AQA A-Level Psychology- Social Influence- Conformity Questions and Answers Graded A+

AQA A-Level Psychology- Social Influence- Conformity Questions and Answers Graded A+ Social Influence Process by which a persons attitude, beliefs or behaviour are modified by the presence or actions of others. Conformity Result of Social Influence, where people adopt the behaviours, attitudes and values of the majority members of a group. Compliance Type of conformity in which people conform publicly but privately disagree. Identification Type of conformity in which people change their beliefs in order to fit in but the change may only be temporary. Internalisation The deepest type of conformity in which people change their beliefs permanently, so the beliefs become a part of their way of seeing the world. Explanations for Conformity The two explenations are Informational Social Influence (desire to be right) and Normative Social Influence (desire to be liked). Dual Process Dependency Model Informational Social Influence and Normative Social Influence mixing together. Informational Social Influence- Sherif (1935) He wanted to investigate whether a group norm world emerge when individuals were faced with ambiguous(no clear answer) tasks. He asked individuals to judge how far a light appeared to move on a screen. After individual judgements were made, he asked them to figure out a group answer. they discussed this aloud until a group norm emerged. He altered the study so that the group decision was made first, the group norm emerged far more quickly then. When asked to give an individual answer, they stuck with the previous (group) one. When faced with an ambiguous task people look to others in the group for guidance. They experience Informational Social Influence. Normative Social Influence- Asch (1951) He wanted to find out how may participants would conform to the group (majority) even when it was clear that the group was wrong. Seven male participants looked at two cards. The first cars showed one vertical line and the other three lines of different lengths. the participants were asked to say which lines match. The answer was obvious. Only one out of seven participants wasn't aweare of the experiment (naïve participant). Accomplices gave the incorrect answer on 12/18 trials. 74% of participants conformed at least once. he concluded that even in an clear situation there still may be a strong group pressure to conform. Validity Genuine/true picture. Population Validity Can be generalised to other people Historical/Temporal Validity Can be generalised to other time periods. Internal Validity How sure the researcher is that the results are due to the dependant veriable. External Validity Can findings be generalised outside of study. Veriables Affecting Conformity- Group Size You need at least 3 confederates for the naïve participant to conform. If there are too many confederates the naïve participants may get suspicious and not conform. If there is no right answer people are more likely to conform because of NSI- desire to be liked. Veriables Affecting Conformity- Unanimity Complete agreement form a group of people about an anwser of viewpoing. If a dissenter is added then the naïve participants confidence increases. The dissenter breaks the united form of the rest of the group. Veriables Affecting Conformity- Difficulty of Task In difficult tasks our confidence tends to drop. People are more likely to doubt themselves and conform in difficult situations. If the task is too easy the participant might feel stupid and conform to feel more confident. Conformity to Social Roles- Zimbardo (1971) He investigated the extent to which people would conform to the roles of the guard and prisoner in a role playing situation of prison life. 75 students volunteered to take part in the sudy for $15 a day. 21 most physically and mentally stable were chosen. 10 were assigned as guards and the rest as prisoners. The mock prison was as realistic as possible 'prisoners' were dehumanised. The study was planned to run for two weeks. Not long after starting the guards became more sadistic and taunting. 4 'prisoners' were released within the first 4 days due to mental breakdowns. Study was stoped after 6 days. In later interviews most partisipants were surprised at what uncharacteristic behaviour they had shown. It was concluded that individuals readily conform to colial roles demanded by a situation, even when the roles override individuals moral beliefs and personal behaviour.