Social Influence

IGCSE Psychology šŸ¤

Social Influence

Social Influence - Processes through which a person or group influences the attitudes of another person or group.

Obedience - Complying with the orders of an authority figure

Authority Figure - Someone with more power and control than another.

Conformity

Conformity - Matching the behaviour/beliefs of others in order to fit in because we do not know how to behave in an unusual situation.

There are three types of conformity. These are:

Compliance

  • Means going along with the group even though privatley, we do not agree.

    Example: All the girls at school wear uggs, and you donā€™t like them that much but you buy them and wear them everyday to fit in.

  • Type of social influence: Normative

    We follow the group because we do not want to be rejected

Internalisation

  • Going along with the group because you do not know how to act in a situation.

    Example: Everyone around you is vegeterian, so you decide to become a vegetarian as well because you believe it is the best thing to do.

  • Type of social influence: Informational

    You look to others and copy them because you are unsure of how to behave.

Identification

  • Similar to compliance but is is only temporary

  • Temporarily adopting the behaviours of the group.

    Example: All the girls have stanleys so you buy one to fit in, even though you prefer your lululemon bottle. When you are not around them, you drink from your lululemon water bottle.

  • Type of social influence: Normative

Deindividuation

Deindividuation - Loss of personal awarness and responsibility as part of being in a group.

We lose our idenitity and blend into a group/ become anonymous. We feel less responsible for our actions as we are ā€˜protectedā€™ by the group.

Bystander affect

Bystanderism - Failing to help those in need.

Whether we help someone or not depends on 2 factors:

Situational

  1. Diffusion of responsibility

  2. Noticing the event

  3. Pluristic ignorance

  4. Cost of helping

Personal

  1. Competence

  2. Mood

  3. Similiarity

Diffusion of responsibility

  • We fell less inclined to help when there are others around instead.

Noticing the event

  • In larger crowds we tend to keep to ourselves and often do not notice what is around us.

Pluristic Ignorance

  • When everyone else isnā€™t helping, it is likely we arenā€™t going to help etheir, because we do not interpret it as an emergency.

Cost of helping

  • Sometimes, we evaluate the situation as having too high a cost to help, as we do not want to harm/inconvenience ourselves as a result.

Competence

  • We may not be able to help.

Personal mood

  • If we are in a good mood, we tend to be more observant and more willing to help.

Conformity

It is to comply or copy what others are doing in a situation because we do not know how to act.