Conformity is a type of social influence involving a change in belief or behavior in order to fit in with a group. This change is in response to real (involving the physical presence of others) or imagined (involving the pressure of social norms / expectations) group pressure. Basically, it can be summed up as yielding oneself to group pressures and differs based on the social setting and pressures thereof. A person adjusts his/her thinking or behavior to coincide with a particular group’s standard. Explaining Sherif’s Results • Why did Sherif’s participants change their estimates when they had to call out their answers in the presence of other people?
The risky shift phenomenon suggests that people are more likely to make a risky decision when in a group as a shared risk reduces individual responsibility. The theory of the risky shift phenomenon was originally put forward by Stoner (1961) contrary to the common belief that people would make more conservative decisions when in a group. Kogan and Wallach (1964) developed a ‘choice dilemma task’ to attempt to measure Stoner’s theory. A large proportion of studies conducted using this method supported the risky shift hypothesis. Wallach, Kogan and Bem (1962) conducted an experiment to examine the effect of social influence when answering risky decisions (See Appendix 1).
Our particular social location, also, affects our attitudes, experiences, and beliefs. Group dynamics, or how groups affect individuals and how individuals affect groups (Fall, 2011) within these attitudes, experiences and beliefs, confers a specific set of social roles, and privileges, which heavily influences our social identity and how we view the world around us. Our cultures introduce and teach us different roles, aspirations, values, and norms in society. The ascribed statuses, that is positions that an individual inherits at birth or receives involuntarily later in life (Fall, 2011), may affect most if not all of our values, norms, and roles whether we like it or not. In this paper I will be exploring and examining how my social location has affected me and
a)Attitude: Belief/Feeling that predisposes one to act in certain way to objects, people, and events. b) Attitudes are well remembered and central to our self-concept, however, are more likely to lead to behavior, and measures of general attitudes do predict patterns of behavior over time. c) Attitudes can affect actions if attitude is specifically related to behavior, if the attitude are salient and if the outside influences are minimal. 2 .a) Describe Milgram’s experiments on obedience, and b) outline the conditions in which obedience was highest. a) Stanley Milgram designed a study that investigates the effects of authority on obedience.
Over time a stimulus may affect a segment of the population in such a dramatic way that they alter as a society their moral make. “The nature and structure of belief systems is important from the perspective of an informational theorist because beliefs are thought to provide the cognitive foundation of an attitude. In order to change an attitude, then, it is presumably necessary to modify the information on which that attitude rests. It is generally necessary, therefore, to change a person's beliefs, eliminate old beliefs or introduce new beliefs." (Richard Petty) The unfolding of time brings changes and transitions to societies.
By understanding the concepts of the each theories a person can see how they can affect the social institution, such as the family, differently and can present a more much better understanding of the concepts as they apply to reality. What are the Sociological theories? Functionalism, the Conflict Theory, and Interactionism comprise the three main sociological theories. These theories affect the way people think and perceive the world around them. As a result, the development, nature and understanding of different social institutions, including the family, health-care systems, religion, education, media, politics and economy, are determined or affected by these three social theories.
Since then social influence has become a field of study devoted to discovering the principles that determine our beliefs, create attitudes, and move us to action. Two forms of social influence are conformity (majority influence) and minority influence. Conformity is where a larger group of people change the behaviour (but not necessarily the attitudes and beliefs) of an individual or smaller group while minority influence is where a small group or an individual change the behaviour and usually the beliefs of an individual. The difference is both in the size of the ‘group’ causing the influence and the type of change it creates in the individual (compliance or conversion). As stated above majority influence is when adapt the behaviour, attitudes or values of the majority after being exposed to their values or behaviour.
The term disposition refers to somebody’s beliefs, attitudes, and personality. When people attribute other people’s behaviour to external factors such as the immediate rewards and punishments in a social setting or social pressure, they are making a situational attribution. While making judgements about people’s behaviour, we tend to make errors. Attribution theory argues that people are more likely to explain another person’s actions by pointing to the dispositional factors, rather than to the situation. When people overestimate the role of dispositional factors in an individual’s behaviour and underestimate the situational factors, it is called the fundamental attribution error.
Researching Social Class and Single Parenthood History has established for us the possibility that changing environments and atmospheres can cause shifts in psychological and social standings (Kottak, 2000, pg 12). How these things are affected and what can be done to discover the nature of these results can only be realized through experiment and research. Science attempts to answer questions in order to further our knowledge. Using this knowledge can help us make changes that can positively affect life and the world as we know it. It can also help predict the expected future statistics, if things continue the way they are.
Introduction Recent work by Sherif Sherif cited in Miller and McGlashan Nicols (1953) has shown that with the regard to group norms theory (GNT) it can be explained “how individuals acquire belief systems and ideologies that support the prescription of prejudice” (Miller et el., 2008). This theory argues the differences of behaviour of people who is in-group and out-group. Being a member of an in-group gives rise to discrimination of people in out-group. The current research is the clear example of discrimination of people with body art(out-group), especially in employment. Moreover, as Ligos cited in Miller et el (2001) claimed that the discrimination associated with tattoos in the workplace also occur among those who also have body art.