Explanations for Conformity (AQA A Level Psychology)

Normative social influence

• Conformity can be explained as stemming from two different motivations:

  • Normative social influence (NSI): the need to be liked/accepted by the group (the fear of rejection)

  • Informational social influence (ISI): the need to know what to do (fear of social disapproval/humiliation)

• NSI occurs when an individual is keen to adopt the social norms of a specific group, e.g.:

  • Going to church every week because that is what the group do

  • Wearing black all the time because that is what the group do

  • Professing to dislike a particular person because that is what the group do

• Someone is more likely to be affected by NSI if they feel that their behaviour and attitudes do not align with those of the group, e.g.:

  • ' I stopped going to church years ago but the group goes every week'

• This lack of cohesion with the group may cause anxiety which in turn may lead to an adjustment in behaviour, e.g.:

  • 'I'm going to start attending church with the group so that they feel that I am one of them'

• NSI may involve an individual going against their inner beliefs, ideals or opinions in order not to be rejected by the group, e.g.:

  • Agreeing with the group that a new film is rubbish while secretly having enjoyed it

  • Ignoring a school friend because this is what everyone else in the group is doing but privately believing that this behaviour is cruel and wrong

• NSI as an explanation of conformity is linked to compliance and identification

• The essence of NSI is emotional as it is based on the need to be liked and accepted

Informational social influence

• Informational social influence (ISI) tends to take place when the individual is unsure and/or lacks knowledge about what to do or how to behave in a specific situation, e.g.:

  • On someone's first day at work they will look to others for cues as to how to behave in the office, where to go at lunchtime, the appropriate dress code etc.

  • In a new university class, the professor sets a difficult equation to solve

    • someone unsure of the answer may listen to what others are saying and agree with their answer (even if the answer turns out to be incorrect)

• ISI occurs when the individual looks to the group for guidance

• ISI can occur when there is a crisis and a decision needs to be made quickly

  • The assumption that follows is that the group knows what to do

  • If everyone in the group assumes that everyone else knows what to do, then this can result in faulty decision-making which could potentially be disastrous (e.g. mistakes in piloting a passenger plane or large-scale financial lending)

• Someone is more likely to be affected by ISI if they are insecure about what is deemed 'right/wrong' behaviour, e.g.:

  • Someone collapses in the street but no one stops to help them, so the individual assumes that the situation is not serious, thus no help is given

• ISI as an explanation of conformity is linked to internalisation

• The essence of ISI is cognitive as it is based on information processing

Evaluation of explanations for conformity

Strengths

• There is good research support for ISI:

  • Jenness (1932) asked participants to estimate the number of beans contained in a jar

  • Participants then discussed their estimates in a group and then each participant made a second independent estimate

  • The findings showed that the second estimate moved closer to the group estimate, indicating ISI, thus the theory has validity

• NSI has good application to real behaviour in real settings (high ecological validity):

  • Schultz et al. (2008) - used a sample of hotel rooms in one city to test NSI

  • Half of the hotel rooms displayed a sign stating that, ‘75% of guests choose to reuse their towels each day’

  • The results showed a 25% reduction in the use of fresh towels in the rooms which displayed the sign, compared to the control condition (no sign)

  • Thus, guests had conformed to the norms of the majority group

Limitations

• Neither explanation for conformity explains why some people resist both NSI and ISI, e.g. freedom fighters, rebels, iconoclasts

  • The above observation means that both explanations for conformity cannot be generalised to everyone

    • to this extent they cannot account for individual differences

• It is rare for both NSI and ISI to be tested in real conditions

  • Most research in this field is lab-based

  • Lab-based research is low in mundane realism which reduces the scope of its external validity