Module 1: Social Influence
Instructor Notes
This module focuses on the social influence that leads individuals, sometimes against their will, to adopt and adhere to the opinions and behaviours of others. We will consider both conformity and leadership. We’ll look at the potential benefits of conforming to others but also consider the costs of doing so. And we will also consider which people are most likely to conform.
This week contains a number of “Major Points” with videos and discussion and assignment prompts to support the topics. This chapter contains an abundance of content. As an instructor, you will want to choose just 1 or 2 videos and perhaps just a few of the “Major Points” to cover and meet the learning outcomes of your course. You may wish to reference the “How to use this Resource” section for ideas on how to tailor your course offering.
Readings
Chapter 6: Influencing and Conforming in Principles of Social Psychology – 1st H5P International Edition.
Teaching Materials
- Major Points
- Selected video presentations (choose 1 or 2)
- Class Discussion
Student Tasks
- Online Discussion forum
- Assignment: Conformity
- Chapter Quiz (Available upon request)
Major Points
- Power of the social situation
- Mere presence of others
- Social facilitation
- Social inhibition
- Social loafing
- Bystander effect
- Deindividuation
- Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment
- Anonymity and decreased awareness
- Conformity: Social norms
- Asch’s Line Experiment
- Minority influence
- Situational determinants of conformity
- Normative and Informational pressure
- Persuasion
- Source, Message, Audience
- Central and Peripheral routes of persuasion
- Obedience
- Milgram’s “shocking” experiment
- Factors determining level of obedience
Videos
YouTube
Asch’s Conformity Study by Parker Bourassa is licensed under a CC BY 3.0 License. (4:23)
The Stanford Prison Experiment by GoodpixelProductions is licensed under a CC BY 3.0 License. (13:40)
Milgram Obedience Study by Iqbal Baryar is licensed under a CC BY 3.0 License. (9:53)
Major Experiments in Social psychology by Learn Some is licensed under a CC BY 3.0 License. (14:07)
National Film Board of Canada
The following video, Captive Minds: Hypnosis and Beyond is available to educators. Create your CAMPUS account to generate a link to the National Film Board of Canada. The video is also embedded below on this page.
‘Captive Minds: Hypnosis and Beyond’, ‘Pierre’ ‘Lasry’, provided by the National Film Board of Canada is available for non-commercial use and classes under 150 participants. (55:48)
Ted Talks
Phillip Zimbardo: The Psychology of Evil is licensed under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International License. (22:58)
Nicholas Christakis: The Hidden Influence of Social Networks is licensed under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International License. (17:59)
Discussion
Examples
Watch the TED Talk “The hidden influence of social network”. The speaker gives several examples of human traits which are affected by the social networks; e.g., obesity, happiness. https://www.ted.com/talks/nicholas_christakis_the_hidden_influence_of_social_networks
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- Think of an attribute you believe is least affected by our social network.
- Post this on Discussion Forum providing your reasons why you believe it is the least affected trait
- Respond to TWO other posts indicating if you agree or disagree and why
Assignment
Assignment: Conformity
Think of two examples in your life when you conformed– went along- with the false majority, knowing fully well that you really did not want to. Integrating past psychological experiments and theories, briefly outline psychological factors that may explain why you conformed.
Content Attributions
The instructor notes are adapted from Principles of Social Psychology – 1st International H5P Edition by Dr. Rajiv Jhangiani and Dr. Hammond Tarry which is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.