Although this research has helped many psychologists (Erickson et al, Everett waters) with their experiments this one may not be very valid, because the results may not apply to infants with different cultures and beliefs, therefore we cannot generalize the results as it was only tested on middle-class US children. Another fault in the experiment was that it didn’t take into account the extraneous variables which may have
The males were divided into three groups; those who were alone, those who were placed with two people that did not react and were a part of the experiment, and then three males who were all students and were not aware of the situation. Of those participants who were alone 75% reported the emergency before the experiment was terminated. Of those who were placed with two non-reacting others, only 10% reported the emergency before the experiment was terminated Of the group of three students only in about 38% of the eight groups did even one person respond before the experiment was over. From this experiment, one can conclude that the social environment really does affect a person’s response. If a person is within a group that does not react the individual may feel as though the situation is not an emergency
Discuss research into conformity Asch has conducted a study into conformity. His aim was to see if participants would yield to majority social influence and give incorrect answers when the correct answers were always obvious. A group of student volunteers took part in a vision test. Only one of the participants were genuine, the others were confederates. The participants were seated in a room and asked to look at 3 lines of different length and asked to state which line was the same length as the standard line.
Asch believed that conformity was a rational process and so wanted to assess if a minority would conform to a majority even if the majority was clearly wrong. Asch had participants carry out a line judgement task in which they had to indicate which of three comparison lines was closest to a standard line presented on two lines. Asch used 123 male student participants that were divided into groups of 7 to 9 seated around a table. In actuality, in the groups, only on of them was a participant (he was naive to this) and the rest were confederates – the participant was also always seated second to the end of the row so that he would not be the last to answer. The group were asked to indicate and on a signal from the researcher, the confederates would give unanimous wrong answers on 12 of the 18 trials for each experiment.
I think it is because of two basic reasons; firstly, as Tatum points out, one can relate better with peers of their own race because they too understand the difficulties of being a minority. I think she really made a great point, how can we expect a white person to understand the racism towards African Americans. Ms. Tatum gave an example regarding a 9th grade substitute teacher suggesting four-year colleges to all her white students and suggesting that a black adolescent male in her class go to a community college. It would be almost silly for that African American boy to sympathize with one of the white peers, not only would it be hard to relate to each other, it would be downright embarrassing. I actually think that the white teenager wouldn’t be able to see why the colored boy was hurt, they would just brush it off and give an explanation like “oh the teacher didn’t mean it like that”.
Black males perform more poorly on literacy test than do other students. Starting from an early age, it has become known that Black males are confronted with a series of barriers that make it more challenging for them to achieve academic and social success. The story David shared was dealing with six friends that was able to help us understand not only the ways in which Black males are literacies, but also the whys and how’s Black males had to deal with life as a African American. He spoke about being silence which means having little to no voice to be able to speak your opinion or views on things. David Kirkland states that, “We need silence to be able to reach our Self.
“Hard Times” Studs Terkel wrote the book, “Hard Times”, to get the American people of what it was like from every situation during the great depression. Terkel called in a memory book in by doing so it just didn’t have historical statistic proof but it showed emotion in each interviewee. It was where some of his colleagues’ shared hurtful memories while other expressed exhilaration, sometimes both. Terkel shared some of his experiences as well. He could not remember the black day of October but he does manage to have blur images he can put together of that horrific day.
Asch Study Asch (1951) devised what is now regarded as a classic experiment in social psychology, whereby there was an obvious answer to a line judgment task. If the participant gave an incorrect answer it would be clear that this was due to group pressure. Aim: Solomon Asch (1951) led an experiment to investigate the extent to which social pressure from a majority group could affect a person to conform. Procedure: Asch used a lab experiment to study conformity, where 50 male students from America participated in a ‘vision test’. Using a line judgment task, Asch put a naive participant in a room with seven confederates.
They conformed to the majority, this was normative social influence. Sherif(1935)researched whether people are influenced by others when they are doing an ambiguous task. He carried out a experiment with a repeated measures design. He used a visual illusion called the autokinetic effect, where a stationary spot of light, viewed in a dark room, appears to move. Participants were falsely told that the experimenter would move the light.
Younger children believe that cheating is wrong but that it is acceptable in some instances. In elementary school children break or bend the rules to win games against their peers. But as they get older- around junior high- they begin cheating on academic work. “Cheating peeks in high school when about 75%of students admit to some kind of academic misgivings”. In schools cheating has become so socially acceptable that students think that it is okay to cheat.