Many other researches from other different researchers have shown similar findings.
Aims
My aim in this experiment is to find out if conformity increases when the number of confederates in a group increases. As well as this, I would like to see what happens to conformity as the group increases. Asch did this sort of experiment in 1951. In a way I am replicating his study. As the confederate’s increases in the group, the conformity levels will rise due to correct procedures and methods. As well as this, previous research has evidence for this hypothesis. However, if I do not go according to the procedures, or do it incorrectly, I will find there will be no significant difference in conformity as the confederates in the group increases.
Hypotheses
A directional hypothesis has been selected as previous research in this section has shown similar outcomes. As the confederates increase in the group of participants, the conformity levels will increase too. This is what we have leant and what past research has indicated to us. But however, there may be no significant difference between the number of confederates and the number of participants who conform.
Participants who are in a group where there are more confederates are more likely to conform compared to those who are in a group where there are less confederates.
Method
Firstly my chosen research method is experimental because I am comparing two variables: The group size, and Conformity. I am going to use an independent measure design as I will use different participants in different situation.
Independent variables are those factors, which the experimenter manipulates in order to observe their effects. For example, in an environmental psychology experiment, room temperature might be manipulated as an independent variable in order to observe the effects on, say, complex decision making. In a social psychology experiment on small groups, the number of experimental stooges sitting round a table giving the same prepared response might be manipulated as an independent variable to observe the effects on the conformity of a naive subject.
In my experiment, my results could be experimenter bias. This may be due to participants knowing the issues of my experiment or knowing the area I’m experimenting and therefore the experimenter subtly and unintentionally alters his/her behavior toward the two groups This could effect my results significantly.
There may be social desirability: People may not answer honestly and therefore this will effect my research.
Ethics
There are certain ethical issues I have to bear in mind to make my experiment as moral as possible. Here are the things I will have to bear in mind when carrying out my study to make this experiment ethical:
- The right to withdraw: Each participant who takes part in my study will have a right to with draw whenever they like during the experiment. I cannot force them to do this experiment, they have to volunteer themselves.
Psychologists must analyze and report research fairly and accurately. This is to protect the welfare of participants and so the potential benefits must outweigh potential harm
- Consent: Participants must agree to take part in this experiment, and must sign consent forms to say that they agree to the terms and conditions.
- Deception: Participants will be deceived at the beginning of the experiment, as they will not no the true nature of the experiment. They will not know that confederates are present within the group. This is only to get accurate results, because if the participants knew the nature of the study, there would be social desirability. However, each participant will be debriefed at the end of the study, and told exactly what is going on.
- Breach of Confidentiality: The answers given by the participants will only be used for my project and nothing more. So all information is confidential.
Participants
The people who carried out this research was: Myself, Ramandeep, Rakesh and Rishie. We all worked together to carry out this study.
We tried to keep all the participants equal, in regards of their gender and age. We tried to get an even balance of male and female participants. This is to keep the characteristics equally balanced and therefore we could get reliable results. We were targeting, 16-17 year olds to do this experiment that were not studying, or had never studied psychology. This way they would not know what was going on and we could “cheat” them in doing this experiment without any deviating results. All participants were randomly picked.
The participants were given the instructions and told of the conditions just before they sat down to take part in the experiment. The instructions were clearly written on a piece of paper. They read this and either agreed, and by doing so they signed a consent form. Or the participant disagreed and therefore did not take part.
Apparatus and Material
The materials used in this experiment, were:
Instructions written on a paper telling the participants what they had to do
A piece of A4 paper with the question that we were asking.
A consent form where subjects signed if they agreed to take part.
The actual paper which had the three shapes on it, along with the standard shape. This was the question paper.
A debriefing letter was given to the participant after they had carried out the actual experiment.
Standardised Procedures
The participants were chosen randomly from Wygeston Queen Elizabeth College. The participants we chose fitted neatly in a consistent age group. We chose these participants and then asked them if they would like to take part in an experiment.
Most of the replies were yes, and on doing so, they were given a piece of paper with the instruction of the experiment. They read this and either agreed or disagreed to it. The participants who agreed were then given consent forms to sign, which set conditions and expressed what they were agreeing to.
The first group of 20 participants were facing 3 confederates. The second group had 5 confederates. One participant was sent in the room with the 3 confederates and was given the question sheet. This showed one shape labelled standard box, and next to this were three other shapes. The participant was told to choose a shape that he felt matched the standard shape. After the three confederates had given their wrong answers, it was the participant’s turn to answer.
Each participant went through this routine until all 20 participants had sat in the room with the 3 confederates and answered the question.
The next group did the same but instead of facing three confederates, they were now facing 5 confederates. And the same procedure happened with each individual participant.
However after the experiment each participant was debriefed and told that we were carrying out an experiment on conformity. Participants received a debriefing letter giving them all the information on our study and thanking them. These letters and question can be seen in the Appendix section.
Results
Here are the results:
This table shows that four participants conformed in the first group where there were three confederates present, while eleven participants conformed in the group with five confederates.
The first group saw fewer conform then the second group. This is something to consider.
Standardised instructions
The experiment you are taking part in is for psychology coursework only. The results obtained will not be shown to anyone else. The experiment consists of the following:
- You will be shown a piece of A4 sized paper. On this paper you will find four boxes.
- One of these boxes will be labelled standard box.
- You will be required to look at the other three boxes labelled a b c and choose one of the three that you feel is the same as the standard box.
- U will only have 30 seconds to answer when you are asked to
- Only your first answer will be taken down
Debriefing
A researcher called Asch originally designed the experiment you have just taken part in. This experiment tests conformity rates. Conformity is when people change their own behaviour or opinions so they fit into society or different groups. For example, if you do not agree with the way people dress, you may dress that way to fit in. If everyone came to college dressed like punks, you’d feel left out, so you would dress like a punk to fit in. The other participants who took part in the other experiments were confederates and knew what the experiment was about. They were also told to give consistent wrong answers to see if you gave the wrong answers by following them consistently.
Asch found in his experiment that as group size and as the number of confederates increased, conformity increased.
Thank you for taking part in this experiment. It would be appreciated if you do not tell the aim of this experiment to other people, as we need more people to take part in this experiment.
Graphs
This graph shows the group with the three confederates. 20% of these participants conformed
This graph shows the group who had five confederates, 60% of participants conformed here.
Discussion
My results show that Asch’s theory of conformity is correct. He said that the more confederates present the higher the conformity levels, and he also said the bigger the group size, the higher the conformity. This was proven in my experiment. My hypothesis was correct.
Informational influence is the degree that people are influenced because they accept the other subjects as sources of information about the word. Our tendency to conform based on informational influence depends on two aspects of the situation: how well informed we believe the group is and how confident we are in our own independent judgement. The more we trust the group's information and value their opinions in a situation, the more likely we are to go along with the group. Anything that uncrosses confidence in the correctness of the group should increase conformity, and conversely, anything that leads us to doubt the group's knowledge or trustworthiness should decrease conformity.
Occasionally we feel it's more important to maintain other people's positive regard. This type of influence by normative reasons is called normative influence. Sometimes we conform to gain the approval of the group, in other times we do so to avoid disapproval. In growing up, people often learn that one way to get along with the group is to go along with group standards. The fear of being deviant is justified by the group 's response to deviance. When someone does not go along with a group, that person becomes the target of efforts to bring them in line, and ultimately risks rejection.
Conformity to majority patterns is a basic aspect of social life. But our emphasis on the power of the majority should not blind us to the importance of minority influence. The important social movements of our times have all begun with small numbers of people who challenged the existing assumptions of the majority. The Civil rights, women's rights, and gay rights movements had their start with small numbers of people convinced that their positions were better in accord with moral facts of the matter than were in the views of the majority.
Another research that comes from Moscovici (1969) who proposed that the behavioural style of a minority is important. His research procedure was like an Asch experiment and involved having subjects making judgements in the presence of the group. He showed subjects different coloured slides, which were unambiguous and members of groups of six were asked to name the colour of the slide. Now all the slides were blue but varied their luminance. In a control group, all six subjects were naive, that isn't to say there were no confederates opposing the majority, and virtually all the slides were described as blue. In the experimental group, however, two confederates were employed who consistently labelled the colour of the slides green. Subjects had previously been told that all group members had normal vision, so they could not suggest that what appeared to be incorrect responses was due to colour blindness. With this minority pressure, about a third of the subjects reported seeing at least one "green" slide, and 8 percent of judgements were the slides were "green". Clearly, the minority view had a noticeable effect on the naive majority.
The consistent minority, affected subjects in two quite different ways. First, it caused some of the subjects to change their overt responses, a direct effect. Secondly, it affected a larger number of subjects by causing them to alter the way they looked at the blue-green distinction. It caused them to broaden their concept of green, a so-called latent effect of minorities.
A point to consider however, When we find ourselves in groups we inevitably find ourselves in the minority occasionally. Generally speaking, we will feel a little uncomfortable with that situation, which explains why we generally seek out groups with interests similar to our own. Imagine, though, that you are in a group where you are sure you are right and everyone else is wrong. Would you yield to group pressure and go along with everyone else?
Oddly enough, research shows that the pressure to conform does not increase as the group’s size increases above around four or five. One possible reason, suggested by Wilder () in Baron and Byrne () is that the subjects begin to suspect collusion amongst the group members once the group goes beyond that number. If that is the case, then that suggests that the best way to influence a person would be to get them to receive the same message from a variety of independent small groups, rather than from a single large group. That seems also to fit with Noelle-Neumann's view that, as the interpersonal support for the deviant opinion decreases, so the deviant opinion will be weakened and the dominant opinion become even more dominant
Everyone conforms. As a famous researcher named Ridley quoted “Humankind, I suggest, has always fragmented into hostile and competitive tribes and those that found a way of drumming cultural conformity into the skulls of their members tended to do better than those that did not.” So to say, the majority influences people so they can be right and make a good impression on others. Minorities influence with consistency, both over time, which is called diachronic consistency, and with each other or synchronic consistency. A consistent minority is effective because it is coherent, it disturbs the group norm(s) by creating conflict and it has an innovative impact. Those who can do this have an envied talent.
Conclusion
The urge to conform and copy others' behaviour is one, which confers an evolutionary advantage. Of course, we don't simply conform to such practical behaviours as gathering food; we also conform to religions, fashions, fads, extremist political movements and so on. And the evolutionary advantage there is not immediately obvious, but you should bear in mind that we are a species, which operates in groups, groups which compete against other groups
Bibliography
Psychology Henderson James book
The Internet