1. Now discuss the questions in pairs!
Please have some ideas ready to share
v=BgRoiTWkBHU

2. Social Influence ~ Conformity & Obedience
Social Psychology
Social Influence ~ Conformity & Obedience
"The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing." - Albert Einstein

3. Learning Outcomes
You will have watched a famous piece of research into conformity.
You will begin to reflect on the aims of social influence research.
You will be learn some new terminology
You will consider how psychologists use the laboratory experiment to investigate human behaviour

4. Social Influence What is social influence?
Social influences are the forces exerted by other people which affect your behaviour
Such influences could be classed as ‘good’, ‘bad’, ‘prosocial’ and ‘antisocial’.

5. Obedience
“I was just following orders”
Adolf Eichmann

6. Nazi soldiers taking Jewish people to the Ghetto
Obedience
Nazi soldiers taking Jewish people to the Ghetto

7. What questions will psychologists want to answer?
WW2 has just ended.
What questions will psychologists want to answer?

8. Would you have taken part?
Is observing and doing nothing taking part?

9. Obedience
Task:
With a partner, make a list of as many examples as possible where we have to obey authority in everyday life

10. Social
Influence Ψ

11. Ψ Conformity examples? Yielding to group pressure
A type of social influence that involves a change in behaviour or belief as a result of real or imagined group pressure Ψ
examples?

12. Minority Influence
A type of social influence when a persuasive minority exerts pressure to change the attitudes, beliefs or behaviours of the majority Ψ
examples?

13. Obedience
A type of social influence that involves a change in behaviour which results from a direct order or command from a perceived authority figure Ψ
examples?

14. There are different types of conformity
Compliance Identification Internalisation
TASK: using pg 3 in Mask:
1. In pairs, 1 read compliance - 1 read identification
2. Summarise your type using no more than 50 words
3. Then, take turns to share your definition with your partner – vice versa – both make a summary of what your partner said
4. If finished, both read and summarise Internalisation

15. TYPES OF CONFORMITY
COMPLIANCE
Going along with other in public
Superficial change but will stop as soon as group pressure stops
IDENTIFICATION
There might be something about the group that we value
Identify with the group so we publicly change our opinion
INTERNALISATION (16words!)
Genuinely accepts the group norm
Private AND public change of behaviour / opinions
Likely to be permanent
According to Kelman (1958) there are 3 ways in which people conform….

16. Normative social influence Informational social influence
Why do people conform
Normative social influence
Informational social influence
These can be seen as EXPLANATIONS for conformity Ψ

17. Need to be liked… linked to emotion
Normative social influence
Because you want to be liked or respected by other members of the group
This involves people changing their public but NOT private opinion (public acceptance)
Need to be liked… linked to emotion

18. Informational social influence
Because you believe in and trust the knowledge or judgement of others
This involves people changing their private and public opinion (private and public acceptance)
Need to be right…. Linked to what you think

19. Ψ Why do people conform? People might conform because of Informational
Influence
Normative
Because you believe in the knowledge or judgement of others
Because you want to be liked or respected by other members of the group
This involves people
to change their private and public opinion (private and public acceptance)
to change their public but NOT private opinion (public acceptance)
A change in behaviour and/or beliefs to match others as a result of real or imagined (but unspoken) group pressure. Ψ

20. Questions to consider….
Is conformity always a good thing?
Look at how social norms or unwritten social rules affect our behaviour
Bystander apathy and diffusion of responsibility
Smoke filled room

21. Tasks…
Complete sheet to ensure you understand the difference between types and explanations
Then we’ll peer mark…

22. Example of stimulus material used in Asch’s experiments on conformity
Standard Line
Comparison Lines A 1 2 3 Ψ

23. Sherif (1935) The Autokinetic effect
On the next slide is a light. The light will move and you have to say in which way it is moving.

25. Sherif (1935)
The autiokinetic effect is when a stationary spot of light appears to move due to small movements of the eye
Sherif told participants to estimate by how far the spot of light had moved.
Asked individually
Then exposed to the estimates of two other participants
Estimates tended to converge to a group norm which was an average of these individuals’ estimates.

26. Issues with the research
Sherif and other researchers used ambiguous situations to investigate conformity.
Little known about conformity in non-ambiguous situations
Asch also took issue with the methodology of these studies:
“…confronted with opinions contrary to their own, many subjects apparently shifted their judgment in the direction of the views of the majorities ... there is some reason to wonder whether it was not the investigators who, in their enthusiasm for a theory, were suggestible, and whether gullible subjects were providing answers they thought good subjects were expected to give.”
What research method terms can we use to sum up Asch’s criticisms?

28. Writing up a study in Psychology
When we describe a piece of research you need to ‘Always Proceed Really Carefully’ we need to cover the ‘APRC’
Aim – Consider what  the researcher was trying to find out.
Procedure – How did the researcher conduct the research? What did they do? What did they control? What materials did they use? What did they standardise? What did the ppts do? How did they collect their data?
Results – These are usually always some kind of number , sometimes this is presented as a fraction or a decimal or a percentage.
Conclusion  – Having considered the aim and analysed the results what conclusion can be drawn? The conclusion does not include any numbers

29. Aim
Investigate the effects of group pressure on individuals in unambiguous situations.
When confronted with an obviously incorrect answer, would individuals would give an answer which perpetuated this error (conformed) or would they would give an independent response?
He also aimed to investigate the effect of various factors on the rate of conformity

30. Procedure
Asch carried out a number of variations of the same experiment.
You need to know in-depth procedures for the baseline study, and also some of the variations (cover more next lesson)
You need to SCAM:
Sample
Controls
Apparatus
Method – the recipe – step by step

31. The baseline study Findings for the baseline study
In a control study carried out before this experiment, it was found that less than 1% of people made errors when carrying out this task when by themselves.
What does this suggest about the line estimating task?

32. Results from the baseline study
On the critical trials, 36.8% of responses were wrong.
25% never gave a wrong answer
Others agreed on nearly every trial
Behaviour was constant

33. Those who did not conform…
Asch states “Those who strike out on the path to independence, do not, as a rule, succumb to the majority”.
confidence in their own judgment
capacity to recover from doubt
felt it was “their obligation to call the play as they saw it”

34. Those who did conform…
Asch says “Those who chose the path of compliance are unable to free themselves, and the ordeal is prolonged”.
Believed that “I am wrong, they are right”
conformed so as “not to spoil the results"
suspected the majority were “sheep”
thought the majority were “victim of an optical illusion”

35. Conclusions
The results from both the baseline study and the variations suggest that there is a strong tendency to conform to group pressures, even in an unambiguous situation.

36. Evaluation needs to follow
Again, the structure is important…
You would give some strengths and some weaknesses
Approx. 4 PEEL paragraphs

37. PEEL
Your Answers.

38. Point What is your point? Introduce your point..
“The theory of… argues that…”

39. Evidence Present the evidence to support your point…
“_____ conducted an experiment… and found….”

40. “This shows/suggests….”
Explain
Explain the evidence in relation to the point. How does it support your point?
“This shows/suggests….”

41. Link Link your ideas back to the question or point.
“Therefore this supports…”

42. Task Read the Asch (1951) study
GHG pg 18
Mask 6-7
Make notes using an APRC format – pg 13 in your packs
Working in a pair so you can support each other, develop a GRAVE of Asch – pg 14/15 can help you with this
In your packs complete:
Pg 2 & 3 of key terms as much as you can … obviously some we have not covered
Pg 4, 6-12

43. Homework
On pg 7-8 mask there is also an updated version of the Asch (1955) study – make an APRC of this as well (if you don’t have mask, take a picture of your peers text book)
Questions to answer:
What are the main differences between Asch (1955) and Mori and Arai’s (2010)study?
Are there any ethical issues with either study?
What does replication mean and why was it important with Asch’s study?
Do you think similar findings to Asch would be found today (2017)? Why, why not?
Mori and Arai’s study was meant to reduce demand characteristics. What are demand characteristics and how did Mori and Arai attempt to reduce them? Did they reduce them?