Social Influence: Conformity: Asch (1955)

What was the aim?

To investigate the degree to which individuals would conform to a majority who gave obviously wrong answers

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What was the procedure?

123 American male students took part in what they believed was a visual perception test. They were placed in groups of confederates. They had to look at lines and compare them. There were 18 trials, 12 were critical. The real pp answered last.

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What were the findings?

The control group had an error rate of 0.04%. On the 12 critical trials there was 32% conformity. 75% conformed at least once. 5% conformed to all 12 wrong answers.

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What were the 3 reasons the post-interviews found for conformity?

Distortion of action (compliance), Distortion of perception (identification), Distortion of judgement (internalisation)

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What were the conclusions?

The judgements of individuals are affected by majority opinions, even when they're wrong.

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What were the conclusions?

There are big individual differences in the amount to which people are affected by majority influence. As most participants conformed publicly not privately, it suggests that they were motivated by normative social influence.

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