Conformity vs. Authority

Argue as to why you would argue for conformity or why you would argue for authority. Make notes evaluating the intrapersonal and interpersonal processes that align with these concepts. Also, explain why you would not use the unchosen one. Please include in-text citations and references when appropriate.

Conformity is one of the effects of the impact of others on our emotions, feelings and behaviors. Obedience to authority is another type of social influence. Obedience is a change in the actions of a person in order to comply with an authority figure's demand. People always comply with the request because they are worried about the repercussions if they do not comply with it. In order to explain this phenomenon, we are analyzing another classical experiment in social psychology. The finding that conformity is more likely to occur when responses are public than when they are private is the reason that government elections require secret voting, so that we are not coerced by others. The influence of Asch can easily be seen in children when they have to vote for something publicly. For example, if the teacher asks if the children would like to have extra recess, no homework, or candy when a few children vote, the others would comply and go with the majority. In another class, the plurality would be allowed to vote differently, and most of the children would comply with that majority. If anyone changes the vote, whether it is done in public versus private, this is known as compliance. Compliance can be a type of conformity. Compliance is compatible with a request or a request, even though you do not agree with the request. In the Asch experiments, the participants were satisfied by giving the wrong answers, but privately they did not agree that the obvious wrong answers were right. Several variants of the original Milgram experiment were performed to assess the limits of obedience. If some aspects of the scenario shifted, the participants were less likely to continue to generate shocks. For example, when the setting up of the experiment was relocated to the office building, the number of participants with the highest shock fell to 48%. When the learner was in the same room as the instructor, the highest shock rate fell to 40%. When the hands of teachers and learners were touching, the highest shock rate fell to 30%. When the researcher made the orders by phone, the rate fell to 23 percent. These variations indicate that when the humanity of the individual being shocked increased, obedience decreased. Similarly, when the authority of the experimenter reduced, so did obedience.