What are your reactions to the results of the various studies? (Asch, Milgram, Z

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What are your reactions to the results of the various studies? (Asch, Milgram, Zimbardo)
Describe a social situation you have been in which influence your behavior or opinions.
After reading about the experiments testing the influences of others on behavior, do you think social situations affect an individual’s personality? If so, are the effects lasting or temporary?
Give details and specific examples to support your answers. Provide the complete URL of any website where you find information to support your posts. Don't miss this! Social psychology refers to how individuals affect one another other. These human interactions (both good and bad) can be observed around us every day on a bus, at a party, in our homes. and, as we will see later, even in an elevator. Social psychology can be observed from individual interactions such as the relationship between spouses or on a grander scale the behavior of countries at war Social Standards There is a time and place for everything. At a football game, you expect to see fans munching nachos, yelling at the players, and wearing face paint. At a golf match, you would get escorted off the premises for that kind of behavior. These are examples of social norms. People also take on social roles. When you are talking to a baby, you might speak slowly using a high pitched voice and repeat yourself many times. You definitely would not talk to your boss this way. Psychologist Philip Zimbardo designed The Stanford Prison Experiment people in an evil place. in order to find out "what happens when you put good Conformity Conformity is more powerful than we think. Since childhood we are taught to conform -how to use good manners, what to wear to bed, how to greet someone, how to obey traffic laws, etc. When we visit another country, we try to learn how to conform as necessary Media Do you believe celebrity gossip? Have you ever strike up a conversation with someone about a television show you watched the night before? We are not only affected by interactions with people, but we are also affected by what we hear on the radio, see on television, or read about on the web. Though these interactions are not personal, the thoughts and opinions expressed in the media can still impact its audience USTYNO In 1980, First Lady Nancy Reagan coined the term Just Say No" in what would become a very powerful and large-scale campaign to discourage children from engaging in recreational drug use by offering various ways of saying "No."Though a complete correlation between the drop in recreational drug use and the "Just Say No. campaign can never be clearly established, evidence suggests that drug use and abuse did, in fact, decline during the Reagan presidency According to research at the University of Michigan, high school seniors using marijuana dropped from 50.1% in 1978 to 36% in 1987, to 12% in 1991 . Similarly, the percentage of students using other drugs also decreased. Hallucinogen use dropped from 11% to 6%, cocaine use from 12% to 10%, and heroin use from 1% to 0.5%. Social psychology is not only used to study the antagonistic traits of humans (racism, prejudice, sexism, etc.) but also the benevolent traits of humans (philanthropy culture, romance, etc.). Our social system heavily affects the development of our personalities so it is useful to study the ways in which humans influence and affect one another

Explanation / Answer

Solomon Asch's experiment on conformity (1951) is now regarded as a classic experiment in social psychology, which was a vision test done using a line judgment task. According to my personal reaction, the results of the study has shown that people tend to chose the answer which the majority have chosen. This is done because people tend to think that that they might be wrong if their answers are correct even if the others have selected a wrong option. This study is the best example of how people follow what others are doing in order to get acceptance from others and in order to be a part of the particular group, even if they are wrong.

Stanley Milgram carried out an experiment on obedience in 1963 to check whether the German were obedient towards their authorities or not and how far can they go in obeying their authorities. The results of the experiment concluded that the people can go up to any extent when they follow the legal authorities. This experiment gave a platform to the researcher to investigate about the general obedience that a person possesses towards authorities. What I feel out of this experiment is that the subjects who were instructed to give the electric shocks even up to an extreme voltage, did obey the rules, might have a thinking that it wasn't their responsibility instead, it was the responsibility of the authority person who instructed them to do so. Therefore, they did not have any problem in following what was instructed to them.

Zimbardo carried out an experiment on the American prison guards in 1973. His interest was investigating the sadistic behavior of the guards was a dispositional factor or a situational factor. The results concluded that the guards who were appointed through the ad soon started behaving like the real prison guards and becoming more hostile towards the patients. The experiment made me feel that people tend to change according to their environment as it demands so as to survive there.

There have been many situations where my behavior has been influenced by the social environment. A situation that I could recall is when I had a discussion with my family about certain topic. A coming to the solution, when most of the family members were in favor of one particular solution, then I too responded in a same manner and behaved too so as to be a part of my family and not getting isolated from that social situation. This is a general tendency that might happen with people in some or the other way.

After reading all these experiments, I would say that "Yes" the social situations do affect an individual's personality as they tend to behave in the same manner in every situation. We have already studied that personality is enduring in nature, so when repeatedly behaved in some manner, it does become a part of our personality and is somewhat permanent in nature and yes it is also stable, as we learn to behave in a certain manner.

For example, the Zimbardo's experiment on the Prison guards concluded that with time the guards took up a hostile role towards the prisoners in the experiment eventually and soon it became their basic nature towards every prisoner. In their general life too they would become a little strict towards certain things which would help them to continuously take up the role of the guard at the prison.

Another example can be, when we indulge in a specific job which requires us to behave in a particular manner in our office environment, we gradually learn and become a part of it to get adjusted with other officials and the similar characteristics are seen in our personal lives as well. So it does shape our personality in that way which is also long lasting.

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