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Conformity is the tendency to shift one’s opinions or actions to correspond with those of other people because of implicit or explicit social pressure. Conformity is motivated by the perceived expectation of others that you will behave in a particular way. You may not necessarily be convinced that your conforming behavior is right, but you do it anyway.
Solomon Asch arranged a conformity experiment by asking group members to judge the length of lines against a standard. He found that when all but one group member were instructed to select an inappropriate line as being a correct match, the last participant often agreed with the incorrect choice of the group, thus conforming.
The conformity in the Asch experiment involved people outwardly yielding to the belief of the group to avoid negative consequences. Conformity can also involve identification, the tendency to go along with others because he or she admires them; and internalization, in which the person actually comes to accept another’s ideas as correct.
The likelihood of conformity is decreased when another group member does not conform, when the person is anonymous, when a person is lower in status or self-esteem than other group members, or when a person does not feel he or she fits into the group.
Research has shown that the negative outcomes of nonconformity are greater than people think. Nonconformists are often ostracized or socially rejected. Despite these negative consequences, some people feel compelled to express their individuality. This self-expression can often take creative forms. Studies have shown that men are more likely than women to dissent. Conformity can have positive outcomes. It can encourage people to perform socially responsible acts.
Obedience is compliance with the explicit demands of a person in authority. Milgram has researched the circumstances in which people conform and follow orders, even when such obedience involves cruelty to others. In Milgram’s experiment, participants were told they were participating in a learning experiment and were ordered to give increasingly intense electric shocks to another participant. Although no shocks were actually given, Milgram’s participants believed they were hurting and perhaps even harming another person. Psychology students and psychiatrists estimated that few participants would give the complete range of shocks to another person. However, the experiment produced startling results: 26 of the 40 participants (65%) obeyed verbal commands to continue administering the shocks until the highest voltage level on the generator was reached. The participants who did obey were not sadists; in fact, the procedure caused them severe emotional strain.
Several factors affected obedience, as demonstrated by later experiments. Obedience was somewhat decreased by letting the participant see or hear the person receiving the shocks. Obedience also decreased when the experimenter increased his distance from the participant. Obedience was further diminished when the participant saw another person refuse to deliver the shocks, thus breaking the illusion of unanimity.
Milgram’s experiment has been criticized as unethical on grounds that the procedure might have been emotionally harmful to those participants who obeyed Milgram’s instructions. Milgram, however, rejected this criticism, adding that most participants responded that they had found the experiment enlightening. Such research highlights the controversy over whether important questions should be investigated despite possible harm to participants.
Both the Milgram and Asch studies show that our inner moral sense is vulnerable to pressure from others. To further demonstrate this point, other researchers asked participants to disrupt an applicant applying for a job. Even though the participants found their task very disagreeable, 90% complied.
Compliance involves going along with a request from someone who holds no particular authority over you. The foot-in-the-door phenomenon involves a small request that one is sure to comply with followed by a major request. The door-in-the-face technique involves making an outrageous request and following it with a much more realistic one. The low-ball phenomenon occurs when, once a commitment to act has been made, conditions are changed slightly for the worse. People will stick to the earlier commitment. The that’s-not-all technique involves an offer which, before you have a chance to respond, is made even better by adding something to "sweeten" the deal. All four of these phenomena lead to greater compliance.
A group is defined as two or more people who must interact in a fairly structured way, whose orientation is toward specific goals, and who identify themselves as a whole.
The role others expect a person to play can shape that person’s behavior. Zimbardo performed an experiment in which he randomly assigned college men to the role of "prisoner" or "guard" and told them to act out their roles in a mock prison setting. After only six days, Zimbardo was forced to stop the experiment because participants were taking their roles so seriously that the situation was potentially dangerous. Zimbardo argues that this experiment demonstrates the power social roles have over our personalities.
The phenomenon of social facilitation suggests that a person’s performance is improved when he or she is in the presence of others. Some research supports this notion; other research contradicts it. Zajonc’s model attempts to reconcile these results. He believes that the presence of others increases drive or motivation, thereby strengthening the dominant, or automatic, responses. On an easy task, high drive enhances performance, because the dominant responses are correct, thus producing the social facilitation effect. On difficult tasks, however, high drive interferes with performance because the dominant responses are incorrect. Social facilitation effects may be the result of increased alertness in the presence of others, an increased evaluation apprehension when we think others are judging us, or an increased effort to overcome distractions which would otherwise lower our performance.
Social loafing is the tendency to lessen our contribution when working with others on a group task. It is in many ways the mirror image of social facilitation. Loafing increases as the size of the group increases. Loafing can be decreased by comparing each individual’s performance to a standard, by providing tasks that are challenging or involving, by believing one’s teammates are working hard, by feeling committed to the group, and by being rewarded for group success.
Group decision making typically has many advantages. But when a group is both powerful and isolated, groupthink may occur, with disastrous results. Groupthink is the phenomenon of a group being so concerned with maintaining unanimity that it can no longer appraise alternatives realistically. Examples of groupthink include the group that encouraged President Kennedy’s decision to invade Cuba’s Bay of Pigs and the decision process that led to the space shuttle Challenger accident. Groupthink is characterized by an illusion of invulnerability; a compulsion to avoid disrupting group unity, even at the expense of ignoring important information; and a suppressing of doubts, thus creating an illusion of unanimity. It is more likely to occur in highly cohesive groups that lack established procedures and that are headed by a strong-minded respected leader. Stress or time pressure may also contribute to groupthink, but probably less than group structure considerations. Groupthink can be avoided by encouraging group members to express their doubts, to discuss options, and to challenge ideas before they are adopted.
A minority group can exert powerful group influences, especially when its view is expressed consistently and visibly and it is able to create conflict among the majority. Majorities influence people to conform, whereas minorities encourage people to seriously analyze their arguments, thereby leading to more internalized attitude change. A similar view holds that a majority view leads to superficial processing of information whereas minority views lead to more careful and creative thinking. Even though majorities elicit greater compliance, minorities can have a major impact on a group, although the minority members are often disliked.
Aggression is behavior intended to injure another person. Aggression is usually the product of both dispositional and situational factors. Some psychologists, such as Freud, believe that aggression is innate. Freud believed aggressive energy builds up until it is expressed. This release--called catharsis--serves to reduce aggressive energy and the aggressive drive.
Building on Freud’s ideas, researchers in the field of sociobiology (a subfield of psychology that examines the biological basis of social behavior) believe that some of our behaviors are the result of the way our nervous systems have evolved. For example, Konrad Lorenz viewed aggression as an evolutionary remnant of the "fighting instinct," although humans differ from animals in that we have not evolved the ability to control aggression against members of our own species. Biological theories are supported by data from twin studies which indicate a genetic link in aggression and by the finding that men are more physically aggressive than women. However, biological theories have difficulty explaining wide individual variations in aggression. Aspects of aggression may be genetically influenced. Aggressive children tend to grow into aggressive adults (Theme 1).
Social learning theories suggest that aggression is learned through observation and reinforcement of violence. Bandura showed that, children will imitate an adult who is aggressive towards a Bobo doll. Some theorists believe that watching televised violence increases the tendency to behave aggressively; others argue that viewing violence has a cathartic effect, releasing pent-up hostility. Most studies currently support the social learning position that violence should be removed from TV. TV violence appears to trigger not only imitation but also an increased level of overall aggressiveness. Furthermore, the more violence we see, the less we are upset by it--a somewhat frightening consequence.
John Dollard and his colleagues proposed that aggression is the result of frustration--interference in goal-directed activity. Although some research supports the frustration-aggression hypothesis, more recent formulations suggest that frustration probably produces several responses, one of which is aggression. Berkowitz has further clarified the frustration-aggression hypothesis by concluding that frustrations generate aggression only to the extent that they are unpleasant. Thus, it is negative feelings of any sort that lead to aggressive behavior.
Although altruism (the unselfish concern for others) may have a genetic base, most social scientists reject such an instinct-oriented theory, since it cannot account for large individual differences in altruistic behavior. Instead, they prefer to consider the environmental factors that can encourage or inhibit altruism.
Several factors influence bystander intervention, including noticing an event, determining if it is an emergency, and accepting the responsibility for helping rather than diffusing it to other people. Bystander intervention is less likely to occur if other people are present than if only one person observes an emergency.
Latané and Darley have conducted several studies in which participants who are either alone or with others witness an emergency. These experiments support the conclusion that helping decreases when more bystanders are present. Apparently, the presence of other people serves to reduce the probability that the crisis will be judged as an emergency and to increase the likelihood that responsibility will be diffused among those other people. When a situation is obviously an emergency and when it is clear that no one else is helping the victim, people are more likely to help. This supports the idea that the bystander effect is not the result of apathy, but rather of indecision about the appropriate thing to do.
Research suggests that when people are in a good mood, they are more likely to behave altruistically, either because they want to stay in a good mood or because their good mood evokes positive thoughts which lead to good deeds. According to the negative state relief model, we are also more helpful when we are in a bad mood. Here we do nice things to make ourselves feel better.
Bateson argues that we help others to the extent we feel empathy (the experience of another’s emotional condition as one’s own) with them. In his experiments, participants high in empathy acted to help a confederate in both easy and difficult escape situations, but participants low in empathy were less likely to help when an easy escape was available.
Belief in a just world can increase helping behavior by motivating people to try to restore justice when they see innocent people suffering. However, if people derogate victims in an attempt to convince themselves that people get what they deserve, belief in a just world can reduce altruism.
Richard Dawkins has proposed a mechanism through which altruism would be favored by natural selection. By saving the lives of one’s offspring, an organism is increasing the likelihood of passing along its genes. There is some support for this hypothesis.
Helping is not highly related to any personality characteristics. Instead, it seems to be the result of situational pressures and the person’s ability to provide genuine help.
Sexual violence is pervasive in American society today, and college students are at a particularly high risk. When surveyed, 15% of college men admitted to having forced intercourse at least once, and 35% say they might rape a woman if they would not be caught. Men are particularly aggressive toward women if they frequently watch pornography, material designed to sexually arouse its viewers or readers.
Research on the effects of pornography have shown that pornographic material does arouse aggression in men and that this aggression is directed more against women than men. However, other research suggests that when men see a lot of pornography, pornographic materials lose their power to elicit aggression, but tend to lead participants to have more callous attitudes toward women.
Violent pornography combines sexual explicitness with violence to produce an increase in aggression toward women. Violent pornography also appears to reinforce the rape myth, the belief that women who resist and say "no" really want to be raped. These and similar findings led Surgeon General Koop to conclude that pornography should be curtailed. Social scientists, however, argue that pornography produces no more aggression against women than many nonpornographic materials which portray ideas of violence against women. They recommend educating the public about sex and violence, because they believe that negative attitudes about women, more than pornography, lead to the rape myth and sexual aggression.
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