social influence part 2 Flashcards
dispositional explanations, resistance to social influence, minority influence, social change (25 cards)
What does dispositional explanation of obedience refer to?
How your personality effects your likelihood of obeying
What key research links to the dispositional explanation of authority?
Adorno
What kind of personality type did Adorno say was most likely to obey authority?
Authoritarian personality
what scale did Adorno use to classify the authoritarian personality?
The F-scale (fascism scale)
what are the 3 aspects of the authoritarian personality which come under AO1?
1) context (Adorno’s research)
2) characteristics
3) origin (childhood)
what did Adorno suggest was the origin of an authoritarian personality?
harsh punitive parenting, strict disciplinarian upbringing, they displace their hatred of their parents onto others
what are the characteristics of the authoritarian personality?
- highly respectful to authority fugures
- offer blind obedience
- believe rule-breaking should be harshly punished
- dogmatic thinkers
- hostile towards those they percieve to have lower status than themselves
evaluation of dispositional explanations of authority
+ supporting evidence: Elms and Milgram, used 20 obedient and disobediant p’s from the electric shock study, gave them the F-scale and the obediant ones ranked higher on it
- that may be a correlation not a causation, other factors can be involved
+ Altmeyer: similar expt. to milgram, as F-scale score increased, so did the amoubt of electric shock given
- this explanation ignores the situational variables, Milgrams variables show strong evidence for the sitatin having an impact on likelihood to obey
what are two factors which influence resistance to social influence?
social support and locus of control
who came up with locus of control?
Rotter
what is social support in regards to resistance to social influence
the presence of others resisting social influence can help others to do the same as it relieves some of the real or imagined pressure to conform
how does social support link to Asch’s study
The presence of another non-conformist, breaks the unanimity and lowered the conformity by 5.5%
how does social support link to Milgram’s study?
p’s were more likely to resist when they were joined by a disobedient ally, obedience dropped from 65% to 10% with an ally present
evaluation of social support as an explanation of resistance to conformity
+ supporting research: Mullen, meta-analysis of research on jaywalking, people were more likely to do it if they saw others do so
+ Allen and Levine: line length guessing expt. but they had an ally who didn’t conform who wore thick glasses (to suggest poor vision) and even this reduced conformity of the real p
- alternative explanation= locus of control
what does locus of control refer to?
how much control a person feels they have over their own life/destiny
what are the different locuses of control and what do they mean?
- internal LOC: “I can do attitude”, control over your own destiny, takes responsiblity for actions good or bad
- external LOC: “I can’t do attitude”, shift blame onto others, puts things down to bad luck
which locus of control is more likely to resist conformity and why?
internal because they are more likely to take personal responsibility and act upon their own morals
Evaluation of locus of control as an explanation for resistance to conformity
+ impact on economy: understanding criminal behaviour, they may be able to explain their actions as they have an external LOC but in knowing this, they can be taught to change that, lowering reoffending rates
+ Holland: replicated milligrams study with internals and externals, finding out that more of the internals (37%) were disobedient and the externals (23%)
- alternative explanation: social support theory (Asch found that with an alibi they were more likely to resist
what is minority influence?
situations where one person or a small group of people influences the beliefs or behaviours of the majority
what research supports the idea of minority influence?
Moscovici
what was moscovici’s study?
- gave 128 female p’s an eyetest to test for colourblindness
- groups of 4 p’s were joined by 2 confederates
- they were shown 36 slides all of which were shades of blue and asked to identify the colour
- 1st condition: confederates said green consistently, 32% p’s were influenced by this consistent minority
- 2nd condition: confederates were inconsistent in their responses- said green 24 times and blue 12, 1.25% p’s were influenced by this inconsistent minority
3 factors which impact minority influence
- consistency: the minority must be constant in their views to increase the interest of others (diachronic and synchronic)
- flexibility: they can’t be seen as too rigid/ extreme in their views- a balance is needed between consistency and flexibility, they must listen and adapt to other viewpoints
- commitment: they must be seen as commited to their cause, augmentation principle= putting themselves at risk to show greater commitment
what is social change
when whole societies change their entire beliefs or attitudes as a result of minority influence, this process takes time as everyone must take time to reconsider their ways of thinking
evaluation of minority influence
+ Moscovici’s research
+ more supporting evidence: Wood et al, meta-analysis of 100 studies similar to Moscovici’s and agreed that the most efficient minorities were consistent
- counterpoint: Schacter, presented a troublesome youth case to a group of student social workers and a confederate (the minority), they didn’t agree with the confederate’s harsh opinion even though he was consistent in his opinions
- artifical/unrealistic nature of moscovici’s task: identifying the slide colour involves no morals or consequences, in real life the minority and majority is much more complex, involving power status and hostility
