Conformity & Asch's study

Conformity is changing your behaviour or opinion to match a group (majority influence).

• Asch (1951) asked participants to judge which of three lines matched a standard line — an easy task.
• Confederates deliberately gave the wrong answer. On critical trials, participants conformed and gave the wrong answer about one third (around 33%) of the time.
• About 75% of participants conformed at least once; when tested alone, error was under 1%.

Interpretation: people conform partly to fit in (normative influence) and partly because they doubt themselves on the answer.

Asch's finding

Factors affecting conformity

Asch and others showed several factors change how much people conform:

• Group size — conformity rises as the majority grows, up to about 3–4 people, then levels off.
• Anonymity — people conform less when their answer is private/anonymous.
• Task difficulty — conformity rises when the task is harder and the answer is less obvious.
• Dispositional factors — personality and expertise affect it; confident experts conform less.

What raises conformity?

Obedience & Milgram's Agency theory

Obedience is following a direct order from an authority figure. Milgram found around 65% of participants gave the maximum (apparently dangerous) shock when ordered by an experimenter.

• Agency theory: people shift into an agentic state, seeing themselves as an agent carrying out authority's wishes, so they don't feel personally responsible.
• The opposite is the autonomous state, where people feel responsible for their own actions.
• Social factors affecting obedience include authority, culture and proximity (nearer authority = more obedience).

Sort: conformity or obedience?

Tap a term, then tap the group it belongs to.

Milgram's Agency theory

Dispositional factor: Adorno's Authoritarian Personality

Adorno proposed a dispositional explanation for obedience: some people have an Authoritarian Personality.

• Such people are especially obedient to authority and hostile to those they see as 'inferior'.
• Adorno linked this to a strict upbringing in childhood.
• This is a dispositional explanation (about the person), unlike Milgram's mainly situational Agency theory.

Exam tip: contrast Adorno (personality) with Milgram (situation) when explaining why people obey.

Match the social-influence idea

Tap a description on the left, then its matching term on the right.

Situational vs dispositional

Evaluating Asch and Milgram

Both classic studies have strengths and criticisms:

• Asch strength: highly controlled lab conditions. Weakness: an artificial task, so low ecological validity.
• Milgram strength: striking, standardised procedure. Weakness: serious ethical problems (deception, distress).
• Both may reflect the era and culture in which they were run.

Minority influence & resisting pressure

People don't always conform or obey:

• A consistent minority can gradually change a majority's view (minority influence).
• Having an ally who disagrees with the majority makes it much easier to resist conforming.
• Feeling personally responsible (autonomous state) makes disobedience more likely.

The big ideas to know

You've covered the AQA Social Influence topic — Asch, Milgram, Agency theory and Adorno. Press Finish to see your score.