conformity - asch's study

what is the definition of conformity

• the tendency for a person to change their behaviour or beliefs in response to a pressure from people in a group

types of conformity

• compliance - individuals publically go along with the majority view but privately disagree with it

• linked to a need to be accepted

• superficial, temporary

• internalisation - individuals take on the expressed view publicly and privately as they accept it is correct

• deepest level of conformity and leads to a far reachingand permanent change in behaviour e.g converting to a religion

asch’s research into conformity - aim and procedure

• aim - investigate extent to which social pressure from a majority group would cause individual to conform

• procedure - 50 american student volunteers took part

• told it was a visual perception task

• placed around table of confederates , believing selves were a small part of group but they were the only genuine ppt

• task - state what comparison line was the same as the stimulus line (a, b or c)

• 12 of these trials were ‘critical’ where the confederates were told to give the wrong answer - all conf. giving same wrong answer

• naive ppt was the last to answer , seeing peers get the wrong answer

asch’s research into conformity - results and conclusion

• results - control group had an error rate of 0.04% (3/720 trials) - shows how obvious the answer was

• on 12 critical trials, conformity rate was 36.8% to wrong answers

• 75% of ppts conformed to at least one answer - only 25% remained completely independent

• 5% conformed to every answer of 12 trials

• conclusion - asch found majority = significant effect on minority even in obvious situations

• NSI critical in persuading people