conformity

conformity

an individual chooses an action that is favoured by the majority
types of conformity
1. internalisation
  1. public, private, permanent
  2. the person has accepted beliefs as their own
2. compliance
  1. public
  2. to gain approval or avoid disapproval
3. identification
  1. public, private
  2. the person changes opinion because they want to be part of the group
research into conformity
1. asch
  1. volunteer sample
    1. 123 male american undergraduates
  2. participants were shown 3 lines and a standard line
    1. standardised question
      1. "which of the three lines is the same length as the standard line?"
  3. participants always asked in the same order
    1. real participants asked last or second-to-last
  4. confederates gave incorrect answers on 12 of the 18 trials
  5. results of asch's study
    1. 32% of participants conformed to the incorrect answers on the 12 critical trials
    2. 75% of participants conformed at least once
    3. 25% of participants didn't conform on any trials
    4. participants conformed to avoid disapproval from the group but continued to trust their own judgement
      1. compliance
2. evaluation
  1. :) real-life application
    1. avoid conformity affecting people in real life
      1. eg. rodney king
        officers acquitted of beating king despite evidence
        a juror said she changed her vote due to pressure from other jurors
  2. :) high reliability and validity
    1. lab experiment
      1. standardised procedures
      2. artificial environment
        control EVs
  3. :( ethical issues
    1. participants told it was a vision test
      1. deception
      2. not fully informed consent
    2. psychological harm
      1. participants put under pressure to conform
  4. :( ecological validity
    1. unrealistic task
      1. unnatural behaviour
  5. :( cultural bias
    1. can't be applied to all cultures
      1. all participants were american
        individualistic / more concerned with self
        collectivist cultures (eg. china) value group over individual
        bond and smith - conformity levels were higher in china than what asch found in the US
  6. :( gender bias
    1. can't be applied to everyone
      1. all participants were male
      2. lacks credibility
      3. neto - found women had higher levels of conformity
        could be due to women being more aware of their social relationships
variables affecting conformity
1. group size
  1. description
    1. 1) majority consists of 1 or 2 people
    2. 2) majority consists of 3 or 4 people
  2. effect on conformity
    1. 1) lower levels of conformity
      1. 12.8%
      2. smaller group = less pressure
    2. 2) higher levels of conformity
      1. 32%
      2. bigger group = more pressure
  3. likely reason
    1. more people = more pressure to conform
2. unanimity (agreement)
  1. description
    1. one confederate would give a different (correct) answer
      1. breaking unanimity
  2. effect on conformity
    1. decreased from 75% to 5.5%
  3. likely reason
    1. participants feel more confident in their answer with an ally
3. difficulty of task
  1. description
    1. lines were more similar in length
      1. more difficult to see which line was most similar to the standard line
  2. effect on conformity
    1. conformity levels increased
  3. likely reason
    1. more uncertainty in own answer = look to others for guidance
dual process dependency model
1. explanation of conformity
2. deutsch and gerard
3. normative social influence
  1. explains compliance
    1. person conforms because they want to gain approval or avoid disapproval
      1. this leads to a change in public behaviour
    2. this may be because the group has the ability to include and exclude people from the group
    3. the person may have their own belief but conform to gain approval and not be excluded
  2. shown by asch's study
  3. the need to be liked
4. informational social influence
  1. explains internalisation
    1. person conforms because they think the majority is right
      1. the majority has knowledge and information and person doubts own answer
        leads to person changing public and private belief
  2. the need to be right
5. evaluation
  1. :) evidence to support
    1. asch - supports normative social influence
      1. participants conformed to avoid disapproval - want to be liked
  2. :) evidence to support
    1. lucas - supports informational social influence
      1. more conformity answering difficult maths questions compared to easy maths questions
  3. :( individual differences
    1. informational social influence - explains how people with low IQ conform
    2. normative social influence - explains how people with low self-esteem conform
  4. :( too simplistic and hard to establish which explanation explains a specific conformity
    1. hard to know if people are conforming because they want to fit in or if they think the majority is right
      1. reality - a mix of both NSI and ISI is best explanation
        DPDM does not explain this
  5. :( other affecting factors
    1. more important factors than needing to be liked or be right
      1. eg. whether the person has things in common with group
        abrams - found 7x conformity when other group members were part of the participants' in-groups rather than out-groups

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	Created by yui chen over 3 years ago