Conformity, Deviation, and a General Theory of Interpersonal Behavior.

Bass, Bernard M.

doi:10.1037/11122-003

“…by year of pUblication. The number published before 1950, between 1950and 1954, and between 1955were as follows: 6, 31, and 46 (Allen, 1965); 32, 31,and 68 (Bass, 1961);16, 39, and 78 (Blake & Mouton, 1961); and 21, 36, and 68 (Campbell, 1961). Incidentally, the answers which you and the other advanced high school and college students gave to this test during the first testing session have been tabulated.…”

Section: Suspicion Can Of Course Be Enhanced By Communication Amongmentioning

confidence: 99%

Suspicion of deception: Implications for conformity research.

Stricker

¹

,

Messick

²

,

Jackson

³

1967

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Subjects' suspicions were appraised about two conformity procedures--a simulated-group version of the Asch situation and questionnaires with fictitious norms~Many subjects suspected that the purpose of both procedures was to determine whether their responses would be influenced by others, that they did not hear spontaneous responses by others in the simulated group, and that the normative answers reported on the questionnaires were incorrect.Boys were generally more suspicious than girlso The suspicion variables were highly interrelated for both sexes and, in general, negatively related to conformity measures. Correlates of the suspicion variables included acquiescence and SD response styles, ascendance, self-esteem, and intelligence. Suspicion of Deception: Implications for Conformity Research lDeception is a widely used tactic in current psychological research 0 The deceptions take a variety of forms and are fre~uently involved in the explanation of the purpose of the study, in the feedback given to the subject, and in the descriptions of the other participants, and of the mechanics of the experiment. Certain kinds of studies, particularly in the areas of personality and social psychology, routinely use some form of deception. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine how some phenomena could be investigated otherwise.The study of conformity in particular is steeped in deception. Since the inception of these studies at the turn of the century (Bridges, 1914;Brown, 1916;Munsterberg, 1914;Terman, 1904), investigators have been concerned about the plausibility of the deceptions that they employed and have sometimes attempted to assess their effectiveness. However, in common with deception studies in other areas, such appraisals are the exception rather than the rUle, and those that are made are often rather superficial (Stricker, 1966). In view of the important role of deception in conformity research, a systematic evaluation of its usefulness is imperative.The purpose of the present study was to assess the extent of SUbjects' suspicions about deceptions and to determine some of the characteristics of suspicious subjects, using data about SUbjects' suspicions that were routinely obtained in the course of a large study of conformity. Method SubjectsThe sample consisted of 190 paid volunteers, 101 males and 89 females, who were either in the 11th or 12th grades of high school or had just graduated,

show abstract

“…It is difficult to determine whether the extent of suspicion observed in this study is atypical. Comparatively few studies report such data and, although the vast research on conformity has been extensively reviewed (Allen, 1965;Bass, 1961;Blake &Mouton, 1961;Campbell, 1961), the reviews have not been concerned with this issue. However, some bench marks can be obtained by examining several classic studies, each representing a somewhat different approach to the investigation of conformity.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Suspicion of Deception: Implications for Conformity Research1

Stricker

¹

,

Messick

²

,

Jackson

³

1966

ETS Research Bulletin Series

1

0

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Subjects' suspicions were appraised about two conformity procedures--a simulated-group version of the Asch situation and questionnaires with fictitious norms~Many subjects suspected that the purpose of both procedures was to determine whether their responses would be influenced by others, that they did not hear spontaneous responses by others in the simulated group, and that the normative answers reported on the questionnaires were incorrect.Boys were generally more suspicious than girlso The suspicion variables were highly interrelated for both sexes and, in general, negatively related to conformity measures. Correlates of the suspicion variables included acquiescence and SD response styles, ascendance, self-esteem, and intelligence. Suspicion of Deception: Implications for Conformity Research lDeception is a widely used tactic in current psychological research 0 The deceptions take a variety of forms and are fre~uently involved in the explanation of the purpose of the study, in the feedback given to the subject, and in the descriptions of the other participants, and of the mechanics of the experiment. Certain kinds of studies, particularly in the areas of personality and social psychology, routinely use some form of deception. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine how some phenomena could be investigated otherwise.The study of conformity in particular is steeped in deception. Since the inception of these studies at the turn of the century (Bridges, 1914;Brown, 1916;Munsterberg, 1914;Terman, 1904), investigators have been concerned about the plausibility of the deceptions that they employed and have sometimes attempted to assess their effectiveness. However, in common with deception studies in other areas, such appraisals are the exception rather than the rUle, and those that are made are often rather superficial (Stricker, 1966). In view of the important role of deception in conformity research, a systematic evaluation of its usefulness is imperative.The purpose of the present study was to assess the extent of SUbjects' suspicions about deceptions and to determine some of the characteristics of suspicious subjects, using data about SUbjects' suspicions that were routinely obtained in the course of a large study of conformity. Method SubjectsThe sample consisted of 190 paid volunteers, 101 males and 89 females, who were either in the 11th or 12th grades of high school or had just graduated, -2-All of the girls were from Princeton, N. J., while 62 of the boys were from Princeton, N. J., and 39 were from Pennington, N. J., a similar neighboring town.ProceduresThere were three data-gathering sessions. The first and third sessions involved group-administered procedures, and the second session involved simulated-group laboratory procedures. In the first session, a self-report personality inventory containing response style and content scales was given together with instruments containing the items used in the conformity measures, administered with standard test-taking instructions. At the second session, subjec...

show abstract

“…This is because the informational and normative pressures of Personality and Co-Witness Suggestibility 6 conformity are heavily mediated by the interpersonal characteristics of the targeted individual (Cialdini & Goldstein, 2004;Glomb & Liao, 2003;Heerdink, van Kleef, Homan, & Fischer, 2013); due to the exchanging of information between individuals being a highly social interaction (Gabbert, Memon, Allan, & Wright, 2004) and the act of conformity being an interpersonal behaviour (Bass, 1960). The relationship between interpersonal characteristics and co-witness suggestibility was demonstrated by Wright and colleagues, who found that individuals with higher levels of social anxiety were more vulnerable to being influenced by a co-witness during memory recall, due to a greater fear of negative evaluation ).…”

Section: Predicting Co-witness Suggestibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Personality Correlates of Co-Witness Suggestibility

Mojtahedi

¹

,

Ιωάννου

²

,

Hammond

³

2017

Journal of Forensic Psychology Research and Practice

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The present study examined the relationship between co-witness suggestibility and individual differences in interpersonal characteristics. Participants (N=473) took part in an eyewitness simulation, five independent conditions were used to control for misinformation size. Using confederates, the researchers exposed participants to misinformation about the witnessed event, prior to collecting their statements. The participants then completed the Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation-Behaviour assessment (FIRO-B; Schutz, 1958), a measure of expressed and wanted control, affection, and inclusion. Results suggested that the wanted control dimension was an accurate predictor of co-witness suggestibility.Eyewitnesses who scored highly on Wanted Control, were significantly more likely to accept misinformation from co-witnesses; and were more likely to lose confidence in their own judgements, after a group discussion. In addition, the results suggest that the unanimity of misinformation, but not the size, had a significant influence on co-witness suggestibility.

show abstract

Conformity, Deviation, and a General Theory of Interpersonal Behavior.

Cited by 29 publications

References 64 publications

Suspicion of deception: Implications for conformity research.

Suspicion of deception: Implications for conformity research.

Suspicion of Deception: Implications for Conformity Research1

Personality Correlates of Co-Witness Suggestibility

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About