Conformity- Asch

What research supports NSI?

Asch’s investigation into conformity

• can also support ISI when lines become harder

How did Asch study conformity?

• **what did participants have to take part in

A line judgement task

What is a confederate?

A confederate is a person who appears to be a real participant but is actually working for the researcher

What is a naive participant?

A naive participant is the real participant who does not know the true aim of the study.

What method did Asch use to study conformity?(4)(not results just method)

• **how many people

• **how many trials

• 8-10 male participants were shown a standard line and three other comparison lines

• However this was deception as only one was a real participant

• They had to say aloud one by one which line matched the standard line (the answer was obvious) - the participant would sit last or second to last

• In 12 critical trials the confederates all gave the same wrong answer before the naive participant responded

What are critical trials?

What are neutral trials?

Critical trials = the specific test rounds in Asch's study where the confederates all gave the WRONG answer on purpose

• Critical trials

Key rounds where the test condition is active; where the behaviour being studied is actually measured — the rounds that count.

• Neutral trials

Normal rounds with no test condition applied; used as a baseline or filler — not the main data.

RESULTS of ASCH’S RESEARCH:

• What was the overall rate of conformity in critical trials?

• What percentage of people conformed at least once?

• What percentage of people conformed all 12 times?

• 33%

• 75%

• 5%

After the first laboratory experiment Asch tested the method again with different variables.

• what was the variables Asch tested?

• Group size - Asch varied the number of confederates from 1-15

• Unanimity - one confederate gave the right answer breaking the groups unanimity by disagreeing with majority

• Task difficulty - Asch made the task more ambiguous by reducing difference in line lengths

what were conformity rates with 1,2 or 3 confederates?

• 3% conformity rate with 1 confederate

• 13% with two confederates

• 33% with 3 confederates

After 3 confederates the % did not increase

The fact that the conformity rate didn’t increase after 3 confederates suggests what?

This suggest that only 3 wrong people are need to create group pressure

What was the overall conformity rate when one confederate gave the correct answer?+why

Conformity dropped to 5.5% due to social support

Did conformity increase or decrease by making the task more difficult?

• What could this arguable be due to?

Increased to to being more uncertain

• ISI

Evaluation:

1. How does Asch’s research support NSI?

2. How does task difficulty support ISI?

1. 75% conformed at-least once even though answer was unambiguous, they didn’t want to stick out

2. The variation in task difficulty increased ambiguity of correct answer, participants = more uncertain so more likely to rely on judgment of others

Evaluation:

1. how does Asch’s task lack mundane realism/ ecological validity?

1. 
   

• Simply asking participants to point out the correct answer on a line judgement task feels artificial and does not match real life scenarios

• Also conforming happens with people we know not strangers

Evaluation:

1. How does Asch’s lab experiment have high internal validity?

   • Internal validity = whether the study tests what it says it does; results from the variable you changed, not something else

2. How does Asch’s method lack temporal validity?

   • Temporal validity = whether results hold true across different times / not just when the study was done

1. Carefully controlled and he used standardised procedures eg control group and experimental group

2. Perrin and Spencer(1981) suggest Asch’s work lacks this, that high conformity rates are due to the cultural condition in the Cold War America. Replication in British students found that there was only conformity in only 1 trial out 396

   
   

Evaluation:

1. What did bond find?

1. In meta analysis of 133 studies using Asch’s line judgement task across 17 countries, bond found that conformity rates are much higher in collectivist cultures where social norms prioritise consensus, compared to individualist societies that value independence and personal freedom