Social Influence: Conformity and Obedience

What you'll learn

This topic examines how individuals change their behaviour and attitudes due to the influence of others. You'll explore why people conform to group norms and obey authority figures, using classic psychological research to understand these powerful social forces. This content directly addresses OCR GCSE Psychology specification requirements on social influence.

Key terms and definitions

Conformity — changing one's behaviour or beliefs to match those of others in a group, often due to real or imagined group pressure.

Obedience — following direct orders or commands from an authority figure, even when these instructions may conflict with personal conscience.

Social influence — the process by which individuals and groups change each other's attitudes and behaviours through interaction.

Normative social influence — conforming to be liked, accepted or to avoid rejection by a group; going along with the majority to fit in.

Informational social influence — conforming because you believe others have more accurate information; accepting the group's view as reality.

Compliance — publicly conforming to group behaviour while privately maintaining one's own views; a superficial form of conformity.

Internalisation — genuinely accepting and believing the group's views, resulting in both public and private agreement.

Situational variables — factors in the environment or context that influence the likelihood of conformity or obedience occurring.

Core concepts

Types of conformity

Conformity exists on a spectrum from surface-level agreement to deep-seated belief change. Understanding these distinctions is essential for OCR exam questions.

Compliance represents the most superficial level. An individual publicly agrees with the group but privately disagrees. For example, a student might laugh at a joke they don't find funny because everyone else is laughing. This type of conformity is temporary and driven by normative social influence — the desire to be accepted.

Internalisation is deeper and more permanent. The individual genuinely accepts the group's beliefs as correct, changing both public behaviour and private beliefs. This occurs through informational social influence when someone believes others possess superior knowledge. A teenager might adopt their friends' political views after hearing compelling arguments, truly believing these positions are correct.

A third type, identification, involves conforming to the expectations of a social role, though this is less emphasised in OCR specifications than compliance and internalisation.

Asch's research on conformity

Solomon Asch (1951, 1955) conducted landmark experiments demonstrating conformity to group pressure even when the group is obviously wrong.

Procedure:

• Participants were seated with 6-8 confederates (actors pretending to be participants)
• All viewed lines of clearly different lengths
• Confederates intentionally gave incorrect answers on 12 critical trials
• The real participant answered second-to-last, after hearing most confederates respond
• Task was unambiguous — the correct answer was obvious

Findings:

• 75% of participants conformed at least once
• Overall conformity rate was 37% across all critical trials
• Control group (no confederates) made errors less than 1% of the time
• When interviewed, participants reported conforming to avoid standing out or because they doubted their own judgement

Variables affecting conformity:

Asch manipulated several situational variables to identify factors influencing conformity rates:

• Group size: Conformity increased with group size up to 3-4 confederates, then plateaued
• Unanimity: One dissenting confederate (giving the correct answer) reduced conformity to 5.5%
• Task difficulty: Making lines more similar increased conformity as participants relied more on others' judgements

Evaluation points:

Strengths:

• Controlled laboratory experiment with high internal validity
• Established baseline conformity rates in unambiguous situations
• Identified specific variables affecting conformity

Limitations:

• Artificial task lacking ecological validity — real-world conformity often involves more important decisions
• Sample bias: American male undergraduates in the 1950s may not represent all populations
• Ethical concerns: participants experienced stress and were deceived
• Cultural bias: individualist American culture may show different conformity rates than collectivist cultures

Milgram's research on obedience

Stanley Milgram (1963) investigated how far ordinary people would go in obeying an authority figure, even when instructions conflicted with their conscience.

Procedure:

• 40 male participants recruited through newspaper advertisements
• Assigned the role of "teacher" (the "learner" was a confederate)
• Instructed to administer electric shocks for every wrong answer
• Shock levels increased from 15V to 450V (labelled "XXX")
• No real shocks were given, but participants believed they were real
• Experimenter (authority figure) wore a lab coat and gave standardised prompts when participants hesitated

Findings:

• 100% of participants administered shocks up to 300V
• 65% continued to the maximum 450V
• Many showed signs of extreme stress (sweating, trembling, nervous laughter)
• Participants often challenged the experimenter but continued when told to proceed

Situational variables affecting obedience:

Milgram conducted variations identifying factors that increased or decreased obedience:

• Proximity of authority: Obedience dropped to 21% when instructions were given by telephone rather than in-person
• Proximity of victim: Obedience decreased to 40% when teacher and learner were in the same room; further decreased to 30% when teacher had to force learner's hand onto shock plate
• Location: Moving from Yale University to a run-down office building reduced obedience to 48%
• Presence of allies: When two other "teachers" (confederates) refused to continue, obedience dropped to 10%
• Uniform: Obedience decreased when the authority figure wore ordinary clothes instead of a lab coat

Evaluation points:

Strengths:

• High internal validity through controlled procedures
• Systematic variations identified specific factors affecting obedience
• Findings have real-world applications for understanding atrocities and institutional behaviour

Limitations:

• Severe ethical issues: deception, lack of informed consent, psychological harm, difficulty withdrawing
• Artificial laboratory setting reduces ecological validity
• Sample bias: only American males tested initially (though replications with women showed similar results)
• Historical context: 1960s post-war obedience may differ from contemporary attitudes

Explanations for conformity and obedience

Why do people conform?

Normative social influence explains conformity through the fundamental human need for social acceptance. People fear rejection, ridicule or exclusion from groups. This motivates compliance even when individuals privately disagree. School uniform adherence often reflects normative influence — students wear the same clothes to avoid standing out, not because they believe it's inherently correct.

Informational social influence explains conformity through uncertainty. When people lack knowledge or confidence, they look to others as sources of information, assuming the majority is more likely to be correct. In emergencies, bystanders often look to others to determine appropriate responses, sometimes leading to collective inaction.

Why do people obey?

Several factors explain obedience to authority:

• Legitimate authority: People learn to obey those in recognised positions of power (parents, teachers, police, doctors). Uniforms, titles and settings establish legitimacy.

• Agentic state: Milgram proposed that people shift from an autonomous state (acting according to their own principles) to an agentic state (seeing themselves as agents carrying out another's wishes). In this state, they feel less personal responsibility for their actions.

• Gradual commitment: Milgram's participants began with small shocks, making it psychologically difficult to refuse as intensity increased. This "foot-in-the-door" process creates momentum toward compliance.

• Buffers: Physical or psychological distance from consequences makes obedience easier. Milgram's participants couldn't see the learner's suffering directly, reducing emotional impact.

Cultural and individual differences

Research demonstrates that conformity and obedience vary across cultures and individuals:

Cultural variations:

• Collectivist cultures (emphasising group harmony) generally show higher conformity rates than individualist cultures
• Smith and Bond (1993) reviewed Asch-type studies across cultures, finding conformity rates from 14% to 58%
• British participants typically show moderate conformity levels between American and more collectivist Asian samples

Individual differences:

• Personality factors: People with external locus of control (believing outside forces control outcomes) show higher obedience
• Gender: Most research finds minimal gender differences in conformity or obedience rates
• Situational factors typically override individual differences in determining behaviour

Contemporary relevance and applications

Understanding social influence has practical applications:

Positive applications:

• Public health campaigns using social norms to promote vaccination, reduce smoking or encourage recycling
• Peer education programmes leveraging informational influence
• Workplace safety protocols designing systems to encourage speaking up against dangerous instructions

Negative consequences:

• Explaining collective wrongdoing in institutions (abuse scandals, corporate misconduct)
• Understanding radicalisation and cult recruitment
• Recognising vulnerability to fraudulent authority figures

Worked examples

Example 1: 4-mark question

Question: Explain one difference between normative social influence and informational social influence. [4 marks]

Model answer: Normative social influence occurs when people conform to be liked or accepted by a group, whereas informational social influence occurs when people conform because they believe others have more accurate information [1 mark for basic difference].

For example, a student might agree with their friends' opinion about a film even though they disliked it, to avoid being excluded from the group — this demonstrates normative influence driven by the need for acceptance [1 mark for normative example with explanation].

In contrast, if students are unsure about the answer to a homework question, they might adopt the answer given by most of their classmates, believing the majority is more likely to be correct — this demonstrates informational influence driven by uncertainty [1 mark for informational example with explanation].

The key distinction is the motivation: normative influence is about fitting in socially, while informational influence is about being correct [1 mark for clear distinction].

Example 2: 6-mark question

Question: Describe and evaluate Asch's research into conformity. [6 marks]

Model answer: Asch (1951) investigated conformity using a line judgement task. Participants were placed in groups with confederates who deliberately gave wrong answers [1 mark for procedure]. Asch found that 75% of participants conformed at least once, with an overall conformity rate of 37% across critical trials [1 mark for findings]. This demonstrated that people will conform even when the correct answer is obvious [1 mark for conclusion].

A strength of Asch's research is that it was a controlled laboratory experiment, meaning variables could be precisely manipulated and cause-and-effect relationships established [1 mark for strength]. For example, Asch systematically varied group size and unanimity to identify their effects on conformity rates [1 mark for elaboration].

However, a limitation is that the task lacked ecological validity as judging line lengths in a laboratory is artificial and doesn't reflect real-world conformity situations involving more important decisions [1 mark for limitation with elaboration]. Additionally, the sample consisted only of American male undergraduates in the 1950s, limiting generalisability to other populations and time periods [alternative limitation].

Example 3: 2-mark question

Question: Identify two situational variables that affected obedience in Milgram's research. [2 marks]

Model answer:

• Proximity of the authority figure [1 mark]
• Location/setting (e.g., Yale University versus run-down office) [1 mark]

Alternative acceptable answers: Proximity to the victim/learner; presence of other disobedient participants; uniform/appearance of authority figure.

Common mistakes and how to avoid them

• Confusing conformity types: Students often mix up compliance and internalisation. Remember: compliance is public agreement only (temporary, normative influence), while internalisation involves genuine belief change (permanent, informational influence).

• Misunderstanding Milgram's findings: The key finding is that 65% went to 450V, not that "everyone obeyed." Always cite accurate percentages and specify which variation you're discussing, as obedience rates varied dramatically across conditions.

• Weak evaluation: Avoid generic criticisms like "it's unethical" without explanation. Specify the ethical issue (e.g., deception, psychological harm), explain why it's problematic, and link to principles like informed consent or protection from harm.

• Ignoring the question focus: If asked about situational variables, don't discuss individual differences or vice versa. If asked to describe, don't evaluate; if asked to evaluate, don't just describe.

• Vague examples: Use specific, detailed examples. Instead of "people conform at school," write "a student might adopt their peer group's negative attitude toward a teacher to maintain social acceptance, demonstrating normative social influence."

• Assuming findings apply universally: Acknowledge sample limitations. Asch and Milgram's original studies used American male participants; results may not generalise to other cultures, genders or time periods.

Exam technique for "Social Influence: Conformity and Obedience"

• Command word precision: "Describe" requires factual information about procedures and findings (no evaluation). "Evaluate" requires strengths and limitations with elaboration. "Explain" requires reasons and mechanisms, showing understanding of why/how something occurs.

• Structure AO1 (description) answers chronologically: For research studies, follow: aim → procedure → findings → conclusion. For 4-6 mark questions, include sufficient detail (participant numbers, percentages, specific conditions tested).

• Develop AO2 (evaluation) points: Use the three-point technique: (1) identify the evaluation point, (2) explain why it matters, (3) link to the specific research. Each developed point typically earns 2-3 marks depending on question length.

• Balance your answers: For "describe and evaluate" questions worth 6+ marks, allocate approximately half your response to description and half to evaluation. Two well-developed evaluation points beat four underdeveloped ones.

Quick revision summary

Social influence explains how people's behaviour changes in response to others. Conformity involves matching group behaviour through normative influence (desire for acceptance) or informational influence (believing others are correct). Asch demonstrated that 37% of responses conformed to obviously incorrect group answers, with unanimity and group size affecting rates. Obedience involves following authority commands. Milgram found 65% of participants delivered maximum shocks when instructed, with proximity, location and uniform affecting rates. Understanding these processes helps explain both everyday social behaviour and extreme situations involving harmful compliance. Both phenomena are influenced more by situational factors than individual personality differences.