Asch Conformity Study (1951) Asch (1951) wanted to examine the extent to which s

Question

Asch Conformity Study (1951) Asch (1951) wanted to examine the extent to which social pressure from a majority, could affect a person to conform. The study consisted of 50 male students from Swarthmore College in America, who believed they were taking part in a vision test. Asch used a line judgement task, where he placed on real confederates (actors), who had agreed their answers in advance. The real participant was deceived and was led to believe that the other seven people were also real participants.The real participant always sat second to last. In turn, each person had to say out loud which line (A, B or C) was most like the target line in length (the correct answer was always obvious). Each participant completed 18 trials and the confederates gave the same incorrect answer on 12 trials, called critical trials. Asch wanted to see if the real participant would conform to the majority view, even when the answer was clearly incorrect Asch measured the number of times each participant conformed to the majority view. On average, the real participants conformed to the incorrect answers on 32% of the critical trials. 74% of the participants conformed on at least one critical trial and 26% of the participants never conformed. Asch also used a control group, in which one real participant completed the same experiment without any confederates. He found that less than 1% of the participants gave an incorrect answer.

Explanation / Answer

Chosen study - Asch conformity study (1951).

Type of method used- Experimental research (lab).

Details of the method used -Experimental research in psychology is a process where the Independent variable is manipulated to see its effect on the Controlled variable, which is under investigation . This is done under controlled situation and random sampling method is used by the research.This method of research is use to test the hypothesis or a cause and effect relationship, and use statistical method to analyse the data obtained. Independent variable in this research is the social pressure from the majority of people, while the dependent variable is the changes in conformity in an individual due to the pressure.The control group are the actors who were who have agreed to the responses in advance. While the sample that is under study are the real subjects whose response are being studied (whether they conform to the wrong answers of the actors). The statistical method was used to analyse the data that was gathered in critical trails.

Describe the features that make this type of study - Experimental research in psychology has following features. 1.There is an Independent variable which is controlled by the researcher. It's effect on the dependent variable is studied. This is done under controlled conditions.2. There is a control group which is introduced in the research design alongside the real subjects, to see the changes in behavipur in the subjects under investigation.3. The method of selecting subjects is based on random sampling. 4.This type of research stidy the cause-effect relationship i.e. the effect I.V has on the D.V, under controlled conditions. 5.This research use statistical techniques(Qualitative) to analyse the data gathered during the research.

Explain the reasons and appropriateness of the researchers choice of the methods used- Since the researcher wanted to study the effects of social pressure from majority on conformity of an individual, experiment research design was rightly chosen by the researcher. The research required controlled conditions under which Independent variable to be under the control of the researcher. The research also required controlling the extraneous variable which was possible under controlled lab experimental design like this. The statistical technique was rightly used to analyse the data obtained in the critical trials , which could further be replicated or tested by another researcher in future. Hence, the experimental research design was rightly used.

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