Social Infuence

Question 1

Types of conformity

Answer 1

Internalisation, identification, compliance

Question 2

What’s compliance

Answer 2

Compliance is where the individual changes their own behaviour to fit in with the group. They may not necessarily agree with the behaviour / belief but they go along with it publicly. It is not a permanent form of social influence; it lasts only as Long as the group is present. Here the type of conformity is likely to be linked to NSI.
Eg,Compliance is where you go along with the group to fit in even if you don’t really believe their view point

Question 3

What’s identification

Answer 3

Moderate type of conformity publicly change your behaviour and opinions to be accepted by group even if we don’t private agree with everything the group stands for

Question 4

What’s internalisation

Answer 4

Deep type of conformity involving genuine change of private views to match the group. Permanent

Question 5

Why do people conform?

Answer 5

Normative social Influence and informational social influence

Question 6

What’s normative social influence and A03

Answer 6

When people agree with the opinion of the majority in order to be liked and gain approval. This often leads to compliance which is where people will agree publicly with group but don’t change their personal opinions
When asch interviewed ps after the said they conformed to avoid rejection by others

Question 7

What’s informational social influence?

Answer 7

Conform to be right and correct. Cognitive process bc its to do with what you think. Leads to permanent change in behaviour
Lucas et Al asked students to ander maths problems that were easy or difficult and found that there was greater conformity to incorrect answers when q Was difficult

Question 8

Difference between compliance and identification

Answer 8

Identification- you do it because you value the group

Question 9

Internalisation

Answer 9

Accept groups beliefs as yours, ypu change both your private and public views. Is a Permanent change as you continue to think this even when not in group

Question 10

What was aschs research?

Answer 10

When he wanted to investigate conformity in a group setting where the answer was obviously wrong

Question 11

What did aschs research find? And Conclusion of it

Answer 11

On the 12 trials, the mean average conformity rate was 33%
75% confirmed atleast once
Conclusion that people change opinions to avoid standing out and that a majority can influence a minority in an unambiguous situation where the answer is obvious demonstrating normative social influence

Question 12

What are the variables affecting conformity investigated by asch

Answer 12

Group size, the unamity of the majority, the difficulty of the task

Question 13

How does group size affect conformity investigated by Asch

Answer 13

Condition one - one participant 1 confederate
3% conformed
Condition two- one participant 2 confederates
13% conformed
Condition 3 - 1 participant 3 confederates
32% conformed

Question 14

How does the unamity of the majority Affect conformity aschs experiment

Answer 14

Asch broke unamity by adding a confederate who always gave the right answer. The conformity rate fell from 33% to 5%
Then he added a confederate that gave a different answer from the majority, rates fel, to 9%
Asch found that unanimity affected level of conformity – where the majority were unanimous in their wrong answer, conformity levels increased (whereas when there was an ally, conformity levels deceased

Question 15

What happens to conformity levels when the Difficulty of the task is quite high asch experiment

Answer 15

Level of conformity increased as situation is ambiguous so we are morelikely to conform due to ISI

Question 16

Procedure of aschs experiment

Answer 16

Misinformed participants telling them they were taking part in a study on the perception of line length
Sample consisted of 123 American male college students
Group of 6-7 only 1 participant others confederates

Question 17

Evaluation of Aschs research

Answer 17

It’s a child of its time
Asch’s findings may not be so relevant today as the outcome may have been influenced by social attitudes of the 1950s and the post-war attitudes that people should work together and consent rather than dissent. Perrin and spencer repeated achs study and found 1 conforming response out of 396 trials. Perrin and Spencer suggested that aschs research is a child of its time as they argue that there has been a cultural change regarding the importance of conformity since then. This is a limitation of aschs research as his research lacks temporal or historical validity. Not consistent across time.
Methodological issues
A limitation is that Asch’s task was artificial.This is because asch used lines for his task and the line length lacks mundane realism. This means that its not a valid measure of real life conformity. This is a limitation as
where conforming takes place in a social context and often with people we know rather than strangers.
Additionally, Participants were aware they were in a study they may have behaved unnaturally. This is a problem as it would lower the studys internal validity.
Findings can’t be generalised to everyday situations of conformity
Limited application of findings
Asch used an all male sample. This may not represent female behaviour. another issue is that men in achs study where all Americans. In other parts of world conformity may be more important there, suggests that aschs findings may only apply to American men bc he didn’t take gender and cultural differences into account.

Question 18

What are social roles

Answer 18

Parts people play in society

Question 19

What’s the standard prison experiment?

Answer 19

Controlled participant observation - despite being named the standard prison experiment
Zimbardo wanted ton experiment if guards behave brutaliy because of their personality or is it because of the prison environment that causes the behaviour?

Question 20

Evaluation of zimbardo prison experiment a03

Answer 20

Lacks generalisability as it was 24 male American white college students - we can’t argue widerpopulation eg females would behave same
Unethical -
they weren’t protected from harm, five of the prisoners left early bc of their adverse reactions to the physical and mental torment. Guards f3lt anxiety and guilt result of their actions - right to withdraw- student wanted to leave but zimbardo persuaded him to stay. Zimbardo debriefed after
Zimbardo himself took part in the action as he was a participant observer. This means his own behaviour could’ve affected the way in which events unfolded, decreasing the validity of the findings
Limitations of zimbardos study comes in contradictory research and findings. On reicher and haslams 2006 replication participants didn’t conform to their social roles automatically. For example the guards didn’t identify with their status and refuses to impose their authority. The prisoners identified as a gr9up to challenge the guards authority which resulted in a shift of power and collapse of prison system. This 8s a limitation as results contradict findings of zimbargo and show that social doles may not be automatic
Useful practical applications -
Zimbardo argues that the same conformity to social role effect was evident in the study was also evident in Abu ghraib, military prison in Iraq known for the torture and abuse of Iraq prisoners by us soldiers. Zimbrado believed that the guards who comitted the abuses were the victims of situational factors that made abuse more likely. Strength as Gives us insight into conformity of social roles in modern day events
High ecological validity as it was a stimulated prison environment

Question 21

What was the procedure of the zimbardo prison experiment?

Answer 21

Established a mock prison in the Stanford University.
Volunteers recruited from newspaper. They were male American college students. Had to go through psychological tests to see if they’re emotionally stable
Students were randomly assigned to act as prisoner or guard. Prisons were arrested at their homes to increase realism
Prisoners called by their numbers, guards had control over them

Question 22

Findings of zimbardo Stanford prison experiment and conclusion

Answer 22

Guards took their role with enthusiasm, abusive slowly. Enforced rules and punished prisoners highlighting the difference in social roles
Prisoners rebelled within 2 days, guards abusive, study was terminated after 6 days
The simulation revealed the power of the situation to influence people’s behaviours. Guards and prisoners conformed to their social roles and this was taken on very quickly

Question 23

Obedience explaination

Answer 23

A form of social influence in which an individual follows a direct order. Person is usually figure of authority with power to punish

Question 24

Explanaton for obedience AGENTIC STATE

Answer 24

When person acts on behalf of an authority figure and This allows the person to deny responsibility for their actions and distance themselves from the consequences of those actions

Question 25

What agentic shift

Answer 25

autonomous state where we take full responsibility to agentic state

Question 26

What's, legitimacy of authority

Answer 26

When people are obedient as they accept the power and status of legitimate authority figurebecuase they have the power to punish

Question 27

Procedure of milgrams study

Answer 27

Advert - asking for volunteers to take part in a study of memory 40 American males (20-50 age) The participants paired with confederate at uni. There weere 2 confederates explaining the experiment and the other was learner Teacher told to ask learner questions and if they got it wrong they would give an electrical shock starting at 15 volts moving up by 15 till 150 volts If the Teacher tried to stop, the professional in the lab coat would give them prods to keep going

Question 28

Aim of milgrams study

Answer 28

Wanted to find out whether ordinary Americans would obey an unjust order from a person in authority

Question 29

Baseline findings of milgrams study

Answer 29

Al participants went upto atleast 300 volts on the shock generator.65% went upto the max 450 volts

Question 30

Conclusion on milgrams study

Answer 30

Under certain circustmaves people will unwillingly go against their moral judgementsand obey authority figure

Question 31

Evaluate milgrams experiment

Answer 31

Unrepresentative sample Only male ps from america took part in exp. Study gives is an insight into obedience in a limited sampme that suffers from culture and gender bias and findings into obedience may differ when caried out with women or other cultures. Issue as difficult to generalised the findings about obedience to other populations Ethical issues Milgrams study was fraught with ethical issues. For eg, ps weren't harmed psychologically when they were led to believe they were electrocuting someone, but they were deceived about the aims of the study and the fact that the confederate was another participant. This is an issue as it questions the integrity of the researchers and calls into question the integrity of psychology as discipline Demand characteristics Orne and Holland argued that ps in milgrams study gave very high shocks bc they had guessed that the shocks weren't real. The pov is supported by Perry who discovered that many of milgrams ps had been sceptical at the time about wether the shocks were real. One of milgrams research assistants divided the ps into doubters and believers and found that delivers were more likely to disobey and give only loe intensity shocks. Supports view that study lacks interna, validity

Question 32

Variations of milgrams studies and percentages

Answer 32

Proximity - The researcher was placed in a different room to the real participant, they were instructed to shock on the phone which led to obedience falling from 65% to 20.5% Location - Research in. A Run down office 47.5% compared to prestigious uni Uniform - Bickman - IV uniform vs not, in uniform 92% not 49%

Question 33

Authoritian personality origins

Answer 33

Formed in childhood mostly due to harsh& strict parenting style Create resentment and hostility in child, but unable to express to parent due fear of punishment Leads to them displacing fear onto others

Question 34

Adornos findings

Answer 34

Those with an authoritarian personality 1) contemptuous of those thought to be weak 2) conscious of other ppls status 3) stereotypes of pplsb

Question 35

Procedure of adornos f scale

Answer 35

Attitude towards racial minorities wide measured in 2000 whitw Americans. F scale was also used to measure the different components tha make up an authoritarian personality

Question 36

Aim of adorno

Answer 36

Measure if certain types if personalities are more likely to obey

Question 37

What do the findings of adornos authoritian personality research suggest?

Answer 37

People with an authoritarian personality tend to be very obedient to authority because they have enormous respect for them They believe we need strong leaders to enforce traditional values They show contempt for people they perceived as having inferior social status

Question 38

Evaluation of authoritarian personality

Answer 38

Ignores external causes of obedience- Evidence by milgram shows that situational variables have a greater effect on obedience than disposition. Bickman showed that wearing uniform rather than ordinary clothes doubled obedience levels from 49 to 92%. Limitation as it appears that personality has a limited effect obedience. In general it appears that external factors are more important than dispositional Can't explain group obedience A major weakness of the theory is that it can't easily account for the obedience of an entire group or society. For example, it's very unlikely that the high levels of obedience, racism and anti semitic behaviour seen in Germany during ww2 would be due to dispositional factors. Unlikely that a whole population possessed an authoritarian personality. Weakness as it appears that alternative explanations must influence obedience much more than the authoritarian personality Supporting Elms and Milgram found that when 20 obedient participants from Milgrams original obedience research (who had delivered 250V) were questioned using the F scale, the obedient participants scored higher on authoritarianism

Question 39

Explanation of resistance to social support

Answer 39

It refers to the ability of people to withstand the social pressure to conform to the majority or obey authority Social support. If atleast 1 person in group resists pressure to conform or obey(dissenter) this can help others to do same .

Question 40

Evaluation of social support

Answer 40

Asch found in his line judgement task that when one of the confederates gave a different answer to the others, the conformity rates dropped from 33% to 5% In one of the milgram variations, the participant was one of a team of three testing the learner. The confederates refused to administer the shocks and obedience rates fell from 65% to 10% Allen and levine conducted an asch type experiment, when dissenters were present conformity rates decreased even when the dissenters wore thick glasses and problem with vision

Question 41

Locus of control - explanations of resistance to social influence

Answer 41

Locus of control is how much a person believes that they have control over events that happen in their lives. This is usually measured along a scale with internal control at one end and external control at the other. Internal control refers to those people who see that they have a great deal of control over their own behaviour and will take responsibility for their own actions. External control refers to those who believe that their behaviour is controlled by other forces such as luck or fate.

Question 42

Evaluate locus of control as explanations of resistance to social influence A03

Answer 42

Contradictory Not Al evidence supports link between internal LOC and resistance to social influence.Twenge etc Al analysed findings from obedience studies over a 40 year period and found that despite people being resistant to social influence, they increasingly believed their fate was determined more by luck rather than their own actions suggestive of an external LOC Support - crowne et Al completed an asch type experiment and then measured whether participants had an internal or external LOC. He found that internals conformed less than externals Holland repeated milgrams baseline study and found that internals were more likely to disobey and refuse to go to the highest shock level than externals Strength as both studies demonstrate link between loc and resistance to social influence Correlational Correlational evidence fails to establish cause and effect,eg that having an internal locus of control causes a person to defy authority or not conform There could also be a unknown variable such as individual personality This is an issue because the locus of control explaination for resisting social influence may lack validity

Question 43

What's minority influence and 3 factors which influence how successful the minority are in converting majority

Answer 43

Where a minority of people persuade others adopt their beliefs attitude or behaviour Consistency, commitment, flexibility are the 3 factors which influence how successful the minority are in converting majority

Question 44

What's conversion

Answer 44

A majority group will try to convert the majority to their way of thinking, and majority tries to understand Change is deep when it happens

Question 45

Whats consistency and 2 types

Answer 45

Repetition increases awareness and interest in from the majority Synchronic consistency - people in minority all saying same thing Diachronic consistency - they've been saying Same thing for time now

Question 46

Consistency research moscovici et Al 1969 Procedure

Answer 46

Participants asked to view set of blue coloured slides that varied in brightness, and then state whether the slides were slides were blue or green 2 of 6 participants were confederates Consistent condition: the 2 confederates consistently called the blue slides green on all trials Inconsistent condition- 2 confederates called the slides green 24 times and blue 12 times Control group also judged slides without confederates

Question 47

Commitment on minority social influence

Answer 47

Sometimes minorities engage in extreme acitivities to draw attention to their cause Risk to minority but they take it showing commitment to the cause Generates interest in minoritys cause

Question 48

Flexibility in minority social influence

Answer 48

It's shown when minority listen to the views of others and try to act just or amend their views to those of majority Nemeth and brilmayer

Question 49

Consistency social influence findings moscovici

Answer 49

Consistent condition- participants called the slides green in 8.42% of the trials and 32% of these participants called a slide green atleast once Inconsistent trial- participants called the slides green on only 1.25% of the trials

Question 50

Evidence to support role of commitment in minority social influence

Answer 50

Real life examples Suffragettes, civil rights movement, and gay rights. Led to many policy and law reforms eg equal pay act for women Supports importance of commitment in minority influence. However your seen as deviant due to taking part in extreme activities that are used to demonstrate commitment

Question 51

Flexibility research support nemeth and bilmayer minority influence.

Answer 51

They tested a mock jury situation where group members discussed the amount of compensation to be paid to someone being involved in a ski lift accident When confederate put forward an alternative POV and refused to change his position, this had no influence on group but when they showed flexibility and compromised to had influence .

Question 52

Evaluation of minority influence, consistency, commitment and flexibility

Answer 52

Behaviour style (consistency commitment and flexibility) may not be the most important factor in minority influence Research Indictaes that if majority identifies with minority, they're more likely to change their views in line with those in minority Study by Maass et al showed that a straight manjority were influenced more by a minority arguing for gay rights if the minority were straight rather than pay. This is because the straight majority identified with the straight minority

Question 53

Process of social change

Answer 53

Drawing attention to issue Consistency flexibility and non dogmatic The snowball effect - more people gradually pay attention the minority view, until it reaches a tipping point, which leads to wide scale social change Social cryptomesia - people can remember a change in social attitudes or behaviours that occurred but they forget the origins of that change or who were responsible for it

Question 54

Scoail influence through majority influence

Answer 54

Normative social influence Mikgram obedience

Question 55

Evaluate agentic state and legitimacy of authority A03

Answer 55

Supporting research of the agentic state Support for the 'agentic state' explanation comes from Milgram.In a variation to his original study. the researcher was placed in a different room to the participant. Rather than giving orders face to face, participants were instructed to administer the electric shocks via a telephone link. This resulted in a dramatic fal inobedience (from 65% to 20.5%). Without the presence of the authority figure, participants shifted to anautonomous state. They now saw themselves as responsible for their actions, resulting in the large fall in obedience.This supports the view that obedience increases when in an agentic state (origstudy) and falls when in an autonomous study. Agentic state or just plain cruel? There is research evidence to show obedience is not alwaysdue to being in an agentic shift. Mandel (1998) describedone incident where Nazi soldiers were ordered to shoot Civilians in a small town in Poland. This was even though they did not have direct orders to do so This suggests that dispositional (personality) factors may as play a role in explaining obedience. Although Milgram believed that the agentic state best explained his findings, he did concede that some individuals are just plain cruel and will use a situation to satisfy their sadistic impulses.This is a problem as the explanation may be limited and cannot account for whyOnly some people 'shift' to the agentic state whilst others do not. Legitimate Authority A strength of the legitimate authority' explanation comes from the variations of milgrams obedience research: He found that participants were more likely to obey a researcher (authority figure) when the research took place in the prestigious setting of Yale University (65%) compared to the everyday setting of a run-down office (47.5%).This suggests we do obey because we perceive that the authority figure has greater legitimate authority and social power

Question 56

Evaluation or situational variables for obedience

Answer 56

Alternative explanation The situational variables explanation ignores the effect of INTERNAL factors, Such as dispostion or personality, on obedience. For example, research has shown people with an authoritarian personality are more likely to show blind obedience to those whom they perceive to be higher in status than themselves. This is supported by research conducted by Elms and Milgram (1966) who found that those with authoritarian personality traits were more likely to administer bine. shocks in Milgram's experiment. This reduces the validity of this explanation. This is because obedience could be due to internal, dispositional effects, rather than external, situational factors 'Obedience 'alibi' Milgram's variations support the view that the situation a person finds themselves is mainly responsible for their obedience. But this explanation has been criticised as psychologists argue that it offers an exCUse or 'alibi for evil behaviour. This is a criticism of the situational explanation of obedience as it is offensive To survivors of the Holocaust to suggest that the Nazis were simply obeying orders and were victims themselves of situational factors bevond their control.

Question 57

Studies of conformity are sometimes criticised for being unethical. Briefly explain 2 ways in which psychologists might address ethical issues in social influence research

Answer 57

• Participants should be given the right to withdraw (at the start; throughout the study; withdraw their data at the end) • Participants should not be put in embarrassing/uncomfortable situations • Participants should be fully debriefed at the earliest opportunity

Question 58

Outline one method that psychologists have used to study conformity.

Answer 58

laboratory experiment where confederates deliberately gave the wrong answer to see if the naïve participant conformed carried out by Asch