Types and Explanations for Conformity
Variables affecting conformity (Asch 1955)
Research into conformity to social roles - Zimbardo
Obedience: Milgrim study
Situational variables affecting obedience
Obedience: Social-psychological factors
Obedience: Authoritarian personality
Resistance to social influence
Minority influence
Social influence processes in social change
Types and Explanations for Conformity
A01
Kelman 3 types of conformity.
Compliance - go along with others to gain approval via social comparison - different private view
Internalisation - go along with others, accepted their point of view assuming they are right, public and private
Identification - conform to opinion of a group as something we value, identifying, public change not private e.g
army adopting beliefs but leaving, new opinions adopted - temporary
A01 Deutsch and Gerard - two process theory
Informational social influence - desire to be right, internalisation, ambiguous situations
Normative social influence - desire to be liked, compliance, unambiguous situations
Humans as social species fundamental need for social companionship and fear social rejection
A03 Asch found 36.8% conformity - repeated but had them privately write down - conformity fell to 12.5% -
informational influence still at play- however, artificial stimuli used in lab
A03 Conformity reduced to 5.5% with dissenter ppt saying correct answer, reduces NSI and ISI - not always
certain which is at work
A03 Lucas - answers to mathematical questions - greater conformity to incorrect answers when difficult rather
than easy - ambiguous task, ISI support in an ambiguous task, informational social influence is more likely to look
to others for the correct answer.
A03 Shultz researched hotel guests when he showed them a message that ‘75% of guests reuse their towels
each day’. This reduced their use by 25% versus the control group who received environmental benefits
information of reusing towels. This supports the NSI as they are conforming to fit in and do ‘the right thing’.
Environment messages are less effective so NSI is more powerful than ISI. RWA - economic benefit as it
improves the environment and saves money.
Variables affecting conformity (Asch 1955)
A01 Asch 123 american students
Naive ppt in a group of 6-8 confederates
Unambiguous line task 36.8% conformity in 12/18 trials
75% at least once and 25% never
Control conditions with no confederate giving wrong answer - 1% mistakes
Group pressure - conformity to wrong answers He found 3 variations:
A01 Variation 1 - unanimity - naive participant gave the support of an agreeing partner giving the correct answers
throughout - conformity dropped from 36.8% to 5.5%. Even when the ‘partner’ in the study answered differently
from the majority, they were still wrong, conformity dropped from original study to 9%. This shows when
unanimity of the group is broken, it reduces the power so the desire to be liked by the majority (normative social
influence) is reduced - the majority is inconsistent.
A01 Variation 2 is based on group size as less than 3 confederates have conformity of less than 15% and when
, increased to 3 conformity rose to 31.8% as an additional confederate makes a difference. Small majority is not
sufficient for influence - no need for more than 3. The third variation is task difficulty as Asch varied the
complexity to make line judging more difficult. The more difficult, conformity increased showing informational
social influence as tasks were more ambiguous. Participants looked to others to find a response as assumed
they are correct - desire to be liked.
A03 Perrin and Spencer replicated Asch’s experiment with engineering students and found ppts confirmed to the
majority when the wrong answer was given on 1/396 trials. As Asch’s experiment was done in 1950s America
during the cold war with Russia, the fear of communism due to McCarthyism made people afraid of standing out.
Conformity was at 36.8% but too high due to historical context. As P&S did their study after this time, conformity
wasn't as high - lacks historical validity (not generalizable to conformity levels now).
A03 Cost- benefit analysis - cost as deception in research for the vision test, the real purpose was to see how the
naive participant would react to confederate behaviour. Psychological harm - didn't know what they were involved
in so no informed decision was made, Back et al - suggested ppts in Asch’s experiment had increased autonomic
arousal. Only americans used
A03 Benefit - maintains the integrity of the research as active deception is needed - if they guessed the aim there
would be demand characteristics which invalidates the results. Psychologists have learnt about behaviour and
see the strength of the desire to be liked. This also has important implications for group decisions such as jury
making, business decisions and importance of the ‘devil's advocate’
A03 Low mundane realism as judging line task is not realistic, no consequences for not conforming (apart from
disapproval), Asch tried to apply the findings to JDM but the consequences are much higher and an innocent
person can go to prison. May not be testing real conformity - just for the task. This lacks external validity.
Research into conformity to social roles - Zimbardo
A01 Zimbardo - disposition or situation that makes an individual become tyrannical? Mock prison in the basement
of stanford university. Advertised students (volunteer sampling), selecting emotionally stable ppts after
psychological testing. Randomly assigned guard or prisoner role, prisoners arrested and blindfolded by police
heightening realism. Stripsearched, deloused, issued uniform and number. Daily routines regulated, numbers
used, not names. Guards had uniforms, wooden clubs, handcuffs, keys and mirror shades. They were told they
have complete power over the prisoners e.g when they can go to the toilet. Planned to last 2 weeks.
A01 First 2 days, prisoners rebelled against anonymity and guards responded with aggression
Set menial tasks like cleaning toilet with bare hands
One prisoner excessively disturbed - withdrew
4 prisoners released
1 went on hunger strike and put in a hole with no other prisoners
Called off after 6 days
Power of situation can influence behaviour through conforming to roles
Even volunteers performing certain functions e.g prison chaplain behaved like it was a real prison rather than
psychological study
A03 Banuazizi and Mohavedi - play acting not conforming to the role. Based on stereotypes on how they were
supposed to behave. Eshelman based his role on a British character from the film, ‘Cool Hand Luke’. Thought
prisoners were supposed to riot. Internal validity questioned. Zimbardo disputes criticism of demand
characteristics as 90% of conversations were prison orientated, increasing internal validity.
A03 Only ⅓ of the guards were brutal, ⅓ wanted fair rules and ⅓ supported prisoners e.g offering cigarettes.
Fromm - Zimbardo exaggerating power of the situation, ignoring dispositional influences. Overstated findings,
individual differences as guards are able to exercise their morality, despite situational conformity pressures
A03 Even though he selected ‘stable ppts’ offering the RTW and counselling - Ethical issues right to withdraw not
clear. Zimbardo dual role as prison superintendent - sent prisoners back when they wanted to leave.
Psychological harm as they thought they couldn't leave. Physical harm - should have stopped earlier.
A03 From 2003-2004 US Army Military Police committed human right violations against Iraq prisoners in
Baghdad prison. Tortured, physically and sexually abused, some murdered. RWA - situational factors made
abuse more likely - lack of training, boredom, no accountability to higher authority and assigned guard role =
abuse.
