Asch’s Study Redone: Conformity Among the Genders by McKenna Wick

Asch’s Study Redone: Conformity Among the Genders

In society people tend to conform to others as to blend in rather than stick out. The study Asch did in 1951 had male participants who about 75% conformed to the group. The question is, would women show the same amount of conformity. This study will duplicate Asch’s study almost to the letter. The only difference is that instead of men, women will be used to test their conformity. The importance of conformity goes back generations. During the Holocaust, conformity is suspected to be a large part of why the German people went along with all the horrible things that were going on. They were afraid to stand out of the crowd and say it was wrong, so they would conform to the group. This study is to test how people would still conform today.

Literature Review

Asch’s study used college aged men to test conformity, not using a representative sample. This created a “bias sample” (McLeod, 2008) and did not show the conformity among other ages or gender. So, while his experiment did show people’s tendency to conform to a major group, it only showed it in men who were in college. This left the study wide open as to what women would do, or men of different ages. Asch’s study also tested conformity in different group sizes, and how it would go if the subject had an “ally” (McLeod, 2008) in the room with them. In smaller group sizes where there were less people to go against, the men were more likely to say the correct answer. The same is true when they had another person in there saying the right answer. If they had someone else to agree with, they were more likely to give the right answer. This shows that if some else goes “against the grain”, then they will see an ally and go with them. He also asked them questions in private, leading them to give truthful answers as opposed to group answers (Asch, 1951). Intergroup behavior usually has either positive or negative attitudes (Sherif, M, Sherif, C, 1953). If the subject was feeling hostility in the room, they were less likely to give the correct answer as to not go against the people he is now viewing as hostile. If the environment had perhaps been more friendly, or indifferent, that may have changes the outcome, and could have been part of the reason that 25% did not conform to the group in his study. Going back to having an ally in the group. This leads back to social support. Those with social support, in any aspect of life, will be less likely to conform to the group (Allen. V & Levine. J, 1968). In history, those with social support go far knowing that there is support coming from somewhere. In this study, the group that had another person giving the correct answer gave the subject social support. Asch’s study was “a child of it’s time” (Perrin, S. & Spencer, C., 1980). Coming out of World War 2 less than a decade before his experiment, the Holocaust was fresh in everyone’s mind. How could a clear majority of people go along with the mass murder of an entire religious group? Was it because they all really did believe in what Hitler was telling them? Or did they conform to the group in fear of persecution themselves. Asch’s study showed the human tendency to go along with the group.

Hypothesis

If you put a group of women into a room together, then they will show the same conformity as men in the study before them.

Method

Independent variable

The independent variable is the woman put into the group of confederates. With every group, she would be switched out with another participant in the study

Dependent variable

The dependent variable is if the women give the same answer or not. She will be under surveillance as to what answer she gives, the correct one or the answer that the other women are giving

Participants

The participants in this study will be a group of 20 women of all ages and ethnicity as to increase the representation of the population. Splitting them evenly, only 10 of the women will know what this study is testing. The other 10 will be the test subjects, and the one’s we study for conformity.

Procedure

Setting up this experiment, the subjects will be gathered from an add advertising a quick study of memory. We will then separate them into those who know the study and those who do not using random assignment. After the participants are separated out, those who are going to be purposely giving the wrong answer, it will be explained to them as to what they are doing. After everything is explained and set up, the experiment begins.

Putting the 10 confederates into the room at one time, we then call each of the subjects back one by one. We ask them a series of questions, at first the confederates are told to get the answer right. After the third question, the confederates are told to give the same incorrect answer for all of them. We then see how the subject answers. Will she conform and say the incorrect answer, or will she give the correct answer despite everyone else not doing so. We will repeat this with each subject until all of them have participated in the questionnaire. We then will gather our results.

Reference

1. McLeod, S. A. (2008). Asch experiment. Retrieved from www.simplypsychology.org/asch-conformity.html

2. Sherif, M., & Sherif, C. W. (1953). Groups in harmony and tension. New York: Harper & Row.

3. Allen, V. L., & Levine, J. M. (1968). Social support, dissent and conformity. Sociometry, 138-149

4. Asch, S. E. (1951). Effects of group pressure upon the modification and distortion of judgment. In H. Guetzkow (ed.) Groups, leadership and men. Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Press

5. Perrin, S., & Spencer, C. (1980). The Asch effect: a child of its time? Bulletin of the British Psychological Society, 32, 405-406