Social support

• Real world research support

  • Strength- evidence for positive effects of social support
  • E.g Susan Albrecht et al evaluated Teen Fresh Start USA, an 8 week programme to help pregnant adolescents aged 14-19 to resist peer pressure to smoke
  • Social support provided by older buddy
  • End of programme, those who had a buddy were significantly less likely to smoke than a control group of pps who did not have a buddy
• Research support for dissenting peers

  • Strength- evidence to support the role of dissenting peers in resisting obedience
  • William Gamson et al pps told to produce evidence that would be used to help an oil company run a smear campaign
  • Researchers found higher levels of resistance in their study than Milgram did in his
  • Probably because pps were in groups so could discuss the instructions, 88% grouos of pps rebelled against orders
• Social support explanation

  • Study by Allen and Levine showed social support can help individuals to resist influence of a group
  • In Asch type task, dissenter was someone with apparently good eyesight, 64% of genuine pps refused to conform, but when there was no supporter at all, only 3% resisted conformity
  • Study also showed that social support does not always help, because when dissenter had obviously poor eyesight (thick glasses) resistance was only 36%