| What is conformity? | Type of social influence involving a change in belief or behaviour in order to fit in with a group. This change is in response to real or imagined social pressure. |
| What are the two explanations for conformity? | Normative social influence and informational social influence. |
| Define the two explanations for conformity? | Normative - (the desire to be liked) when we conform fit in with the group because we don't want to appear foolish or be left out.
Informational - (the desire to be right) when we conform because we are unsure of the situation, so we look to others who we believe may have more knowledge than us. |
| Name the types of conformity in order from deepest to shallowest. | Internalisation, identification, compliance |
| Explain the shallowest type of conformity. | Compliance - Individuals go along with the group to gain approval/avoid disapproval. When exposed to the views/action of the majority, individuals engage in social comparison, concentrating on what others do or say and adjust themselves to fit in. Fitting in is seen as desirable and so motivates conformity. |
| Explain the middlest type of conformity. | Identification - The individual accepts influence because they want to be associated with another group/because membership of that group is beneficial. By adopting the group's attitudes or behaviours, they feel more a part of it. The individual accepts the attitudes they are adopting as true but the purpose of that is to be socially accepted. |
| Explain the deepest type of conformity. | Internalisation - Individuals go along with the group because of an acceptance of their views. When exposed to group views, individuals are encouraged to engage in a validation process. This is where they examine their own beliefs to see if they or others are right. Close examination of the group's position may convince the individual they are wrong and the group is right. Leads to acceptance of group views publicly and privately. |
| Evaluation points of types of social influence in terms of research support and individual differences. | . + Asch (1951): interviews with ptts showed fears of looking odd/changed answers privately which validates normative social influence (NSI)
. + Lucas et al: found that ppts conformed more when questions were harder which validates informational social influence (ISI)
. - Asch (1955): unclear whether dissenter reduces rates of conformity by reducing power of NSI or reducing power of ISI, so may work together in real life situations
. - McGhee and Teevan: some people = more concerned with being liked so NSI explanation for conformity may be able to explain conformity for only some, so may not be generalisable to all. |
| Name the three situational variables affecting conformity. | Group size, unanimity, task difficulty |
| Who's key study tests the variables affecting conformity, and when was the base experiment conducted? | Asch (1951) |
| What was the aim of the key study concerning the variables affecting conformity? | To investigate how far social pressure from a majority group could affect a person to conform. |
| What are the main points of the procedure to Asch's base study on conformity? | .Sample: 123 male, US undergraduate students
.7 ptts (all but the 2nd to last = confederate)
.Group asked to do an unambiguous line judgement task
.Each confederate had to state the same wrong but unanimous answer
.18 trials total |
| What were the findings of Asch's base study on conformity? | 33% of genuine ptts agreed with confederates' incorrect answers. (75% of ptts conformed on at least one trial). 25% never conformed in any trials. |
| What was the conclusion of Asch's base study on conformity? | Most said they conformed (not because they believed the majority but) because they feared being ridiculed. (Few said that they actually believed the answers). |
| Summarise the evaluation points for Asch's base study on conformity? | - Lack temporal validity (1950's > anti-Soviet movement = scared of not complying)
- Low internal validity (actors = not believable so ptts instead respond to demand characteristics but Mori + Arai filtered glasses fix)
- Lacks population validity (conformity higher in collectivist cultures than individualist |
| What variations were there on Asch's study on conformity? | Added a dissenter, made the task more difficult, and bigger/smaller group size. |
| How did adding a dissenter affect the rate of conformity in Asch's study? | If dissenter gave an answer different to the majority but also not correct, conformity dropped to 9%. If ptt given support by dissenter (or other real ptt) who gave correct answer conformity dropped to 5%. |
| True or false: Most participants in Asch's study conformed privately but not publicly. | False: Most participants conformed publicly but not privately. |
| How does the difficulty of the task affect the rate of conformity in Asch's study? | Task more difficult = rate of conformity increase |
| How did the group size affect conformity? | As a majority's size increased, so did the level of conformity, until a maximum level after which increases in group size did not increase unanimity. |
| Evaluation of Asch's studies in terms of validity and cultural differences. | . -1950's USA = strong anti-communist movement so people scared of not conforming. ALSO Perrin and Spencer repeated study in 80's UK and only 1/396 conformed (low temporal validity). HOWEVER when tested on youths on probation and their probation officers, similar levels to Asch's found = higher risk to not conforming makes conforming rate higher
. - Hard for confederates to act convincingly when giving wrong answer HOWEVER Mori and Arai gave ppts filtered glasses so the majority's answer was more convincing; only female ptts' results closely matched results OG Asch study
. - Smith et al: conformity % in collective = 37% vs individualistic = 25% because different cultures view conformity differently so research lacks population validity |
