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SOCIAL INFLUENCE - Coggle Diagram
SOCIAL INFLUENCE
Minority Influence: where one person or a small group of people influences the behavior and opinions of a larger group of people
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diachronic consistency: minority have been saying the same thing for a long time e.g. Jehovah witness
commitment: minorities engage in extreme activities to draw attention to their cause. this increases the amount of interest from majority group- augmentation principle
flexibility: you take others views into consideration. Nemeth 1986- mock jury, 3pps & 1 conf, they had to decide on compensation for someone. if conf stayed low and wouldn't move his figure up, the pps wouldn't move theirs down (inflexibility)
Majority Influence: if you hear something new from a consistent, committed and flexible minority, you are likely to consider their views
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Moscovici et al. 1969: colour perception test. investigate role of consistent minority upon opinions of majority in unambiguous situations. 32 groups were shown 36 blue slides with filters varying intensity of colour, and confederates answered wrongly. 8.2% agreement with minority, with 32% agreeing at least once. shows when minority influence is small, consistency is the important variable
social change: when society adopts a new way of behaving, due to minority becoming majority e.g. homosexuality
six processes of social change (link to Civil Rights Movement): drawing attention, consistency, deeper processing, augmentation, snowball effect, social cryptomnesia
Nolan et al 2008: tried to reduce energy of a city, hung leaflets on peoples doors, half telling them they had to do it, half telling them to do it to help the other neighbors. there was a significant drop in energy usage in second group, conformity can lead to social change through NSI
evaluate minority influence:
strengths: research support to inc. reliability- Nolan et al 2008
negatives: Charlan and Nemeth 1986 said its indirect and delayed
social role: the parts individuals play as members of a social group, which meet the expectations of the situation
Milgram 1963: to see if individuals would obey an authority figure. set up in a uni and only used male pps, 1 pps and 1 confederate, pps asked conf a Q and if they got it wrong they got a 'shock'- voltage went up to 450V. 62.5% went all the way to 450, 100% went to 300. authoritative figure repeated 'its my responsibility if anything happens'. strength: used an age range. negative: deception
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Sheridan and King 1972: both males and females were giving electric shocks to puppies, puppies were eventually knocked out by gas to appear 'dead'. 54% of men went to 450V, 100% of women went to 450V
Hofling et al. 1966: 'doctor' calls nurses to administer a patient an overdose of medicine. 21/22 obeyed.
strength: ecological validity, clear controls
negative: ethical issues, temporal validity
Jerry Burger 2009: replication of Milgrams experiment to see if people would act differently today. for ethical reasons they only went to 150V. 73% of women went to highest voltage, 65% of men.
strength: range of cultures, pps were screened before hand and told deception might be involved
negative: still caused pps harm
legitimacy of authority: the degree to which individuals are seen as justified in having power over others
e.g. My Lai Massacre- William Calley
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Bushman 1988: a female was dressed in 3 different uniforms and asked people for change or a car park ticket:
police uniform: 72% obeyed
business executive: 48%
beggar: 52%
Bickman 1974: carried out a field experiment in NYC where 3 different confederates dressed in different outfits, they stood in the street and asked public to pick up rubbish: jacket and tie, milkmans outfit, security guards uniform. people were more likely to obey the security guard
Situational variables of Milgram's study & their effect on levels of obedience:
baseline study- 65%
change of location- 47.5%
proximity (teacher in same room) 40%
proximity (teacher forces learners hand on electric shock plates)- 30%
proximity (orders given by phone)- 20.5%
uniform taken away- 20%
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conformity: a change in a persons behaviour or opinions as a result of imagined pressure from a person or group of people
3 types of conformity: compliance- individuals adjust to avoid disapproval, it doesn't affect your internal feelings (temp)
identification- individuals adjust both publicly and privately (can be temp)
internalisation- individuals will truly accept the groups norms (permanent)
2 type of social influence: normative social influence- desire to look normal
informational social influence- our desire to be right as it helps us to feel in control with our lives
Asch's 1951:(majority influence) 6 confederates, 1 pps got shown 3 lines to match to target line. confederates said all wrong answers, in all 18 trails 37% conformed everytime.
strength: ethically sound
negative: doesn't include a wide variety of people as it was only middle class male uni students
factors that effect conformity: culture, mood, factor of fear and relief, gender, task difficulty, unanimity, size of majority
Zimbardo 1973: Stanford Prison experiment to see if peoples behaviour would change in a negative environment. he got volunteers to act as prisoners and hired a group of men to be prison guards. found that guards started dehumanising prisoners and prisoners went crazy. experiment was meant to last 2 weeks but was shut down after 6 days
strength: can influence public policy
negative: extremely unethical
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Adorno et al. 1950: 'F scale study'- study into obedient/authoritarian personalities, 2000 middle class Americans were studied looking at unconscious attitudes to other racial groups
right wing= more obedient
left wing= less obedient
strengths: research support- Elms and Milgram 1966 showed people who score highly on F scale are very obedient
negatives: limited explanation- generalization
e.g. doesn't provide an explanation for German Nazi situation. political bias- measures extreme form of right wing politics
cause of authoritarian personality: formed from childhood, if parenting is too strict it creates a resentment of hostility. they take their feelings out on others (who are seen as weaker)
qualities: hostile to 'non-conventional' people, believe we need 'toughness', more obedient to authority figures
e.g. Donald Trump- authoritarianism
Dispositional explanation for obedience: an internal explanation, looks at importance of personality characteristics against situational explanation