SOCIAL
INFLUENCE:
Conformity, Social Roles, and Obedience
SOCIAL INFLUENCE:
How an individual’s thoughts,
feelings, and behaviors respond to
their social world, including
tendencies to conform to others,
follow social rules, and obey
authority figures.
WHAT TYPE OF SOCIAL
INFLUENCE EXIST?
Implicit expectations: are unspoken rules. Like the
unwritten laws and are enforced by group norms.
Explicit expectations: Clearly and formally stated expectations
for social behavior.
IMPLICIT EXPECTATIONS
Conformity: A type of implicit social influence where individuals
voluntarily change their behavior to imitate the behavior of
others.
Social roles: A type of implicit social influence regarding how
certain people are supposed to look and behave.
EXPLICIT EXPECPTATIONS
Compliance: A type of explicit social influence where an
individual behaves in response to a direct or indirect request.
Obedience: A type of explicit social influence where individuals
behave in a particular way because someone of higher status
ordered them to do so.
SOCIAL NORMS AND THE HERD MENTALITY
Social norms: Rules that indicate how people are expected
to behave in particular social situations.
Herd mentality: The tendency to blindly follow the direction
your group is moving toward; when group norms encourage
individuals to conform to those around them, especially
when it comes to their beliefs.
CONFORMING IS CONTAGIOUS
Social contagion: The spontaneous distribution of ideas,
attitudes, and behaviors among larger groups of people.
Mass psychogenic illness: A form of social contagion where
physical symptoms of an illness appear within a cohesive social
group, although the illness appears to have no physical cause.
example: The Tanganyikan Laughter Epidemic.
WHY AND WHEN DO WE CHOOSE
TO CONFORM?
Theory of informational and normative influence: The idea that there are
two ways that social norms cause conformity (see informational social
influence and normative social influence).
Informational social influence: When individuals voluntarily conform to
group standards because they are uncertain about the correct answer or
behavior.
Auto-kinetic effect: An optical illusion that occurs when an individual
perceives a stationary object as moving due to natural, intermittent
movements of the eyes.
WHY AND WHEN DO WE CHOOSE
TO CONFORM?
Public conformity: Conforming thoughts or behaviors shared
with others; these actions may not be genuinely endorsed (see
private conformity).
Private conformity: Conforming thoughts or behaviors that are
kept to oneself and are felt genuinely by the individual (see
public conformity).
GENERATIONAL INFLUENCE ON
CONFORMITY
Generational influence: A cultural belief or norm that
transcends the replacement of people; when individuals
continue to conform even when the originator of the
behavior is no longer present.
NORMATIVE SOCIAL INFLUENCE
When individuals publicly conform to gain social acceptance and
avoid rejection.
NORMATIVE SOCIAL INFLUENCE
Two types of norms:
Descriptive norm: What an individual perceives to be the behavior of
most people in a specific situation; what most people do, or what is
commonly done.
Injunctive norm: What an individual perceives to be the socially
acceptable behavior in a specific situation; what is socially
sanctioned, or what society says people are supposed to do.
SOCIAL ROLES
How do Social Roles change our
behavior?
"knowing what to do when you wake up in the
morning"
Social roles tell us how to act (think, feel, and
behave)
Deindividuation- a psychological process that
occurs when self-awareness is replaced by a
social role or group identity,resulting in loss of
individuality
ANONYMITY
IS THE STATE OF BEING UNIDENTIFIED OR UNRECOGNIZED, WHERE A PERSON'S
IDENTITY IS HIDDEN OR NOT REVEALED.
ANONYMITY ENCOURAGES
DEINDIVIDUATION
ENCOURAGES DEINDIVIDUATION BY MAKING INDIVIDUALS FEEL LESS IDENTIFIABLE,
LEADING THEM TO ACT IN WAYS THEY WOULDN'T IN A MORE PERSONAL OR
ACCOUNTABLE SETTING
LOWER SELF-AWARENESS
IS A REDUCTION IN AN INDIVIDUAL'S ATTENTION TO THEIR THOUGHTS, FEELINGS, AND
ACTIONS, OFTEN LEADING TO LESS SELF-REGULATION.
SOCIAL DISINHIBITION
IS THE REDUCTION OF SOCIAL INHIBITIONS, WHERE INDIVIDUALS ENGAGE IN
BEHAVIORS THEY WOULD TYPICALLY AVOID IN A SOCIAL CONTEXT.
CLOTHING CAN FACILITATE PARTICULAR
SOCIAL ROLES
Clothing on Social Roles
by signaling a person's position or status within a group, such as
uniforms indicating authority or professionalism.
Clothes that prime Positive and Negative Social Roles
What about good social roles?
-Johnson and Downing (1979) wondered more specifically whether clothing could
prime both antisocial behavior and prosocial behavior.
CLOTHING CAN FACILITATE PARTICULAR
SOCIAL ROLES
Clothes that prime Positive and Negative Social Roles
ANONYMITY THAT ENCOURAGES INTIMACY
ANONYMOUS CONNECTION
-Interactions where individuals remain unidentified, fostering
openness and trust.
STANLEY MILGRAM: THE MAN BEHIND THE
CONTROVERSY
Stanley Milgram (1933–1984) was deeply influenced by
the Holocaust and sought to understand how ordinary
people could commit atrocities.
His research aimed to explore the power of authority and
obedience in shaping human behavior.
Inspired by Adolf Eichmann’s trial, where Eichmann
claimed he was "just following orders," Milgram wanted to
test whether people obey harmful orders simply due to
authority.
THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT
WWII raised psychological questions about obedience, leading social
psychologists to study how individuals conform to authority.
Earlier research on social influence, such as Solomon Asch’s
conformity studies, showed people conformed to group pressure
even when the answer was clearly wrong.
Milgram extended this by investigating obedience to direct orders,
particularly when those orders led to harming others.
THE STUDY’S PROCEDURE
Participants were recruited for a "memory study" at Yale University and were paid for participation.
They were assigned the role of "Teacher," while an actor (confederate) played the "Learner."
The Teacher was instructed to administer electric shocks for incorrect answers, increasing in
voltage from 15 to 450 volts.
The shocks were not real, but participants believed they were.
If participants hesitated, the experimenter used verbal prods such as:
1. "Please continue."
2. "The experiment requires that you continue."
3. "It is absolutely essential that you continue."
4. "You have no other choice, you must go on."
Results: 65% of participants continued to the maximum voltage of 450 volts.
THE PATH TO DISOBEDIENCE
Not all participants obeyed blindly; some resisted.
Disobedience followed a process:
1. Inner doubt – Participants felt uneasy about harming the Learner.
2. Public dissent – Some voiced their concerns to the experimenter.
3. Direct confrontation – A few openly challenged authority.
4. Disobedience – Some ultimately refused to continue.
Example: One participant, an industrial engineer, stopped at 255
volts, stating, “I do have a choice. If I have to hurt somebody to do
that, I can’t continue.”
ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS
Deception: Participants were misled about the true purpose of the study.
Psychological harm: Many participants showed signs of extreme stress, with
some displaying nervous laughter or even having emotional breakdowns.
Lack of proper debriefing: Critics argue that Milgram downplayed the distress
caused and did not debrief all participants effectively.
Impact on research ethics: The controversy surrounding Milgram’s study led
to stricter ethical guidelines in psychology, including the establishment of
Institutional Review Boards (IRBs).
BEYOND OBEDIENCE: SACRIFICING
FOR A HIGHER CAUSE
Engaged Followership Hypothesis: Some researchers argue that participants
were not just blindly obedient but believed in the legitimacy of the
experiment’s scientific goal.
Sacrificing for a “Noble” Cause: Participants justified their actions as
contributing to valuable scientific knowledge, similar to how individuals may
commit harmful acts in the name of a cause they perceive as greater than
themselves.
Historical Parallels: Nazi officers, such as Adolf Eichmann, believed they were
performing necessary duties rather than committing crimes.
TWO INTERPRETATIONS OF MILGRAM
—AND OF THE HOLOCAUST
OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY
Milgram believed people obey due to social structures that
require authority to maintain order.
Societies function because people follow rules, such as traffic
laws or government regulations.
In extreme cases, this tendency to obey can lead to harmful
actions when the authority figure promotes immoral behavior.
TWO INTERPRETATIONS OF MILGRAM
—AND OF THE HOLOCAUST
ENGAGED FOLLOWERSHIP (BELIEF IN A CAUSE)
Some participants saw themselves as contributing to a meaningful
cause (scientific advancement).
This interpretation suggests that people justify harmful actions if they
believe they serve a higher purpose.
This idea extends beyond Milgram’s study to historical atrocities,
where perpetrators believed they were fulfilling an important mission.
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