1. Ch. 7: Conformity

2. Yielding to Social Influence
Conformity  Compliance  Obedience

3. Chameleon Effect
Mimicking the behavior of someone with whom you are interacting
If the person you’re talking to crosses their arms, you’re likely to as well.

4. Mood Contagion
The mood of the person we’re interacting with tends to rub off on us
Participants rated themselves as happier after hearing a speech that had a happy tone

5. Sherif Study
Sherif study had people sit in a dark room and judge how much a light was moving.
This is difficult bc light often appears to move in the dark even when it doesn’t really.
People did this alone, then with a group, and the groups eventually converged on similar answers.

6. Asch Study
Asch line test: One participant was with several confederates. Started off with everyone making the correct judgment of line length, but then the confederates started to make errors.
Only 25% of participants never conformed
50% conformed at least half the time
The remaining 25% conformed at least once
Total rate of conformity was 37%.

7. Sherif & Informational Influence
Informational influence: influence that produces conformity when a person believes others are correct in their judgments.
Sherif study – they weren’t sure, so four eyes are better than one.

8. Asch & Normative Influence
Normative influence: influence that produces conformity when a person fears the negative social consequences of appearing deviant.
Asch study – people knew they were right, but didn’t want to be ridiculed.

9. Private vs Public Conformity
Private conformity: Beliefs are ACTUALLY changed
This is TRUE acceptance or conversion – persuasion
Sherif study showed this
Public conformity: Beliefs are NOT actually changed – you just pretend they are
Sometimes called compliance
Asch study showed this – when alone, conformity went away

10. Motivation & Task Difficulty
When motivation is high (like a reward), participants conform MORE when the task is difficult (like Sherif study)
They’re not confident, so they rely on others
They conform LESS when it’s easy (like Asch study)
They’re confident and don’t need to rely on others

11. Group Size & Conformity
Size of group increases conformity only up to about four people

12. Norm Awareness We conform to whatever we perceive the norm to be
In one study, people were handed pamphlets. The more litter there was in the area, the more likely people were to throw the pamphlets on the ground.

13. Presence of an Ally
In Asch study, the presence of just one other person who agreed with the participant reduced conformity by 80%

14. Age & Conformity
Conformity appears to happen most with young adolescents, peaking at 9th grade
Older adults are less likely to care about conforming than younger adults

15. Gender & Conformity
Men tend to conform more about feminine issues, and women conform more about masculine issues – so the determining factor is familiarity, not gender
In public situations, males conform less but females conform more – falling into traditional gender roles

16. Culture & Conformity Conformity is greater in collectivist cultures.
Cultures that are more homogeneous, where most members share a language, religion, etc., are less tolerant of those who veer from the norm, or don’t conform.

17. Minority Influence To exert influence, someone in the minority must be
Forceful
Persistent
Unwavering
Flexible and open-minded
If you have the guts to stand against the majority, then people assume you must have a good point.

18. Majority vs Minority
Majorities force conformity with normative pressure
Minorities make people actually rethink their positions, leading to a more lasting conversion