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Summary A level Psychology- social influence revision guide + questions
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1A01
Conformity is yielding to group pressure, a change in behaviour/opinions due to
imagined/real pressure from person/group. (minority influence)
Types:
Kelman’s (1958) three ways people conform:
Compliance (ACT)- temporary, publicly but not privately going along with majority
influence, only in presence of group.
Identification (IDENTIFY)- public and private acceptance of majority influence-
temporary, e.g. army man may adopt new opinions once out.
Internalisation (INTERNAL)- (true conformity), public and private acceptance of
majority influence- adoption of new belief system, long-term e.g. religion.
strongest to weakest— In, Id, Com.
Explanations:
Deutsh and Gerald developed two-process theory model:
Informational social influence (ISI)- a motivational force to look at others with need
to be correct, cognitive process, evolutionary basis, more likely in unfamiliar
situations, internalisation.
Normative social influence (NSI)- need to be liked/accepted by a group and agree
with opinion, compliance.
Cognitive dissonance- unpleasant feeling of anxiety by holding two contradicting
beliefs.
Jenness- p needed to predict jellybeans in jar, discussed, found that people changed
answer based on groups estimate, showed internalisation as believed others were
right, NSI too as wanted to be accepted.
A03
Evaluation-
- Less deception, ethical, lacks mundane realism as in lab. (jenness)
- nAffiliators people who need to be liked a lot- conform more- McGhee and Teevan.
- Lucas et al- students conformed more when maths problems were harder- ISI.
- Two-process model is oversimplified and ISI and NSI may work together,
conformity reduced when dissenter (agreed with p) was in study, due to NSI or
ISI.
, 2
- Support for NSI, Asch p felt embarrassed, when wrote answers down conformity
dropped to 12.5%.
- Real life application to marketing.
- Hogg found that conformity increased with friends, dual-dependency model.
A01
Asch’s research
Aim- investigate extent people would conform
to wrong answers.
Procedure- 123 American male students- told
visual deception, with 6-8 other ps, other ps
were with confederates (pretend p), which
comparison line was the same as A, B,C, 18
trials and confederate gave wrong answer on
12 of them, p answered 2nd to last or last.
Control group repeated it and made a mistake on 3/720- obvs answer.
Findings- on 12 critical trials where con gave wrong answers there was a
conformity rate of 36.5%.
75% conformed to at least one wrong answer, 25% didn’t conform, 5% conformed to
all wrong answers.
Post experiment found three reasons:
1. Distortion of action-public not private- avoid ridicule.
2. Distortion of perception- believed perception was wrong.
3. Distortion of judgement- doubted their judgement.
Conclusion:
NSI- public not private to gain acceptance.
A03
Evaluation:
- didn’t have many consequences for p if conformed so low in ecological validity-
limits generalisability
- Unethical due to cognitive dissonance and deceit.
- Men used- androcentrism, Neto suggested Woman may be more conformist, used
from USA- individualist not collectivist.
- Artificial- DC
- Majority are independent as it was only 36.8%.
- Mori- Asch study, p wore sunglasses with 1 wearing one that saw different lines,
that 1 p answered incorrect 20% of time, women conforming more, externally
valid as p know p, and generalise as used women.
- ‘child of its time’- Perrin and Spencer repeated it and found one student conform
in 396 trials on engineering students in UK, due to USA social norms?
A01
Variables affecting conformity
Situational variables- environment that affects individuals conformity:
Group size- conformity increases with group size, up to 15 confederates added had
no effect, 3 confederates was the highest level of conformity at 32%.
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