Richardson (2009) - Low Status Conform to High Status?

• Would low status participants conform to poor investment advice from high status people?

AIM:

• To test effects of info. on newcomers willingness to agree to group decisions.
• To assess how the status of individuals affects attempts to make them conform to obviously wrong answers.

METHOD:

• 84 male and female students.  Randomly assigned to same-sex groups of 3.
• 2 of each group = confederates. 1 real (naive) participant.
• Naive participants were led to believe they were newcomers to the teams.
• Confederates always introduced themselves first. Described biographical details such as level of education, amount of experience and so on, as high or low status.
• Teams then looked at info. about 2 stock companies and decided whether to invest money in one (1 stock company was always superior to the other).
• Team members gave their opinion, with real (naive) participants always answering last.
• 2 confederates chose the weaker of the two stock companies.

FINDINGS:

• In the teams where the confederates are believed to be of high status, participants conformed to the group decision.
• The reverse was true where confederates were believed to be of low status.

CONCLUSIONS:

• People of percieved lower status conform to the decisions of those with percieved higher status, even when they believe those decisions are suspect, in order to attain higher status.
• People use competence based clues about the status of other group members to determine the level of their conformist behaviour.  
• People of higher perceived status within a group are more able to resist attempts to make them conform.

EVALUATIONS:

• Research has practical application for the formation of groups. New group members should not be made to feel inferior, if they are to give honest opinions and be able to resist attempts to conform to obviously wrong/poor decisions.
• Implies that bade decisions made by people of high status are given additional support by the conformity to such decisions of junior group members. Similar to the findings of Tarnow (2000) that 80% of aircraft accidents are often caused by junior co-pilots not questioning the wrong decisions of higher status pilots.
• Study had unethical aspects: deceit.  Confederates were not who they claimed to be, therefore informed consent could not be given.