Conformity - Asch's research - Flashcards in A Level and IB Psychology

Group size

Asch increased the size of the group by adding more confederates, thus increasing the size of the majority. Conformity increased with group size, but only up to a point, levelling off when the majority was greater than three.

1 of 13

Unanimity

The extent to which all the members of a group agree. In Asch's studies, the majority was unanimous when all the confederates selected the same comparison line. This produced the greatest degree of conformity in the naive participants

2 of 13

Task difficulty

Asch's line-judging task is more difficult when it becomes harder to work out the correct answer. Confomity increases because naive participants assume that the majority is more likely to be right

3 of 13

Procedure

Showed two cards at a time, 1 standard line, other 3 comparison lines. Participant had to say which line matched. 123 male American undergraduates. 1 participant, 6-8 confederates in each trial. Confederates gave wrong answers, then right (12/18)

4 of 13

Findings

Naive participant gave wrong answer 36.8% of the time. 75% conformed at least once. When interviewed afterwards, they said they conformed to avoid rejection (NSI)

5 of 13

Variations - Group size

With 3 confederates conformity rose to 31.8%. Addition of further confederates made little difference

6 of 13

Variations - Unanimity

Introduced a confederate who disagreed with the others - sometimes wrong, sometimes right. Conformity was reduced by a quarter

7 of 13

Variations - Task difficulty

Asch made the task more difficult by making standard line and comparison lines more similar. Conformity increased due to ISI

8 of 13

Evaluation - A child of its time

Perrin and Spencer repeated the experiment with engineering students. Only 1 out of 396 conformed. Asch's study was in conformist time in America, less conformist today

9 of 13

Evaluation - Artificial situation and task

Participants knew they were in a study and may have had demand characteristics. Groups didn't represent everyday groups. Therefore findings don't generalise to everyday situations

10 of 13

Evaluation - Limited application of findings

Only men were tested. Men were from USA, an individualist culture. Similar studies in collectivist cultures had higher conformity

11 of 13

Individualist cultures

Where people are more concerned about themselves than the social group

12 of 13

Collectivist cultures

Where the social group is more important than individuals

13 of 13

Get Revising

Conformity - Asch's research

Other cards in this set

Card 2

Front

Back

Card 3

Front

Back

Card 4

Front

Back

Card 5

Front

Back

Comments

Similar Psychology resources: