Conformity

March 16, 2021 10:28 PM

• From a Western POV, conformity tends to carry a negative

connotation, as they will not like being called a real conformist,
due to the individualistic culture.

• Instead from eastern perspectives, conformity is seen as

tolerant, self control and maturity.

• The moral is that we choose labels that suit are values and
judgments.

Conformity - is a change of behaviour or belief to accord with

others, this involves acting or thinking different from the way
you would act and think if you were alone

- Confederate went in an elevator and took his hat off, every

one followed. Turn to face the other way, everyone else did.
Specifically when the situation is ambiguous or new.
- Information influence: you are conforming to be right if you
are unsure of what to do.

Compliance - conforming to an expectation or request without

really believing in what your doing, such as putting on a suit for
work when you may dislike it. This is insincere and outward
conformity. You do not have to believe, but still will comply.

Acceptance - sincere inward conformity. We genuinely believe

in what the group persuaded us to do.

The neuroscientific explanation is that shorter live memories

that cause public compliance are different than the neural
basis for longer term private acceptance.

Obedience - If we comply to an explicit command. More difficult

to resist.

The primary reason for this is to attain a reward or avoid

punishment

Personality wont help predict how you will act in one specific
situation, but will identify general patterns of conformity.

Subtle influence

Facilitated communication - assist children who have

developmental disorders and are unable to talk. A facilitated
would hold the kids hand and let them place it where the kid
wants to.

However the facilitator had an unconscious bias and was typing

his own words, not the kids.

Mass hysteria

High stress causes EPI: it is spread and contagious. School

children were practicing for a concert rehearsal. This stressful
situation, one kid doesn’t feel too well, then all started believe
they were sick. 36 reported that they were sick but they were no
potential cause, and sickness went away in a few hours.

The power of suggestion - say your arm looks itchy, they are
more likely to itch in 30 seconds

Sherifs Studies of Norm Formation (autokinetic)

- Recreated a scene to observe social norm in the lab. They

had participants to guess how far a light moves in a dark
room, without any real way of judging the distance. You
may say 15 cm, than 20 or 25 with repeated trails.
Autokinetic: light is not moving, it is an illusion

- Peocedure is repeated and final estimate is asked. Next day,

participant is joined with two others that shared the
experience.

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Autokinetic: light is not moving, it is an illusion

- Peocedure is repeated and final estimate is asked. Next day,

participant is joined with two others that shared the
experience.

- Same light and distance, but with other participants your

number will conform to theirs, going from 20 down to 15
and lower. This group norm was false, and he termed it the
autokinetic phenomenon.

- Increased convergence with more trials, by day 4 there is a

norm. They are unaffected.

• Even years later, the group norm was the same and speaks to
the suggestibility of people.

• To add to this they used confederates (research actors) to

inflate the estimate, the illusion persisted for 5 generations of
participants, showing our views of reality are not ours alone.

• This inflated illusion - ours views of reality are not ours alone.

• Seen through laugh-tracks in comedy shows, or mood linkage -

when being around happier people, we are happier.

Chameleon effect - if a research actor touches their face, you

would do it to without conscious intention to conform. This is
behaviour synchronization, which includes speaking and this
results in us feeling what others feel . Facebook accused of
highlighting negative new stories to bias users toward Donald
Trump and making them have more negative posts.

Mimicry - incline the other person to like you, as those who

often drop pens are more likely to help pick up a pen when you
drop one, their behaviour is mimicking yours. Experimenters
that mimicked that participants movements were likely to
consume a new drink and say they would buy it, and would even
foster dislike if the behaviour being mimicked is negative.

• The Werther Effect - in the novel a character commits suicide

after failing to win over a women. Reports of young men
imitating this emerged. Suicides increase after publicizing.

• This can be global, as newspapers that reported windshield

damage, caused 3000 complaints of damage. When the
newspaper hinted that the real culprit might be mass
suggestibility, and the complaints stopped. This is because
people looked carefully at their windshield instead of looking
through them.

• Surprisingly, in a London psychiatric units and indigenous

communities, fictional suicides on soap operas, dramas focusing
on the suicide ironically increase the rate of suicide.

Aschs Studies of Group Pressure

• ASCH Originally did this experiment to disprove the power of
conformity, but results showed otherwise.

• Given 3 lines and a standard lines, you will easily answer if

people agree with what line is the same. However, if 3 people
before you say a different comparison line, you will question if
your eyes are deceiving you. 3/4 of participants conformed at
least once, 37% responses were conforming. Since 63% they did
not, it means people tell the truth even when others do not.
Even though there is no consequence or reward, people still
conform. This raises questions about education and values that
guide our conduct.

• Lacks mundane realism, but they do have experimental realism

of conformity.

• Status: The lower your status the more likely you are to conform

• Public response: you want to seem consistent, do not want to

be seen as a hypocrite, as you declared something in public.

• Jury - If you ask to say guilty or not guilty outloud, those who
answer last will be effected if all previous people said guilty. This
Is also seen by raising your hand, "the attractive person says
guilty".

• No prior commitment - no prior commitment, you are more

likely to conform.

• Dental flossing - experimenters told participants that fellow

students flossed [x] times where X was either the participants
number or 5 greater then there number, showing that inflated
estimated increased participants intent to floss and that they
flossed more over ensuing 3 months.

• If participants were told only 18% had cancer screening, few

people would sign up whereas if higher rates would occur if
majority of men did. This suggests health education campaigns
must not publicize low participation rates.

• Referees decision depends on if it is home or away team, and

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• Referees decision depends on if it is home or away team, and
that louder soccer teams receive more yellow cards.

Milgram Obedience studies

- A stern experimenter in a gray coat explain this is the effect

of punishment on learning. They must teach a list of word
pairs to the other and to punish by delivering shocks of
increasing intensity. The confederate is the learner, and the
teacher takes a mild shock from 15 to 450 volts, in 15 volt
increments.

- Experimenter: move one level higher each time the learner

gives a wrong answer, he hears grunts from 75 until 120
whereby he shouts the shocks are painful. At 150 volts he
cries out "experimenter get out of here". At 300 volts, he
refuses to answer and by 330 volts he falls silent.

• When teacher pleas to end experiment, the experimenter

says "please continue, the experiment requires you
continue, you have no choice, wrong answers should be
treated as wrong answers"

• When Milgram asked psychiatrists, students how far they

would go, they stated they would disobey by 135 volts, but
others would disobey by 200 and no one expected anyone
to go to the highest voltage.

• 26 of the 50 men aged 20-50 (65%) went to 450 volts.

Those who did stopped at 150 volts.

• When replicated with only up to 150 volts, 70% were

obeying. In a variation, the learner stated they had a heart
condition, but the experiment stated that the shocks are
painful but no permanent tissue damage will occur. 40 men,
25 of them (63%) complied with the experimenters
demands, even if the teacher was women,

• Explained what occurs when authority and demands of

conscience clash.

• Ethics of Milligrams Study - Distressed to participants was

significant as it changed their self concept, one participants
wife called him "Eichmann". Milgram defended by his
numerous findings and that participants supported after the
study explained, as 84% were glad to have participated and
40 of those who suffered temporarily were not mentally
harmed a year later.

WHAT CAUSED OBEDIENCE IN THE MILGRAMS STUDY?

• Victims distance - participants acted with greatest

obedience and least compassion when learners where not
seen. When learner was in the same room, only 40% obeyed
to 450 volts. Full compliance dropped to 30% when forcing
the learners hand to contact with a shock plate.

○ Many soldiers could not kill innocent women and men

with machine guns, so instead a more distant form of
killing through gas chambers was done.

○ People act most compassionately towards those who

are personalized, and negative to those depersonalized.
Women who saw their own developing fetus, would be
more committed to pregnancy.

• Authority's Closeness and Legitimacy: When the

experimenter gave instructions through the telephone, full
obedience dropped to 21%. This study shows that when
making the request close, compliance increases. This can be
done by simply being in the same room or physically
touching participants.

• Presence of Legitimacy: In another variation, the

experimenter leaves and says the data will be recorded
automatically. Another person assigned a clerical role
(actually a confederate) states to increase the shock by one
for every wrong answer. 80% of the teachers refused to
comply. Rebellion against an illegitimate authority
contrasted sharply with differential politeness shown to the
experimenter (seen as high authority).

Nurses stated they would refuse to give a dose of a drug from an

unknown physician that is an overdose. All of them stated they
would not have given the medication. But when done, all but
one obeyed without delay. This is because the nurse was
following the script, as the doctor is legitimate authority.

Obedience - is explicitly commanded, and show how compliance

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unknown physician that is an overdose. All of them stated they
would not have given the medication. But when done, all but
one obeyed without delay. This is because the nurse was
following the script, as the doctor is legitimate authority.

Obedience - is explicitly commanded, and show how compliance

can take precedence over moral sense. Milgram's study link
behaviour and attitudes and the power of the situation. Both
Aschs and Milgram show compliance can take precedence over
ones moral values, this is a sense of persuasion the
experimenter did to go against their values.

Behaviour and Attitudes

• This study showed that attitudes fail to determine behaviour,

as the teachers external influence override inner convictions,
causing them to harm the learner.

• The powerful social pressure of the experimenters commands

overcame a weaker one (the remote victims pleas).

• The effect of authority was shown as the "learner-has-a-heart

condition" in Connecticut instead of yale had an obedience rate
of 48% rather than 65%. Without coercion, people do not act
cruelly.

• Foot in the door phenomenon - present in the Milgram's study,

as the mild 15 mV elicited no protest. But by the time you
deliver 75 mV, the teacher complied 5x and thus at 330 volts,
you had complied 22 times. Your reducing your dissonance, and
thus in a different psychological state from the beginning of the
experiment. This progressive effect, as external behaviour and
internal disposition can feed one another and cause it to
escalate.

• The subjects devalue the victim as he was so stupid and thus

deserved to get shocked.

• The Power of the Situation

• Students would rather let sexist comments and not be
confrontational, as it violates the norm of being nice.

• Sexist comments on a deserted island. "we need more women

to keep the men satisfied". Only 5% said they would ignore the
comments, 55% actually said nothing. This shows the
normative pressure and the difficulty in predicting our
behaviour.

• Does analysis of harm exonerate others when they do wrong.

Authors say no because the root of evil is explained not by this,
as explaining does not excuse someone's decision.

Procrastination involves this similar unintended drift toward

self-harm. This means that ordinary people that "simply do their
jobs" can become agents in a destructive process.

What predicts Conformity

• IF the non-coercive variation of Asch's experiment could elicit

37% conformity rate. The researchers indicated if we feel
incompetent, insecure about our decision or if the judgment is
difficult, we are more influenced by others.

• In addition, group attributes effect conformity, as it is the

highest if three or more have cohesive, unanimous and high in
status, the response is public and made without prior
commitment.

Group Size: Had people 1, 3, 5, 10 confederates looking up at

the sky, higher conformity when a group was present.

• Up to 5 people will elicit more conformity than one or two, and

has diminishing returns beyond that, plateaus after 5~. 1-5
people looking up on a busy sideway, people also increased
from 1-5.

• Jury case, participants watched 4 confederates giving their

judgements. When the confederates were presented as two

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has diminishing returns beyond that, plateaus after 5~. 1-5
people looking up on a busy sideway, people also increased
from 1-5.

• Jury case, participants watched 4 confederates giving their

judgements. When the confederates were presented as two
independent groups of two people, the participants conformed
more than when the 4 confederates presented judgments in a
single group. Conclusion: the agreement of several small group
makes a position more credible than one large group.

Unanimity

• Someone who punctures a groups unanimity deflates its social

power, as people will nearly always voice their conviction if only
one person has differed from majority.

• Charlan Nemeth and Cynthia Chiles (1988) discovered this after

having people observe a lone individual in a group of four
misjudge blue stimuli as green. Although the dissenter was
wrong, observing him enabled the observers to exhibit their
own form of independence: 76 percent of the time they
correctly labelled red slides “red” even when everyone else was
calling them “orange.” Participants who had no opportunity to
observe the “green” dissenter conformed 70 percent of the
time.
• "I would have answered just the same if he werent there"

Cohesion

• An opinion from a minority within the group has greater

influence than opinions outside the group. A heterosexual
couple arguing for gay rights would sway heterosexuals more
than homosexuals.

• The more cohesiveness, the more power the group has over it
has over its members, including sororities. People rate music
higher if it was liked by someone like them. Similarly, people are
more likely to cheat if they see as student cheating with a
university sweaters they attend. Cohesion fed conformity also
appears in university dorms as students attitudes merge to
those living near them.

Status

• Peoples jay walking rate increases from 25% to 44% of another

jay walker, and are best discouraged if there is a well-dress
non-j walker.

Public Response

• People conform more when they respond in front of others than

privately. Similarly, uni students answer controversial questions
more diversely when submitting anonymously.

• Also seen in Aschs experiment, were more likely to not conform

if they wrote their answer privately.

No prior Commitment

• Although horse brushed the other in a derby, the referees did

not reverse their decision.

• Prior commitment: once they commit themselves to a position,

people seldom yield to social pressure. Real umpires and
referees rarely reverse their initial judgements. A hung jury is
more likely if they are polled through a show of hands rather
than a secret ballot, as making a public commitment makes
people hesitant to back down.

• In Aschs experiment, once you disagree with everyone else. The

experimenter will asks you to reconsider the majority will never
back down. Once there is a public commitment, you will stick to
it. This is also seen in salesperson that asks you questions to
prompt you to state the benefits of their product.

You clap after a lecture, but upon seeing hitting the table with a
knuckle, you will copy and start hitting the nuckle on the desk as
you believe it is a German ovation.

Why Do We Conform?

1. Person may bow to the group to be accepted and avoid

rejection (normative influence). Going along with a crowd to
avoid rejection and gain approval. Seen as those deviate
from the norm are rejected. Brain scan show a group
judgment differing ones own activate a brain area active
when feels the pain of bad betting decisions. This influence
can cause one to support what they do not believe in or
suppress disagreement.

• Neural activity associated with normative influence in a brain

area when people are anxious about social rejection.

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• Neural activity associated with normative influence in a brain
area when people are anxious about social rejection.

2. Obtain important info (informational influence). This

involves private accepting of others influence, shown
through autokinetic situation where the ambiguous reality
allowed others to be a valuable source of information. I cant
tell how far the light is moving, but this guy seems to know.

• If a friend buys a car, he may provide information that

influences to but that same car, our friends influence the
experiences that inform our attitudes.

• fMRI scans when answering perceptual questions following

hearing other individual responses. When going against the
group, the brain regions with emotion became active.
When conforming to a wrong answer, brain regions
dedicated to perception became active.

• Informational influence in areas involved with ones

judgement of a stimulus.

• This provides evidence that when people conform, their

perceptions may genuinely influence.

They found that participants who conformed to a group

standard subsequently interpreted information in ways that
upheld their decision to conform. A normative influence can
cause informational influence as people are justifying their
conformity.

• Participants given a story of Robert that had the option of

going to a medical school or pursuing music. One group
were told that most people stated Robert should pursue his
dream of music and the other group were told that most
said medical school as it is the most safe.

• Conclusion: sometimes we change what we say if the basis

of our belief is a result of our conformity. The medical
school group stated it was the most safe, whereas the music
group thought that it would result in fame rather than a
local orchestra. This act of dissenting or conforming was
driven by normative influence.

• Conformity is greatest when people respond before a

group, and reflects a normative influence. This is because
subjects receive the same info whether they respond
publicly or privately.

• The conformity is greater when participants feel

incomplete, when the task is difficult and they care about
being right, all being influence by informational influence.

Who Can Be Conformed: Personality

• Predicts behaviour better when social influences are weak,

since Milgram's study created a strong situation, this made
it difficult for personality differences. However, if two
strangers are in a waiting room with no cues to guide
behaviour, individual differences in personality shine.

Culture
Culture background helps predict the degree to which
people conform.

• Collectivist countries (social harmony is key) are more

responsive to others influence. This may be a evolutionary
response.

• Higher rates of conformity for tribes in Zimbabwe (51%),

whereas French were less conforming in Aschs experiment.

• Conformity is needed for survival, and reduce the spread of

disease. As areas such as japan with high conformity emerge
to protect people from dangerous diseases.

• Working class prefer similarity than middle class that saw

themselves as unique. 72% picked a majority color, whereas
44% middle class picked majority.

Gender

• Milgram found no gender difference. A little difference for

women to conform more was seen in experiments where
people observed participants behaviour, when non-
observable the difference was not present.

• Higher conformity by women participants if researchers

were male, men tend to choose more male-oriented topics
where women are less knowledgeable and thus cause

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people observed participants behaviour, when non-
observable the difference was not present.

• Higher conformity by women participants if researchers

were male, men tend to choose more male-oriented topics
where women are less knowledgeable and thus cause
informational conformity.
•
○ Similarly, male were conform more for female-oriented
topics.

Social Roles

ALLOW some freedom of interpretation to those

act them out, but some aspect of any role must be
performed. A students must do the exam and hand
in the paper to get a minimum GPA

Roles are formed only when multiple norms are included,

stand on right side when riding an escalator is a norm, not
social role.

When Will People NOT

CONFORM?
• Reactance: When social pressure threatens their sense of
freedom, they often rebel. Ex. Romeo and juliet.

• This boomerang effect is present when people sense their

freedom is being restricted.

• The theory of reactance - people act to protect their

freedom, many non-nerdy students stopped wearing a
Livestrong band when the nerdy students wear wearing
them.

• This has lead to underage drinking.

• A Canada census has 20k people state their religion sjedi to

protest the intrusive survey on religion.

Asserting uniqueness

• In western cultures, people feel uncomfortable when

appearing too different or too similar, they want to be
moderately unique. Shown as experimenters stated their 10
attitudes were identical or distinct from 10k students. The
identical groups asserted their individuality through
nonconformity.

• Those who have the highest need for uniqueness tend to

conform less for majority.
• The majority group may see the minority group as
hypersensitive
• Spontaneous self concepts - depicts want to be unique, as
those who are asked to tell us about yourself are most likely
to mention distinctive attributes.

• If you are the only guy in a room full of girls, your are aware
of your gender, as if in a room full of boys your gender loses
salience.

Chapter 7: Group Influence

• Group: what really defines a group is our ability to label

who is in the group and who is not (tribalism) as well as an
aspect of interactionism (you influence one another)

• People working in a classroom individually on computers

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• Group: what really defines a group is our ability to label
who is in the group and who is not (tribalism) as well as an
aspect of interactionism (you influence one another)

• People working in a classroom individually on computers

would not be classified as a group.

• Another fact is that you have to define yourself to be in

that group. If you are watching a sport, you are only in
that group if you state it.

• If an atheist is watching a church sermon to laugh at those

who are religious, then he is not part of the group
(Christianity)

Us Versus Them Theory - groups emerge through separating

others and affiliating (connecting and belonging to others) in
order to achieve a social identity, achieve.

Social facilitation:

• "Mere Presence Effect" passive audience and not

competing, no reward/punishment, we still behave
differently. Reeling in fishing line by themselves, went
faster when in a group then by themselves.

• We laugh more when in a group than by themselves. Close

in proximity - higher arousal

• Observed in animals - ants excavate more and chicken eat

more grain.

• Negatively effecting performance - cockroaches/green

finches learn mazes slower with a group. Seen for humans
when learning nonsense syllables/maze completion and
multiplication.

• Rober Zajonc: Arousal enhances whatever response

tendency is dominant for easy tasks. People perform worse
when it is a complex task where the correct answer is not
dominant.

• Arousal for multiplication will improve performance as they

are well learned. However, complex mathematic equations,
doing a maze are more difficult and therefore more likely to
have incorrect responses

• In the presence of others, students took more time to learn

the complex maze.

• Pool players (who had made 71 percent of their shots while

being unobtrusively observed) did even better (80 percent)
when four observers came up to watch them play. Poor
shooters (who had previously averaged 36 percent) did even
worse (25 percent) when closely observed.

• Home-field advantage is not always an advantage for good

teams than for poor-performing teams. Home field
advantage is higher for teams that rely on teamwork such as
basketball, and less that rely on individual efforts such as
baseball. Soccer is more simplistic, whereas baseball has
many other factors.

• For simple tasks (reeling in a fish) you will perform better

with a crowd. However for complex tasks, social facilitation
as a result of crowding occurs.

• To test this, the hypothesis that "arousal enhances what

response tendency is dominant", which increases
performance on easy tasks, and harder for difficult tasks

• Anxiety helps easy tasks, easy anagram such as "akec" =

cake

Home field advantage - better for teams that are highly

skilled than poor performing teams. This advantage can be
simply due to familiarity with home env. Less travel fatigue,
feelings of dominance derived from terriorial control or

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Home field advantage - better for teams that are highly
skilled than poor performing teams. This advantage can be
simply due to familiarity with home env. Less travel fatigue,
feelings of dominance derived from terriorial control or
increased team identity when being cheered by fans.

Crowding: where presence of others effect performance

and have positive/negative effects.

• The effect of others presence increases with their number.

The arousal and self-conscious attention created by a large
audience interferes even with automatic behaviour such as
speaking.

• When we are crowded, we are more likely to laugh or clap,

but enhances arousal that facilitates dominant responses.
Friendly people that sit close together are liked even more
whereas unfriendly are disliked more. Exp. Watching a
humorous video, confederate could make them laugh more
when sitting close.

• Example of crowding was to place rat in a pen, then stabilize

at 150. He splits the pen into quarter by subdividing, the
alpha rat takes one side and kicks out other males, and
allows for a couple females. This results in great
overcrowding for the other region , causing infant mortality
and premature death.

Three possible factors create arousal: Evaluation

apprehension, distraction and mere presence

Evaluation Apprehension

• They make us anxious as we wonder how they are

evaluating us. To test this, social facilitation for the
pronunciation of nonsense syllabus and easy to pronounce
syllables. This mere presence condition, blindfold observers
supposedly in preparation for a perception experiment. In
contrast to the effect of the watching audience, the mere
presence of these blindfolded people did not boost well -
practiced responses

• The enhancement of dominant responses is strongest when

people think they are being evaluated. If self-conscious
basketball players analyze their body movements while
shooting critical free throws, they are more likely to miss.

• Evaluation apprehension will interfere our ability to

perform, unless it’s a task that has been repeated many
times, than crowding through social facilitation will occur
and help you perform in simple tasks.

Driven by Distraction

• Tested if the reason that the arousal stems from

wondering how co-actors are doing and how the audience
is reacting. This is a distraction, and this conflict between
paying attention to others and paying attention to the task
overloads our cognitive system, causing arousal.
Distraction can be a person or even a burst of light.

Mere Presence

• The mere presence produces arousal even without

evaluation apprehension or arousing distraction. Since this
is found in all animals, it suggest an innate social arousal
mechanism common to much of the zoological world.

• Social facilitation offers predictions that the presence of

others is arousing and this social arousal enhances
dominant responses. In addition, it suggests that the
theory has brought new life to a long dormant field of
research.

• Three examples of collective influence: social facilitation,

social loafing and deindividuation

• Four examples of social influence in interacting groups:

group polarization, groupthink, leadership and minority
influence

Many Hands Make Light Work

• That collective tug of war team was half the sum of

individual efforts, contrary to "in unity there is strength".

• When told to pull hard as you can, they pull 18% harder if
pulling along then when they believed other people were
helping (machine was doing the work)

• To motivate group members one strategy is to make

individual performance identifiable, "timmy you do the
introduction, and I do the conclusion"

• University swim team members swim faster in intrasquad

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• To motivate group members one strategy is to make
individual performance identifiable, "timmy you do the
introduction, and I do the conclusion"

• University swim team members swim faster in intrasquad

relay races when someone monitors and announces their
individual times

Social Loafing

• Loafing: students pumped exercise bicycles more

energetically when being individually monitored that when
they thought their output was being pooled with other
riders. This is "free-ride" on group effort.

• Revealed effort decreases (loafing increases) as the size of

the group increases for additive tasks. When individuals
cannot be evaluated or held accountable, loafing becomes
more likely. A swimmer is individually tested, whereas no
single person is accountable in tug of war.

• If are effort is not measured and anonymous, we

unconsciously conserve energy to survive.

• Social loafing is prevalent in all countries. People in groups

loaf less when the task is appealing, challenging or involving.
When they see others as unreliable, they work harder.
Cohesiveness intensifies effort.

• When arousal and diffused responsibility combine, the

results may range from Lessing restraint to self-gratification
to social explosions. The commonality is that they are
provoked by the power of a group

• Seen in clapping experiment, noise produced by 6 people

clapping as loud as you can was less than 3x than one
personal alone. Done through blindfolding and even seen in
cheerleaders. Those who clapped in both alone and groups
did not believe they were loafing, but recognize it occurs.

• The reason behind social loafing can be because the

participants believe they are only being evaluated alone and
not in a group. Group settings decrease evaluation
apprehension, since responsibility diffuses due to
anonymity. However, if evaluated alone, people are made
the center of attention - social facilitation occurs, whereas
in a crowd and anonymous, it decreases evaluation and
increases social loafing.

• 16% more product made when individual output was

identified, regardless if they knew their pay will be
effected in their assembly line job.

• Cultural difference of social loafing - in Russia, peasants

have little responsibility for a given plot, highly evident in
collectivist non-communist regimes.

• Gender differences - women tend to be less individualistic

and seem to have less social loafing.

We can decrease social loafing if the goal is compelling and

essential for survival. Ex. Olympic bob sled, no social loafing
will occur. Social loafing occur less when task is challenging
appealing or involving.

• Deindividuation - group situations where people abandon

moral restrain and lose sense of individual responsibility
and lose evaluation apprehension. This occurs when one is
aroused, has diffused responsibility and inhibitions
diminish. This results in lack of restraint (food fight) or
complete self-gratification (riots/group vandalism)

• People will feel anonymous in crowds. Even those that are

dragged to a hockey game and do not like fighting, they
will still cheer during a fight. Talking shit online is an
example of this.

This phenomenon depends on :

○ Group size: occurs even when people are identifiable

and will be prosecuted. The "jump" phenomenon for
suicide is seen more amongst a large crowd at night
than in broad daylight with a few people.

○ Physical anonymity: Allows one to be less self

conscious and more responsive to cues present in the
situation, where negative (clan uniforms) or positive
(nurses uniform) women dressed in KKK outfit, and
participants were 2x as likely to press the shock button
when being anonymous through the outfit. A possible
confound is the KKK outfit may encourage hostility.

○ Ex. Of deindividuation - had a confederate driver stop

at a red light and wait for 12 seconds whenever she
was followed by a convertible or a keep. The horn-
honking were recorded, those who had their top down
such as jeeps and convertibles were less likely to honk.

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○ Ex. Of deindividuation - had a confederate driver stop
at a red light and wait for 12 seconds whenever she
was followed by a convertible or a keep. The horn-
honking were recorded, those who had their top down
such as jeeps and convertibles were less likely to honk.
Those how had top up and were anonymous, honked
1/3 sooner, 2x as often and for nearly twice as long.

○ children were 2x more likely to take extra Halloween

candy when in a group, when anonymous, and,
especially, when deindividuated by the combination of
group immersion and anonymity through masks.

However it is not the case that being physically anonymous

will always unleash our impulses, as the Zimbardo KKK
experiment it may be due to the outfits that encouraged
hostility and increased the number of shocks

Arousing and distracting activity

• Aggressive outbursts by large crowds often preceded by

minor actions that arouse and diver people attention. Ex.
Activities such as throwing rocks and group singing set the
stage for more uninhibited behaviour. Self-reinforcing
pleasure when doing an impulsive act. If we see others
doing what we are, we believe they share the same feeling
which reinforces our own attitudes.

• More impulse group action absorbs our attention. Yelling at

a referee gives attention to player, without thinking about
their own values and reacting to the immediate situation.

Diminished Self Awareness

• Unself conscious and deindividuated people are less

restrained and less self-regulated and more likely to act
without thinking about their own values.

• Self-awareness is the opposite of deindividuation, and

alcohol decreases self-awareness to increase
deindividuation.

• Those who are self aware are consistent, the inner attitudes
reflect their external actions. Those who are made aware of
their actions, are less likely to cheat as they have
independency and feel distinct. In other countries, such as
Japanese they care more what others think, people are no
more likely to cheat when not in front of a mirror.

Group Polarization

• Group discussion often strengthens members initial

inclinations.

• This group phenomenon is not a shift to risk, but a tendency

for group discussion to enhance individuals initial learning.
Discussion typically strengthens the average inclination of
group members.

• Mititoshi Isozaki (1984) found that Japanese university

students gave more pronounced “guilty” judgments after
discussing a traffic case. Groups increase the "too much
invested" theory. Shown through experiment, where 72%
people said they would reinvest into a failing business,
whereas 94% said the would if placed in groups.

• Brauer and his co-workers (2001) found that French

students’ dislike for certain other people was exacerbated
after discussing their shared negative impressions.

• Like minded people strengthen shared views, this increases the

initial attitude gap between opposing sides,

• Polarization in communities: like-minded people join gangs

through mutual reinforcement, unsupervised peer groups
are the strongest predictor of a neighborhoods crime
victimization rate.

• Group Polarization - analysis of terrorist show that it does

not erupt suddenly. The result is violent acts that the
individual apart from the group would have never
committed.

• Informational influence on group polarization: group elicit a

pooling of ideas, favoring a dominant viewpoint. Not only
are arguments heard, active participant induces a greater
attitude change, the verbal commitment magnifies the
impact. The more group members repeat one another's
ideas. They rehearse and validate them

• Normative influence on group polarization: Social

comparison: human nature to evaluate our abilities and
opinions, comparing views with those of others. We are

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impact. The more group members repeat one another's
ideas. They rehearse and validate them

• Normative influence on group polarization: Social

comparison: human nature to evaluate our abilities and
opinions, comparing views with those of others. We are
more influenced by reference groups (groups we identify
with). Pluralistic ignorance: they don’t realize how strongly
others support the socially preferred tendency. This involves
self-serving bias as they view themselves as a better than
average embodiment of socially desirable traits and
attitudes.

• The polarization from mere social comparison is less than by

a discussion.

Risky Shifts: to test the theory that groups are more

cautious than individuals. Done by posing a dilemma faced
by fictional characters.

Comparing risk-taking by individuals and groups, finings

group decision usually risker. During discussion, opinions
converge

Symptoms of group think

Collective form of dissonance reduction that surfaces as group

members try to maintain positive group feeling when facing a
threat. The challenger explosion was due to group think.

1. An illusion of invulnerability: There is little question that

captain smith and his crew had developed an illusion that
nothing bad could happen, "god himself could not sink this
ship"

2. Unquestioned belief in the groups morality: group

members assume the inherent morality of their group and
ignore ethical moral issues. Life boats were needed, but the
builders decided they were not need

3. Close minded: Rationalization: the group discounts

challenges by collectively justifying their decisions. Even
though titanic officers knew they were near icebergs, they
continued at full speed.

4. Close minded: Stereotyped view of opponent: some believe

they were trying to break a speed record in corssing the
Atlantic. One reason is because shipping business is
competitive and these stereotyped views of their opponents
might have well led smith and his crew to ignore the
warnings from other ships

5. Pressures toward uniformity: conformity: when they

lookout who saw the iceberg complained he did not have
binoculars, he was insulted by his colleagues for not being
able to use his naked eye.

6. Pressures toward uniformity: Self-censorship: members

often withhold their thoughts as disagreement can be
uncomfortable. He did not suggest they pick up new pair at
the next port.

7. Pressures toward uniformity: Illusion of unanimity: Delf

censorship and pressure to puncture the consensus create
an illusion of unanimity. The consensus confirms the groups
decision. Did none of the crew think they should slow
down? Hitler creaed an atmosphere where pressure to
conform suppressed all deviance. The absence of dissent
created an illusion

8. Pressures toward uniformity: Mind guards: some members

protect group from information that would call into
question the morality of the decisions. After receiving
several warning messages about ice bergs, he failed to taken
down the final message and he failed to pass this message
to the captain.

The internet (rally like mindede people), communities

(associate), schools (accentuation phenomenon) and terrorist
organizations (people who share grievances bring them
together)

Explaining polarization - Informational influence

theory - idea that common knowledge to group members will
be included in the discussion, rather than information outside
the group will be left out. This causes viewpoints to converge
and discussion to head in one direction.

Active participation produces more attitude change than passive

listening. This is through rehearsal and validation.

Normative influence Theory - Most persuaded in reference

groups, we want people to like us and thus express stronger
opinions to adopt others view and thus fit in.

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Normative influence Theory - Most persuaded in reference
groups, we want people to like us and thus express stronger
opinions to adopt others view and thus fit in.

Pluralistic Ignorance - People don’t realize how strongly others

support the socially preferred tendency. This is weaker than
active discussion, but simply observing others responses
through social comparisons stimulates small polarization

Primary: your home

Secondary: theatres, you place coat on your seat to go get

popcorn. Class, go to the washroom and someone sitting on it.

Public territories: You are not as mad if someone sits on a public

bench when you sat their first.

Collective Behaviour: "jump baiting" if one sadistic or drunk

individual says "jump" to a person hanging off the bridge.
Instead of someone saying something, they have diffuse sense
of responsibility, they will laugh and promote the behaviour.

Convergence - spreads like a contagion. This creates a norm of

callousness. Ex miller lite commercial ad had "less filling" or
"taste great" groups. As a joke, at a bar "one person said less
filling and the other said taste great/ 20 min later they keep
saying to but someone threw a rock. This rock escalates to
people setting fires and turning over cars, as they are
deindividuated and aroused.

Critiquing group think:

Group think is the tendency of decision-making groups to

suppress disagreement in the interest of group harmony

• Directive leadership is associated with poorer decisions as

subordinates feel to powerless to speak up

• Groups make smart decision have distributed conversation

• Groups do prefer supporting over challenging info

• When members look to a group for acceptance, they may

suppress disagreeable thoughts

• Groups have broad discussions, group success depends on

knowledge and communication

• Groups with diverse perspectives outperform groups of like

minded experts, In discussion, info that shard does tend to
dominate and crowd unshared info, meaning they do not
benefit from all that the members know.

• When academic colleagues in a close-knit department share

their draft manuscripts with one another, they want critique:
“Do what you can to save me from my own mistakes.” In a free-
spirited atmosphere, cohesion can enhance effective teamwork.

• Preventing groupthink: be impartial, do not start by stating

positions, encourage critical evaluation through devils advocate,
subdivide the group then reunite, welcome critiques from
outside experts, call a second chance meeting to air any doubts
prior to making a decision.

• In close friendships - in highly cohesive families committed

members will care enough to voice disagreement

• People feel more productive when generating ideas in

groups, but, time and again, researchers have found that
people working alone generate more good ideas

• Large brainstorming groups are especially inefficient. In

accord with social loafing theory, large groups cause some
individuals to free-ride on others’ efforts. In accord with
normative influence theory, they cause others to feel
apprehensive about voicing oddball ideas. Instead break up
into small groups and share views.

• Through weather forecasting, google, game shows,

prediction markets and the crowd wihin, we can conclude
that when info from many diverse people is combined all of
us together can become smarter than any of us alone.

• In one analysis of 50 Dutch companies, the highest morale

was at firms with chief executives who most inspired their
colleagues “to transcend their own self-interests for the
sake of the collective”

• Persuasive forces are powerful, but we can resist persuasion by

making public commitments and by anticipating persuasive
appeals.

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sake of the collective”

• Persuasive forces are powerful, but we can resist persuasion by

making public commitments and by anticipating persuasive
appeals.

• Pressures to conform sometimes overwhelm our better

judgment, but blatant pressure can motivate us to assert our
individuality and freedom.

• The groups we create and belong to influence our behaviour;

but if we act consistently, we can sometimes influence the
group.

Consistency - persistent nonconformity is painful, explains the

minority slowness effect -tendency for people with minority
views to express them less quickly than people in the majority.

Self confidence - consistency and persistence convey self-

confidence.

A persistent minority punctures illusion of unanimity. This

consistency can overcome the majority. When a minority doubts
the majority, the majority become free to express their own
doubts and may even switch to the minority position. This
means that by arguing consistently and forcefully, they can
convince the majority that minority influence is worth of study.
The defected individual from the majority in to the minority can
become the most influential on the majority.

Civil rights movement, same-sex marriage.

Exception to group think

Problem solving ingroups can be effective. When given an

anlogy, unievrsity students miss the question when answering
alone, but get it correct after discussing.

Groups allow for critique. This limits cognitive bias and produce
higher quality ideas.

Creative work teams tend to be small - as it forces people to

generate many ideas and prevents social loafing.

LEADERSHIP
Task leadership -Directive style, one that can work efficiently if
the leader is bright enough to give good orders. This view is
authoritarian: one person decides the rules, effective in time
crunch when something needs to happen fast. Ex. Hospitals for
covid in China were faster than adding solar panels in the united
states

• Social leadership - input from others, more democratic as it is

voted on. Women, in general, are more egalitarian than men
and are more likely to oppose hierarchies

• Many experiments reveal that such leadership is good for

morale -group members usually feel more satisfied when they
participate in making decisions

Transactional leadership - listening to subordinates, friendship

to make them happy, and then have high expectations for them.
Transactional is generally more effective. Not the best in India
coalmine factories where it is life or death, social and task is
more effective.

Transformational leadership - leader is charismatic, born

leaders great communicators and role model optimism. The
collectivist mindset and leads to engaged and effective workers.

• Leadership of this kind—transformational leadership motivates

others to identify with and commit themselves to the group’s
mission. Transformational leaders—many of whom are
charismatic, energetic, self-confident extroverts—articulate high
standards, inspire people to share their vision, and offer
personal attention . The frequent result of such leadership in
organizations is a more engaged, trusting, and effective
workforce

• Form trust through sticking to goals, executing them and having

self-confidence, reinforcing allegiance of followers.

Defections from the majority - persistent minority punctures the

illusion of unanimity. A defected person from a majority is more
persuasive than a consistent minority voice.

Factors that strengthen minority influence are not unique to

minorities.

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