ASCH's research
11 January 2024 09:47
What is conformity?
A change in a person's behaviour or opinions as a result of real or imagined pressure from a person or group of
people
Asch's baseline study (1951)
- 123 American males
- Thought they were taking part in a perception test
- Tested in a group of confederates
- Only one real participants per group
Asch's initial findings
On average participants conformed to an incorrect answer 36.8% (about a third) of the time.
There were individual differences of course, with 25% not conforming at all.
However 75%of participants conformed at least once.
Variables investigated by ASCH (1955)
- Group size
- Unanimity
- Task difficulty
Group size
Asch varied the number of confederates from 1-15
- Conformity increased with group size, but only up to a certain point.
- 3 confederates saw a rise in conformity to 31%
- 7 saw the highest level of conformity - 36%
- Then it started to level off again.
Unanimity
Introduction of a non-conforming confederate
- Gave either the correct answer or a different incorrect answer
▫ Conformity dropped to 5%-9%
- Social support can reduce the pressure to conform and allow us to be independent. e.g. if a group agrees to go
somewhere but you don’t want to, you don’t say anything since the majority want to go, but if someone in the
group also expresses that they don’t want to go then you would agree with them and speak up.
Task difficulty
Asch made the task more difficult, by making the difference between the line lengths smaller.
In this variation, Asch found the rate of conformity increased.
- As the task becomes more ambiguous people tend to look for others for guidance and to assume they are
right.
- Informational social influence.
EVALUATION
STRENGTH
Research support
- One strength of Asch's research is support from other studies for the effects of task difficulty.
- For example, Lucas et al (2006) asked their participants to solve 'easy and hard' maths problems. Participants
were given answers from three other students and it was found that the participants agreed with the wrong
answers more often when the problems were harder.
- This show's Asch was correct in claiming that task difficulty is one variable that affects conformity and
therefore supports his findings.
Social Influence Page 1
, therefore supports his findings.
COUNTERPOINT to research support
Confidence
However, Lucas et al's study also found that conformity is more complex than Asch first suggested.
Participants with high confidence in their maths abilities were found to conform less on hard tasks than those with
low confidence.
This shows that an individual-level factor can influence conformity by interacting with situational variables (e.g. task
difficulty) which is something that Asch did not take into account.
Findings may not be universally applicable and may have underestimated how much people conform
Artificial stimuli
One limitation of Asch's research is that the task and situation were artificial
Participants knew they were in a research study and may simply have gone along with what was expected of them.
The task of identifying lines was relatively trivial and therefore there was no reason to conform.
Also according to Fiske (2014) Asch's groups were not very 'groupy' i.e. they did not really resemble groups that we
experience in everyday life.
The means the findings do not generalise to real world situations, especially those where the consequences of
conformity might be important
Social Influence Page 2
, Types and explanation for conformity
18 January 2024 09:43
3 types of conformity:
- Compliance
- Identification
- Internalisation
Compliance
- The shallowest level of conformity
- Here a person changes their public behaviour, the way they act, but not their private beliefs.
- This is usually a short-term change and is often the result of wanting to fit in .
Internalisation
- Deepest level of conformity
- Here a person changes their public behaviour and their private beliefs.
- This is usually a long-term change and often the result of careful consideration and believing it is the correct thing to do.
Identification
- A moderate level of conformity
- Conformity occurs because a person wants to be associated with another person or group.
- Has elements of both internalisation and compliance.
- Beliefs are adopted and seen as correct (internalisation), however the purpose of this is to fit in and be accepted (compliance)
- The individual may not privately believe in everything the group stands for.
Reasons for conformity
Normative social influence
This is when a person conforms to be accepted and to feel that they belong to the group.
- Here a person conforms because it is socially rewarding, or to avoid social rejection; for example, to avoid feeling that they don't
'fit in'.
→ Compliance and identification.
- Is an emotional process that occurs when with strangers or close friends.
Informational social influence
When a person conforms to gain knowledge, or because they believe that someone else is 'right'.
→ Internationalisation.
- This change in behaviour and belief is the result of a person adopting a new belief system, because they genuinely believe that
their new beliefs are 'right'.
- It is a cognitive process that occurs in the presence of experts, when the situation is ambivalent or when the task is difficult.
EVALUATION
STRENGTH
Research support for NSI
When asked to judge the lengths of lines and match them to a standard line, he found that many of the participants went along with
the obviously wrong answers of the other group members.
When asked by Asch post-experimental interviews why they did this, participants said that they changed their answer to avoid
disapproval from the rest of te group, which clearly shows that compliance occurred as the participants conformed in order to 'fit in'.
Further to this, Asch demonstrated in a later variation (1955) that when the pressure to publicly conform is removed by asking
participants to write down their answers on a piece of paper, rather than say them aloud the conformity rates fell to 12.5% as the fear
of rejection became far less
Research support for ISI
Lucas found greater conformity to incorrect answers when the questions were difficult rather than easy. When the problems were
hard the situation became ambiguous (unclear). The participants did not want to be wrong, so they relied on the answers they were
given. This shows that ISI is a valid explanation of conformity because the results are what ISI would predict.
LIMITATION
Lack of clarity
However, it is often unclear whether it is NSI or ISI at work in research studies (or in real life).
For example Asch (1955) found that conformity is reduced when there is one other dissenting participant present. The dissenter may
Social Influence Page 3
11 January 2024 09:47
What is conformity?
A change in a person's behaviour or opinions as a result of real or imagined pressure from a person or group of
people
Asch's baseline study (1951)
- 123 American males
- Thought they were taking part in a perception test
- Tested in a group of confederates
- Only one real participants per group
Asch's initial findings
On average participants conformed to an incorrect answer 36.8% (about a third) of the time.
There were individual differences of course, with 25% not conforming at all.
However 75%of participants conformed at least once.
Variables investigated by ASCH (1955)
- Group size
- Unanimity
- Task difficulty
Group size
Asch varied the number of confederates from 1-15
- Conformity increased with group size, but only up to a certain point.
- 3 confederates saw a rise in conformity to 31%
- 7 saw the highest level of conformity - 36%
- Then it started to level off again.
Unanimity
Introduction of a non-conforming confederate
- Gave either the correct answer or a different incorrect answer
▫ Conformity dropped to 5%-9%
- Social support can reduce the pressure to conform and allow us to be independent. e.g. if a group agrees to go
somewhere but you don’t want to, you don’t say anything since the majority want to go, but if someone in the
group also expresses that they don’t want to go then you would agree with them and speak up.
Task difficulty
Asch made the task more difficult, by making the difference between the line lengths smaller.
In this variation, Asch found the rate of conformity increased.
- As the task becomes more ambiguous people tend to look for others for guidance and to assume they are
right.
- Informational social influence.
EVALUATION
STRENGTH
Research support
- One strength of Asch's research is support from other studies for the effects of task difficulty.
- For example, Lucas et al (2006) asked their participants to solve 'easy and hard' maths problems. Participants
were given answers from three other students and it was found that the participants agreed with the wrong
answers more often when the problems were harder.
- This show's Asch was correct in claiming that task difficulty is one variable that affects conformity and
therefore supports his findings.
Social Influence Page 1
, therefore supports his findings.
COUNTERPOINT to research support
Confidence
However, Lucas et al's study also found that conformity is more complex than Asch first suggested.
Participants with high confidence in their maths abilities were found to conform less on hard tasks than those with
low confidence.
This shows that an individual-level factor can influence conformity by interacting with situational variables (e.g. task
difficulty) which is something that Asch did not take into account.
Findings may not be universally applicable and may have underestimated how much people conform
Artificial stimuli
One limitation of Asch's research is that the task and situation were artificial
Participants knew they were in a research study and may simply have gone along with what was expected of them.
The task of identifying lines was relatively trivial and therefore there was no reason to conform.
Also according to Fiske (2014) Asch's groups were not very 'groupy' i.e. they did not really resemble groups that we
experience in everyday life.
The means the findings do not generalise to real world situations, especially those where the consequences of
conformity might be important
Social Influence Page 2
, Types and explanation for conformity
18 January 2024 09:43
3 types of conformity:
- Compliance
- Identification
- Internalisation
Compliance
- The shallowest level of conformity
- Here a person changes their public behaviour, the way they act, but not their private beliefs.
- This is usually a short-term change and is often the result of wanting to fit in .
Internalisation
- Deepest level of conformity
- Here a person changes their public behaviour and their private beliefs.
- This is usually a long-term change and often the result of careful consideration and believing it is the correct thing to do.
Identification
- A moderate level of conformity
- Conformity occurs because a person wants to be associated with another person or group.
- Has elements of both internalisation and compliance.
- Beliefs are adopted and seen as correct (internalisation), however the purpose of this is to fit in and be accepted (compliance)
- The individual may not privately believe in everything the group stands for.
Reasons for conformity
Normative social influence
This is when a person conforms to be accepted and to feel that they belong to the group.
- Here a person conforms because it is socially rewarding, or to avoid social rejection; for example, to avoid feeling that they don't
'fit in'.
→ Compliance and identification.
- Is an emotional process that occurs when with strangers or close friends.
Informational social influence
When a person conforms to gain knowledge, or because they believe that someone else is 'right'.
→ Internationalisation.
- This change in behaviour and belief is the result of a person adopting a new belief system, because they genuinely believe that
their new beliefs are 'right'.
- It is a cognitive process that occurs in the presence of experts, when the situation is ambivalent or when the task is difficult.
EVALUATION
STRENGTH
Research support for NSI
When asked to judge the lengths of lines and match them to a standard line, he found that many of the participants went along with
the obviously wrong answers of the other group members.
When asked by Asch post-experimental interviews why they did this, participants said that they changed their answer to avoid
disapproval from the rest of te group, which clearly shows that compliance occurred as the participants conformed in order to 'fit in'.
Further to this, Asch demonstrated in a later variation (1955) that when the pressure to publicly conform is removed by asking
participants to write down their answers on a piece of paper, rather than say them aloud the conformity rates fell to 12.5% as the fear
of rejection became far less
Research support for ISI
Lucas found greater conformity to incorrect answers when the questions were difficult rather than easy. When the problems were
hard the situation became ambiguous (unclear). The participants did not want to be wrong, so they relied on the answers they were
given. This shows that ISI is a valid explanation of conformity because the results are what ISI would predict.
LIMITATION
Lack of clarity
However, it is often unclear whether it is NSI or ISI at work in research studies (or in real life).
For example Asch (1955) found that conformity is reduced when there is one other dissenting participant present. The dissenter may
Social Influence Page 3
