Social influence- P1 Flashcards
(20 cards)
Asch’s research
Conformity AO1
- conformity= change in behaviour due to real or imagined pressure from others
- Jenness- 101 p’s estimated how many beans in a jar (there were 811), they spilt into 3 groups to discuss then estimated again- nearly all changed their answer (females more)
- Asch’s research- assessed extent to which people conform in unambiguous situations, 123 male american students, niave p out with 6 confederates who all guessed wrong (which lines were the same), the p agreed with the wrong answer 36.8% of the time
- Asch’s variations:
-group size: varied from 1-15 confederates, conformity peaked at 7, any more= suspicious
-unanimity: conformity dropped to 5% with a dissenting ally
-task difficulty: more conformed when task was harder
Asch’s research
Conformity AO3
- W: artificial task- no emotional involvement= no reason not to conform, demand characteristics, in real life conforming/not has consequences
- W: not generalisable- used limited sample (only white american men), women may be more likely to conform
- S: real world applications- understanding juror behaviour- first vote predicts 95% cases
- W: cultural variations- Bond and Smith found collectivist cultures have higher conformity than individualists
- W: temporal validity- McCarthyism= 1950’s people were more scared to be different, Perrin and Spencer replicated the expt on British students in 1970’s and found much lower levels of conformity
Types and explanations of conformity AO1
Types
1. compliance- desire to be liked, superficial, going along with what is “normal”, not an internal change e.g. dress codes
2. internalisation- desire to be right, going along with majority because you believe they are correct, private and public change e.g. turning headlights on
3. identification- conforming to opinions of a group because we value the group, public change even if we don’t agree privately
**Explanations **- Deutsch and Gerard
1. normative social influence- conform to be liked (compliance), we fear rejection, conform to appear normal, emotional process
2. informational social influence- go along with majority because we believe they are right and we also want to be right (internalisation), public and private change, cognitive process
Types and explanations of conformity AO3
ISI
* S: research support- Lucas et al- conformity was greater when maths problems were more difficult (ambiguous situation), showed ISI because they didn’t want to give the wrong answer so relied on the opinions of others
* W: hard to seperate NSI and ISI in research- Asch found that conformity reduced in the presence of an ally, the ally may have reduced NSI (provided social support), or ISI (provided another source of info)
NSI
* S: research support- Asch interviewed his p’s and some said they conformed because they were self conscious and afraid of dissaproval
-when answers were written privately, conformity decreased
* W: individual differences in NSI- it doesn’t predict conformity in every case, some people are more concerned than others (nAffiliators)
Zimbardo’s research
Conformity to social roles AO1
- social roles= ‘parts’ we play in society, conformity to these is changing our behaviour to match those we associate with
- Stanford prison experiment: Zimbardo, mock prison, basement of Stanford uni, 21 male american and canadian p’s, randomly assigned role of prisoner or guard
- deindividuation= loss of personal identity- guards: khaki uniform and mirrored sunglasses, prisoners: arrested from homes, stripped, searched, deloused, smock, cap, heavy chain, ID number
- findings- everyone conformed
-prisoners: followed guards orders, degrading tasks, wrote letter home signed with ID number, started a rebellion
-guards: woke prisoners up in the night, put them in solitary confinement, tried to force feed, some enjoyed their power
-relatives: visited on visiting day
-Zimbardo as the superintendent- identified so closely with his role, he failed to see what was happening from a psychologists POV- study ended on day 6/14
Zimbardo’s research
Conformity to social roles AO3
- W: ethical issues- informed consent, they gave consent but weren’t informed of the extent of emotional difficulty e.g. being actually arrested
-protection from harm, Zimbardo ignores his duty of care - S: practical applications- can help explain why normal people commit atrocious acts to other e.g. in 2003 pictures released of American soldiers threatening, degrading, stripping Iraqi prisoners- conformity to their social role
- W: exaggeration of findings- only 1/3 of guards actually behaved brutally, 1/3 tried to impliment rules fairly, 1/3 actively helped prisoners= most guards could resist pressure
-reliability issues- Reicher and Haslam conducted a similar study and found guards felt uncomfy and prisoners rebelled early on - S: high control- individual differences minimised- everyone assessed for emotional stablity, random allocation to roles= limited researcher bias, internal validity
Obedience- Milgram’s research AO1
- obedience= following a direct order, often from someone with authority, who has the power to punish defiance
- Milgram’s study: context- post ww2, wanted to investigate whether other cultures would obey as the Germans did in WW2
- procedure- 40 men volunteered to take part in a ‘memory’ study at Yale, they met confederate Mr Wallace who they are told has a heart condition, they think they are getting randomly allocated to ‘teacher’ or ‘learner’ but the real p is always the teacher, they were told to give Mr Wallace an electric shock if he got a question wrong
- results: all p’s went up to 300v, 65% continued to the ‘deadly’ 450v, many showed signs of ditress: twitching, sweating, 3 had seizures
Obedience- Milgram’s research AO3
- W: ethical issues
-deception- at every stage, however: 84% said they were happy they took part
-informed consent- consented to a memory study, however: informed consent would be impossible and lead to demand characteristics
-protection from harm- distress, trembling, seizures, however: debriefed and showed no signs of permanent harm - W: issues with validity:
-internal validity: reported that 75% believed the shocks were real, Orne and Holland argued that p’s did not believe the set up to be real, so p’s were just play acting
-ecological validity- Orne and Holland also argued that real life obedience looks very different to this so may not be as high - S: research support- Hofling, 22 nurses phoned by a fake doctor telling them to administer a dangerous dose of a fake drug to a patient, 21/22 obeyed breaking 3 rules of nursing
-HOWEVER: evidence is mixed, Rank and Jacobson- 16/18 nurses disobeyed
Situational variables (obedience) AO1
- proximity- Milgram varied how close the teacher and learner were, in the baseline study they could hear but not see eachother
-when the teacher had to force the learner’s hand onto a shock plate obedience reduced from 65% to 30%
-closer proximity= lower obedience becuase buffers are reduced - uniform- baseline study the experimenter wore grey lab coat, in one of the variations he was replaced by someone in everyday clothes
-obedience is lower when the experimenter didn’t have a lab coat on, less legitimate of an authoriy figure - location- baseline study was at the reputable Yale university, variation took place in run-down office block, obedience decreased because the experiment seemed less legitimate
Situational variables (obedience) AO3
- W: validity issues- Orne and Holland suggested that p’s were aware of the fake set up, research such as Bickmans may be more ecologically valid
-e.g. when experimenter was replaced with a member of public even Milgram recognised that this was so unrealistic they may have seen through the deception - S: research support- Bickman- supports the uniform variation, field expt, confederate in a jacket and tie, milkman’s uniform and security guard uniform all asked members of the public to do things like pick up litter, 2x more likely to obey security guard
- S: insight into real-life obedience, tend to associate uniforms with power (less likely to break the law if we see someone in a police uniform), children may follow the rules at school but not at home, they percieve the school as a more legitimate location
Situational explanations of obedience AO1
Agentic state:
* Milgram- we obey because we believe we are acting as an agent for someone else so don’t take responsibility
* autonomous state= individual feels repsonsible for their own actions, acting on their own principles and morals
* agentic shift= shift from autonomy to agency, occurs when we percieve someone as an authority figure
* agentic state= mental state where we feel no responsibility for our own actions because we believe we are acting as an agent for someone in authority, frees us from the demands of our consciousness meaning we obey orders regardless of whether they are morally/ethically wrong
* binding factors= aspects of a situation which allow us to ignore or minimise the damaging effects of our actions to reduce the ‘moral strain’, e.g. shifting the responsibility to the victim
* legitimacy of authority= we fall into the agentic state when the authority figure appears legitimate, has high social power, is above us in the social heirarchy
* destructie authority= when people abuse thier legitimate authority e.g. hitler
* gradual commitment= they’ve gone so far so might as well continue
Situational explanations of obedience AO3
- S: research support- Hofling: 21/22 nurses obeyed a fake doctor’d orders to administer a dangerous dose of a fake drug to a patient, they were acting as an agent for the doctor
HOWEVER: Rank and Jacobson- 16/18 nurses disobeyed (unreliable findings) - S: support- Milgram’s study- some p’s asked the experimenter who was responsible and when the experimenter said that he was, they continued with no objections
Legitimacy of authority
* S: explains cultural differences in obedience- many studies show that different countries differ in obedience, this may be due to their different social hierarchies, how children are raised influences how they percieve authority
* W: doesn’t explain all matters of (dis)obedience- why people break the law when their is a clear social heirarchy
Dispositional explanations of obedience AO1
- Authoritarian personality- Adorno
- focusses on the importance of personality in obedience
- used the F-scale (potential for fascism scale) to determine the extent to which people have an authoritarian personality
- authoriarian personality= more likely to obey those in power and discriminate against those they see as inferior
- traits: rules are absolute and dogmatic, offer blind obedience to authority, believe breaking rules should be punished regardless of the reason, conformist, strict and rigid upbringing
- how it develops- harsh, punitive, disciplinarian parenting… leads to fear or hatred of parents… fear leads to excessive respect for authority/ hatred leads to displacement of anger onto others
- Adorno’s research- studied 2000+ middle class white americans and thier unconscious attitudes to other ethnic groups, used the F-scale (questions like ‘nobody has ever learnt anything except through sufferring’)
- findings= those who scored highly identified with ‘strong’ people and were contemptuous towards the ‘weak’, showed extreme respect for authority
Dispositional explanations of obedience AO3
- S: supporting research- Elms and Milgram: interviewed 20 obedient and 20 disobedient p’s using from the electric shock studies using the F-scale, they found the obedient p’s showed more signs of authoritarian personality
HOWEVER: those who obeyed didn’t have ALL the typical features of authoritarian traits e.g. punitive parenting - W: limited explanation- cannot explain obedience in the majority of a country e.g. ww2 germany displayed anti-semitic and obedient behaviours despite all having different personalities
-alternative theory: many would have identified with the nazi-parties views so scapegoated jewish people (social identity theory)
-ignores situational factors- as found in Milgram’s study - W: political bias- only measures tendency toards extreme right-wing ideology, left wing authoritarianism has a lot in common with right wing e.g. total obedience to authority
Resisting social influence AO1
**1. social support **
* resisting conformity: the pressure to conform is reduced if other non-conformists are present
* Asch found that the presence of an ally lowered overall conformity by 5.5%, the ally breaks the unanimity of the majority
* resisting obedience: the pressure to obey is reduced if we see others disobey
* Milgram found that obedience dropped from 65% to 10% when the p’s were joined by a disobedient confederate, they act as a ‘model’ for behaviour
**2. locus of control **
* Rotter
* internal LOC= ‘I can do’ attitude, takes responsibility for own actions, controls own destiny
* external LOC= attribute blame onto others, ‘I can’t do’ attitude
* LOC is a continuum- a scale within which we fit somewhere
* resistance to social influence- those with internal LOC’s are more likely to resist, they take responsibility so base decisions on their own beliefs and morals
Resisting social influence AO3
1. social support
* S: research support for obedience and social support- Mullen et al found that people are less obedient to jaywalking signs when they are exposed to other jaywalkers
* S: research support for conformity and social support: Allen and Levine used and Asch- like set up but used one dissenting confederate with thick glasses (to suggest poor vision), conformity was reduced even though the other dissenter’s competence was questionable
2. locus of control
* S: research support- Holland replicated milgram’s expt. and categorised p’s into external LOCs or internal LOCs- 37% internals disobeyed vs 23% of externals disobeyed
* W: inconsistent/contradictory research: Schurx, similar expt. to Milgram but using ultrasound bursts, 80% went to highest level, found no correlation between LOC and level of obedience
* S: practical applications- applies to the criminal justice system, crime could be explained by LOC, in rehab they could be taught to have an internal LOC
Minority influence AO1
- minority influence= where one person or a small group of people influence the beliefs of the majority
- 3 factors effect minority influence
1. consistency- the minority must be constant in their views, this increases interest of others, diachronic consistency= the minority are saying the same message over a long period of time, synchronic consistency= all members of the minority say the same thing
2. commitment- minorities must show they are committed to their cause, e.g. extreme activities with risk lead to the augmentation principle
3. flexibility- can’t be seen as too rigid in their views or they’ll be seen as extreme, they have to be willing to adapt - Moscovici’s research- wanted to investigate the effect of a consistent minority, put p’s into groups of 6 including 2 confederates, in one group the minority (confederates) were consistent, in the other group they were no consistent
- they were shown 36 shades of blue slides and they had to say whether it was blue or green
- in the consistent group, p’s agreed with the minority 8.4% of the time vs 1.25% of the time in the inconsistent group
Minority influence AO3
- W: artificial nature of the tasks- identifying the colour of a slide is far removed from real life minority influence e.g. jury decision making and political campaigning
-furthermore, limited findings- the agreement was very low (8%) even for a consistent minority= minority influence is quite rare - S: research support for consistency- Moscovici: showed that a consistent minority was more effective than an inconsistent one
-Wood et al: carried out a meta-analysis of similar studies and found that consistent minorities were the most influential - contradictory evidence for commitment- if a majority sees that a minority has self-interest in their campaign, they are less likely to be influenced: Maas and Clark found a gay minority arguing for gay rights was less persuasive than a heterosexual minority… commitment is important but they mustn’t be seen as self-interested or it becomes suspicious
Social change AO1
- social change= when whole societies change their views/ behaviour following minority influence- can be positive (women’s rights) or negative (eugenic beliefs)
- stages…
1. drawing attention- e.g. marches
2. consistency- presenting the same messages over time
3. deeper processing of the issue- majority begin to think deeply about potential injustices
4. augmentation principle- minority put themselves at risk to reinforce their message
5. snowball effect- more and more people begin to support the minority until it becomes the majority
6. social-crypto amnesia- minority opinion has become the majority and we forget where the opinion first started - linking to conformity- campaigns can exploit conformity by appealing to normative social influence by providing info about what others are doing e.g. ‘bin it, others do;
- linking to obedience- obedience can be used to encourage social change through gradual commitment- once a small instruction is followed, it is easier to obey a bigger one, we ‘drift’ into a new behaviour
Social change AO3
- S: social change is beneficial to society- social change occurs because of the type of thinking that minorities encourage (divergent, broad thinking) in which we actively evaluate info, this leads to better decisions and more creative approaches to social issues
- W: deeper processing may not play a role- it may be majority influence that brings about deeper processing (not minority), because we like to think we share the same views as the majority so if we percieve that we do not we may re-evaluate
- W: barriers to social change- research into social change provides advice for those wanting to influence the majority, but ultimately barriers will alwasy exist- Bashir found that p’s were less likely to be environmentally friendly because they didn’t want to be associated with the sterotypical ‘tree-huggers’- stereotypes are a barrier to social change
