Social Influence Essay Plans
Describe and Evaluate Asch’s Research into Conformity
AO1:
- Conformity ~ a change in a person’s behaviour or opinions as a result of real or imagine pressure from other people.
- Asch (1951) 123 male American students, tested in a group between 6 and 8 confederates. Participants identified the
length of a standard line, on the first few trials confederates gave correct answers but then all selected the same
wrong answers. Each participant competed 18 trials with 12 ‘critical trials’ with the confederates giving the wrong
answer.
- Naïve participants gave the wrong answer 36.8% of the time. However, there were individual differences and 25% of
participants never gave a wrong answer. Conformed to avoid rejection and continued to privately trust their own
opinions.
- Asch (1955) conducted the same experience but with variables. Group size (between 1 and 15) ~ with 2 confederates
13.6% conformity, 3 31.8% and adding more made little difference), unanimity (presence of a dissenting confederate)
reduced conformity whether they were giving the correct answers or not, task difficulty (lines more similar in length) ~
conformity increased when the task was more difficult.
Artificial task Asch’s study was an artificial situation and task, it is a trivial task with no meaning so is not
generalisable to everyday situations. Also, the participants were aware that they were taking part in a
study and so the results may be subject to demand characteristics and this lowers the external
validity.
Control group Asch used a control group to test that the participants were actually conforming and not just giving
answers that they actually believed to be true. In the control group only 3 out of 720 were mistakes,
this increases the validity of the research.
Cultural differences in There are cultural differences in conformity. Smith & Bond (1998) suggest that the conformity in
conformity China would be higher than in the USA. This is because USA is an individualist culture and people are
more independent however collectivist countries such as China have higher conformity rates because
they rely on others more. This is a limitation of the research as it ignores cultural differences.
Also, Asch’s study only had male participants, Neto (1995) suggests that women may be more
conformist than men, because they are more conscious about fitting in and taking other people’s
advice.
Supporting Research Crutchfield (1955) did a similar study in cubicles; each participant was told he was the last to guess
and the other participants answers were visible on a screen. 50% of the time participants were given
incorrect answers, they found similar levels of conformity to Asch (30%). This gives Asch’s study more
reliable.
Situational variables Lucas et al (2006) asked participants to solve ‘easy’ and ‘hard’ maths problems and were given fake
answers from 3 other ‘students. They found that participants conformed more often when the
problems were harder, although this did depend on a situational variable. They found that participants
with high confidence in their maths abilities conformed less on hard tasks than those with low
confidence. This is a limitation of Asch’s research, and shows that task difficulty only seems to have
an effect when people are not confident in their abilities.
Outline and Evaluate Research into Explanations of Conformity
AO1:
-Conformity ~ a change in a person’s behaviour or opinions as a result of real or imagine pressure from other people.
-Informational Social Influence – motivated by a desire to be correct, most likely to happen if the situation is new or
ambiguous
- Normative Social Influence – motivated by a desire to be accepted, an emotional process, most likely to occur with
strangers where you are concerned about rejection.
Research support for Lucas et al (2006) found that more participants conformed to incorrect answers when the maths
ISI problems were difficult. This was most true for students who rated their maths ability as poor. This
supports informational social influence as they conformed with others who they thought were smarter
than them because of their desire to be correct.
, Research support for Asch (1951) asked participants why they agreed with the clearly wrong answers, some said they felt
NSI self-conscious about giving the right answer and were afraid of disapproval. When participants were
asked to write answers down, conformity rates fell to 12.5%. This supports the normative social
influence explanation.
There are individual nAffiliators are people who have a greater need for social relationships. McGhee & Teevan (1967)
differences in NSI found that students who were nAffiliators were more likely to conform. This is a limitation of the
normative social influence explanation because the desire to be liked underlies conformity for some
people more than others, and so it is not necessarily a generalisable idea.
Sometimes they can Asch added a dissenting participant in his research, this reduces the normative social influence as they
work together have more social support, however it also reduces informational social influence as there is an
alternative source of information. This means it can be difficult to tell which explanation is at work, or
they could work together.
Outline and Evaluate Research into Conformity to Social Roles
AO1:
- Social roles ~ the parts people play as members of various social groups, accompanies by expectations of what is
appropriate behaviour in each role.
- Zimbardo et al (1973) recruited 24 ‘emotionally stable’ students and randomly assigned them prisoner or guard.
- Prisoners were arrested from their homes, delivered to the prison, blind-folded, strip-searched, deloused and issued a
uniform and a number.
- Guards had uniform, wooden club, keys and mirrored shades.
- Prisoners were heavily regulated and had 16 rules to follow, enforced by the guards who had complete power.
- Prisoners rebelled 2 days in, guards were enthusiastic about their role and their behaviour was a threat to the prisoners
psychological and physical health.
- One prisoner went on hunger strike and the guards attempted to force feed.
- 3 prisoners were released early because of signs of psychological disturbance.
- Study stooped after 6 days instead of the original 14.
Control of variables Zimbardo had control over the key variables, he chose emotionally stable participant and randomly
assigned them their roles, this means that individual differences are rules out and that the behaviour
was due to the pressures of the situation rather than their personality. This increased the validity of
the study.
Lack of realism Banuazizi & Mohavedi (1975) suggested that the participants were in fact play acting and their
performances were based off of the stereotypes of how prisoners and guards were supposed to
behave. For example, one guard based his role on a character from the film Cool Hand Luke, and the
prisoners rioted because that’s what they believe real prisoners did.
Zimbardo may have Fromm (1973) says that Zimbardo may have exaggerated the power of social roles to influence
exaggerated the results behaviour. Only 1/3rd of the guards acted brutally 1/3rd applied rules fairly and the rest supported
prisoners. Zimbardo (2007) said that the guards sympathised, offered cigarettes and reinstated
privileges., and that most guards were able to resist situational pressures to conform to a brutal role.
This suggests that Zimbardo originally overstated the conformity to social roles and understated the
influence of dispositional factors such as personality.
Ethical issues There are ethical issues to this research as it was traumatic for prisoners. Also, parts of the research
such as being arrested form their homes may damage their reputation with others and wasn’t really
necessary. In addition, Zimbardo was playing two conflicting roles at once. He was both lead researcher
and prisoner superintendent and this limited his ability to protect his participants from harm because
of the conflicting nature of these roles.
Describe and Evaluate Milgram’s Research into Obedience
AO1:
- Obedience ~ a form of social influence in which an individual follows a direct order from a figure of authority.
- Milgram (1963) recruited 40 male participants (20-50) for a ‘memory study’.
- The participant was given the role of teacher and a confederate the role of learner. The learner was strapped in a
chair with electrodes.
- The teacher had to give the learner an increasingly severe shock each time he made a mistake on word pairs.
Describe and Evaluate Asch’s Research into Conformity
AO1:
- Conformity ~ a change in a person’s behaviour or opinions as a result of real or imagine pressure from other people.
- Asch (1951) 123 male American students, tested in a group between 6 and 8 confederates. Participants identified the
length of a standard line, on the first few trials confederates gave correct answers but then all selected the same
wrong answers. Each participant competed 18 trials with 12 ‘critical trials’ with the confederates giving the wrong
answer.
- Naïve participants gave the wrong answer 36.8% of the time. However, there were individual differences and 25% of
participants never gave a wrong answer. Conformed to avoid rejection and continued to privately trust their own
opinions.
- Asch (1955) conducted the same experience but with variables. Group size (between 1 and 15) ~ with 2 confederates
13.6% conformity, 3 31.8% and adding more made little difference), unanimity (presence of a dissenting confederate)
reduced conformity whether they were giving the correct answers or not, task difficulty (lines more similar in length) ~
conformity increased when the task was more difficult.
Artificial task Asch’s study was an artificial situation and task, it is a trivial task with no meaning so is not
generalisable to everyday situations. Also, the participants were aware that they were taking part in a
study and so the results may be subject to demand characteristics and this lowers the external
validity.
Control group Asch used a control group to test that the participants were actually conforming and not just giving
answers that they actually believed to be true. In the control group only 3 out of 720 were mistakes,
this increases the validity of the research.
Cultural differences in There are cultural differences in conformity. Smith & Bond (1998) suggest that the conformity in
conformity China would be higher than in the USA. This is because USA is an individualist culture and people are
more independent however collectivist countries such as China have higher conformity rates because
they rely on others more. This is a limitation of the research as it ignores cultural differences.
Also, Asch’s study only had male participants, Neto (1995) suggests that women may be more
conformist than men, because they are more conscious about fitting in and taking other people’s
advice.
Supporting Research Crutchfield (1955) did a similar study in cubicles; each participant was told he was the last to guess
and the other participants answers were visible on a screen. 50% of the time participants were given
incorrect answers, they found similar levels of conformity to Asch (30%). This gives Asch’s study more
reliable.
Situational variables Lucas et al (2006) asked participants to solve ‘easy’ and ‘hard’ maths problems and were given fake
answers from 3 other ‘students. They found that participants conformed more often when the
problems were harder, although this did depend on a situational variable. They found that participants
with high confidence in their maths abilities conformed less on hard tasks than those with low
confidence. This is a limitation of Asch’s research, and shows that task difficulty only seems to have
an effect when people are not confident in their abilities.
Outline and Evaluate Research into Explanations of Conformity
AO1:
-Conformity ~ a change in a person’s behaviour or opinions as a result of real or imagine pressure from other people.
-Informational Social Influence – motivated by a desire to be correct, most likely to happen if the situation is new or
ambiguous
- Normative Social Influence – motivated by a desire to be accepted, an emotional process, most likely to occur with
strangers where you are concerned about rejection.
Research support for Lucas et al (2006) found that more participants conformed to incorrect answers when the maths
ISI problems were difficult. This was most true for students who rated their maths ability as poor. This
supports informational social influence as they conformed with others who they thought were smarter
than them because of their desire to be correct.
, Research support for Asch (1951) asked participants why they agreed with the clearly wrong answers, some said they felt
NSI self-conscious about giving the right answer and were afraid of disapproval. When participants were
asked to write answers down, conformity rates fell to 12.5%. This supports the normative social
influence explanation.
There are individual nAffiliators are people who have a greater need for social relationships. McGhee & Teevan (1967)
differences in NSI found that students who were nAffiliators were more likely to conform. This is a limitation of the
normative social influence explanation because the desire to be liked underlies conformity for some
people more than others, and so it is not necessarily a generalisable idea.
Sometimes they can Asch added a dissenting participant in his research, this reduces the normative social influence as they
work together have more social support, however it also reduces informational social influence as there is an
alternative source of information. This means it can be difficult to tell which explanation is at work, or
they could work together.
Outline and Evaluate Research into Conformity to Social Roles
AO1:
- Social roles ~ the parts people play as members of various social groups, accompanies by expectations of what is
appropriate behaviour in each role.
- Zimbardo et al (1973) recruited 24 ‘emotionally stable’ students and randomly assigned them prisoner or guard.
- Prisoners were arrested from their homes, delivered to the prison, blind-folded, strip-searched, deloused and issued a
uniform and a number.
- Guards had uniform, wooden club, keys and mirrored shades.
- Prisoners were heavily regulated and had 16 rules to follow, enforced by the guards who had complete power.
- Prisoners rebelled 2 days in, guards were enthusiastic about their role and their behaviour was a threat to the prisoners
psychological and physical health.
- One prisoner went on hunger strike and the guards attempted to force feed.
- 3 prisoners were released early because of signs of psychological disturbance.
- Study stooped after 6 days instead of the original 14.
Control of variables Zimbardo had control over the key variables, he chose emotionally stable participant and randomly
assigned them their roles, this means that individual differences are rules out and that the behaviour
was due to the pressures of the situation rather than their personality. This increased the validity of
the study.
Lack of realism Banuazizi & Mohavedi (1975) suggested that the participants were in fact play acting and their
performances were based off of the stereotypes of how prisoners and guards were supposed to
behave. For example, one guard based his role on a character from the film Cool Hand Luke, and the
prisoners rioted because that’s what they believe real prisoners did.
Zimbardo may have Fromm (1973) says that Zimbardo may have exaggerated the power of social roles to influence
exaggerated the results behaviour. Only 1/3rd of the guards acted brutally 1/3rd applied rules fairly and the rest supported
prisoners. Zimbardo (2007) said that the guards sympathised, offered cigarettes and reinstated
privileges., and that most guards were able to resist situational pressures to conform to a brutal role.
This suggests that Zimbardo originally overstated the conformity to social roles and understated the
influence of dispositional factors such as personality.
Ethical issues There are ethical issues to this research as it was traumatic for prisoners. Also, parts of the research
such as being arrested form their homes may damage their reputation with others and wasn’t really
necessary. In addition, Zimbardo was playing two conflicting roles at once. He was both lead researcher
and prisoner superintendent and this limited his ability to protect his participants from harm because
of the conflicting nature of these roles.
Describe and Evaluate Milgram’s Research into Obedience
AO1:
- Obedience ~ a form of social influence in which an individual follows a direct order from a figure of authority.
- Milgram (1963) recruited 40 male participants (20-50) for a ‘memory study’.
- The participant was given the role of teacher and a confederate the role of learner. The learner was strapped in a
chair with electrodes.
- The teacher had to give the learner an increasingly severe shock each time he made a mistake on word pairs.
