GCSE-ready- Home
- Lessons
- GCSE Psychology
- Conformity to majority influence
Conformity to majority influence
🎬 The doodle video for this lesson is coming soon. Subscribe on YouTube to see it first.
Would you give an answer you knew was wrong, just because everyone else did? Solomon Asch found many people would.
Why we conform
Informational influence: conforming because we think the group knows better, especially when the task is hard or unclear.
Asch (1951) asked male American students to match line lengths in a group where the other members were confederates who sometimes gave the same wrong answer. Participants conformed on about a third of these critical trials, and about 75% conformed at least once, even though the right answer was obvious.
Situational factors
Unanimity: if just one other person disagrees with the majority, conformity drops sharply.
Task difficulty: when the task is harder, people conform more (informational influence).
Privacy: people conform less when they can give their answer privately (in writing) rather than out loud.
Personality factors
Self-esteem and confidence: people with high self-esteem or confidence in their ability tend to conform less.
Need for approval: people who strongly want to be liked conform more.
Age: resistance to peer pressure tends to grow during adolescence (Steinberg and Monahan, 2007).
Culture: people from collectivist cultures tend to conform more than those from individualist cultures.
In an Asch-style study, one confederate starts giving the correct answer. What would you expect to happen to the participant's conformity, and why?
- The majority is no longer unanimous.
- The participant has social support and feels less alone.
Answer: Conformity would drop sharply, because the majority is no longer unanimous and the participant has an ally.
We conform to fit in (normative) or because we think others know best (informational). Situational factors: group size, unanimity, task difficulty, privacy. Personality factors: locus of control, self-esteem, need for approval, age and culture. Asch found high conformity even on an easy task.
Check you have got it
Answer 7 quick questions with instant marking. If you get one wrong, GCSE-ready shows you why and gives you another go. It is free, and you do not need an account.