Conformity Research Paper

Social psychology is the area of psychology that studies how people are influenced by each other. Social influence is a major part of social psychology. There are two types of social influence. They are normative social influence and informational social influence. Both normative and informational social influence are theoretical concepts because you cannot see the information being passed. Conformity is a result of social influence. Even if people do not realize it, they are conforming in society everyday as a result of social influence. As humans we feel the need to belong to social groups. In these social groups we conform to the rules of other people, sometimes without even realizing it. We most often conform to these rules around complete strangers. We follow other people’s behavior and decisions because that is what is considered normal or accepted. This, in psychology, is known as normative social influence. Normative social influence is all about how people go along with social norms. According to www.changingminds.org, social norms are “the rules that a group uses for appropriate and inappropriate values, beliefs, attitudes and behaviors.” We do
Some examples of conformity that people often think of are drinking, smoking, doing drugs and having sex because that is what other people are doing. Those are examples of conformity; however, conformity is not always bad. There are two types of conformity. They are public and private conformity. Private conformity is when your behavior is consistent with your personal beliefs and values. An example of private conformity is when you wear certain clothes because you like them, not because other people like them. Public conformity is when your behavior goes against your personal beliefs or values. An example of public conformity is when you wear clothes that you don’t like because other people like them. Solomon Asch is known for his research on