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Social Psychology
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Research Examining Conformity
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tutor2u Full Lesson PowerPoint
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Social Psychology
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Lesson Objectives:
 To outline Jenness’ (1932) research on conformity.
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 To replicate and outline Asch’s (1951) research on conformity.
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Guess The Number Of Sweets In The Jar…
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 Task: ON YOUR OWN & WITHOUT DISCUSSING YOUR ANSWER, write
down how many skittles you think are in the jar on my desk, on the
post-it note provided.
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Guess The Number Of Sweets In The Jar…
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 Task: Now, rewrite your
own estimate on the same
post-it note.
 Did you change your
original estimate? If so, by
how much?
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Estimate
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Group
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 Task: Now as a group, discuss how many skittles are in the jar and
write your group estimate on a mini-whiteboard.
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Jenness (1932)
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There were 347
skittles in the jar.
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Jenness (1932)
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 Jenness (1932) was one of the first psychologists to study
conformity. His experiment used an ambiguous situation involving a
glass bottle filled with beans. He asked participants individually to
estimate how many beans the bottle contained.
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 Jenness then put the group in a room with
the bottle, and asked them to provide a
group estimate through discussion.
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 Question: What do you think Jenness (1932)
found?
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Jenness (1932)
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 Jenness found that nearly all participants changed their original
answer when they were provided with another opportunity to estimate
the number of beans in the glass bottle.
Females
925
878
382
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Males
Average estimate before
790
Average estimate after
695
Average change
256
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Maths Question: Calculate the
% change in estimations before
and after, for both males and
females.
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Jenness (1932)
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 Jenness then interviewed the participants individually again, and asked
if they would like to change their original estimates, or stay with the
group's estimate. Almost all changed their individual guesses to be
closer to the group estimate.
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 Task: Answer the two questions on your handout.
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Asch (1951)
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Asch (1951) – Replication
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 Task: You will be divided into two groups. Your task is to reproduce
Asch’s (1951) research on conformity. You will then have 20 minutes
to put together your performance which must ACCURATELY portray
the research.
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 You will then perform your version of Asch’s (1951) research and look
for errors in each other’s performances.
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 An accurate outline of the Asch method can
be found on your handout.
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 How accurate were you…
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Asch (1951) – Replication…
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 Task: While watching the performance, make a note of ANY
inaccuracies with their replication.
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Asch (1951)
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Evaluating Asch
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 Outline and evaluate research into conformity. (12 marks)
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 Task: Try to come up with 4-5 evaluation points for Asch’s study.
Consider the method, ethics and application to everyday life…
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Evaluating Asch
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Be ready to share
your point in 3
minutes!
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 Task: Now select one of the points bullet-pointed and write one
‘perfect’ burger paragraph.
3 Minutes
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A Level Psychology Support from tutor2u
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and Students. Join our resource-sharing communities on Facebook and make
full use of our resources on the free tutor2u Psychology Channel.
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Facebook Groups:
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Research Examining Conformity
Jenness (1932) was one of the first psychologists to study conformity. His experiment used
an ambiguous situation involving a glass bottle filled with beans. He asked participants
individually to estimate how many beans the bottle contained.
Jenness then put the group in a room with the bottle, and asked them to provide a group
estimate through discussion.
Average change
256
382
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Jenness found that nearly all participants changed their original answer when they were
provided with another opportunity to estimate the number of beans in the glass bottle.
Males
Females
Maths Question: Calculate the %
change in estimations before and
Average estimate before
790
925
after, for both males and females.
Average estimate after
695
878
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PL
Task: Do you think the results are due to normative/informational social influence, and
why?
Is this an example of compliance, identification or internalisation, and why?
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Asch (1951)
Procedure: Asch’s sample consisted of 123 male students from three different colleges in the
USA, who believed they were taking part in a vision test. Asch used a line judgement task,
where he placed one naïve participant in a room with seven to nine confederates (actors),
who had agreed their answers in advance. The naïve participant was deceived and was led to
believe that the other seven to nine people were also real participants. The naive participant
was always seated second from last. In turn, each person had to say out loud which line (A, B
or C) was most like the target line in length. The correct answer was always clear. Each
participant completed 18 trials and the confederates gave the same incorrect answer on 12
trials, called critical trials. Asch wanted to see if the real participant would conform to the
majority view, even when the answer was clearly incorrect.
Results: Asch measured the number of times each participant conformed to the majority
view. On average, the real participants conformed to the incorrect answers on 32% of the
critical trials. 74% of the participants conformed on at least one critical trial and 26% of the
participants never conformed.
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Group 2
How accurate was their performance; were
there any errors with their replication?
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Asch (1951) – Replication
Group 1
How accurate was their performance; were
there any errors with their replication?
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Outline and evaluate research into conformity (12 marks)
Task: Try to come up with 4-5 evaluation points for Asch’s study. Consider the method,
ethics and application to everyday life…
 Evaluation Point 1

Evaluation Point 2

Evaluation Point 3

Evaluation Point 4

Evaluation Point 5
Explain
Evidence/
Example
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Point
Task: Now select one of the points bullet-pointed and write one ‘perfect’ burger paragraph.
© tutor2u AQA A Level Psychology Handout
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