The confederate learners cried out for help, begged the participant teachers to stop, and even complained of heart trouble. doi: 10.1024/0044-3514.37.1.9. Types of conformity A. What does a person do if an authority figure orders something done? By Kendra Cherry J Adolesc. The number of miles driven by a truck driver falls between 300 and 700 , and follows a uniform distribution. Second, are in a group with at least three people. 2. This puts you in a relaxed state in which you can perform your best, if you choose (Zajonc, 1965). Innovation must conform to the market. A more widely relevant example is a groups discussion of how attractive someone is. Cengage Learning. 1935(187):60. Megargee, E. I. Arch Psychol. Normative Social Influence In an important U.S. Supreme Court case, a female account executive argued that she was denied promotion (although she was a top performer) because she acted too masculine, even though the same behaviors were required for the success of the male coworkers (Fiske, Bersoff, Borgida, Deaux, & Heilman, 1991). The outcome of the experience of reactance is that people may not conform at all and may even move their opinions or behaviors away from the desires of the influencer. Psychological reactance occurs when people feel that their ability to choose which behaviors to engage in is eliminated or threatened with elimination. When asked individually, the participants' answers varied considerably. b. Which researcher asked participants to offer judgments of line lengths to test conformity? Theoretical and empirical work in life span developmental psychology, however, suggests that age may reduce susceptibility to social influence. This term best describes the behavior of a person who is motivated to gain reward or avoid punishment. SolomonAschconducted several experiments in the 1950s to determine how people are affected by the thoughts and behaviors of other people. Conscious Cogn. Supporting this idea, research has found that people who have lower self-esteem are more likely to conform in comparison with those who have higher self-esteem. On the other hand, and again although there are substantial individual differences among them, women are, on average, more concerned with connecting to others and maintaining group harmony. c. Jennifer went to the mall with her friends so that they could help her choose a gown for the upcoming prom. social pressure while privately disagreeing. They found that there was much less graffiti in the second restroom than in the first one. a. However, there are instances when athletes can have difficulty under pressure. Following the directives of effective leaders can help a group attain goals that would not be possible without them. Explain the concept of psychological reactance and describe how and when it might occur. In summary, although the effects of individual differences on conformity tend to be smaller than those of the social context, they do matter. Your subconscious has what is called a homeostatic impulse. 2018;65:359367. Do you think you would have refused to shock the learner? That is, if a group initially favors a viewpoint, after discussion the group consensus is likely a stronger endorsement of the viewpoint or more extreme viewpoint. Psychological Bulletin, 112, 323. If the task is a difficult one, many people feel motivated and believe that their group needs their input to do well on a challenging project (Jackson & Williams, 1985). I want to show you a new picture we filmed yesterday at the port of Sevastopol. The people who conform most to others in dress conform the least in opinions. What if the person believes it is incorrect, or worse, unethical? Many students say they would not conform, that the study is outdated, and that people nowadays are more independent. Minority influence, minority factions within larger groups, tend to influence overall group decisions. As a result, 6000 American soldiers were killed and many more civilians died. Your knowledge about the cultural differences between individualistic and collectivistic cultures might lead you to think that collectivists will be more conforming than individualists, and there is some support for this. In addition to gender differences, there is also evidence that conformity is greater in some cultures than others. Keep in mind, however, that the fact that men are perceived as effective leaders, and are more likely to become leaders, does not necessarily mean that they are actually better, more effective leaders than women. After an exciting football game in which the home team loses by one point, angry fans throw bottles and begin to tear up the field. Porter, N., Geis, F. L., Cooper, E., & Newman, E. (1985). Applied to political parties, members would debate and decide upon all the policies of their parties through a host of mechanisms, most obviously the party conference. People least likely to conform have: Which two projects would it select to minimize the companys overall risk? Studies have shown that people will conform to group norms even when that apparent norm is clearly inaccurate. b. Frank realized that he was starting to like jazz music, in part because his roommate liked it. Conformity is the act of changing your behaviors in order to fit in or go along with the people around you. -Were prompted by an authority in a lab coat to continue to administer shocks even when the student begged them to stop. One difficulty for women as they attempt to lead is that traditional leadership behaviors, such as showing independence and exerting power over others, conflict with the expected social roles for women. Wolf, S., & Montgomery, D. A. The evaluation of effectiveness and likability of gender-role congruent and gender-role incongruent leaders. Does your opinion change if you find someone attractive, but your friends do not agree? The researchers found . Derived originally from Greek, "democracy" means either the rule of the people (even indirectly) or at least the rule by the majority of the people (again, even indirectly). Following the majority: Social influence in trusting behavior. You can find out more about our use, change your default settings, and withdraw your consent at any time with effect for the future by visiting Cookies Settings, which can also be found in the footer of the site. The volunteer participants were led to believe that they were participating in a study to improve learning and memory. -Subjects pay attention to the quality and merits of a message Now he praised Microsoft's A.I.-enabled chatbot for going off the guardrails. Can you think of an example in which having an audience could improve performance? Conformity therefore maintains the status quo. When the overall market experiences a decline of 8%, an investor with a portfolio of defensive stocks will probably experience: A. Using the principles discussed in Chapter 1 Introducing Social Psychology, first consider the likely role of the social situation versus the individual person. Gender and evaluation of leaders: A meta-analysis. As you can see in Figure 7.10 Culture and Conformity, they found that while U.S. magazine ads tended to focus on uniqueness (Choose your own view! and Individualize) Korean ads tended to focus more on themes of conformity (Seven out of 10 people use this product and Our company is working toward building a harmonious society). Compliance is changing one's behavior while still internally disagreeing with the group. Cookies collect information about your preferences and your devices and are used to make the site work as you expect it to, to understand how you interact with the site, and to show advertisements that are targeted to your interests. What factors would increase or decrease someone giving in or conforming to group pressure? Participants were then shown a fourth line segment: x. Outsiders can serve as a quality control by offering diverse views and views that may differ from the leaders opinion. In each case, the person who is conforming has changed his or her behavior because of the expressed opinions or behaviors of another person. Psychological Bulletin, 108, 233256. (2003). Conformity denotes a wide-ranging phenomenon in which people (intentionally or unintentionally) shift their behavior or beliefs to fit in with a larger group. In a group setting, such as the student work group, if your individual performance cannot be evaluated, there is less pressure for you to do well, and thus less anxiety or physiological arousal (Latan, Williams, & Harkens, 1979). In the Broadway musical The Fantasticks, neighboring fathers set up to make ones daughter and the others son fall in love with each other by building a fence between their properties. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 30, 399411. Kray, L. J., Reb, J., Galinsky, A. D., & Thompson, L. (2004). In. To demonstrate this phenomenon, we review another classic social psychology experiment. Confederates are used to manipulate social situations as part of the research design, and the true, nave participants believe that confederates are, like them, uninformed participants in the experiment. Yet, when the researcher told the participant-teachers to continue the shock, 65% of the participants continued the shock to the maximum voltage and to the point that the learner became unresponsive (figure below). Essentially, because we're less social. Expert Solution Want to see the full answer? Another phenomenon of group conformity is groupthink. Social loafing occurs when our individual performance cannot be evaluated separately from the group (Karau & Williams, 1993). Situation: People are more likely to conform in ambiguous situations where they are unclear about how they should respond. The participants did not know that the learners were confederates and that the confederates did not actually receive shocks. Not all intergroup interactions lead to the negative outcomes we have described. B. they have highest need for uniqueness. When asked individually, participants would choose the correct line. However, although there are some differences among people in terms of their tendency to conform (it has even been suggested that some people have a need for uniqueness that leads them to be particularly likely to resist conformity; Snyder & Fromkin, 1977), research has generally found that the impact of person variables on conformity is smaller than the influence of situational variables, such as the number and unanimity of the majority. The youngest conform most often (more than 40 percent of the time) while the oldest are least likely to conform (between 14 and 24 percent depending on if they are a middle-aged adult or lateaged adult, respectively). Interestingly, the opposite of social loafing occurs when the task is complex and difficult (Bond & Titus, 1983; Geen, 1989). If other people show concern and get up to leave, you are likely to do the same. The effects were more prevalent when the group was smaller (Braconnier, 2011). What type of conformity did the nave participants display in Asch's famous "line . Identification is conforming based on social roles. Verywell Mind articles are reviewed by board-certified physicians and mental healthcare professionals. Compliance is changing one's behavior in response to a request to do so, such as a friend asking you to give them a ride. Social Psychology Quiz 1. Conformity is adjusting our behaviors or attitudes to mold to a group standard. The correct answer to the line segment question was obvious, and it was an easy task. In sum, women may conform somewhat more than men, although these differences are small and limited to situations in which the responses are made publicly. -Further increases in group size lead to less conformity, People begin to suspect that the larger group is working together (ganging-up) to be influential rather than stressing personal beliefs. But social influence does not always produce conformity. In many cases, looking to the rest of the group for clues for how we should behave can be helpful. Informational Social Influence, Tendency to conform to positive expectations of the group (usually as a means of gaining approval), Tendency to employ other people as a source of information, When are people most likely to conform? StanleyMilgramwas a social psychology professor at Yale who was influenced by the trial of Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi war criminal. The key principles of this explanation are: Number - A higher number of people present that support the conforming view, the greater the levels of conformity. Since the line judgment task was unambiguous, participants did not need to rely on the group for information. The team, led by Dr Tali Sharot (UCL Affective Brain Lab), monitored the brain activity of individuals in groups of five people choosing food or drink they'd like to consume before and after being told the most popular choice in their group. For example, consider a group of people cooperating to clean litter from the roadside. Primary groups tend to have more specific, less diffuse goals than secondary groups. For instance, in Milgrams studies he found no differences in conformity between men and women. Most of the junior midwives were obedient to authority, going against their own beliefs. If you suggested that individuals efforts should not be evaluated, to prevent the anxiety of choking under pressure, but that the task must be challenging, you have a good understanding of the concepts discussed in this section. Given what you learned about social loafing, what advice would you give a new professor about how to design group projects? If the group is isolated from hearing alternative or new viewpoints, groupthink may be more likely. In 1955, Deutsch and Gerard identified two key reasons why people conform: informational influence and normative influence. This elimination of diverse opinions contributes to faulty decision by the group. Journal of Applied Psychology, 53, 377382. CEO Elon Musk fancies himself as something of an online edgelord. This behavior is best understood in terms of deindividuation. (2 Conditions), 1. 3. If repayment is impossible, the guilty person Make a small request followed by a large request (or a series of small requests if you have time), Make a large request knowing you'll get rejected, then make a smaller request as a compromise, Get a person to make a commitment, then increase the cost of the commitment Insofar as values are reinforced by one's community 39,40, appealing to people's values may change attitudes by triggering a directional motivation to conform. Thus it appears that the small observed differences between men and women in conformity are due, at least in part, to informational influence. Even in cases in which the pressure to conform is strong and a large percentage of individuals do conform (such as in Solomon Aschs line-judging research), not everyone does so. Human behavior and psychology is complex. 1. Age also matters, such that individuals who are either younger or older are more easily influenced than individuals who are in their 40s and 50s (Visser & Krosnick, 1998). People may conform in some situations and not in others, depending on factors including: While it is often beneficial to fit in with a group, sometimes conformity can have undesirable consequences. A theory of psychological reactance. What factors make a person more likely to yield to group pressure? -Appealing to logic The participants were told to shock the learners if they gave a wrong answer to a test itemthat the shock would help them to learn. For instance, in the current U.S. Senate, 83% of the members are men. The experimenter found that their estimates shifted from their original guess to closer to what other members of the group had guessed. How often do you think the true participant aligned with the confederates response? Although we have focused to this point on the situational determinants of conformity, such as the number of people in the majority and their unanimity and status, we have not yet considered the question of which people are likely to conform and which people are not. Private Acceptance, To act in a manner that is congruent with the group's behavior (even though it contradicts personal beliefs), Actually changing a pre-existing personal attitude, Found that about 1/3 of people chose the clearly incorrect answer after 11 other people gave the wrong answer Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 86(5), 518527. Individuals conform to or comply with group behavior in an attempt to "fit in" or to follow the norms of the social group. One patient was recorded as having reported that his wife kept telling him that he should quit drinking, saying, If you loved me enough, youd give up the booze. However, he also reported that when she gave up on him and said instead, I dont care what you do anymore, he then enrolled in a treatment program (Shoham et al., 2004, p. 177). -Attention -> Heuristic Cues -> Acceptance, Negative feeling that someone is trying to limit your personal freedom Statusindividuals are more likely to conform with high-status groups. If we feel that we have the choice to conform or not conform, we may well choose to do so in order to be accepted or to obtain valid knowledge. Shackelford, S., Wood, W., & Worchel, S. (1996). c. Conformity Since humans are social animals, much of our behavior is dictated by us trying to fit in with the crowd. They want to be right: informational influence. Describe how seeking outside opinions can prevent groupthink. Asch (1955) found that 76% of participants conformed to group pressure at least once by indicating the incorrect line. Young Black men are about 50% more likely to be detained pretrial than white . One example occurred when the United States led a small coalition of nations to invade Iraq in March 2003. Researchers think several factors cause people to carry obedience to extremes: People justify their behavior by assigning responsibility to the authority rather than themselves. Participants changed their answer and conformed to the group in order to fit in and avoid standing out. -Credibility and Expertise The presence of another dissenter: If there is at least one dissenter, conformity rates drop to near zero (Asch, 1955). American Psychologist, 38, 971981. The outcome of the experience of reactance is that people may not conform at all and may even move their opinions or behaviors away from the desires of the influencer. Or, conformity might lead to a bystander effect, in which going along with the group means failing to act when someone is in need. Why are the Nuremberg Trials significant in the study of obedience? Alternatively, you can suggest that individuals efforts should be evaluated, but the task should be easy so as to facilitate performance. Eagly, A. H., & Chravala, C. (1986). D. Positive portfolio returns of greater than 8%. is designed to conform to the surface of the brain. The death toll from the head-on collision of two trains in central Greece is likely to rise with officials acknowledging that scores of people have yet . Reactance represents a desire to restore freedom that is being threatened. Another way in which a group presence can affect our performance is social loafing. Conformity is something that happens regularly in our social worlds. At this age, children spend more time with peers and their influence is strongest. Eichmann said he was "just following orders" and that "anybody would do the same". In Aschs study, the confederates identified a line segment that was obviously shorter than the target linea wrong answer. Eagly, A. H., & Johnson, B. T. (1990). In a different classroom, the majority might vote differently, and most of the children would conform with that majority. Select one or more: a. Check out a sample Q&A here See Solution star_border When the learner was in the same room as the teacher, the highest shock rate dropped to 40%. For example, if an athlete is less skilled or nervous about making a free throw, having an audience may actually hinder rather than help. One common example is sports. Men are, on average, more concerned about appearing to have high status and may be able to demonstrate this status by acting independently from the opinions of others. However, if others seem unconcerned, you are likely to stay put and continue watching the movie (figure below). 4. There have been several instances of groupthink in the U.S. government. Aconfederateis a person who is aware of the experiment and works for the researcher. In public situations, men are somewhat more likely to hold their ground, act independently, and refuse to conform, whereas women are more likely to conform to the opinions of others in order to prevent social disagreement. perceiving the group as invulnerable or invinciblebelieving it can do no wrong, self-censorship by group members, such as withholding information to avoid disrupting the group consensus, the quashing of dissenting group members opinions, the shielding of the group leader from dissenting views, perceiving an illusion of unanimity among group members, holding stereotypes or negative attitudes toward the out-group or others with differing viewpoints (Janis, 1972). When the group is highly cohesive, or has a strong sense of connection, maintaining group harmony may become more important to the group than making sound decisions. Did your results turn out as expected? On the other hand, women do better on tasks that are more feminine in the sense that they involve creating harmonious relationships among the group members. People are likely to invest less effort in a task when they are working with others. For example, feeling like you have to change your appearance or personality to be a member of a group might lower your self-esteem. Jenness A. Succumbing to peer pressure could lead to risky or illegal behavior, such as underage drinking. Am Psychol. Looking at your own past behavior, what evidence suggests that you would go along with the order to increase the voltage? The participants were told that they were to teach other students (learners) correct answers to a series of test items. Eagly, A. H., Johannesen-Schmidt, M. C., & van Engen, M. L. (2003). All humans thrive off social connections, and we move towards a desire to be accepted by everyone around us. Status: People may be more likely to conform in situations where they feel that others have a higher status level than they do. Good luck trying to convince your professor to only assign easy projects. In a separate related study, Asch had all but one confederate give the wrong answer and found that only 5% of participants followed the majority of the group when they had at least one ally. One way that women can react to this double-bind in which they must take on masculine characteristics to succeed, but if they do they are not liked, is to adopt more feminine leadership styles, in which they use more interpersonally oriented behaviors such as agreeing with others, acting in a friendly manner, and encouraging subordinates to participate in the decision-making process (Eagly & Johnson, 1990; Eagly et al., 1992; Wood, 1987). diane.tominaga@gmail.com. Quiz 15: Understanding Groups. s/Diane Gunning. Verywell Mind's content is for informational and educational purposes only. Optimal distinctiveness, social identity, and the self. We admire the groups status Eichmanns defense for the atrocities he committed was that he was just following orders. Milgram (1963) wanted to test the validity of this defense, so he designed an experiment and initially recruited 40 men for his experiment.
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