-participants were greeted by individuals they assumed were a scientist in a lab coat and another participant (however these are confederates)
-the roles assigned to the participant was teacher and the role assigned to the confederates was learner, this was due to a fixed setup
- the teacher (which is the real participant) saw the confederate get strapped into a chair and connected to electrodes, and then was led to another room
-the teachers task was to ask the learner questions and give an electric shock for wrong answers (the volts increased by 15v each time)
-at 300v the learner would pound on the wall and after 315v the learner would become silent
-if the teacher (participant) refused to continue administering shocks the scientist would use prods such as “please continue” and “its essential that you continue” and “you have no other choice, you must go on”
Milgram’s findings:
-100% participants shocked up to 300 volts
-65% participants continued all the way to 450 volts
evaluate Milgram’s study (A03)
+Milgram’s use of standardised procedures such as pre-recording of the learners response and the clear script for the experimenter to follow, led to high levels of control, ensuring that each participant had precisely the same experience. those clear instructions also enabled replications by Milgram and other researchers. the results found in Milgram’s original experiment have been shown by Blass to be reliable both across 8 additional countries and across time periods
-Milgram’s original experiment and later variations have been criticised for multiple methodological flaws. because task such as using a shock generator lacks mundane realism, the task is not realistic compared to everyday life. additionally the study also lacks ecological validity because the environment of Yale university is not normal for the participants. Orne & Holland claim the task was so unusual that the participants figured out they were not actually shocking anyone they’re just acting on demand characteristics by guessing what Milgram’s aims are and acting accordingly.
+/- Milgram’s research methods are considered highly unethical because his participants suffered from emotional distress during the study since they found it difficult to withdraw due to the prods given by the experimenter, they also were deceived as they thought they were taking part in an memory study not an obedience study which also means they were unable to provide informed consent. however it can be argued that these decisions were necessary for Milgram to conduct his research.
what are 2 explanation of obedience?
-agentic state
-legitimacy of authority
what is the agentic state?
the agentic state is a mental state in which the individual sees themselves as acting as the agent of (acting behalf on) an authority figure. they dont feel guilt or responsibility for their actions
