Asch carried out an experiment in 1951 to investigate the extent to which social pressure from a majority group could affect a person to conform. Asch used a lab experiment, where 50 male students from a college in the USA participated in a ‘vision test’. Using a line judgement test, one of the more naïve participants was put in a room with 7 confederates. The confederates had agreed in advance what their responses would be involving the line task. The real participant didn’t know this, and was led to believe that the other 7 people were participants just like themselves. Each person in the room had to say clearly which comparison line was most alike the target line. The answer was made obvious. The real participant sat at the back of the room and gave their answer last. There were roughly 18 trials in total and the confederates gave the wrong answer on 12 trials. Asch was interested to see if the real participant would conform to the majority view, the experiment also had a controlled condition where there were no confederates. It was found that 32% of the participants who were placed in this situation conformed to the earlier incorrect responses. Over the 12 trials about 75% of participant’s conformed at least once and 25% never conformed. In the control group, with no pressure to conform, less than 1% of participants gave the wrong answer. It was therefore concluded that people either conform due to the fact that they want to fit in or because they believe that the group is better informed than they are. This study is criticised in that it is a biased sample as the participants were all male, all belonged to the same college and were all the same age. With this in mind and the fact that the sample size was small suggests that the data collected isn’t representative of the target population, as it cannot be generalised to female groups for example. Another issue is that the experiment is artificial meaning that it lacks or has very low ecological validity and…
Conformity is a social influence in which an individual changes their beliefs or behaviour in order to fit in with another individual or group. This fulfils the need to feel accepted and not outcast which can increase the individuals self esteem. Conformity can be demonstrated by a change in the individual’s clothes, language or attitude etc. to adapt to the group; thus displaying the desire to be a group member. It indicates to the group that ‘I am not a threat as I am like you and following your rules’. It gives the group a sense of security as the consistency of a conformists behaviour allows members to predict what each one will do. Members of a conformist group may…
Conformity is a form of social influence and is the tendency to copy other people's behaviour and attitudes from within a group.…
Conformity within a group entails members changing their attitudes and beliefs because of real or imagined social pressure in order to match those of others within the group. (Passer & Smith, 2003)…
The anther in the article individuality vs conformity explains that there is a middle between being weird, trying to fit in with the rest, and being yourself in the middle. The anther supports her analysis by justifying how she thinks there is a middle to individuality and conformity. The anther argue in order so that when teen read this they are inspired to find a side. The author writes in a friendly style for her teen audience and other interested in the topic of the balance between…
Research into conformity includes Sherif’s study conducted in 1935. The aims of his study were to study how people were influences by other people’s opinion, in their perception of the autokinetic effect. The Participants were seated in a dark room. Fifteen feet in front of the participants was a pinpoint of light that appears. Participants have to guess how far it moves. The dot doesn’t actually move but due to autokinetic effects, very small movements of the eyes make the light seem to move. Each participant developed their own personal answer, which varied considerably between individuals. Then the next day, three participants re-did the experiment, with two other participants that gave very different answers, to see if hearing other people’s answer would affect their answers. For example if a participant said it moved 6 inches when he was on his own. However when two other participants that said much less joined him, he says it moves much less than the day before. The first participants original response changes when in company of other people, this showing social influence. The…
disorder.” It is quite self explanatory, but incase you do not understand, Feys is basically saying that…
Social Influence what is conformity? Conformity is a type of social influence involving a change in belief or behavior in order to fit in with a group. We feel the pressure of those people around us, This change is in response to real or imagined group pressure.…
An important concept in the sociocultural level of analysis is conformity. Psychologist Baron (2008) defines conformity as a ‘type of social influence in which individuals change their attitudes or behavior to adhere to existing social norms’ (Baron). Social norms are the guiding principles pertaining to the appropriate behaviors, attitudes, and traditions that should be followed by individuals of the relevant society and or culture. Social norms are the concepts which cause an individual to conform often because of a desire to be accepted and liked by others - also known as the normative influence. To research conformity to a group norms, Sherif (1935) and Asch (1951) both conducted valuable…
Conformity is the convergence of individuals’ thoughts, feelings, or behavior toward social norms. One of the most influential conformity researchers in psychological history is Muzafer Sherif, who researched the reason why people conform. Conformity can occur for two different reasons, such as, informational influence and normative influence. Normative influence is when people want to be liked and so by being in a group they gain social approval that leads to compliance. On the other hand, informational influence is when people want to be right, so they join a group that they perceive to be correct, which leads to acceptance.…
Conformity is something that happens daily in our social worlds. Although we are sometimes aware of our behaviour, in many cases we conform without being very aware that we are doing so. Sometimes we go along with things that we don’t agree with or we behave in a way that…
Imagine the following situation: you are in a classroom and the teacher has asked the class a question. You have got one answer to the question, but you see majority of the students raising their hands for a different answer to the same question. What would you do? Would you go along with your own answer or would you change your mind and go along with the majority thinking that if majority of the people have the same answer then the answer must be correct? Most of the people would change their minds and follow the majority. In psychology, conformity is defined as the tendency to change our perceptions, opinions, or behavior in ways that are consistent with group norms (Brehm, Kassin, and, Fein 213), also simply known as “following the crowd”.…
Conformity is a form of social influence that involves you to change your beliefs to fit in with a group. This change is due to the physical presence of the group members, or imagined group pressure that involves the pressures of social norms. In the public services compliance with common practices is following a particular course of action which is the social norm. It can be seen when the police are dealing with suspects as the suspect is innocent until proven guilty and the law should not be taken upon in one person’s hands. Social Norms can be as common as being polite by saying sorry in certain situations.…
The causes of conformity among individuals have long been debated and researched in recent decades. It is for this reason that conformity is an intriguing psychological concept. It causes sound-minded individuals to go against their best judgement, to engage in behaviour which they usually would not engage in, even accept and welcome an idea they internally disagree with, all in order to not be a deviant from the group. It is thus interesting to look at the factors which cause people to conform, to do what they see others doing, to rely on the judgements of the group, and to ignore their own senses and perceptions. It is the reasons for the individual's desire to conform that I will be discussing in this paper.…
Conformity is the compliance with standards, rules, or laws. Nonconformity is the opposite. A conformist is a person who follows the rules and does not break the status quo. A nonconformist refuses to follow the normal ideals put forth by society. Each individual person will have different opinions on conformity and nonconformity.…