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Social influence AO3 ONLY (conformity: types and explanations (research…
Social influence AO3 ONLY
conformity: types and explanations
research support for ISI
Lucas et al (2006) - asked students to give answers to mathematical problems that were easy or more difficult. There was greater conformity to incorrect answers when they were difficulty rather than easier ones. This was most true for students who rated their mathematical ability as poor.
The study shows that people conform in situations where they feel they don't know the answer, which is exactly outcome predicted by the ISI explanation.
Individual differences in NSI
some research shows that NSI does not affect everyone's behaviour in the same way. For example, people who are less concerned with being liked are less affected by NSI than those who care more about being liked. SUch people are described as nAffiliators. These are people who have a greater need for affiliation - a need for being in a relationship with others. For example McGhee and Teevan (1967) found that students high in need of affiliation were more likely to conform.
This shows that the desire to be liked underlies conformity for some people more than others. Therefore there are individual differences in the way people respond.
ISI and NSI work together
The idea of Deutsch and Gerrards 'two process' approach is that behaviour is either due to NSI or ISI. But the truth is that more often both processes are involved. For example, conformity is reduced when there is one other dissenting participant in the Asch experiment. This dissenter may reduce the power of NSI or may reduce the power of ISI.
Individual differences in ISI
As with NSI, ISI does nor affect everyone's behaviour in the same way. Asch found that students were less conformist (28%) than other participants (37%). Perrin and Spencer (1980) conducted a study involving science and found very little conformity.
Research support for NSI
Asch(1951) found that many of his participants went along with a clearly wrong answer just because other people did. So he asked them why they did this. Some of the participants said they felt self-conscious giving the correct answer. When asch repeated the study but asked participants write their answers instead of saying them out loud conformity rates fell to 12.5%
conformity asch's study
Artificial situation and task
Participants knew they were in a research study and may simply have gone along with the demands of the situation (demand characteristics). The task of identifying lines was relatively trivial and therefore there was really no reason no to conform. Also although the naive participants were members of a group it didn't really resemble groups that we are part of in everyday like. This is a limitation because it means that the findings do not generalise to everyday situations. This is especially true where the consequences of conformity might be more important and we interact with other people in groups in a much more direct way
Limited application of findings
Only men were tested by Asch. Other research suggests that women might be more conformist, possibly because they are more concerned about social relationships than men are (Neto 1995). The men in Asch's study were from the united States, an individualist culture. Similarly conformity studies conducted in collectivist cultures have found that conformity rates are higher.
a child of its time
Perrin and Spencer (1980) repeated Asch's original study with engineering students in the UK. Only one student conformed in a total of 396 trials. It may be that the engineering students felt more confident about measuring lines than the original sample and therefore were less conformist. But it is also possible that the 1950s were an especially conformist time in America and therefore it made sense to conform to established social norms. But society has changed a great deal since then and people are possibly less conformist today.
Ethical issues
the naive participants were deceived because they thought the other people involved in the procedure were also genuine participants like themselves. However it is worth bearing in the mind that this ethical cost should be weighed up against the benefits gained from the study
conformity zimbardo's research
Lack of realism