Conformity and Obedience studies

mosocvici, milgramand asch

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  • Created by: Matt Dale
  • Created on: 05-06-11 13:39

Who: Asch

Procedure: a 'vision' tst; looking a lines to match the correct line. Done on Americans; there was confederates giving incorrected line length answers. 

Findings: Within the trials where confederates were giving the wrong answers; 37% of the participants also gave the incorrect answers, Asch did the study again with no confederates, 1% gave incorrect answer to line length

Conclusions: Conformity occurs becuase of: disortion of perception, distortion of judgement, distortion of action

A02: Cultural validty; all Americans; Mcarthyism; people scared to be diffrent, lacks mundane realsim, weird task 

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Obedience

Who: Mosocovici

Procedure: a 'colour test: 32 groups of 6 women: 4 participants, 2 confederates, had to state the colour shown. Confederates gave incorrect answers

Findings: 32% Gave same answers as confederates at least once. Conformity levels were 8.42%, however when confederats were inconsistent, levels dropped to 1.25%

Conclusions: Consistency is key in conformity, Mosovici's conversion theory; people conform to minority to avoid conflict

A02: Gender and sample bias, lacks mundane reaism (ecological validity)

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Obedience to authority

Who: Milgram: electric shock test

Procedure: Voleenteers asked to do a teacher, learner exercise. 2 confederates, learner and experimenter. Participant was always the teacher and adminstered the shocks. Each time the learner got a question wrong, the participant had to administer a shock. The shocks increased in 15 stages upto 450 volts. The experimenter issued prods to continue the study; 'carry on, it is essential'

Findings: 65% went to 450 volts! All went to 300 volts

Conclusions: Suggest people are obediant to authority

A02: ethical issues: psychological harm, deception,

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Milgrams explanation to why people obey

Gradual commitment: As participants already given low level shocks, issuing higher shocks is less difficult, 'foot-in-the-door' persuasion

Agentic Shift: The participant belives their actions are that of the experimenter, and they are just an agent carrying out these actions. 

The role of buffers: Where a buffer blocks the consequences of a persons action, so they cannot see the results of their actions, e.g. the wall

Justifying obidence: Giving a reason, the results are good for a certain cause

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