Resistance to social influence

• What is social support in conformity?

  • It can help resist conformity
  • If there's other people present who aren't conforming then pressure to conform is less
• What is the impact of someone not following the majority?

  It enables a person to follow their own conscience
• What does the other person in social support (conformity) act as?

  A model
• What can social support help people resist?

  Obedience
• What did Milgram show?

  • That obedience dropped from 65% to 12% where there was a disobedient confederate was disobeyed
  • Other person's disobedience acts as a 'model' for the participant to act and follow their own conscience
• What did Rotter (1966) propose?

  The concept of locus of control - internal vs external
• What how are people with an internal locus of control?

  • Believe that things that happen to them are controlled by themselves
  • e.g. If you do well in an exam it's because you worked hard
• What how are people with an external locus of control?

  • Believe that things happen without their own control
  • e.g. If they did well in an exam they might say it was because they used an excellent textbook
• What do people explain differently?

  Their successes and failures, isn't a case of being either internal or external
• What is Locus of Control?

  A continuum with high internal LOC at one end and high external LOC at the other end with low levels somewhere in between
• Why are people more likely to resist social influence (conform or obey)?

  If they have an internal LOC
• What does it mean if a person takes personal responsibility for their actions and experiences?

  They're more likely to base their decisions on their own beliefs and resist pressure from others
• What are people with an internal LOC more likely to have?

  They're more likely to have specific traits that lead to greater resistance like self-confidence, achievement orientated, higher intelligence and less need for social approval
• What did Allen & Levine (1971) find out?

  • Independence was high when there was one dissenter in an Asch-type study
  • Occurred even if the dissenter wore thick glasses and said he had difficulty with his vision - so clearly in no position to judge the length of his lines
• What view does Allen & Levine support?

  That resistance isn't motivated by following what someone else says but it enables someone to be free of the pressure from the group
• What did Gamson (1982) find out?

  • That high levels of rebellion (i.e independent behaviour) in his study than Milgram
  • This was probably because the participants in Gamson's study were in groups. They had to produce evidence that would be used to help an oil company run a smear campaign
  • 24/33 groups of participants (88%) rebelled showing that peer group is linked to greater resistance
• What is one strength of the LOC explanation?

  There's research evidence that supports the link between LOC and resistance to obedience
• What did Holland (1967) do?

  • Repeated Milgram's study & measured whenether the participants were internals or externals
  • Found that 37% of internals didn't continue to the highest shock level (i.e. they showed some independent behaviour)
  • 23% of externals didn't continue
  • Internals showed greater resistance to authority
  • Research support of this nature increases the validity of the LOC explanation and confidence that it can explain resistance
• What did Twenge (2004) do?

  • Analysed data from American locus of control studies over a 40 year period had become more independent but also more external
  • If resistance was linked to an internal locus of control, we would expect people to have become more internal
  • Challenges the link between internal LOC & increasing resistant behaviour
  • It's possible the results are due to a challenging society where many things are out of personal control