Asch Conformity

Solomon E Asch was a Polish gestalt psychologist and an important part of social psychology. Asch’s contribution to the studies of conformity was immense and he was considered a pioneer to social psychology.In the early 50’s Asch performed some psychological experiments which tested how social pressure would be able to affect an individual’s will to conform and individual levels of conformity where many people were found out to have shown signs of conforming (Crane, 2012). Through Asch’s advancements, we have come to know the Asch Paradigm which lays the foundation of conformity. According to Asch and his many studies, conformity is rewarded to a great extent with many social benefits. When an individual chooses to conform, they do so in

In that study, a participant that had eventually conformed stated that he was wrong and that the rest of the people were right which can be seen as the individual doubting himself. Based on that statement from the participant, another reward is that conforming can protect oneself from doubting themselves and can lead to confidence. In figure 3.3 of Opinions and Social Pressures, there are a series of photos associated with the experiment being performed. In the figure, the outlier of the group is described as distraught and under stress; “he shows the strain of repeatedly disagreeing”. In this instance, conforming can lead to prevention of straining one’s self and the prevention of being under stress and being distraught. As in most of Asch’s experiments regarding conformity, the participant that is subject to conform is almost always quiet and shy with their differing opinions/views, but those in the ingroup are open and free with theirs. Based on that, conformity is also rewarding by allowing the person that has conformed to be free and open with their opinion rather than holding it back in fear of being isolated and/or loathed. “What you don’t know, won’t hurt you” is a well known saying that can be applied to conformity’s rewards in Asch’s experiments. By conforming, an individual may be spacing themselves from a truth which they may not

(Effects of Group Pressure, 1951) Asch had written about two subjects in an experiment of his in which one of them had maintained who he was with stress whilst the other yielded to conforming. While the former man reacted calmly throughout the experiment, the latter man was experiencing loss in confidence in himself after conforming. This finding shows that conformity can be discouraged since excessive social pressure can possibly lead to the individual under pressure to experience loss in self confidence. Asch has also stated that conformity is discouraged by the presence of a supporting partner since the presence of a supporting partner immensely brought down the social pressure. Based on that, we can safely say that conformity is only encouraged when not done in a place where a supporting partner is available where it is otherwise