Social Influence New Flashcards
(30 cards)
Define social influence
Implicit/explicit pressure that causes a temporary/permanent change in another person’s attitudes/behaviour.
Define obedience
- When a person changes their attitudes/behaviour due to an explicit order.
- It occurs within a hierarchy
Define conformity
-when a person changes their attitudes/behaviour due to implied pressure from another..
- it occurs amongst people with equal status.
- there’s 3 types, compliance, identification and internalisation.
Who identified the 3 types of conformity?
Kelman
Define compliance as a type of conformity
- short-term change in public behaviour but private remains the same.
- occurs easily to temporarily fit in or avoid conflict.
- only lasts while in the presence of the majority group
- shallowest form as its only public change.
- supporting evidence = Asch
Define identification as a type of conformity
- lasting change in public and private attitudes to show group membership.
- occurs moderately easily to show a sense of belonging to the majority group but only lasts whilst they identify with them.
- a deeper form than compliance as it causes genuine and lasting change in both public and private attitudes
- supporting evidence = Zimbardo
Define internalisation as a type of conformity
- permanent change in public and private attitudes as they genuinely agree with the majority group. Doesn’t occur easily as it involves meaningful change that lasts despite the presence of the majority group.
-its the deepest form. - supporting evidence from Jenness.
Who came up with the explanations for conformity?
Deutsch and Gerrard
Describe the 2-way process theory for conformity by Deutsch and Gerrard
- normative social influence (NSI) occurs when we conform to be liked or accepted, so we change our public behaviour as we worry about rejection/ social exclusion. It’s emotional, not cognitive. It can lead to compliance as it results in short-term change which only remains in the presence of the majority group.
-> Asch found participants conformed to the majority group in their public estimation of length of a line in 36.8% of clinical trials as they feared rejection. - informational social influence (ISI) occurs when we conform as we wish to be right and believe others hold the correct answer. They change public and private behaviours. It often occurs in ambiguous situations and is cognitive. It’s mostly linked to internalisation as it usually results in long-term change despite the presence of the majority group.
-> Jenness found participants conformed to the majority group in estimating the number of white beans in a jar as there was no obvious answer and they assumed the majority knew better.
Discuss the research conducted into ISI
-Jenness ISI study
-> lab, repeated measures, opportunity sampling.
-in the first private estimation 101 students made private , independent estimations of the number of beans in a jar. This was an ambiguous task. Participants then discussed their estimations in a group, before deciding upon a group estimation.
- in the second private estimation they made a second independent estimations and the difference in the first and second private estimations was recorded.
- it was found the second private estimations moved closer to the group estimation e.g. for male participants mean of 1st was 790 beans but mean of the second was 695 beans.
-it was also found that women were more likely to conform.
- to conclude, her research provides strong evidence for internalisation, participants changed their estimation as they publicly and privately agreed as shown by the 2nd private estimations changing. It’s also evidence for ISI as they changed their estimation in a hopes of being correct and believed the group had the answer. The task was ambiguous so participants felt uncertain and conformed.
Evaluate research conducted by Jenness into ISI
-a limitation is that it has low ecological validity which is when findings cannot be generalised to a variety of real-life settings, decreasing external validity of the research. This is because the procedure used a highly controlled lab setting and asked participants to make a judgement unlike everyday situations. Therfore findings may tell us little about real life conformity.
-another limitation is that it has low population validity which is when the findings of a study cannot be successfully generalised to wider populations, decreasing external validity of the research. This is because the procedure only used 101 psychology students meaning it’s difficult to apply these findings outside this small group
Evaluate research into NSI conducted by Asch
->lab, repeated measures, volunteer sampling
-123 American male students were told they were involved in a ‘visual perception’ study. They were tested in groups of 7-9 people, where only 1 was actually a ‘genuine’ participant and others were confederates. Participants faced a screen and were asked to judge 3 comparison lines to see which was the same as a standard line. All taking part had to make their judgements verbally and in order where the genuine participant was either last/penultimate. Although unambiguous
, confederates were instructed to answer wrong on 12/18 trials. Participants conformity rate was recorded by the number of times they gave the obviously wrong answer. They found they conformed in 36.8% of trials, 5% in all 18, and 75% in at least 1. Interviews after confirmed they knew they were giving the incorrect answer to fit in.
-concluding Asch’s research shows evidence for compliance as they showed short-tern public change in their behaviour even though they privately disagreed on order to avoid conflict with the majority group. Asch’s research shows evidence for NSI as
Evaluate the two-way process model
-a strength of the two-way process model is that it has strong research to support it from Lucas, who found participants were more likely to conform to answers for more difficult math questions. Similarly, Asch found participants were afraid of disapproval. This shows people conform in situations where they don’t feel they know the answer (ISI) or because they want to fit in (NSI).
-a limitation is that individual differences affect conformity; people who care more about being liked will be more affected by NSI than others. These are known as nAffiliators and McGhee and Teevan found people with greater need for social relationships, were more likely to conform. This suggests desire to be liked explains conformity in some people more than others, and therefore the two two-way process model may not fully explain conformity
-a final limitation is that the model is overly simplistic as it states conformity is either due to NSI or ISI, however its often both involved. This is because Asch found conformity was reduced when one of the confederates said the obviously right answer so didn’t conform. This reduced effect of NSI or ISI. Therefore it’s not always possible to be sure whether conformity is due to ISI or NSI and may be the 2 processes don’t operate independently of each other.
List Asch’s variations into variable affecting conformity
-group size
-task difficulty
-unanimity
Describe Asch’s group size variation as a variable affecting conformity
- in his original study there were 6-8 confederates. He then used 1,2,3,4,8,10 and 15 and found 1= 3% conformity rate, 2=13%, 3= 31.8%, 4+=35%, and further group size didn’t change beyond his original findings. He concluded that conformity rates increase as group size increases as participants experienced more social influence.
Describe Unanimity as one of Asch’s variations as a variable affecting conformity
-confederates answered unanimously in the original but in the variation, 1 confederate gave the correct answer. With this, conformity= 5.5%. He concluded it shows social influence is reduced when the supportive confederate gave the correct answer. This gave them freedom to show more independent behaviour.
Describe task difficulty as a variation of Asch’s research into variables affecting conformity
- in original it was ambiguous so in his variation the lines were more similar in length. With this, conformity was as high as 57%. Concluding this is because participants experienced informational social influence as well as normative social influence, doubling social influence and increasing conformity due to the ambiguous task.
Discuss Zimbardo’s research into conformity to social roles
->controlled, overt, participant observation, independent groups and volunteer sampling.
-mock prison at Stanford uni, using 24 male participants + allocating role of prisoners/guards, after being assessed as mentally stable + without a criminal record . They were deindividualised and guards were instructed to keep prisoners under control without physical violence. Zimbardo acted as head of the prison. The observation was planned for 14 days. Both quickly conformed to social roles. Guards psychologically harmed prisoners with sleep deprivation, physical exercise, degrading cleaning tasks and constant harassment. After 2 days prisoners rebelled, ripping uniform, shouting etc but quickly became passive and depressed. Many showed significant signs of distress. Some prisoners were released due to stress and 1 went on a hunger strike. The experiment was stopped after 6 days. Concluding, Zimbardo’s research provides evidence we conform to social roles as they conformed to behaviours and attitudes of ‘prisoners’ or ‘guards’. It also gives evidence for identification as participants changed their behaviour to show membership to their group. They displayed change in public and private behaviour only while identifying with the group.
Evaluate Zimbardo’s mock prison research
- a strength is that there’s high control over extraneous variables which is when the procedure doesn’t include uncontrolled variables that could affect the DV and lower internal validity. E.g in the selection of participants, only those mentally stable and without a criminal record could take part and they were randomly assigned to the role of prisoner or guards. They ruled out individual differences in personality as an explanation of the findings so behaviour must be due to the situation they were in. This increases internal validity s we can be more confident about making conclusions about influences of social roles on behaviour.
-although a limitation is that it has demand characteristics which is when participants percieve the demands of the study and act accordingly. Buanuazizi and Movahedi argued participants were play0acting rather than conforming. Their behaviours were based on stereotypes. However Zimbardo’s data showed it was very real to the participants and 90% of conversation was about prison life. One believed the prison was real but run by psychologists, increasing the internal validity as it was real to them.
- another is that it has a lack of research support. Reicher and Haslam found very different findings when they partially replicated the study in that the prisoners did and rejected the limits of their role. This suggests behaviour and brutality of guards in Zimbardo’s study was due to a shared social identity as a group, and not conformity to social roles.
Discuss milgrams research into obedience
->quasi, repeated measures, volunteer sampling.
-40 male participants from a real local newspaper as and paid. They were told they were taking part in a ‘memory and learning’ experiment. They were individually greeted by the ‘experimenter’ confederate in a white lab coat. The participant was pared with a middle-aged man confederate called ‘Mr Wallace’. They were assigned a role of ‘teacher’ or ‘learner’ and the participants believed this allocation to be random but really they were always the ‘teacher’. They watched the learner get strapped into an electric chair, and experienced a shock themselves to show them it was real. They were instructed to teach them word pairs in a nearby room where they could hear but not see each other. The ‘learner’ was given a set of mostly wrong pre-recorded answers and if an error was made, the teacher had to administer shocks from 15v up to a lethal maximum of 450v. As shocks increased, the learner became more dramatic, falling silent after 315v. If the ‘teacher’ objected, the ‘experimenter’ would give verbal prompts.
-it was found 65% obeyed up to the max 450, 100% up to 300v, and participants continued to obey the authority figure despite arguing to stop.
-concluding people show high obedience to an authority figure even when orders go against moral codes.
Evaluate milgram’s research into obedience
- a strength of Milgram’s research into obedience is that the artificial relationship between experimenter and ‘teacher’ wasn’t dissimilar to obedience in wider settings. This is because it simply involved a person of lower status following instructions from an authority figure. Hoffling and Bickman found in their own field experiments, participants were highly likely to obey simply because someone was perceived to have legitimate authority. E.g nurses following instructions of a Doctor they thought was real. Therefore, although the experiment was artificial, the process can be generalised to wider settings.
- a limitation of his research is that it has low internal validity; meaning the study didn’t accurately measure what it intended to measure. This is because critics such as Orne and Holland argued participants behaved how they did as they guessed the shock was fake. Perry’s research supports this. This suggests the study may not have been measuring obedience, as participants would have found it much easier to obey the instructions knowing there were no genuine consequences. But, in interviews after the study, 70% of participants said they thought the shocks were genuine. Sheridan and King’s research supports this as they found more people behaved the same way with real shocks.
- a final limitation of this is that participants may opt have been showing obedience to the experimenter, but rather social identification. This is when a person agrees with a group they identify with, in this case the experimenter and scientific purposes of the study and so they behave accordingly. When obedience rates fell, it was because they identified less with the science and more with the victim. Hallam and Riecher looked at how the participants behaved when prompts were used and argue the first 3 all appeal for the participant to help and identify with science but the fourth demands obedience and each time it was used the participants stopped. Meaning, the study may not tell us about obedience, but how we show social identification; the participants didn’t administer shocks due to obedience but because of social identification with the scientist.
Discuss Hoffling’s research in obedience to authority
->field, independent, opportunity sampling.
-nurses were telephoned by either an unknown ‘doctor’ or ‘nurse’ at their place of work, and asked to administer a dangerous dose of an unknown drug. This broke hospital rules as nurses need signed authorisation from a known doctor first. 21/22 nurses obeyed the ‘doctor’ but 0 obeyed the ‘nurse’. Concluding people show strong levels of obedience, even in everyday settings with high mundane realism. Obedience is only likely to an authority figure as they only obeyed the doctor.
Evaluate Hoflfing’s research in obedience to authority
- a strength of hoffling’s research into obedience is that it has high external validity due to its high mundane realism, which is when the procedure seems life-like. This is because nurses were ordered to administer a dangerous dose of a drug in their own working environment. Making it very easy to generalise findings to a real-life situation.
- another is hat there was high control over variables, so they study is high in reliability. This is when the procedure of the study can be easily replicated and consistently produces similar findings. This is because variables like the script in the call and type of drug and prescription were all standardised. This means the study can be easily replicated and therefore is reliable.
What are the three explanations for obedience?
- situational explanations
-dispositional explanations
-social-psychological explanations
