Asch Research Into Conformity

• Variations of Asch’s study

  1.Group size2.Unanimity3.Task difficulty
• Group Size


  •Asch found that there was very little conformity when the majority consisted of just one confederate, rising to 13% with two confederates.•However, under the pressure of a majority of three confederates, the proportion of conforming responses jumped to 31.8%.
• Unitality


  •To test this, he introduced a confederate who disagreed with the others – sometimes the new confederate gave the correct answer and sometimes he gave the wrong one.•Asch found that that the presence of the dissenting confederate giving the correct answer meant that conformity was reduced to 5%, and 9% when the dissenting confederate gave a different wrong answer.
• Task Difficulty

  In one variation, Asch made the difference between the line lengths much smaller so that the correct answer was less obvious and the task much more difficult. Under these circumstances, the level of conformity increased. This suggests that when the task gets harder, informational social influence plays a greater role.
• Eval Points

  •Methodological Issues:

  + Highly controlled with no. of ppl present & use of confederates

  + Researcher can establish cause and effect
• Eval Points


  -Lacks ecological validity-Only used males so can’t generalise the findings…-Only used Americans so can’t generalise the findings…-Only used  students so can’t generalise the findings. …