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Resistance to social influence - Coggle Diagram
Resistance to social influence
social support
resisting conformity / dissenting peer
pressure to conform is reduced if other people are not conforming
Asch's research showed the dissenter doesnt have to gove the right answer
simply someone else not following the majority frees others to follow their own conscience, dissenter acts as a model
dissenter shows the majority is no longer unanimous
resisting obedience / obedience is reduced by one other dissenting partner
pressure to obey can be reduced if another person is seen to disobey
Milgram's research, obedient behaviour greatly decreased in the disobedient peer condition (from 65% to 10%)
the participant may not follow the disobedient peer but the dissenter's disobedience frees the participant to act from their own conscience
a disobedient model challenges the legitimacy of the authority figure
locus of control (LOC)
internals place control with themselves / externals place control outside themselves
Rotter (1966) described internal versus external LOC
internals believe things that happen to them are largely controlled by themselves (eg. doing well or badly in an exam depends on how hard you work)
externals believe things happen outside their control, if they fail an exam they sat it was because they had a bad teacher or had bad luck
there is a continuum
LOC is not just being internal or external, there is a scale from one to the other people differ in their position on it
high internals at one end and high externals at the other, low internals and low externals lie in between
internals show greater resistence to social influence
people with internal LOC are more likely to resist pressures to conform or obey
if someone takes personal responsibility for their actions they are more likely to base their decisions on their own behalf
people with high internal LOC are more confident, more achievement oriented and have higher intelligence, traits that head to greater resistance
evaluation
strength:
evidence for the role support for resisting conformity
in a programme to help pregnant adolescents to resist pressure to smoke, social support was given by an older 'buddy'
these adolescents were less likely to smoke at the end of the programme than a control group who did not have a buddy
this shows social support can help young people resist social influences in real world situations
strength:
evidence for the role of support for dissenting peers
Gamson et al's (1982) groups asked to give evidence for an oil company to use in a smear campaign
26 out of 33 groups (88%) rebelled against orders much higher than in MIlgram's studies
this hows how supporters can undermine legitimacyt of authority and reduce obedience
strength:
evidence to support the role of LOC in resisting obedience
Holland (1967) repeated the Milgram study and measured whether participants were internals or externals
37% of internals did not continue to the highest shock level only 23% of externals did not continue
therefore resistence partly related to LOC increasing the validity of thei explanation of disobedience
limitation
: not all research supports the role of LOC in reistance
Twenge et al (2004) analysed data from American locus of control studies over 40 years showing that people have beomce more independent but also more external
this is suprising, if resistanxce was linked to internal LOC we would expect people to have become more internal
therefore LOC may not be a valid explanation of resistance to social influence