Social Influence a-level core

Flashcards covering key concepts and studies discussed in the social influence lectures, including obedience, majority influence, and minority influence.

Milgram (obedience)

Classic social influence study focusing on obedience. How far will the participant comply with the experimenter’s instructions before refusing to carry out the actions required of him?

Ordinary people are surprisingly likely to follow orders from authority figures, even when those orders involve harming another person

Asch (majority influence)

Classic social influence study focusing on majority influence.

• Asch → Majority influence: People conform to avoid standing out.

• Moscovici → Minority influence: A consistent, confident minority can change opinions.

Experimenter Prods in Milgram Study

Please continue, or, Please go on. The experiment requires that you continue. It is absolutely essential that you continue. You have no other choice, you must go on.

Burger (2009)

A modern replication of Milgram with ethical adjustments, additional condition and personality variables. Only went to 150 volts. Included an additional condition where participants saw another participant refuse to continue. Made sure there was variety in the population. Participants were prescreened by clinical psychologists. Participants were reminded multiple times that were allowed to leave at anytime. Did not find significantly different results than Milgram. About 70% of participants were willing to continue to 150 volts

Agentic Shift

A 'situationist' perspective by Milgram where people obey and do terrible things just because someone tells them to, see themselves as agents acting in proxy of a legitimate authority.

Haslam et al. (2014)

Meta-analysis of Milgram’s conditions, isolating specific features of the paradigm and how each affects obedience rates.

Reicher & Haslam (2012)

Argue Milgram describes obedience, but doesn’t explain it. Frame variations in terms of social distance, or relationships.

Muzafer Sherif's (1936) auto-kinetic effect

Utilizes an optical illusion to assess group norm formation and transmission.

Asch's frustration

Frustrated by social psychological views that people would mindlessly conform. Believed paradigms used essentially guaranteed conformity while paradoxically making it impossible to establish.

Asch (1955)

Experiment that demonstrated how group size and breaking consensus affect conformity.

Social Comparison Theory (Festinger, 1954)

Intrinsic desire to know ourselves. Opinions are 'validated' when we discover agreement with others.

Deutsch & Gerard (1955)

Proposed normative and informational influence to describe why we are influenced by groups.

Bond & Smith (1996)

Studied how conformity in the Asch paradigm varies by culture, cultural changes in the USA, and between cultures across the globe.

Moscovici (minority influence)

Argues for the importance of minority influence and innovation, public change (compliance) vs private change (conversion). Minorities must be FLEXIBLE but CONSISTENT.

Moscovici, Lage & Naffrechoux (1969)

Adapted Asch paradigm to study minority influence on colour judgements.

Conversion theory (Moscovici, 1980)

Attention to arguments leads to private acceptance. Includes latent (time) and indirect effects.

Maass & Clark (1983)

Studied majority vs minority influence by having participants listen to recordings of a discussion.

Jetten & Hornsey (2014)

Studied minority influences within groups, such as who gets to be different and who gets to criticize the group.