social influence - conformity Flashcards

Question

how did asch investigate unanimity? (a second time)

Answer 1

-in another variation, one of the confederates gave a different incorrect answer to the majority -conformity dropped to 9%

Answer 2

-if you break or disrupt the group's unanimous position, then conformity is reduced significantly, even if the answer provided by the supporter is still incorrect

Answer 3

-in asch's original experiment, the correct answer was always obvious (unambiguous) -in one of his variations he made the task more difficult, by making the difference between the line lengths smaller and therefore appear closer together and more ambiguous -he found that the rate of conformity increased, although he didn't report the percentage

Answer 4

individuals look to another for guidance when undertaking an ambiguous/difficult task

Answer 5

-asch altered the amount of confederates in the experiment each time to see how this affected the rate of conformity

Answer 6

1 confederate = 3% 2 confederates = 12.8% 3 confederates = 32-37% (little changed in conformity once the group size reached 4-5) 15 confederates = 29%

Answer 7

conformity tends to increase as the size of the group increases

Answer 8

group size - asch varied the number of confederates by adding and removing confederates unanimity - asch sometimes arranged for a confederate to give a different answer to the majority/same answer as the real participant task difficulty - asch made the right answer less obvious by having lines of similar length, making the task more ambiguous

Answer 9

-sample was biased -low ecoval -lack of temporal validity -there is further research to question the validity of asch's findings -ethically questionable

Answer 10

P - asch’s initial sample was biased E - asch used 123 male students from colleges in america ↳ we cannot generalise the results to other populations, eg: female students, as we are unable to conclude whether female students would have conformed in a similar way to male students E - participants were from the USA (individualistic culture) ↳ it has been suggested that conformity rates are higher in collectivist cultures e.g. china which are more concerned with group needs L - asch's sample lacks population validity & **further research is required to determine whether males and females and other cultures conform differently**

Answer 11

P - asch’s experiment has low levels of ecological validity E - asch's line judgement task, is an artificial task, which does not reflect conformity in everyday life (the line task was trivial so there was no reason to conform) ↳ the naive participants were in a 'group' but not like groups found in everyday life) which means the task lacks mundane realism L - we are unable to generalise the results of asch to other real-life situations, such as why people may start smoking or drinking around friends, and therefore these results are limited in their application to everyday life

Answer 12

how much a study reflects real life

Answer 13

P - asch's study is criticised for being 'a child of its time (1951) E - asch's research took place at a particular time in US history (McCarthyism - a period of strong anti-communist feelings where people were scared to be different) it is challenged that the relatively high levels of conformity found in asch's research in the 1950s are more relative of the particular social climate operating in the USA at that time, than of a universal human behaviour L - suggests that asch’s experiment lacks historical/temporal validity and **the conformity rates found in 1950 may not provide an accurate reflection of conformity in modern times**

Answer 14

P - there is further research to question the validity of asch's findings E - perrin and spencer (1980) replicated asch's research using british maths and engineering students and found significantly lower levels of conformity (only one conforming response out of 396 trials) L - suggests that asch's experiment lacks historical/temporal validity and the conformity rates found in 1950 may not provide an accurate reflection of conformity in modern times

Answer 15

P - asch’s study was ethically questionable E - asch’s deceived the participants (they thought it was a vision test) asch didn’t protect ppts from harm (many ppts felt stressed when disagreeing) L - it’s unethical

Answer 16

agreeing with the majority because we want to be liked/don’t want to be rejected

Answer 17

agreeing with the majority view/behavior because we believe they know better/are more likely to be right

Answer 18

the need to be liked

Answer 19

the need to be right

Answer 20

-emotional rather than a cognitive process

Answer 21

conformity

Answer 22

-social impact theory (when group membership and social approval are important to us) -the group size is larger - i.e. 4 or more -the person perceives some cost associated with not conforming (rejection)

Answer 23

identification or internalisation: individuals believe that they are conforming to the 'correct' values

Answer 24

it is a cognitive process

Answer 25

-in a situation that is new to a person (so you don't know what is right) -in an ambiguous situation (the right course of action is not clear) -the situation is a crisis -we believe others to be experts

Answer 26

-asch's study into conformity supports NSI -there is research support for ISI -individual differences may play a role in explaining social influence -NSI does not affect everyone's behaviour in the same way -asch's research into task difficulty supports ISI -it is sometimes unclear whether behaviour is due to NSI or ISI

Answer 27

P - asch's study into conformity provides research support for NSI E - asch found that many of his participants went along with a clearly wrong answer just because other people did ↳ when asked why they did this, some of them said they felt self-conscious giving the correct answer and were afraid of disapproval L - this supports the NSI as an explanation of conformity because it suggests that people do conform to situations due to a fear, rejection or social disapproval

Answer 28

P - there is research support for informational social influence E - lucas (2006) asked students to give answers to mathematical problems that were easy or hard ↳ there was greater conformity to incorrect answers when they were difficult rather than when they were easier questions (this was most true for students who rated their mathematical ability as poor) L - study shows that people conform in situations where they feel they don't know the answer, which is exactly the outcome predicted by the ISI explanation. we look to other people and assume they know better than us and must be right

Answer 29

P - individual differences may play a role in explaining social influence, which means that the processes will not affect everyone's behaviour in the same way E - perrin and Spencer (1980) conducted an Asch-style experiment, using engineering students in the UK ↳ only one conforming response was observed out of nearly 400 trials ↳ this could be because the students felt more confident in their ability to judge line lengths or due to a change in the time in history L - there are differences in how individuals respond to ISI and NSI

Answer 30

P - NSI does not affect everyone's behaviour in the same way E - people who are less concerned with being liked are less affected by NSI than those who care more about being liked ↳ McGhee and Teevan (1967) found that students who have a high need for affiliation are more likely to conform L - the desire to be liked underlies conformity for some people more than others. therefore, there are individual differences in the way people respond to NSI

Answer 31

P - asch's research into task difficulty provides research support for the role of informational social influence E - asch found that conformity increased when the task was made more difficult and the ppts were unsure of the correct answer ↳ this was due to informational social influence, as they believed that the group were more likely to be correct, in comparison to themselves L - the results show that when in an ambiguous situation a person will look to others (who know more / better) for guidance (ISI)

Answer 32

P - it is sometimes unclear whether behaviour is due to NSI or ISI E - conformity was reduced when there was a dissenting partner in the Asch experiment ↳ this dissenter may reduce the power of NSI (by providing social support) or reduce the power of ISI (because they are an alternative source of information) L - it isn't always possible to know whether ISI or NSI is at work, this questions the view of ISI and NSI as operating independently in conforming behaviour

Answer 33

when an individual adopts a particular behaviour and belief, while in a particular social situation

Answer 34

identification -a person changes their public behaviour and private beliefs, but only while they are in a particular social role

Answer 35

by observing the social roles of others and conforming to this behaviour

Answer 36

zimbardo (1971)

Answer 37

the US navy: -they were interested in the causes of conflict between guards and prisoners in naval prisons -the aim was to test weather the brutality of prison guards was due to sadistic personalities or whether it was created by the situation

Answer 38

from an ad in a newspaper

Answer 39

1) to examine whether people would conform to the social roles of a prison guard or prisoner when placed in a mock prison environment 2) to examine whether the behaviour displayed in prisons was due to dispositional factors or situational factors

Answer 40

part of our personality as humans

Answer 41

the environment that a person is in

Answer 42

21 male university students

Answer 43

75 volunteers - on the basis of their physical and mental stability

Answer 44

random assignment ↳ prisoner or guard

Answer 45

in the basement of Stanford University, which was turned into a mock prison to make the experiment as realistic as possible

Answer 46

-the 'prisoners' were arrested by real local police -fingerprinted, stripped and given a numbered smocked to wear -chains were placed around their ankles

Answer 47

-uniforms -dark reflective sunglasses -handcuffs -a truncheon

Answer 48

IV: the conditions the ppts were randomly assigned to DV: the resulting behaviour

Answer 49

-both the prisoners and guards quickly identified with their social roles -within hours of beginning the experiment some guards began to harass prisoners and treat them harshly -within two days the prisoners rebelled -the guards used fire extinguishers to retaliate -the prisoners soon adopted prisoner-like behaviour too e.g. snitched, took prison rules seriously; they increasingly became docile and obedient -the guards became more aggressive and assertive

Answer 50

-waking them during the night for headcount’s -forcing them to clean toilets with their bare hands

Answer 51

-five of the prisoners were released from the experiment early -they had adverse reactions to the physical and mental torment -eg: crying and extreme anxiety.

Answer 52

after 6 days rather than 2 weeks: -zimbardo was told that the conditions were inhumane

Answer 53

-people quickly conform to social roles, even when the role goes against their moral principles -situational factors were largely responsible for the behaviour found, as none of the participants had ever demonstrated these behaviours previously -power may corrupt those who wield it i.e. the guards over the prisoners -institutions may brutalise people and result in deindividuation

Answer 54

complete loss of personal identity

Answer 55

-the ppts were unable to focus on who they were and so fell into the role of being prisoner (strip-down, labelling of the prisoners as numbers) → both uniforms created a loss of the individual's personal identity, meaning they would be more likely to conform to their perceived social role

Answer 56

-internal validity -real world applications

Answer 57

-ethical issues -lack of realism -individual differences and personality

Answer 58

P - that the researchers had some control over variables E - emotionally stable participants were recruited and randomly assigned the roles of guard or prisoner ↳ the guards and prisoners had those roles by chance, this means that their behaviour was more likely to be due to the **pressures of the situation** and not their personalities ↳ control over variables increases the internal validity of the findings L - we can be more confident in drawing conclusions about the influences of social roles on

Answer 59

-the guards at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq (2003) were similarly attected by an 'evil situation' which led them to behave in ways which they would normally reject -just like some of the guards in Zimbardo's prison study, the real-life guards at Abu Ghraib were very creative in their evil behaviour

Answer 60

P - zimbardo was also conforming to the social role of prison superintendent, he was not able to fulfil his main ethical responsibility (the welfare of his participants) E - instead, they were exposed to the risk of psychological harm ↳ eg: ppts were finally allowed to leave the study, but later than they should have been L - zimbardo should have given up one or other of his roles. ↳ eg: he could have remained as the lead researcher, let him be detached from the study & more objective about what was happening to his participants. HOWEVER: zimbardo's study could be considered ethical because he followed the guidelines of the Stanford University ethics committee that had approved the research

Answer 61

P - individual differences and personality also determine the extent to which a person conforms to social roles E- in zimbardo's original experiment the behaviour of the guards varied dramatically, from extremely sadistic behaviour displayed by around one third of the participants in that role, to a few guards who actually helped the prisoners by offering support, sympathy, offering them cigarettes and reinstating any privileges L - suggests that situational factors are not the only cause of conformity to social roles, and dispositional factors such as personality also play a role, implying that Zimbardo's conclusion about conformity to social roles, could have been overstated

Answer 62

P - lack of realism E -has been suggested that the participants were play-acting ↳ their performances reflected stereotypes of how prisoners and guards are supposed to behave ↳ one guard based his role on a character from the film 'cold hand luke'. ↳ prisoners rioted because that is what they thought real prisoners COUNTER: ↳ zimbardo's data showed that 90% of prisoners conversations were about prison life, which means that the simulation did seem real to them ↳ increases the study's internal validity

social influence - conformity Flashcards

(91 cards)