types of conformity

• define conformity?

  alteration of behaviours/views as a reaction to the presence of others
• what are the 3p's?

  1. do you agree publicly
  2. do you agree privately
  3. is the conformity permanent
• explain compliance?

  • individual changes their own public behaviour to fit in with group
  • may not agree with behaviour/belief privately
  • not permanent form of social influence lasts only as long as group is present
• explain identification?

  • conforming to behaviour of role model/group they are part of
  • individual changes behaviour/beliefs publicly & privately to fit in with group even when not with them
  • when no longer member of group behaviour reverts to original belief
• explain internalisation?

  • belief/behaviour of majority is accepted by individual & becomes part of their own belief system
  • most permanent type of conformity
  • individual changes their public & private beliefs permanently
• aim of asch 1956 study?

  investigate effect of social pressure from majority on conformity
• asch 1956 method?

  • participants believed they took part in vision task
  • used line judgement task
  • placed 1 real participant in room with 7 confederates who had agreed answers in advance
  • real participant always second to last
  • in turn each person had to say out loud which line a/b/c was most like target line in length
  • correct answer always obvious
  • each participant completed 18 trials
  • confederates gave incorrect answer on 12/18 critical trials
  • measured number of times each participant conformed to majority
• 3 variables affecting conformity?

  1. group size
  2. unanimity
  3. task difficulty
• what is a confederate?

  actor/fake participant
• group size?

  • original - 7 fake 32% conformed on all trials
  • variation ranged from 1-15
  • 1 confederate - only 3% conformity
  • 3/more confederates - 32% conformity
  • as confederates increased conformity increased as were more pressured
• unanimity?

  • original - confederates all gave same wrong answer
  • variation - one of confederates gave correct answer breaking unanimity
  • conformity dropped to 5% as were more confident/reassured
• task difficulty?

  • original - correct answer always obvious
  • variation - increase difficulty by making difference between line lengths smaller
  • conformity increased as were more unsure
• * high levels of reliability?

  • lab experiment - used standardised procedures
  • e.g asking participants same question about which of 3 lines matched standard line
  • means experiment can be repeated by others
  • all evs were controlled - conducted in artificial environment
  • e.g size of group/type of participants
  • internal
  • controlled environment means only iv affected dv so can be sure which factors affect conformity
  • can establish cause & effect between conformity & majority influence
  • easily replicable
• 3 X of research into conformity?

  1. lacks ecological validity
  2. a child of its time/out of date
  3. suffers from androcentrism
• X lacks ecological validity?

  • in aschs study he used artificial task of making participants match different length lines to standard line
  • not something people do in everyday life
  • so behaviour will be unnatural
  • ? ecological
  • only shows why people conform in controlled environment where may be subject to demand characteristics
  • may confound results
  • cannot generalise results to levels of conformity in real life
• X out of date?

  • aschs study was in 1950s where people more inclined to follow societies norms/values
  • due to cold war between east & west leading to higher levels of conformity
  • perrin & spencer 1980 repeated study with engineering students in uk found very different results
  • only 1 student conformed to wrong answer
  • ? temporal
  • can be argued that people are less conformist now
  • so can be argued aschs study does not apply to modern day society
• X androcentrism?

  • asch only used males in study
  • males are unlikely to have similar levels of conformity compared to women
  • neto 1995 found that women have higher levels of conformity than men due to them caring more about social relationships & opinions
  • ? population
  • findings are androcentric
  • cannot generalise findings to entire population in particular women
• sample of aschs study 1956?

  123 male students from swarthmore college in america