Asch Baseline Study (APRC)

• (1) Aim: To examine the extent to which social pressure from a majority could affect a person's likelihood to conform.
• (2) Method: Procedure used a line judgement task with 50 male students from Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania. Participants were deceived into believing confederates were real participants. Each person had to say out loud which line was most like the target line. Confederates gave the same incorrect answer on 12 critical trials.
• (3) Results: Participants conformed to the incorrect answers on 32% of the critical trials. 74% of participants conformed on at least one critical trial.
• (4) Conclusion: Participants conformed due to normative social influence and the desire to fit in.