Charles Hofling's Study
Unknown doctor asked nurses to administer a made up drug, and 21/22 nurses complied
when asked, most people said they wouldn't obey
Stanley Milgram's Study
learner had a heart condition and the teacher administer shock when they got question wrong, and shock levels increased.
Some people laughed while administering the shocks
Obedience declined when further away spatially from the experimenter
Showed that the Holocaust was not uniquely German
More obedience if not held responsible
Disobedience didn't increase with increased shock level
Women voiced more objections but obedience didn't change
Greater distance from victim made obedience increase -Institutional authority increases obedience
Burger Reading
Replicated Milgrams study- today people also obey
Blass Reading
Milgram's research grew out of Asch's research- obedience experiments
Conformity
a change in behavior or belief as a result of social pressure
Line Judgment task (Asch's study)
-⅓ of subjects conformed in critical trials
3/4 subjects conformed at least once
Variations of Asch's study
increase the majority who gave wrong answer- would increase the rate of conformity
planting dissenters so its no longer unanimous, huge effect
changing the differences in the line size, never found a point at which people wouldn't conform (up to 7 inches)
Ross, Bierbraur and Hoffman's Perspectives on Asch's Study
Said the study was extreme and extraordinary pressures to conform
the situation created a unique attribution crisis
conceptual replication with money as reward: gave reason for why they conformed, broke attribution crisis
Bond and Smith: role of culture and other factors on conformity
-collectivist culture is more conforming -women conformed more than men -conform more with own group -prosocial behavior if others do the same, especially in public, increases conformity
Moscovici, Lage, and Naffrechoux: minority influence on conformity
-Consistent minority can have a significant influence
acceptance
Conformity that involves both acting and believing in accord with social pressure.
compliance
Conformity that involves publicly acting in accord with an implied or explicit request while privately disagreeing.
obedience
A type of compliance involving acting in accord with a direct order or command.
mass hysteria
Suggestibility to problems that spreads throughout a large group of people.
cohesiveness
A "we feeling"; the extent to which members of a group are bound together, such as by attraction to one another.
normative influence
Conformity based on a person's desire to fulfill others' expectations, often to gain acceptance
informational influence
Conformity occurring when people accept evidence about reality provided by other people.
reactance
A motive to protect or restore one's sense of freedom. Reactance arises when someone threatens our freedom of action.
Source: Credibility
positive relationship between credibility and persuasiveness of the source
the taller, the more credible you seem, so you're more persuasive
Source: Attractiveness
Attractiveness is not gendered
more attractive source, more persuasive
Source: Perceived similarity
if source is similar to the self, more persuasive
ideological similarities drive the effect more
Source: Power
physical cue for deception- frequent blinking, mouth movement, self-grooming, continuous smiling
Message: Dynamic style
more persuasive if they're trusted and if the perceiver isn't involved in the issue
Message: fast speaking
more persuasive, especially if charismatic, no hesitation
Message: Humor
can help persuade and can hurt by distracting from the message, more effective if audience is happy
association with good feelings
Counterarguments
better to say counterargument to your position and give your side after to strongly knock down
effective in building resistance
repeating messages
after repeating 3 times, not persuasive
using message based on facts
central route to persuasion
message using emotions
peripheral route to persuasion, this is most effective with uninterested audiences, and it matters if the attitude was formed from peripheral route
fear messages
political ads
small effect on voting preferences because it doesn't change political views
does help with political knowledge
persuasion
The process by which a message induces change in beliefs, attitudes, or behaviors.
central route to persuasion
Occurs when interested people focus on the arguments and respond with favorable thoughts.
peripheral route to persuasion
Occurs when people are influenced by incidental cues, such as a speaker's attractiveness.
credibility
Believability. A credible communicator is perceived as both expert and trustworthy
sleeper effect
A delayed impact of a message that occurs when an initially discounted message becomes effective, such as we remember the message but forget the reason for discounting it.
attractiveness
Having qualities that appeal to an audience. An appealing communicator (often someone similar to the audience) is most persuasive on matters of subjective preference.
foot-in-the-door phenomenon
The tendency for people who have first agreed to a small request to comply later with a larger request.
lowball effect
A tactic for getting people to agree to something. People who agree to an initial request will often still comply when the requester ups the ante. People who receive only the costly request are less likely to comply with it.
door-in-the-face technique
A strategy for gaining a concession. After someone first turns down a large request (the door-in-the-face), the same requester counteroffers with a more reasonable request.
primacy effect
Other things being equal, information presented first usually has the most influence
when information presented back to back, and people have to respond later.
recency effect
Information presented last sometimes has the most influence. Recency effects are less common than primacy effects.
if messages presented at different times, and have to respond right after second message
channel of communication
The way the message is delivered — whether face-to-face, in writing, on film, or in some other way.
channel: personal vs media influence
personal is more influential
channel: active vs passive influence
active experience strengthen attitudes, passive experience when experienced repeatedly breeds liking and familiarity
two-step flow of communication
The process by which media influence often occurs through opinion leaders (influencers), who in turn influence others.
influence of age on attitudes
Attitudes do not change; older people largely hold onto the attitudes they adopted when they were young.
need for cognition
The motivation to think and analyze. Assessed by agreement with items such as "The notion of thinking abstractly is appealing to me" and disagreement with items such as "I only think as hard as I have to."
central routes of processing, analytical people
Stimulating thinking makes strong messages more persuasive and (because of counterarguing) weak messages less persuasive.
attitude inoculation
Exposing people to weak attacks upon their attitudes so that when stronger attacks come, they will have refutations available.
way to resist persuasion
counterargument
Reasons why a persuasive message might be wrong
Anatomy of Telephone Appeal
the opening: introduce personal identification, strengthen perceived similarity to strengthen compliance
the ask: establish a norm, joining in-group, and give bargaining room
the response: how much will you give for complying, sign of caring, powerful norms of reciprocity
the closing: thank for their time and pledge, and ask how they would like to give their pledge, doing something that's convenient, consensus information is huge for compliance
Factors enhancing compliance
-similarities: reciprocity -dialogue: emotional vs persuasion -social norms: even if bad norms, consensus effect -self-prediction: get people to imagine that they will do something, will comply especially in public -even a penny: saying this phrase increases compliance -underestimate the compliance effect -100 techniques
Cialdini and Schroeder: Even a Penny
Compliance jumped from 29% to 50% with the phrase "even a penny helps" -amount donated didn't change
Freedman and Fraser: Foot in the Door Technique
Conditions:
small request: small sign, issue: community traffic
small request: small sign, issue: keep CA beautiful
small request: sign petition, issue: traffic
small request: sign petition, issue: keep CA beautiful
control (17% compliance)
Experimenter: large request to put up big sign for traffic issue Compliance with a small request increased compliance with a subsequent larger request, even when small request differed in style and substance from the larger request -self-perception, sees themselves as the type of person to do those things
Bryan and Walton: Helping vs being a helper
labeling the child as a helper makes them become more helpful because self-perception
Burger- foot in the door compliance procedure
can be effective when labelled as a "supporter" and when the large request is a continuation of a small request
can backfire if same person makes a large request right after making the small request- reduce compliance
Dutton and Lennox: Tokenism
Phase 1:
subjects were told they were prejudice against black people and had their ego blown
later they were either: panhandled by black person, white person, not panhandled, or they did not receive that feedback (control) and gave coins to black people Phase 2:
subjects asked to volunteer at school campaign against racism
found that if: panhandled by black person: 31.8% compliance panhandled by white person: 54.8% not panhandled: 46.2% no feedback: 17.9%
Panhandled by white person increased compliance because they thought they were already not prejudice when they gave black people money (bolstered self-image)
Foot-in-the-door technique is backfired by tokenism when large request is asked right after the small request
Tokenism
backfires the foot-in-the-door technique, doing something initially to reduce criticism
Cialdini, Vincient: Door in the Face Technique
asked to do two-year commitment to work at a juvie center, after being told no they scaled back and asked them to volunteer once for 2 hrs
compliance was increased, doubled likelihood of compliance
Gueguen & Meineri
At restaurant, customers refuse dessert are more likely to accept a cup or coffee if the server asked right after the dessert refusal than if they waited 3 minutes
Cialdini, Cacioppo, Bassett, Miller: Lowball technique
when students asked to participate in an early morning experiment, more than twice as likely to do so if the time was mentioned after they consented than if the time was mentioned as part of the request (jumped from 31% agree to 56% agree)
Limits to low-ball technique
compliance increases when people state their initial agreement publicly and if the cost of complying is raised only slightly
Cialdini Reading: Crafting Normative Messages
They found that there was more littering in the littered environment, and more littering occurred when the participant viewed a confederate littering- establish the norm of littering
least amount of littering under the anti-littering norm environment
error to focus an audience on the descriptive norm
Public service communicators should focus on the injunctive norm (what is approved or disapproved)
Burger, Messian, Patel, del Prado, & Anderson (2004): The effects of incidental similarities on compliance
People rely on heuristic processing when responding to requests. Participants who shared similarity with the requester were more likely to comply to request, but only if the incidental similarity was with the requester
Tenets of Principled Negotiation
(1) Separate the problem from the people (2) Focus on underlying interests, not expressed positions (3) Generate a variety of options before deciding what to do (4) Insist that the result be based on some objective standard
Negotiation mistakes
assume that the negotiators job is to narrow the gap between positions rather than broaden positions
negotiators assume their task is distributive when it is actually integrative
differences of opinion get in the way of agreement
negotiators tend to be overconfident that the other side will accept their own position
distributive bargaining
zero sum task- what one side gains the other side loses
integrative bargaining
non-zero sum task, integrate interests of both sides
Parallel between effective negotiation and effective group behavior
discover underlying interests or preferences of group/other side
Abilene paradox
the tendency of people to resist voicing their true thoughts or feelings in order to please others and avoid conflict
everyone collectively agrees to do something that contradicts what they really want to do which defeats the purposes they are trying to achieve
How to avoid the Abilene Paradox
assess risk of taking action, own up to beliefs and feelings, confort the group about what they silently agreed upon
Reasons for Abilene Paradox
action anxiety
conjure up negative fantasies about what would happen if chose other action
real risk
fear of being ostracized
assignment of blame (but its unanimous)
Individual vs Group performance task
groups tend to outperform individuals when given tasks for logic
group performance helps individuals improve too
noninteracting groups do better than brainstorming groups because conformity and production blocking
during brainstorming, interacting groups do better than noninteracting groups
group
Two or more people who, for longer than a few moments, interact with and influence one another and perceive one another as "us."
social facilitation
the strengthening of dominant (prevalent, likely) responses in the presence of others.
evaluation apprehension
Concern for how others are evaluating us
creates arousal in the presence of others
social loafing
The tendency for people to exert less effort when they pool their efforts toward a common goal than when they are individually accountable
free riders
People who benefit from the group but give little in return
deindividuation
Loss of self-awareness and evaluation apprehension; occurs in group situations that foster responsiveness to group norms, good or bad
self-awareness
A self-conscious state in which attention focuses on oneself. It makes people more sensitive to their own attitudes and dispositions
group polarization
Group-produced enhancement of members' preexisting tendencies; a strengthening of the members' average tendency, not a split within the group.
social comparison
Evaluating one's opinions and abilities by comparing oneself with others
pluralistic ignorance
A false impression of what most other people are thinking or feeling, or how they are responding
groupthink
"The mode of thinking that persons engage in when concurrence-seeking becomes so dominant in a cohesive in-group that it tends to override realistic appraisal of alternative courses of action."
Symptoms of groupthink
(1) an illusion of invulnerability, (2) rationalization, (3) unquestioned belief in the group's morality, (4) stereotyped views of the opposition, (5) pressure to conform, (6) self-censorship of misgivings, (7) an illusion of unanimity, and (8) "mindguards" who protect the group from unpleasant information.
preventing groupthink
be impartial, allow critical evaluation, subdivide the group, welcome critiques from outside members, second-chance meeting
leadership
The process by which certain group members motivate and guide the group
task leadership
Leadership that organizes work, sets standards, and focuses on goals
social leadership
Leadership that builds teamwork, mediates conflict, and offers support
transformational leadership
Leadership that, enabled by a leader's vision and inspiration, exerts significant influence
intergroup dynamics
interactions between groups
ingroup bias
the tendency to favor one's own group and see it as superior to other groups
Rabbie and Horwitz: chance win or loss of radio
chance condition: radios go to coin toss winners experimenter condition: experimenter chooses group group condition: group seems to give itself radios control condition: no mention of radios
finding: students who either received or were denied radios displayed group-level biases whereas students in the control condition did not
Johnson: attractiveness of party members
Liberals and conservatives both guessed that relatively attractive were supporters of their own party
outgroup homogeneity bias
the perception that outgroup members are more similar to one another than are ingroup members
Jones: student eating club study
students rated their members as more varied in personality than members of the outgroup
ingroup homogeneity biases
if ingroup is small and the attributes important to its identity, an ingroup homogeneity effect may occur
Rubin and Badea: ingroup homogeneity biases
if it is assumed that people use homogeneity ratings to indicate the extent to which groups possess traits, then this stereotype effect may be interpreted as an expression of perceived trait possession
biases in punishment
The tendency to punish outgroup offenders more severely than ingroup offenders, and to punish people who harm ingroup members more severely than people who harm outgroup members
biased responses to pain and suffering
a greater sensitivity to the pain and suffering of ingroup members than outgroup members