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EXPLORING
PSYCHOLOGY
EIGHTH EDITION IN MODULES
David Myers
PowerPoint Slides
Aneeq Ahmad
Henderson State University
Worth Publishers, © 2011
Social Psychology
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Social Influence
Module 37
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Conformity and Obedience
 Group Pressure and Obedience
 Obedience
 Lessons From the Conformance and
Obedience Studies
Group Influence
 Individual Behavior in the Presence
of Others
 Effects of Group Interaction
The Power of Individuals
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Social Influence
The greatest contribution of social psychology is
its study of attitudes, beliefs, decisions, and
actions and the way they are molded by social
influence.
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Conformity & Obedience
Behavior is contagious, modeled by one followed by
another.
We are natural mimics. Chartrand and Bargh call this
the chameleon effect and tested it through studies in
which one person was planted in a room of working
students. If that person rubbed their face or shook their
foot, the other students tended to do the same.
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Conformity & Obedience
Unconsciously mimicking others helps us to feel what
they’re feeling. Automatic mimicry is part of empathy
and empathic people are more well-liked. Those who
are eager to fit in are more prone to automatic mimicry.
Sometimes the effects of this suggestibility is serious –
resulting in clusters of violence after one violent event.
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Group Pressure & Conformity
Suggestibility is a subtle form of conformity – adjusting one’s
behavior or thinking to coincide with a group standard.
To test conformity, Asch devised a simple test asking
participants to compare lines. When a group of people
answered incorrectly, more than one-third of the subjects
answered incorrectly as well.
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Conditions that Strengthen
Conformity
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
One is made to feel incompetent or insecure.
The group has at least three people.
The group is unanimous.
One admires the group’s status and
attractiveness.
One has no prior commitment to a response.
The group observes one’s behavior.
One’s culture strongly encourages respect for a
social standard.
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Reasons for Conforming
Normative Social Influence: Influence resulting
from a person’s desire to gain approval or avoid
rejection. A person may respect normative
behavior because there may be a severe price to
pay if not respected.
Informational Social Influence: The group may
provide valuable information, but stubborn
people will never listen to others.
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Obedience
Stanley Milgram
designed a study that
investigates the effects of
authority on obedience.
Courtesy of CUNY Graduate School and University Center
People comply to social
pressures. How would
they respond to outright
command?
Stanley Milgram
(1933-1984)
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Obedience
In Milgram’s study, participants were instructed to give
increasingly stronger electric shocks to other participants,
despite the participants negative reactions. Over 60% percent
complied with the request.
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Obedience
Milgram found that obedience was highest when:
-The person giving orders was in close proximity and
perceived as a legitimate authority figure
-The authority figure was supported by a prestigious
institution
-The victim was depersonalized or in a different room
- There were no role models for defiance
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Obedience
A third of the individuals in Milgram’s study
resisted social coercion.
AP/ Wide World Photos
An unarmed individual single-handedly
challenged a line of tanks at Tiananmen Square.
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Lessons from the Conformity and
Obedience Studies
In both Asch's and Milgram's studies,
participants were pressured to choose between
following their standards and being responsive
to others.
In Milgram’s study, participants were torn
between hearing the victims pleas and the
experimenter’s orders.
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Group Influence
How do groups affect our behavior? Social
psychologists study various groups:
1.
2.
3.
4.
One person affecting another
Families
Teams
Committees
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Group Influence
Social psychology’s first experiments focused
on the simplest question about social behavior:
How are we influences by people watching us
or joining us in various activities?
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Individual Behavior in the Presence
of Others
Social facilitation:
Refers to improved
performance on tasks in
the presence of others.
The effect of having an
enthusiastic audience
contributes to the
home-team advantage
in sports.
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Social Loafing
Social loafing is the tendency of an individual in a group to
exert less effort toward attaining a common goal than when
tested individually.
People acting in a group may feel less accountable, worrying
less what others will think and may view their contribution
as dispensable.
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Social loafing often occurs in group projects.
Deindividuation
Group situations can sometimes both arouse
people and diminish their sense of
responsibility.
This loss of self-awareness and self-restraint
occurring in group situations is known as
deindividuation.
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Effects of Group Interaction
Group Polarization
enhances a group’s
prevailing attitudes
through a discussion.
If a group is likeminded, discussion
strengthens its
prevailing opinions
and attitudes.
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Groupthink
Groupthink is a mode of thinking that occurs
when the desire for harmony in a decisionmaking group overrides the realistic appraisal
of alternatives.
The effects of groupthink were seen in:
- The attack on Pearl Harbor
- The escalation of the Vietnam War
- The Watergate cover-up
- Chernobyl reactor accident
- Invasion of Iraq because of WMDs
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Power of Individuals
Non-violent fasts and
appeals by Gandhi led
to the independence of
India from the British.
Margaret Bourke-White/ Life Magazine. © 1946 Time Warner, Inc.
The power of social
influence is enormous,
but so is the power of
the individual.
Gandhi
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