User:Jackdawgirl/sandbox

We are at Boston University

Conformity is the tendency to change our perceptions, opinions, or behaviors in ways that are consistent with group norms. Norms are implicit, specific rules, shared by a group of individuals, that guide their interactions with others. People often choose to conform to society rather than to pursue personal desires - because it is often easier to follow the path others have made already, rather than forging a new one.

The process of changing our behaviors to match the responses of others can be conscious or not. People have an intrinsic tendency to unconsciously imitate other’s behaviors such as gesture, language, taking speed and other actions of the people they interact with. Except for this intrinsic tendency to imitate others, there are two main reasons for conformity: informational influence and normative influence.

People display conformity in response to informational influence when they believe the group is better informed, or in response to normative influence when they are afraid of the consequences of rejection.

Major factors influence the degree of conformity include culture, gender, age, size of the group, situational factors, and different stimuli. But minority influence, a special case of informational influence, can resist the pressure to conform and influence the majority to accept the minority's belief or behaviors.

Size of the group
Although conformity pressures generally increase as the size of the majority increases, Asch's experiment in 1956 suggests that increasing the size of the group will have no additional impact beyond a majority of size three. Brown and Byrne’s 1997 study suggest a possible explanation that people may suspect collusion when the majority exceeds three or four.

Moreover, a study suggests that the effects of group size depend on the type of social influence operating. This means that in situations where the group is clearly wrong, conformity will be motivated by normative influence; the participants will conform in order to be accepted by the group. A participant may not feel much pressure to conform when the first person gives an incorrect response. However, conformity pressure will increase as each additional group member also gives the same incorrect response.