Conformity

• Conformity is a type of social influence and is defined as yielding to group pressures.
• Kelman (1958) proposed three types of conformity:

  1. Internalisation
  2. Identification
  3. Compliance
• Internalisation is the strongest form of conformity and is when an individual accepts the group's norms and values and their change of view is permanent (i.e - being brought up in a religious household and becoming religious yourself)
• Identification is a temporary short term change of behaviour that only occurs when in the presence of a group. This is the middle level of conformity (i.e acting more professional and less silly when you arrive at work).
• Compliance is the weakest level of conformity and is when people go along with the group/ majority to to gain approval. This change is temporary as the individual publicly agrees but privately disagrees, and is likely to occur as a result of normative social influence (i.e - when friends pressure you into drinking alcohol when you truly don't want to, and will not drink outside of such social situations)
• Informational social influence (ISI) is when a person conforms to be right so they look to others for information. This usually leads to internalisation and occurs in situations where we do not have the knowledge to make our own decisions (i.e - following a crowd in an emergency even though they are unsure of where to go, they assume everyone else is going to the right place).
• Evidence for ISI - Fein et al. asked participants to vote for a US presidential candidate after they saw someone voting for somebody else. Most of the participants changed their mind because they wanted to be 'correct', thus demonstrating the impact of ISI as a mechanism for conformity.
• Normative social influence (NSI) is when a person conforms in order to be liked by a group, which leads to compliance. It often occurs when a person wants to avoid embarrassment from disagreeing with a group (i.e - starting to smoke because they are surrounded by other people who smoke).
• Strengths of NSI:

  • Supporting evidence - The link between NSI and bullying suggests real-life application. Garandeau and Cillissen found a boy can be manipulated by a bully into victimising another child because the bully provides a common goal for the boy's friend group (goal = victimising child) so the boy would most likely also victimise the child to avoid disapproval from friends.
• Strengths of ISI:

  • Supporting evidence - Lucas et al. found that conformity to an obviously incorrect maths answer was greater when the question was more difficult and the participants rated their own mathematical ability unfavourably. This shows they are more likely to turn to others when they lack the information to make their own informed decisions (i.e ambiguous situation).
• Limitations of explanations for conformity:

  • NSI and ISI may not be completely exclusive, suggested by Deutsch and Gerrard's 'Two process model'. For example, a confederate can provide social support, reducing the effect of NSI through providing the naive participant with a similar view. Equally, this can also reduce ISI through the confederate providing the participant with an alternative source of information. This means that it may be more beneficial to look at NSI and ISI as complementary mechanisms instead of mutually exclusive.
• Asch's line study (1951):

  • Participants - 123 male American undergraduates in groups of 6 (5 confederates, 1 true participant)
  • Procedure - Participants were presented with 4 lines; 3 comparison lines and 1 standard line. They were asked to state which of the 3 lines was the same length as the standard line. Real participant always answered last or second to last. Confederates gave the same incorrect answer 12/18 trials. Asch observed how often the participant would give the same incorrect answer as the confederates instead of the correct answer.
• Asch's line study (1951) - Findings:

  • 36.8% conformed.
  • 25% never conformed.
  • 75% conformed at least once.

  In a control trial, only 1% of responses given by participants were incorrect (eliminating perception as an extraneous variable, increasing the validity of the conclusions drawn).
• Factors affecting conformity:

  • Group size - Individual is more likely to conform when in a larger group.

  Asch varied the number of confederates 1-16. One confederate = 3% conformity rate, Two confederates = 13% conformity rate. This was a significant increase. Three confederates = 33% (optimum), after this the conformity rate was steady. Sixteen confederates = 31%.

  This suggests the presence of a small, unanimous group has strong social pressures, but beyond a certain point the group size does not increase this pressure.
• Factors affecting conformity:

  • Unanimity of majority - Individual is more likely to conform when the group is unanimous (giving the same answer).

  A confederate broke the groups unanimity by responding correctly. This made conformity fall from 32% to 5.5%. This suggests the presence of a dissenter provides social support.
• Factors affecting conformity:

  • Task difficulty - More likely to conform when a task is difficult

  Asch altered the comparison lines making them more similar in length. Since it was harder to judge the correct answer, conformity increased. This lead to informational social influence suggesting that it is a major mechanism for conformity when a situation is ambiguous.
• Strengths of Asch's study:

  • High internal validity - Strict control over extraneous variables (ie timing of assessment and the type of task used). The participants did the experiment before without confederates to see if they actually knew the correct answer, which removed the confounding variable of a lack of knowledge. This suggests that valid and reliable ‘cause and effect’ relationship can be established, as well as valid conclusions.
• Strengths of Asch's study:

  • Lab experiment - Extraneous and confounding variables are strictly controlled so replication of the experiment is easy. Successful replication increases the reliability of the findings because it reduces the likelihood that the observed findings were a ‘one-off’.
• Strengths of Asch's study:

  • Ethical issues - Researchers breached the BPS ethical guideline of deception and consequently, the ability to give informed consent. However, the participants were debriefed. Ethical issues do not threaten the validity or reliability of findings, but rather suggest that a cost-benefit analysis is required.
• Strengths of Asch's study

  • Supports NSI - Participants reported that they conformed to fit in with the group, so it supports the idea of NSI, which states that people conform to fit in when privately disagreeing with the majority.
• Limitation of Asch's study:

  • Lacks mundane realism - Based on peoples’ perception of lines and so the findings cannot be generalised to real life as it does not reflect the complexity of real life conformity (i.e. where there are many other confounding variables and majorities exert influence irrespective of being a large group).
• Limitation of Asch's study:

  • Lacks population validity due to sampling issues - For example, the participants were only American male undergraduates, and so the study was subject to gender bias, where it is assumed that findings from male participants can be generalised to females (i.e. beta bias).
• Limitation of Asch's study:

  • Ethical issues: - Deception as participants were tricked into thinking the study was about perception rather than compliance so they could not give informed consent.

  There could have been psychological harm as the participants could have been embarrassed after realising the true aims of the study. Such issues simply mean that a cost-benefit analysis is required to evaluate whether the ethical costs are smaller than the benefits of increased knowledge of the field. They do not affect the validity or reliability of findings!
• Limitation of Asch's study:

  • Lacked validity - The social context of the 1950s may have affected results. For example, Perrin and Spencer (1980) criticised the study by stating that the period that the experiment was conducted in influenced the results because it was an anti-communist period in America when people were more scared to be different (i.e. McCarthyism). Thus, the study can be said to lack temporal validity because the findings cannot be generalised across all time periods.