Chapter 6: Conformity and Obedience

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Chapter 6 Conformity and Obedience
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Milgram Experiment

• What breeds obedience?
• 1) Emotional distance of the victim
• Learner remote (near 100)
• Same room (40)
• Force hand (30)

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What breeds obedience?

• 2) Closeness and legitimacy of the victim
• Phone (21)
• Clerk (20)
• Thrown

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What breeds obedience?

• 3) Institutional authority
• Research associates of bridgeport (48)

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What breeds obedience?

• 4) Group Influence
• 2 confederates rebel (10)

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What breeds obedience?

• 5) The situation
• Responsibility (MilitaryEichmann)
• Kilham Mann (1974)
• transmitter (54)
• executant (28)
• Gradual escalation
• Foot-in-the-door
• Hitler
• Cults

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Do you think results would be different today?
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Do you think results would be different today?

• Meeus and Raaijmakers (1995)
• Volunteer to help with job interview
• ability to work under stress
• meet man (confederate)
• Take testpass, get jobfail, dont get it
• Read questions and harass applicant with
  escalating series of negative remarks
• Youre suited for lower functions this job is
  much too difficult for you

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Meeus and Raaijmakers (1995)

• Applicant
• Pleads with participant to stop
• angrily refuses to tolerate the abuse
• falls into state of despairbegs to stop
• Participant
• Felt task was unfair and distasteful
• HOW MANY DO YOU THINK WILL GO ALL THE WAY?

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Meeus and Raaijmakers (1995)

• Results
• With no experimenter present
• 0

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Meeus and Raaijmakers (1995)

• Results
• With experimenter (authority) present
• 92

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Conformity

• The tendency to change our perceptions, opinions,
  or behavior in ways that are consistent with
  group norms.

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Classic Studies involving Conformity

• Sherif (1936) Study of how norms develop in small
  groups
• autokinetic effect-Optical illusion
• Dot of light-2 seconds
• record how far it moves
• Individually and in groups

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Sherif (1936)

• Each group develops its own set of norms.

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Results
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Soloman Asch (1951)

• Arrive for study with 6 other students
• Seated 5th out of 6
• Given one standard line, then 3 others, out of
  which you have to pick the one that matches the
  standard.
• Round 1 Cake, easy, no problem
• Round 2 Lets get out of here this is simple

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Round 3

• The first person gives the wrong answer, followed
  by the same wrong answer for the second, third,
  fourth, and then it is your turn.
• What do you say?
• Clearly they have it wrong. Dont they?
• Did I misunderstand the instructions?

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Results

• Participants went ahead with the incorrect
  majority 37 of the time...
• 50 went along with at least half the trials
• Do you think we would still find this today?

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Larson, 1990Schneider Watkins, 1996

• High levels of conformity found 30 years later
  and in recent studies involving other cognitive
  tasks

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Why do people conform?

• Informational Influence
• People conform because they want to be correct in
  their judgments and they assume that when others
  agree on something they must be right.

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Why do people conform?

• Normative influence
• Leads people to conform because they fear the
  consequences of being deviant. (i.e., We all
  want to be accepted and liked embarrassment)

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Sherif vs. Asch

• SHERIF
• Real answer ambiguous
• Others are source of information
• Informational influence

• ASCH
• Real answer clear
• Others are source of confusion
• Normative influence

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Informational influence and normative influence
produce two kinds of conformity

• Private conformity-also called true acceptance or
  conversion. Change is more than behavioral.
• Public conformity-Also called compliance.
  Individuals pretend to agree even though they do
  not agree privately.

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When do people conform?

• 1) Group Size
• up to a point
• Wilder (1977) - If we think ideas gen.separately
• 2) Unanimity
• 3) Cohesion
• 4) Status
• 5) Public response
• 6) No prior commitment

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Social Impact Theory

• Common bond that leads people toward or away from
  social influence.
• Social influence of any kind is a function of the
  others strength, immediacy and number.
• Social forces act as physical forces
• Ex. Headlights illuminating a surfacestrength
  distance and number.

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Social Impact Theory

• Strength - status, ability, or relationship to
  target. Higher strength better
• ex. Uniforms, prestigious affiliations
• Immediacy - Proximity in time and space to
  target. Closer they are more impact they have.
  Ex. Milgram
• Number of sources - As number increases so does
  influence.

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Who conforms?

• 1) Gender - Results mixed
• 2) Personality - Not much research (1991)
• 3) Culture - Conformity varies by culture

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Resisting social pressure

• 1) Reactance - A motive to protect or restore
  ones sense of freedom.
• Alcohol consumption
• Articles
• Check asserting uniqueness in text.