Psychology Paper 1 Quick Notes
Social Influence
Asch’s research
Baseline study. Line comparison test. 123 American males in groups of 6-8 made up of 1 participant rest
confederate. 75% conformed at least once.
Extended study. Investigated variables.
Group size – 1-15 no change between 3 confederates and higher.
Unanimity – participant conformed less with non-conforming confederate.
Difficulty – task difficulty increased, ambiguous conformity rose. ISI.
Artificial situation.
American men – Women more conformist. US more individualist.
Luca’s maths problems. Situational variables.
Participants deceived.
Types + explanations
Kelman – Internalisation, identification, compliance.
2 process theory Deutsch and Gerard. Informational Social Influence – who has best info – internalisation.
Normative Social Influence – what is norm for group – compliance.
Asch participants feared disapproval – conformity fell 12.5% when written.
Luca’s study supports ISI. Unclear if NSI or ISI.
NSI not always predicted. nAffiliators greater need to be liked conform more.
Zimbardo’s research
Stanford Prison Experiment. 21 emotionally stable men randomly allocated role. Wore uniforms encourage
deindividualization. Activity encouraged conformity. Applied for ‘parole’ if wanted to leave.
Guards took up role enthusiastically. Prisoners subdued and anxious after riot 2 days in put down by force. 3
participants released psychological disturbance. 1 hunger strike. Concluded after 6 days.
Control of key variables by random allocation + emotionally stable.
Exaggerated social roles. Only 1/3rd guards brutal. Had to identify with role to conform. SIT.
Not representative of real-world where guards apply for role – personality.
Milgram’s research
40 American men volunteered take part in memory study. Introduced to confederate. Confederate was
learned. Assessed obedience when authority figure ordered to give electric shock to learner.
65% fully obedience. 12.5% up to 300 volts. Qualitative data extreme tension. Debriefed after 84% glad to take
part.
Replicated in French documentary. 80% delivered max volts. External validity.
Tapes show only ½ believed study real. 2/3rd disobedient. Demand characteristics.
Real shocks to puppy. 54% men and 100% women obeyed.
Only obeyed when gentle language used. Given no choice disobeyed no exception. SIT.
Deceived – unethical.
Situational variables
Proximity – teacher and learner same room (40%), touch proximity (30%), instructions phone (20.5%).
Decreased proximity teacher psychologically distanced themselves.
Uniform – no lab coat (20%). Uniform symbolises authority, encourages obedience.
Location – office block rather than yale (47.5%).
Field experiment. 2x more likely to obey security guard than jacket and tie.
Cultures. Dutch participants 90%. Only 2 replications in India and Jordan. Not cross-cultural.
Aware fake procedure more likely in variables due to contrived situations.
Criticised justifying Nazi behaviour as being due to situational factors beyond control.
Situational explanations
Obedience to destructive authority when someone wishes to shift responsibility. Agentic state – acting as
agent for someone else. Moral strain but don’t disobey. Autonomous state opposite. Agentic shift shift
between autonomous and agentic. Binding factors allow to minimise impact of behaviour. Shift responsibility
reduces moral strain.
, Legitimacy of authority taught in childhood. Can easily become destructive.
Milgram – when told weren’t responsible for harm continued no further objection.
16/18 nurses disobeyed doctors order to administer excessive doses.
WW2 incident G police shot civilians despite not being told to.
Legitimacy accounts cultural differences – 16% Australian women but 85% G women.
Dispositional explanations
Based on personality. Adorno believed form of psychological disorder. Authoritarian personality extreme
respect of authority, view society as weak and hold traditional values. Other people convenient targets.
2000 middle class white Americans attitude towards ethnic groups. F-scale. Authoritarian more conscious of
status power, certain cognitive styles, fixed attitudes.
Milgram -. 20 obedient higher on F-scale than disobedient. Unusual character for authoritarian.
Unlikely whole G popilation were authoritarians. SIT. Identified with oppressive state.
F-scale politically biased. Not consider left-wing extremism. Chinese Maoism.
‘Comedy of methodological error’ easy to influence results.
Resistance to social influence
Ability to withstand social pressure to conform or obey authority.
Social support – can be resisted with presence of other non-conformers. Milgram variation rate of obedience
10% when disobedient confederate. Challenges legitimacy of authority.
Pregnant teens with social support less likely to smoke than control group.
Produce evidence in smear campaign. Placed in groups. Peers support – disobedience. 29/33 groups.
Locus of Control – Internal LOC believing things happen controlled by them. External opposite. Internal more
likely to resists pressure to conform if person takes responsibility for action.
Repeat Milgram study measured LOC. 37% internals didn’t give highest shock but 23% externals.
Meta-analysis LOC studies 40 years. People more resistant but more external. 3 rd variable?
Minority influence
One person or group influences believes of others. Leads to internalisation.
Moscovici drew attention to 3 processes – consistency (synchronic and diachronic), extreme action
(augmentation principle), flexibility. Over time deeper processing occurs more people convert rate of
conversion faster – snowball effect. Minority view become majority.
Meta-analysis of 100 studies found consistent minorities most influential. Moscovici study showed figure of
agreement only 8%. When answers written agreed with minority view.
Deeper processing. People less willing to change opinion of listened to minority group. Controlled.
Real-life majorities more power. Minorities more committed to their cause – absent research.
Social influence and social change
Civil rights movement. Protest drew attention to segregation issues. Activists’ minority position remained
consistent. Protests over several years, same peaceful message. People risked their lives (freedom riders).
Attention of govt gained and more people backed. Snowball effect 1964 Civil Rights Act. Social cryptomnesia –
no one remembers what led to social change.
Environmental campaigns NSI. Change encouraged by what majority doing.
Zimbardo – gradual commitment once small instruction obeyed more difficult to resist.
Messages placed California homes. Greater energy decrease in group with NSI messages.
Foxcroft 70 studies attempt to reduce student alcohol use. No effect on frequency.
Divergent thinking when engage in minority arguments.
Majority influence more significant. Forced to think of own beliefs if majority agree.
Some people resist social change due to stereotypes. E.g., environmentally friendly ‘tree huggers’.
Memory
Coding, capacity, and duration
Coding – format which info stored in memory stores. Baddeley list of words 4 groups. Asked to recall in correct
order. STM worse in acoustically similar. LTM worse in semantically similar words. Info acoustic in STM,
semantic in LTM. Led to MSM – clear difference. Artificial stimulus.
Capacity – amount of info held in memory store. Jacobs read out 4 digits and participant recall in order, reads
out 5 digits and so on until participant cannot correctly recall. Mean span 9.4 items, 7.3 letters. Replicated in
Social Influence
Asch’s research
Baseline study. Line comparison test. 123 American males in groups of 6-8 made up of 1 participant rest
confederate. 75% conformed at least once.
Extended study. Investigated variables.
Group size – 1-15 no change between 3 confederates and higher.
Unanimity – participant conformed less with non-conforming confederate.
Difficulty – task difficulty increased, ambiguous conformity rose. ISI.
Artificial situation.
American men – Women more conformist. US more individualist.
Luca’s maths problems. Situational variables.
Participants deceived.
Types + explanations
Kelman – Internalisation, identification, compliance.
2 process theory Deutsch and Gerard. Informational Social Influence – who has best info – internalisation.
Normative Social Influence – what is norm for group – compliance.
Asch participants feared disapproval – conformity fell 12.5% when written.
Luca’s study supports ISI. Unclear if NSI or ISI.
NSI not always predicted. nAffiliators greater need to be liked conform more.
Zimbardo’s research
Stanford Prison Experiment. 21 emotionally stable men randomly allocated role. Wore uniforms encourage
deindividualization. Activity encouraged conformity. Applied for ‘parole’ if wanted to leave.
Guards took up role enthusiastically. Prisoners subdued and anxious after riot 2 days in put down by force. 3
participants released psychological disturbance. 1 hunger strike. Concluded after 6 days.
Control of key variables by random allocation + emotionally stable.
Exaggerated social roles. Only 1/3rd guards brutal. Had to identify with role to conform. SIT.
Not representative of real-world where guards apply for role – personality.
Milgram’s research
40 American men volunteered take part in memory study. Introduced to confederate. Confederate was
learned. Assessed obedience when authority figure ordered to give electric shock to learner.
65% fully obedience. 12.5% up to 300 volts. Qualitative data extreme tension. Debriefed after 84% glad to take
part.
Replicated in French documentary. 80% delivered max volts. External validity.
Tapes show only ½ believed study real. 2/3rd disobedient. Demand characteristics.
Real shocks to puppy. 54% men and 100% women obeyed.
Only obeyed when gentle language used. Given no choice disobeyed no exception. SIT.
Deceived – unethical.
Situational variables
Proximity – teacher and learner same room (40%), touch proximity (30%), instructions phone (20.5%).
Decreased proximity teacher psychologically distanced themselves.
Uniform – no lab coat (20%). Uniform symbolises authority, encourages obedience.
Location – office block rather than yale (47.5%).
Field experiment. 2x more likely to obey security guard than jacket and tie.
Cultures. Dutch participants 90%. Only 2 replications in India and Jordan. Not cross-cultural.
Aware fake procedure more likely in variables due to contrived situations.
Criticised justifying Nazi behaviour as being due to situational factors beyond control.
Situational explanations
Obedience to destructive authority when someone wishes to shift responsibility. Agentic state – acting as
agent for someone else. Moral strain but don’t disobey. Autonomous state opposite. Agentic shift shift
between autonomous and agentic. Binding factors allow to minimise impact of behaviour. Shift responsibility
reduces moral strain.
, Legitimacy of authority taught in childhood. Can easily become destructive.
Milgram – when told weren’t responsible for harm continued no further objection.
16/18 nurses disobeyed doctors order to administer excessive doses.
WW2 incident G police shot civilians despite not being told to.
Legitimacy accounts cultural differences – 16% Australian women but 85% G women.
Dispositional explanations
Based on personality. Adorno believed form of psychological disorder. Authoritarian personality extreme
respect of authority, view society as weak and hold traditional values. Other people convenient targets.
2000 middle class white Americans attitude towards ethnic groups. F-scale. Authoritarian more conscious of
status power, certain cognitive styles, fixed attitudes.
Milgram -. 20 obedient higher on F-scale than disobedient. Unusual character for authoritarian.
Unlikely whole G popilation were authoritarians. SIT. Identified with oppressive state.
F-scale politically biased. Not consider left-wing extremism. Chinese Maoism.
‘Comedy of methodological error’ easy to influence results.
Resistance to social influence
Ability to withstand social pressure to conform or obey authority.
Social support – can be resisted with presence of other non-conformers. Milgram variation rate of obedience
10% when disobedient confederate. Challenges legitimacy of authority.
Pregnant teens with social support less likely to smoke than control group.
Produce evidence in smear campaign. Placed in groups. Peers support – disobedience. 29/33 groups.
Locus of Control – Internal LOC believing things happen controlled by them. External opposite. Internal more
likely to resists pressure to conform if person takes responsibility for action.
Repeat Milgram study measured LOC. 37% internals didn’t give highest shock but 23% externals.
Meta-analysis LOC studies 40 years. People more resistant but more external. 3 rd variable?
Minority influence
One person or group influences believes of others. Leads to internalisation.
Moscovici drew attention to 3 processes – consistency (synchronic and diachronic), extreme action
(augmentation principle), flexibility. Over time deeper processing occurs more people convert rate of
conversion faster – snowball effect. Minority view become majority.
Meta-analysis of 100 studies found consistent minorities most influential. Moscovici study showed figure of
agreement only 8%. When answers written agreed with minority view.
Deeper processing. People less willing to change opinion of listened to minority group. Controlled.
Real-life majorities more power. Minorities more committed to their cause – absent research.
Social influence and social change
Civil rights movement. Protest drew attention to segregation issues. Activists’ minority position remained
consistent. Protests over several years, same peaceful message. People risked their lives (freedom riders).
Attention of govt gained and more people backed. Snowball effect 1964 Civil Rights Act. Social cryptomnesia –
no one remembers what led to social change.
Environmental campaigns NSI. Change encouraged by what majority doing.
Zimbardo – gradual commitment once small instruction obeyed more difficult to resist.
Messages placed California homes. Greater energy decrease in group with NSI messages.
Foxcroft 70 studies attempt to reduce student alcohol use. No effect on frequency.
Divergent thinking when engage in minority arguments.
Majority influence more significant. Forced to think of own beliefs if majority agree.
Some people resist social change due to stereotypes. E.g., environmentally friendly ‘tree huggers’.
Memory
Coding, capacity, and duration
Coding – format which info stored in memory stores. Baddeley list of words 4 groups. Asked to recall in correct
order. STM worse in acoustically similar. LTM worse in semantically similar words. Info acoustic in STM,
semantic in LTM. Led to MSM – clear difference. Artificial stimulus.
Capacity – amount of info held in memory store. Jacobs read out 4 digits and participant recall in order, reads
out 5 digits and so on until participant cannot correctly recall. Mean span 9.4 items, 7.3 letters. Replicated in
