Download Social Influence: Conformity and Obedience in Schools, Prisons and Experiments and more Lecture notes Psychology in PDF only on Docsity!
Conformity types: Internationalisation Publicly changing behaviour to fit in with the group while also agreeing with them privately identification This occurs when someone conforms to the demands of a given social role in society ex. policeman Compliance The individual temporarily changes their views depending on who they’re with
Explanations for conformity: Informational Social Influence
The desire to be right, because we’re unsure, this leads to internalisation. o ex. if someone was to go to a posh restaurant for the first time, they may be confronted with several forks and not know which one to use, so they might look to a nearby person to see what fork to use first. o Asch - which line is correct Normative social Influence
The desire to be liked, which leads to compliance, it’s a temporary behaviour. To gain approval and acceptance and avoid rejection. o Asch - to be liked by the group
Why do we conform?
- Helps interactions run smoothly
- In schools and prisons it allows to run a large majority of people by a minority group of staff, as long as the people conform to their social roles
Evaluation:
- Difficulties in distinguishing between compliance and internalisation, because this is measured by how an individual defines and measures public acceptance.
- Overlap between the effects of the two types of social influence; we often look to others for information, but partly because we do not want to be different
- NSI may not be detected: Nolan et al 2008 investigated whether people detected the influence of social norms on their energy conservation, people believed that the behaviour of neighbours had the least impact, yet results show otherwise.
- Explanation of ISI: features of the task moderate the impact of majority influence, like objectivity isn’t certain and therefore don’t prove anything.
- Evidence support for NSI: Linkenbach and Perkins found that teens who were told their age peers didn’t smoke were less likely to smoke themselves.
- Schultz et al. found that when hotel guests are exposed to the normative message that 75% of the hotel guests reuse their towels, each day towel use was reduced by 25%, hence this proves that the guests were trying to fit in a certain group.
- Evidence support for ISI: Witten Brink and Henley found that when participants were exposed to negative information about African Americans, later reported more negative beliefs about a black person.
Variables affecting conformity Conformity A type of social influence defined as a change in belief/behaviour in response to social pressure. Conformity to social roles Behaviours associated with a given social position status.
Key Study: Asch 1956 Aim: To measure the strength of the conformity effect using an unambiguous task. Procedure: Participants were asked to look at 3 different line lengths. They took turns to call out which of the 3 lines is similar to the standard one. The real participant answered second to last. On 12 of 18 trials confederates were asked to give the same incorrect answer. Findings: On the 12 critical trials average conformity was 33%. ¼ of participants didn’t conform, the majority of participants conformed to incorrect answers because of compliance.
Reasons for why an individual’s decisions are influenced by the majority:
- Distortion of perception – they saw the lines the way the majority did
- Distortion of judgement – they doubted their judgement and went with the majority ISI
- Distortion of action – agreed in public but not privately (compliance)
Factors affecting conformity: (situation factors) Asch Study Group size The bigger the majority group the more people conformed. With 1 more person added to the group conformity increased by 3%; with 2 more added – 13% increase; with 3 or more – 32% increase (1/3). Group unanimity A person is more likely to conform when all members of the groups are in agreement and give the same answer. Asch 1951 found that even presence of just one confederate that goes against the majority choice can reduce conformity as much as 80%. Difficulty of task When the comparison lines were made more similar lengths, it was harder to judge the correct answer, so the participant was looking for others for the correct answer → conformity increased Answer in Private Conformity decreased, because there is no fear of rejection from the group.
Evaluation:
- Reliability: Asch used a standardized lab procedure so findings can be replicated
- Internal validity: very specific in what to measure – conformity (not people’s ability to perceive small differences in lengths)
- Answers were obvious – Asch shows the impact of majority.
- The study has provided an explanation as to why people may conform to the majority
- Asch’s findings are unique because the study was done during an anti-communistic period when people were scared to go against the majority and were thus more likely to conform. Similar studies were done with authority figures amongst typical participants and found similar results which shows that conformity is more likely if the perceived costs of not conforming are high.
- Effect of group size: Bond 2005 claims that studies have used only a limited range of majority sizes. Asch concluded that a majority size of 3 was sufficient for maximal influence. Bond points out that no studies other than Asch used a majority size greater than 9, meaning we know very little about the effect of larger majority sizes on conformity levels.
- Independent behaviour rather than conformity: Asch believes his study demonstrated a commendable tendency for participants to stick to what they believe to be the correct judgement
- Unconvincing confederates could have sabotaged the study
- Cultural differences in conformity: individualist cultures conformed 25% and collectivist 37%
- Lacks ecological validity: artificial set-up, task is odd
- Ethics – participants were deceived because they thought it was a visual perception task, but this necessary to reduce demand characteristics
- Sample bias: male volunteer students
Situational variables affecting obedience Proximity When teacher and learner were in the same room obedience levels dropped to 40%, because the teacher could see the consequences. When the experimenter wasn’t in the room obedience levels dropped to 21%. Uniform With uniform – 72% Anything else – 48-52% Location A Yale lab, a trustworthy place, let participants feel safer. In less prestigious places obedience dropped to 48%
Key study: Milgram Aim: Investigate obedience to an authority figure Procedure: 40 participants, each of them draw (fixed) lots so a real participant is always the teacher and the confederate is the learner. Teacher had to deliver shocks in 15 volts increments whenever the learner made a mistake. The 2 were in separate rooms. Findings:
- 65% continued to the max shock level (450v).
- All participants went up to at least 300v.
- Only 5 withdrew. Conclusion: People are obedient even when told to inflict pain due to the agency theory.
Evaluation:
- Ethics: debrief was thorough and no major harm was caused
- Controlled and reliable experiment
- Uniform (research support): Durkin and Jeffery 2000 demonstrated that young children’s understanding of police authority
- Researchers found that both valid and invalid (confederate with poor vision) social support reduced conformity.
- Milgram’s was done over 50 years ago. Burger 2009 found levels of obedience almost identical to those of Milgram’s, meaning they have historical validity.
- Uniform: Durkin and Jeffrey 200 demonstrated that young children’s understanding of police authority was dominated by visual cues, specifically the presence of a police uniform.
- Low ecological validity: the task didn’t reflect real life obedience
- Internal validity, lack of realism: Orne and Holland 1968 claimed that participants in psych studies learned to distrust experimenters because they know that the true purpose of the study may be disguised. Perry 2012 found out that Milgram’s participants were sceptical whether the shocks were real. This challenges the validity of Milgram’s study.
- Proximity: Mandel 1998 claims that Milgram’s conclusions about the situational determinant of obedience aren’t borne out of real-life events. Men of the Reverse Police Battalion 101 were ordered to kill Jews, those who weren’t up for the task could refuse. Despite the presence of factors shown by Milgram to increase defiance (ex. close proximity to the victims) only a small minority refused to proceed with the killing. Mandel proposes that using obedience is not the real reason for such behaviours (ex. anti-Semitism)
- Location: Fromm 1973 claims that, because Milgram’s subjects know they were part of a scientific experiment, this made them more likely to obey in real life, thus there results can’t be used for real-life events.
- Lack of informed consent: participants stressed and not protected
- Sample bias: self-selected so they were more likely to follow orders AND the sample included few women
Agentic state and legitimacy of authority Agentic State People will obey an authority when they know their actions carry no weight/no responsibility. Autonomous State When you’re in control of your own actions Agentic shift Switching between autonomous and agentic state
Agency theory Milgram believes that we only exist in 2 states: autonomous and agentic Evidence for agency theory Evidence against agency theory Hofling et al. 1966 used the hierarchy to test obedience in nurses. A confederate doctor rang the ward asking to give a patient twice the marked dose of an unknown drug. 21 of 22 nurses obeyed against the rules. A control group of 22 nurses were asked if they would have done the same, they said not without proper authorisation.
Rank and Jacobsen 1977 repeated Hofling’s study using a familiar drug and at 3 times the dose. A confederate doctor with a familiar name to the nurses telephoned the ward and so the nurses could then discuss it with others before carrying it out. 2 of 18 nurses proceeded. So discussion with a colleague lowered obedience rate.
Evaluation:
- Hospitals have tightened up their rules
- Both studies have ecological validity as they are tested in natural setting
- Doesn’t take into account individual differences
- Autonomic and agentic are hard to measure and define and vary depending on the situation
- Doesn’t explain why some people are more motivated to follow someone with equal authority as someone else
Evaluation:
- Milgram found some patients were cruel and could have used the situation to their advantage. Zimbardo also found similar signs with the guards who inflicted pain on prisoners, which wasn’t an order.
- Milgram’s claim that people shift back and forth between autonomous and agentic state fails to explain the gradual and irreversible transition of doctors who were capable of conducting lethal experiments on helpless prisoners. Staub 1981 suggests that rather than agentic shift being responsible for the transition, it’s the experience of carrying out evil acts for a long period of time that changes the way in which individuals think and behave.
- Fennis and Aarts 2012 claim that agentic shift is more likely in any situation where the individual experiences a reduction in their sense of personal control. This means that agentic shift isn’t confined to obedience to authority.
- Legitimate authority can serve as justification to harm others, in agentic state – a loss of personal control.
- Tarnow 2000 provided support for the power of legitimate authority through a study of aviation accidents. He studied data from NTSB review of all serious aircraft accidents in the US between 1978 and 1990 where a flight voice recorder was available and where flight crew actions were a contributing factor in the crash. Tarnow found excessive dependence on the captain’s authority with sometimes tragic consequences.
Legitimacy of Authority Figure People tend to obey those who’s authority they consider as morally right or legally based
Resistance to social influence Social Support Locus of Control In Asch, presence of a dissident (a confederate who did not conform) led to a decrease in conformity levels in true participants, this it thought that the dissident gave the participant social support and made them feel more confident in their own decision and rejecting the majority.
Social support decreases obedience to authority/majority.
Internal LOC → you believe you have a great deal of personal control over your behaviour and you’re responsible for your actions. You tend to be less conforming and less obedient, hence more independent.
External LOC → you perceive your behaviour as being a result of external influence or luck. Less resistant by social influence. Evaluation
Allen and Levine 1969 found that a correct first answer, in confirming the participant’s own judgement, produced an initial commitment to the correct response that endures even though other group members disagree.
Rees and Wallace 2015 showed that the social support provided by friends helped teens resists conformity pressures from the majority.
Real world, the Rosenstrasse protest: in 1943, a group of German women were protesting in Berlin where the Gestapo were holding 2000 Jewish men, most of whom were married to non-Jewish partners. Despite the Gestapo threatening to open them on fire, the women’s courage eventually prevailed and the Jews were set free. Presence of disobedient peers gave the participants the confidence and courage to resist authority’s orders. Likewise, women defied by the Gestapo were given courage by the collective action of their peers.
Spector 1983 found a correlation between locus of control and predisposition to normative influence – with externals more likely to conform than internals. He found no correlation for informational influence.
Avtgis 1998 (meta-analysis) found that people with internal locus were more resistant to persuasion and less likely to conform, proving the theory
Twenge found people with external locus AND resistance to authority have increased, shedding doubt into the concept
Holland 1967 showed that people with internal locus showed greater resistance to authority in a replication of Milgram’s study
- People are more external than they used to be. A meta- analysis done by Twenge et al 2004 found young Americans increasingly believed in that their fate was determined more by luck than their own actions.
Key study: Gamson et al 1982 The MHRC set-up Procedure: 261 people signed up for this research, being paid 10$ and recorded on film. 33 groups of around 8- 9 they arrived at a hotel room and began the discussion, the experimenter leaves. They discuss a case of unfair dismissal. Experimenter had prompts to get groups going. Early protest: 3 people were asked to argue pro-company view. Late protest: 3 more were asked to comply. Lastly, they had to sign a release form consenting for their views to be used in court. Findings: 16 of 33 groups, 1/3 of participants rebelled when asked to take the company view in the early stage. In 2 cases they wouldn’t go further. 24 of 33 groups rebelled and 14 refused to sign the form. Conclusion: Having support from others increases resistance to orders.
Evaluation :
- Ecological validity: set up was real
- Internal validity: participant responses showed they believed the task was real
- Strong results, showing effect of supportive minority
- Ethics: deception and stressed was caused, however it was necessary to avoid demand characteristics
- Researchers were going to use 80 groups but then saw the level of emotion put the participants at risk and didn’t
Minority Influence
- Member of the majority group change their beliefs/behaviours as a result of expose to a persuasive minority
COMMITMENT, CONSISTENCY and FLEXIBILITY
Key study: Moscovici et al. 1969 Aim: To examine the effect of a consistent minority influence on majority through an unambiguous task Procedure Findings Consistent condition = confederates said the slides were green.
Consistent minority influenced the naïve participants to say green on over 8% of the trials. Inconsistent condition = confederated said the slides were green on 2/3 of the trials, and blue on the rest.
Inconsistent minority exerted very little influence and didn’t differ significantly from the control group Control condition = no confederates All slides were called blue Conclusion: The results show that a minority can sway the majority even when absent as long as consistency is maintained.
Evaluation:
- In a variation, Moscovici found that if participants write their answers privately after exposure to the minority, conformity remained
- Nemeth 2010 argues that exposure to a minority position, people consider more options and make better decisions – hence the cost of findings outweighs harm done to participants; more open-minded
- Flexibility: When a confederate sticks with a view, it has no influence. A confederate who is more open minded to other opinions has an influence
- Xie found a tipping point where 10% of the majority group is sufficient to change their opinion.
- Lack ecological validity and internal validity: artificial setting and an odd task
- Mackie 1987 argues that the views of the minority don’t lead to greater processing, but rather it’s the majority who are more likely to create greater message processing. By contrast, people don’t spend much time processing the minority’s message thus it tends to be less influential, not more.
- Ethics: deception as they were told it was a visual perception task
Internalisation: In minority influence, the attitude shift is internalised. Ex. In martin et al.’s study 2003 participants heard a minority group agree with an initial point of view while a second group heard the same point from a majority. Martin found that people think more deeply into a minority message – it has a long-lasting effect and is more convincing.
Nemeth’s 1987 convergent-divergent theory of minority influence:
- Minority and majority influence leads to different types of thinking
- Minority who disagrees stimulates broader thought and takes in more information. Leading to better decisions and more creative solutions – divergent thinking
- Whenever someone doesn’t agree with the majority, they become stressed and they narrow their thinking – convergent thinkers
