social influence

• Compliance


  A person may agree in public with a group of people but the person privately disagrees with the group's viewpoint or behaviour
• Identification


  The individual takes on the views of a group they join or they admire.
• Internalisation


  A person behaves or agrees with a group of people because they have actually accepted the group's point of view or beliefs
• Jenness' Jelly Beans


  Jenness asked individuals to guess how many jellybeans were in a jar individually. The group then had to arrive at a group estimate. He interviewed the individuals after and asked them if they would like to change their estimate. Almost all changed it in line with the group estimate.
• Sherif's Autokinetic Effect


  Sherif studied an optical illusion in which a stationary spot of light in a room looks like it's moving. He asked the participants individually to estimate how far the light moved. The second time around they were placed in groups of 3. The participants changed their individual views and converged on a group estimate or norm.
• Normative social influence (NSI)


  Conforming because the person wants to fit in, scared of being rejected
• What does normative social influence lead to?


  Compliance
• Informational social influence (ISI)


  A person conforms because they want to be right. They look to the group for guidance.
• What does informational social influence lead to?


  Internalisation
• + Supporting evidence for NSI

  Linkenbach and Perkins: Adolescents exposed to the message that the majority of their peers do not smoke were subsequently less likely to smoke.
• + Supporting evidence for ISI

  Wittenbrink and Henley: Participants exposed to negative information about African Americans, later reported their own negative beliefs about African Americans.
• Asch's aim


  To investigate the extent to which an individual within a group will conform with the majority opinion
• Asch's line study


  An experiment where participants had to pick which line in a group of lines was of the same length as the standard line. When the confederates gave the wrong answer, the participant often conformed.
• What type of social influence did Asch's line study show?

  Normative social influence

  
  

  Participants conformed because they didn't want to be rejected.
• Group size


  When Asch tested conformity with different size groups, he found that conformity was low with just 1 or 2 confederates but rose to 31.8% with a group of 3 confederates. However, adding more confederates didn't make much difference.

  
  

  A small majority does not influence a participant, but there is no need to have a majority of more than 3.
• Unanimty


  Asch introduced a confederate who sometimes gave the right answer and sometimes gave the wrong answer. The presence of the dissenting confederate caused the genuine participant to conform less, whether the dissented gave the right or wrong answer.

  
  

  The presence of a dissenter made the participant behave more independently, suggesting that the influence of the majority depends on the group being unanimous.
• Task difficulty


  Asch made the task more difficult by making the stimulus and comparison lines more similar in length. When he did this, conformity increased.

  
  

  When the task gets more difficult, informational social influence comes into play. This is because the task is more ambiguous so we are more likely to follow people who we assume are right.
• - Lack of consistency across all situations and overtime


  Perrin and Spencer repeated Asch's study using engineering, maths, and chemistry students. Only one participant out of 396 trials conformed.

  
  

  Perrin and Spencer argued that cultural change took place between the 1950s and 1980s.
• - Artificial situation and task


  Ps were aware that they were in a research study so may have changed their behaviour in line with what they believed the experiment needed (demand characteristics).

  
  

  The task of identifying lines in unimportant, so Ps may have had no reason not to conform.

  
  

  Low levels of ecological validity: This does not reflect conformity in everyday life. We are unable to generalise the results to other real life situations.
• - Limited application of findings, cultural bias


  All Ps were male students of around the same age, meaning the study lacks population validity. The results cannot be generalised to females or older groups of people.

  
  

  Similar conformist studies conducted in collectivist cultures have found that conformity rates are higher.
• Aim of Zimbardo's study

  Zimbardo and his colleagues were interested in finding out whether the brutality reported among guards in American prisons was due to the sadistic personalities of the guards or had more to do with the prison environment.
• Procedure of Zimbardo's study

  24 volunteers judged to be the most physically and mentally stable, the most mature, & the least involved in antisocial behaviours were chosen to participate.

  
  

  Participants were randomly assigned to either the role of prisoner or guard in a simulated prison environment. Prisoners were arrested at their own homes and were given prison clothes. They were referred to by their number only.

  
  

  All guards were dressed in identical uniforms of khaki, and they carried a whistle around their neck and a billy club borrowed from the police. Guards also wore special sunglasses, to make eye contact with prisoners impossible. They were instructed to do whatever they thought was necessary to maintain law and order in the prison and to command the respect of the prisoners. No physical violence was permitted.

  
  

  Zimbardo observed the behaviour of the prisoners and guards, and acted as a prison warden.
• Findings of Zimbardo's study

  Zimbardo found that both the prisoners and guards quickly identified with their social roles. Within days the prisoners rebelled, but this was quickly crushed by the guards, who then grew increasingly abusive towards the prisoners.
• - Low ecological validity


  The 'prison' was merely a setup in the basement of Stanford University.

  
  

  The student 'guards' lacked professional training, and the experiment's duration was much shorter than real prison sentences. Furthermore, the participants, who were college students, didn't reflect the diverse backgrounds typically found in actual prisons.
• - Demand characteristics


  Demand characteristics could explain the findings of the study. Most of the guards later claimed they were simply acting.

  
  

  Because the guards and prisoners were playing a role, their behaviour may not be influenced by the same factors which affect behaviour in real life.

  
  

  This means the study's findings cannot be reasonably generalized to real life, such as prison settings.
• - Low population validity


  The sample comprised of US male students. The study's findings cannot be applied to female prisons or those from other countries.
• + Creation of ethical guidelines

  The harmful treatment of participants led to the formal recognition of ethical guidelines by the American Psychological Association. Studies must now undergo an extensive review by an institutional review board (US) or ethics committee (UK) before they are implemented.
• - Ethical issues


  There was a lack of fully informed consent by participants as Zimbardo himself did not know what would happen in the experiment (it was unpredictable).

  
  

  The prisoners did not consent to being 'arrested' at home.

  
  

  Participants playing the role of prisoners were not protected from psychological harm, experiencing incidents of humiliation and distress. For example, one prisoner had to be released after 36 hours because of uncontrollable bursts of screaming, crying, and anger.
• Milgram's electric shock experiment

  An authority figure ordered Ps to deliver what they believed were dangerous electric shocks.

  
  

  Findings: 65% of Ps delivered the maximum 450v shock.
• Milgram's aim in his original experiment

  Milgram wanted to find out what induces people to obey their leaders' orders to torture and kill innocent humans.

  
  

  To find out if participants would obey an unjust order from a person in authority to inflict pain on another
• Proximity variation


  When the participant and learner were in the same room, obedience levels fell to 40%, because the participant could directly feel the learner's pain.

  
  

  When the participant was asked to force the learner's hand onto a shock place, obedience rates fell to 30%.

  
  

  Proximity of the authority figure:

  If the experimenter left the room and gave orders over a phone, only 21% of participants continued to 450v.
• Location variation


  The studies took place at Yale University. Ps said that this prestigious location gave them confidence that the experiment had integrity.

  
  

  Milgram moved the experiment to run-down offices. Obedience rates dropped to 48%.
• Bickman's uniform investigation


  The authority wore either a guard uniform, a milkman uniform or was dressed as a civilian wearing smart clothing.

  
  

  The experiment asked a pedestrian to pick up a bag, give a stranger some change or asked them to wait for the bus on the other side of the pole.

  
  

  Findings: Participants were more likely to obey authority figures dressed as a guard than authority figures dressed in a milkman uniform or dressed as a civilian.
• - Lacks external validity


  The Milgram studies were conducted in laboratory-type conditions.

  
  

  The results may not be generalisable, as people may react differently in real life situations.
• - Biased sample


  The participants in Milgram's study were all male.

  
  

  Milgram's study cannot be seen as representative of the American population as his sample was self-selected. This is because they became participants only by electing to respond to a newspaper advertisement (selecting themselves).

  
  

  They may also have a typical 'volunteer personality'. Not all the newspaper readers responded so perhaps it takes this personality type to do so.
• - Cultural bias


  Milgram's findings have been replicated in a variety of cultures and most lead to the same conclusions as Milgram's original study and in some cases see higher obedience rates.

  
  

  However, Smith and Bond point out that with the exception of Jordan, the majority of these studies have been conducted in industrialised Western cultures, so the results may not be generalisable to all cultures.
• - Ethical issues


  Protection of Ps:

  Participants were exposed to extremely stressful situations that may have the potential to cause psychological harm. Many of the participants were visibly distressed.

  
  

  Right to withdraw:

  When Ps wanted to withdraw, they were given prods to make them continue including 'you have no other choice, you must go on.
• Examples of people who have authority


  Police, managers, parents
• Legitimate


  Agreed by society
• Legitimacy of authority as an explanation for obedience


  The amount of social power held by the person (authority figure) who gives the instruction

  
  

  Most human societies are ordered in a hierarchical way, with some members of the group having legitimate social power to issue instructions to those beneath them in the hierarchy.

  
  

  From early childhood, socialisation in the family and at school teaches us that we must obey those who have authority over us.

  
  

  We may obey people with legitimate authority because we trust them. Alternatively, we may obey them because they have the power to punish us.