Variables Affecting Conformity

• Unanimity


  Participants’ conformity declined from 32% to 5.5% when one ‘partner’confederatewas instructed to give the correct answer and go against the incorrect answer of the majority.
• Group Size


  Increasing the size of the group tended to increase conformity – up to a point. In trials with just oneconfederateand one participant, conformity rates were low. Increasing the number ofconfederatesto 2 also increased conformity to 12.8% and increasing the number of confederates to 3 increased conformity even further to 32% (the same as the original study). However, adding extraconfederates(4, 8, or 16) beyond this did not increase conformity.
• Difficulty 


  Increasing the difficulty of the task was also found to increase conformity. Asch adjusted the lengths of the lines in the study above to make it either more easy or more difficult to see which line was closest in length to the original line. If the difference between the incorrect answer and the correct answer was very small (and thus harder to notice), participants were more likely to conform to the incorrect answers of the majority.
• Other Variables


  Gender: Jenness - women more likely to conform

  Mood: Tong et al - more likely to conform in a good mood + Dolinski - more likely to conform when subjected to an 'emotional seesaw' (creating and then removing fear etc.)

  Culture: Smith + Bond - conformity is higher within 'collectivist' cultures compared to 'individualist' cultures