![CONFORMITY
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permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use.
249
members, will talk about what happened in the discussion at the conclusion of the exercise. Instruct the
observers to discuss their observations honestly—except that they should not say anything indicating
that the deviant was a confederate until you reveal this.
Post-discussion discussion. When the group has finished its discussion and completed the
questionnaire (Handout 7.1d), have the discussants sit with the rest of the class and begin a general
discussion of the group dynamics observed. Ask the observers to note anything they thought was
interesting or noteworthy about the discussion or the group dynamics. Ask the discussants to indicate
how they felt the discussion went and whether or not they found anything interesting in the process or
content of the discussion. While this is going on, look at the responses given by the discussants on
Handout 7.1d, and calculate the proportion of the group members (excluding the confederate) who
picked the confederate as the least likeable group member. Also note which jobs they selected for the
confederate and which types of movies they thought the confederate would favor.
Chart the amount of time that the confederate talked during the first and second halves of the
discussion. One typical result is that the confederate speaks a lot during the first half of the discussion
because so much attention is directed toward the confederate, but then speaks much less during the
second half of the discussion when the others begin to ignore the confederate. This does not always
happen, however. We have seen many instances in which the other students never stop pressuring the
confederate during the discussion, and we have seen a few instances in which the group rejects the
confederate quite early in the discussion and ignores him or her throughout. Ask both the observers and
the discussants to comment on what happened in this particular instance.
Report the results of the questionnaire. Did the group members tend to dislike the confederate? Did they
tend to assign the confederate jobs that would require little interaction with other people? What types of
movies did they think the confederate would like? Are there any interesting patterns in these inferences
and evaluations? (Because of ethical considerations, don’t reveal the responses made about any of the
other discussants.)
To the extent that the group had “ganged up” on the confederate, ask them why they did this and how
they felt during it. Ask them why they tried to reach a consensus even though they had never been
instructed to do so. If the group members did not spend much time trying to persuade the confederate,
ask them why they did not. If not revealed yet, tell the group members about the confederate. Be sure to
emphasize that the confederate had been coached about what to say and how to say it, and that the rest
of the students should not commit the fundamental attribution error (Ch. 4) and infer that the
confederate believes anything he or she said while playing the role of the deviant. Explain Schachter’s
(1951) study and its results. Compare the results of Schachter’s study with the results of this activity.
We often find that when the discussants initially offer their opinions about how to handle Bobby, they
tend to be fairly unsure of themselves. After all, they have just finished reading the case and had
virtually no time to consider the various options. And yet, after ten minutes of discussion, few students
change their opinions (that is, as long as their initial opinions were close to the majority opinions). If
this happens in your class, ask the discussants and observers to speculate about why it happened.
Discuss psychological reactance and ask the class to consider whether it played a role. Similarly,
discuss the power of making a public commitment to a position, and how it plays a role in many
important phenomena, such as in cognitive dissonance (Ch. 6), continuing to invest resources in a
failing course of action (Ch. 8 and Ch. 13), and in two-step compliance techniques such as the foot-in-
the-door (this chapter [Ch. 7]). Also, we have observed that very few groups discuss ways of handling
Bobby other than those mentioned on the kindness-punishment scale. The discussants are not told that
they have to stick to this scale when discussing the case, and yet almost all do. This is another example
of a norm that develops quickly and has a great deal of influence on the discussants.
Discuss how the conformity pressures exerted on a deviant in a real group situation are often much
greater than those observed in this activity because real groups would be more motivated to achieve](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-24-320.jpg)
![CHAPTER 7
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permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use.
256
Activity 7. Sequential Request Strategies
Handout 7.6 asks students to identify the sequential request strategy that is being used in various
scenarios from among these four strategies that are discussed in the text:
Foot in the door ⎯ where a small request is followed by a much larger one (Items 3 and 6)
Low-balling ⎯ where a secured agreement is followed by an enlarged request by revealing
hidden costs (Items 1 and 7)
Door in the face ⎯ where a rejected very large request is followed by a more reasonable one
(Items 5 and 8)
That’s not all ⎯ where a somewhat inflated request is immediately followed by a decrease in the
size of the request through an offer of a discount or bonus (Items 2 and 4)
What if this bombs? This activity is bombproof and presents an opportunity to stress the
similarities and differences between foot in the door and low-balling, and door in the face and
that’s not all.
Activity 8. Predictions and Inferences about Milgram’s Obedience
Research
This activity is designed to get students thinking about Milgram’s research, to help them appreciate
how surprising the results were, and to help raise points for discussion concerning the power of the
situation and the fundamental attribution error. This activity must be done before students have read
Chapter 7 or learned about Milgram’s research. If many of the students have learned about Milgram’s
research already, such as in a previous course, we recommend that you do not conduct this activity.
Procedure. Show the beginning of the film Obedience, which illustrates Milgram’s classic research on
obedience to authority. Show the film up to the point where the procedure has been explained fully and
the first participant shown in the film has refused to continue with the experiment. At this point, stop
the film and distribute copies of Table 7.4 from the text. This table lists the learner’s protests in the
experiment as a function of the level of shock. Explain to the students how after 330 volts the learner
would fall completely silent and not respond. Then, distribute copies of Handout 7.7a to the students.
This handout asks the students to make predictions about the results of the study depicted up to that
point in the film. Ask the students to complete the handout. When they have completed it, show the rest
of the film. At the conclusion of the film, distribute copies of Handout 7.7b. This handout asks the
students to make inferences about the participants in the research, and to indicate their perspective
concerning its ethics.
Discussion. Discuss the students’ predictions. What were the average predictions? To what degree did
the students underestimate the level of obedience found in the research? Calculate the averages
separately for those who had heard of or read about this research and those who had not. How accurate
were the former students? How accurate were the latter? Examine the averages for the questions on
Handout 7.7b. Having learned that most of the participants obeyed the commands of the experimenter
to the point of thinking that they might be doing great physical harm to the “learner,” do the students
appreciate the power of the situation enough that they admit that they might have done the same thing?
Few students do. Discuss this phenomenon with them. Explain the role of the fundamental attribution
error in these judgments. (As stated in Lecture/Discussion Idea 13, the fundamental attribution error
helps explain how observers of this research fail to appreciate how powerful the situational pressures on
the participants were, so they tend to attribute the participants’ behaviors to their dispositions rather
than to the situation. Consider assigning or summarizing articles by Bierbrauer [1979] or Safer [1980]
on this point—see Lecture/Discussion Idea 13.) Did the students tend to think that their classmates were](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-31-320.jpg)
![CHAPTER 7
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permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use.
258
in various situations involving conformity and compliance. Handout 7.8 lists a half-dozen different
scenarios. Select a scenario, and have each volunteer or group of volunteers (depending on the scenario)
come to the front of the class and play their role. Have the observers (i.e., the rest of the class) take
notes about the kinds of strategies used by the volunteers. If the class has read Chapter 7, ask the
students to examine whether the strategies involve normative influence, informational influence, the
norm of reciprocity, low-balling, etc. After the role playing has been completed, discuss the students’
observations, as well as the volunteers’ decisions about how to act, and ask the volunteers to describe
how they felt playing their roles. Discuss the probable effectiveness of these different strategies, and
explain what variables would make these strategies more or less likely to be effective.
What if this bombs? As long as you have the volunteers to do this activity, it is fairly
bombproof. The role-playing should be amusing as well as educational, and it should be very
effective in facilitating discussion. The only potential problem is if volunteers freeze and cannot
act out their parts. If you are concerned about this possibility, assign small groups of students for
each scenario, tell the group what the scenario is, and give them a few minutes to discuss their
strategies and to choose a confident person or persons from the group to act them out.
Activity 11. Demonstrations of Obedience in Class
Two ideas for activities designed to demonstrate how students are willing to obey seemingly irrational
commands by an instructor are detailed in the Activities Handbook for the Teaching of Psychology. The
first of these was proposed by Hunter (1981). In this exercise, the instructor (preferably a guest
instructor) should begin class by giving the students a series of instructions to change seats, stand up,
raise hands, etc. The goal of the activity is to demonstrate to students that they were willing to obey a
series of increasingly bizarre commands because of the authority they ascribed to the instructor. This
can be a good starting point for a discussion of research findings such as Milgram’s. Hunter details
points for discussion, including the ethics of this activity.
Lutsky (1987) presents another demonstration designed to illustrate the power of conformity and
obedience. The gist of this activity is that you should ask the students to write a paper about conformity
and obedience (Lutsky suggests that the paper be about Jonestown), and that during the class in which
the papers are due, you should tell the students to take out their papers and rip them up. Four
confederates should at this point rip up what appear to be their papers. If other students follow suit, you
should take note of this but then quickly tell the students to stop, and then distribute tape to allow the
students to repair their torn papers. Ask the students how many were about to rip up their papers, how
many were considering it, and how many were sure that they would not have ripped up their papers.
Lutsky reports that when he used this exercise in his class, a majority (64 percent) of the naive students
did or was just about to rip up their papers when he yelled “Stop!” to bring the activity to an end. Like
Hunter (1981), Lutsky details points for discussion—including ethics, among others.
We (the authors of this manual) are somewhat less comfortable doing either of these exercises in our
own classes, primarily out of concern about the potential ill-will caused by these kinds of manipulations
of students during class, but we know of others who have tried one or the other of these exercises quite
successfully.
What if this bombs? If the students resist the commands of the instructor, all is not lost because
this result would be an interesting point of departure for a discussion about factors that make
people more or less susceptible to obedience and conformity. What pressures were the students
feeling, and what gave them the courage to defy the commands? What kinds of changes to the
procedure might have made them obey? Would they have obeyed similar commands from a
different kind of instructor (e.g., older, colder, someone from a different course [who would not
be as much under suspicion that they might be running an “experiment” on them], etc.)?](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-33-320.jpg)
![herself at their feet, and, embracing their knees, besought them to
listen to her supplications; but the monsters only replied to her
entreaties by bursts of laughter; and, in spite of her prayers, and
sobs, and supplications, they carried her off with them.[186]
“Alas!” said Mlle. Baby, looking sorrowfully at the young officer,
“are you surprised now at my sadness, and that I could not smile
and be gay after having witnessed such a scene?”
“The demons!” exclaimed the officer, stamping his foot in horror
and indignation. “This infamous, bloodthirsty race should be
exterminated—exterminated to the last man. Why did I not know
this sooner? Yesterday, a Potawatamie came to my quarters to sell
some furs. He asked three times as much as they were worth, and I
declined buying them. He hung around for some time, annoying me
very much, until I finally ordered him to leave. He refused to do so;
then, losing all patience with the fellow, I rose from my seat, and,
leading him to the door, I kicked him out. He went away muttering,
and threatening me with his knife. I had a stick in my hand, and I
now regret that I did not knock him down.”
“How imprudent!” said the young girl. “You ought not to have
provoked that Indian; don’t you know that a savage never forgets an
injury? He may wander around the fort for a year, spying all of your
movements, watching your footsteps, tracking you everywhere,
hiding in the woods and among the rushes in the river, until an
opportunity offers, and he will approach with all the finesse and
cunning of a serpent, spring upon you like a tiger, and strike you a
death-blow, when you least expect it. I see that you go every day
out of the fort to fish on the banks of the river. I advise you not to
go any more; it is not safe, and something terrible might happen to
you.”
“Pshaw!” said the young officer, “you are too timid. I saw the
fellow leave this morning with a number of warriors belonging to his
tribe; they were going to Quebec to sell the furs, which they could
not dispose of here.”](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-37-320.jpg)
![to force open her mouth; but failing in their efforts, they threw the
contents of the vessel in her face, and left the house.[187]
VIII.—THE SERPENT.
Several months had elapsed since the events had taken place
which we have just narrated. It was night. In the centre of the
garden, a simple black cross had been erected on the spot where
the unfortunate young man had been massacred. No inscription
revealed to the passer-by either the name of the victim or the fatal
circumstances of his death. Alas! it was written for ever in characters
of blood on the hearts of the family. Every evening, the
superintendent, with his wife, children, and servants, assembled at
the foot of this cross, to pray for the repose of the soul of his
unfortunate friend. On this especial evening, all the family had as
usual visited the grave, and returned to the house, except the young
girl, who, dressed in deep mourning, still remained kneeling at the
foot of the sombre monument. She was very pale, and there was an
expression of the most ineffable sadness on her face. The evening
dew had almost entirely uncurled her long ringlets, which now hung
in disorder around her cheeks. You might have mistaken her for a
statue of grief. From the clear, high heaven above, the moon poured
floods of melancholy light. Its dreamy rays fell on the sod at the foot
of the cross and on the face of the young girl like a thought from
beyond the tomb—like a silent and grateful sigh from the innocent
victim whose memory had left so tender and anguishing an
impression in her soul. Her lips moved in ardent prayer—prayer, that
celestial solace of the grief-stricken heart, the smile of the angels
through the tears of earth. For a long time she thus silently held
communion with her God, breathing out her prayers with sighs and
tears, as she knelt at the foot of this cross, on the sod still damp
with the victim’s blood. At last she rose, and was about to leave,
when, raising her eyes for a moment, she thought she saw a shadow
moving across an opening in the wall of a shed near by. A cloud, at
that moment passing over the moon, prevented her from](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-44-320.jpg)
![distinguishing what the object was. She waited a moment until the
cloud had passed over, when what was her astonishment to see a
human face in the aperture! It must be a robber, she thought, and
yet she knew positively that the gate was well secured. “He will find
himself nicely caught when the servants come to lock up,” said she
to herself. By degrees, however, the head was pushed more and
more through the air-hole, and gradually emerged from the
obscurity. At the same moment, the moonlight fell clear and full on
the face. The young girl actually shivered. She recognized it but too
well; it was impossible to be mistaken. It was he; she recognized
perfectly his copper skin, his hard, ferocious features, and his
yellowish eyes, rolling in their sockets. It was indeed the
Potawatamie, the murderer of the young officer.[188]
Her first thought was flight, but an invincible curiosity fastened
her to the spot. The Indian continued to work through the aperture;
one arm was already out, and he held something in his hand which
she could not discern. He tried for a long time to get through the air-
hole, which was too small for his body. Finally, while making a last
effort, he suddenly turned his head, and fixed his eyes with a very
uneasy expression on a little bush near him. He seemed undecided
what to do; then, letting go the object, he rested his hand on the
ground, and, pushing it against the earth with all his strength, tried
to force himself back again through the hole. But his broad
shoulders, compressed on both sides by the wall, held him like a
vice, and he could neither move one way nor another. Then his
uneasiness increased, and he looked again anxiously toward the
bushes. A slight rustling of the leaves was then perceptible, and a
small head emerged slowly from the shadow of the branches, and
extended itself toward the savage. It was a rattlesnake.[189]
Immovable and with fixed eyes, the Indian watched the least
movement of the reptile, which advanced softly and cautiously, as if
aware of the strength and power of his redoubtable adversary. When
within a few feet of the savage, it stopped, raised itself up, and,
throwing out its forked tongue, sprang toward his face; but, before
he could touch him, the Indian, as quick as thought, gave him a](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-45-320.jpg)
![If a person want a confessor, he pulls the wire connected with
the church. If a lady desires advice, another pull opens the parlors to
her. If a priest wishes to come from the convent, another pull in
another direction is necessary. And as these pulls (except in the last
case) are invariably followed by a message sent through a speaking-
tube by the same brother porter, to inform the priest of the fact that
he is wanted; and as through the before-mentioned glass door and
otherwise he receives all letters, and answers all queries, both from
within and without, he has, I take it, a pretty hard time of it.
I had been too much absorbed at first to observe what was
taking place around me; but, after a little, I began to remark that
the priests, in passing to and fro through the conciergerie, bestowed
upon me more glances of earnest inquiry than I thought my
personal appearance actually warranted. At last the mystery was
solved by one father being so good as to tell me that seculars
generally waited in the parlors. I bowed, thanked him gratefully, and
went; but not before I had discovered that, if the pigeon-holes for
letters be a true test, there were fourteen or more priests resident in
the Rue de Sèvres at that particular time.
I was not sorry for the exchange of place. It was strangely
interesting to be sitting in those rooms where, so short a time since,
the Communists, under the command of an energetic young
gentleman named Citoyen Lagrange, took prisoner the good
Superior Father Olivaint and his Père Procureur, M. Caubert.
Strange to sit in those parlors, and gaze upon the large and well-
photographed portraits of those two men and martyrs, and to notice
the remarkable likeness existing between them. How both had the
same square forehead and firmly set, powerful mouth; and how both
looked—as they were—soldiers ready to die under the banner for
which they fought.
Ne pleurez pas sur moi,[190] cried Father Olivaint to the solitary
group of sympathizers whom he met on his way to the Préfecture de
Police.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-50-320.jpg)
![church, dedicated to the sacred name of Jesus. Running along all
the inner sides of the quadrangle, both on the ground and the other
two floors, is a lofty, well-ventilated corridor or cloister, adorned here
and there, after the usual manner of convents, with religious
paintings.
The piece of ground forming the natural centre of the quadrangle
is laid out with shrubbery, though without pretension to anything
more than neatness.
On the ground floor are situated the refectory, the kitchens, and
other offices; while the first and second floors are devoted
exclusively to the use of the fathers. The cells, like the corridors, are
lofty and well ventilated, but so simple in their arrangement as to
require no description.
The priests, in the true monastic spirit, sweep and keep clean
their own rooms and even the cloisters; and, from the general air of
cleanliness and order that pervades the place, it is evident that the
work is well done. This walk through the cloisters of the Jesuit house
in Paris would be uninteresting were it not for the remembrance of
one ne’er-to-be-forgotten room; and for the sake of the names
printed upon the cell doors, bringing back as they do to one’s mind
the recollection of past times and weary troubles; and the near
presence of men so many of whom have distinguished themselves in
working for the cause of holy church.
Tread softly, and be silent now, as ye approach yonder door that
bears no printed name; for the key that turns the jealous lock will
disclose that to thy gaze which should excite thy intensest feelings of
humility!
It is the “Martyrs’ Room,” where are kept the relics of the five
heroic men, each one of whom “pro lege Dei sui certavit usque ad
mortem et a verbis impiorum non timuit; fundatus enim erat supra
firmam petram.”[191]
Anatole de Beugy was arrested with the Père Ducoudray.
“Voilà un nom à vous faire couper le cou,” cried the officer in
charge of the party of arrest.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-52-320.jpg)
![“Oh! j’espère,” replied the father calmly; “que vous ne me ferez
pas couper le cou à cause de mon nom.”
I imagine that the officer did not think more highly of F. de Beugy
after this. In fact, all through the time of his imprisonment, his
captors seem not to have liked him or his indomitable sang froid. His
coat is there, in this “Martyrs’ Room” (a secular one, by the bye),
and it is pierced with seventy-two Communist bullets—truly, a very
palpable proof of his enemies’ animosity.
When the Père Olivaint was on his way to execution, as he
descended the stairs of the prison of La Roquette, he found—how
naturally!—that he had his breviary tightly grasped in his hand.
“They have me,” perhaps he thought, “but they need not have this”;
and he presented the book to the concierge of the prison, who had
shown him some kindness. God knows what motives the man had,
but an officer of the National Guard snatched it from his hand, and
threw it into the flames of a fire near by.
The concierge recovered the breviary, or what remained of it,
and it is now in the “Martyrs’ Room.”
He who can look upon this relic without emotion must have a
very hard heart indeed!
Do any of us ever think that the spirit of penance—corporal
penance—is dying out amongst us? There are instruments of self-
mortification in this “Martyrs’ Room” that will convince us to the
contrary.
It is not a miracle—unless the world and life be all a miracle—if,
when men die wondrous deaths, wonderful things should follow
upon those deaths; and when we see a marble tablet in this
“Martyrs’ Room” telling how, not eighteen months ago, at Mass-time,
when the priest invoked the saints whose relics lay beneath the
altars in the church, a child was healed of a grievous disease, we
must not be surprised.
“Ecce ego vobiscum sum omnibus diebus usque ad
consummationem sœculi.”[192]](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-53-320.jpg)
![instructor laughingly, “we have never been very popular in European
society.”
“No,” I answered abstractedly; for I was thinking just then of the
sacred name which the order bears—of him who was “Virum
dolorum et scientem infirmitatem”;[193] and my thoughts reverted to
the martyr shrine that I had so lately seen in the chapel. “But
perhaps you, who have in such a special manner enrolled yourselves
under the banner of the sacred name of Jesus, have received of him
a greater share than others of the shame of the cross.”
The father’s reply was a very practical one. “My dear sir,” said he,
“nothing of the kind. The world dislikes us because we persist in
teaching, and because it knows perfectly well that all our teaching is
impregnated to the core with that particular kind of Catholicity which
it hates—the Catholicity, I mean, whose first principle is devotion
and implicit obedience to the Holy See.”
It will be seen, therefore, from the foregoing fragment of
conversation, that the Jesuits’ work in Paris is for the most part the
Catholic education of the upper classes.
The fathers in the Rue de Sèvres do, in one way and another, a
good deal of work, although but little, perhaps, of a character that
directly identifies itself with the peculiar animus of the order to
which I have alluded. They are popular as confessors, and this
involves a good deal of labor.
They direct two confraternities of men, each numbering
respectively upwards of two hundred members. One is for the
fathers of families, and the other for young men. Each society meets
in the chapel upon alternate Thursdays for Mass and instruction.
Again, the Jesuits render every assistance that lies in their power to
the parochial clergy; and thus the fathers become, now conductors
of missions, and now Lenten or Advent preachers.
At the Rue de Sèvres are given retreats, not only to their own
brethren and the secular clergy, but also, and on a large scale, to
private individuals—men whom care has driven to seek refuge in the
contemplation of the treasures laid up for them in heaven.](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/19707-250424190029-4efae9fa/85/Social-Psychology-9th-Edition-Kassin-Solutions-Manual-55-320.jpg)
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- 4. © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. CHAPTER 7 Conformity LEARNING OBJECTIVES: GUIDELINES FOR STUDY You should be able to do each of the following by the conclusion of Chapter 7. 1. Explain the process and purposes of mimicry. Discuss the implications of mimicry for questions concerning the automaticity of social influence. (pp. 255-256) 2. Define, compare, and contrast conformity, compliance, and obedience. (pp. 257-258) 3. Compare normative and informational influence. Explain each in the context of Sherif’s and Asch’s studies, and in relation to public and private conformity. (pp. 258-263) 4. Discuss the relationship between research on ostracism and the concept of conformity. (pp. 260- 261) 5. Identify and explain each of the factors that have been shown to predict levels of conformity, including group size, awareness of norms, having an ally, age, and gender. Explain the relationship between culture and conformity. (pp. 263-271) 6. Differentiate between majority and minority influence. Explain how to account for the effects of minority influence, and how majorities and minorities exert pressure to affect people’s behavior. (pp. 263-271) 7. Describe the ways in which the discourse of making requests affects compliance with reference to mindlessness. Explain the role of the norm of reciprocity in such efforts to elicit compliance. (pp. 271-273) 8. Define and explain the sequential request strategies known as the foot-in-the-door technique, low- balling, the door-in-the-face technique, and the that’s-not-all technique. Explain why each works. Address strategies for resisting these strategies. (pp. 273-278) 9. Describe the procedures used in Milgram’s research on obedience to authority. Compare the predictions made about how participants would behave to what actually happened. Summarize how each of the following predicted levels of obedience in the study: participant characteristics (e.g., gender, personality), authority figure characteristics (e.g., prestige, presence), and proximity of victim. (pp. 278-284) 10. Consider the applicability of the Milgram findings to real-world events such as the Holocaust. (p. 279) 11. Compare the findings of Milgram to more recent studies of obedience by Meeus and Raaijmakers (1995) and Gamson et al. (1982). Explain the similarities and differences in the procedures and findings of these studies compared to those of the Milgram study. (pp. 284-288) 12. Summarize social impact theory. Identify the factors that influence a source’s strength, immediacy, and number, and the aspects of the target that facilitate resistance. Explain the relevance of this theory to conformity, compliance, and obedience. (pp. 289-291)
- 5. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 230 CHAPTER OUTLINE I. Social Influence as “Automatic” II. Conformity A. The Early Classics B. Why Do People Conform? 1. A need to be right 2. A fear of ostracism 3. Distinguishing types of conformity C. Majority Influence 1. Group size: the power in numbers 2. A focus on norms 3. An ally in dissent: getting by with a little help 4. Gender differences D. Minority Influence 1. Moscovici’s theory 2. Processes and outcomes of minority influence E. Culture and Conformity III. Compliance A. Mindlessness and Compliance B. The Norm of Reciprocity C. Setting Traps: Sequential Request Strategies 1. The foot in the door 2. Low-balling 3. The door in the face 4. That’s not all, folks! D. Assertiveness: When People Say No IV. Obedience A. Milgram’s Research: Forces of Destructive Obedience 1. The obedient participant 2. The authority 3. The victim 4. The procedure B. Milgram in the 21st Century C. Defiance: When People Rebel III. The Continuum of Social Influence A. Social Impact Theory B. Perspectives on Human Nature DETAILED OVERVIEW • Conformity, compliance, and obedience are three kinds of social influence, varying in the degree of pressure brought to bear on an individual. SOCIAL INFLUENCE AS “AUTOMATIC” • Studies show that people mimic each other’s behaviors and moods, perhaps as a way of smoothing social interactions. • Sometimes we are influenced by other people without our awareness.
- 6. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 231 CONFORMITY • Conformity is the tendency for people to change their behavior to be consistent with group norms. The Early Classics • Two classic experiments illustrate contrasting types of conformity. • Sherif presented groups of participants with an ambiguous task and found that their judgments gradually converged. • Using a simpler line-judgment task, Asch had confederates make incorrect responses and found that participants went along about a third of the time. Why Do People Conform? • Sherif found that people exhibit private conformity, using others for information in an ambiguous situation. • Asch’s studies indicated that people conform in their public behavior to avoid appearing deviant. Majority Influence • As the size of an incorrect unanimous majority increases, so does conformity—up to a point. • People conform to perceived social norms when these norms are brought to mind. • The presence of one dissenter reduces conformity, even when he or she disagrees with the participant and lacks competence at the task. • Women conform more than men on “masculine” tasks and in face-to-face settings but not on “feminine” or gender-neutral tasks or in private settings. Minority Influence • Sometimes minorities resist pressures to conform and are able to influence majorities. • In general, minority influence is greater when the source is an ingroup member. • According to Moscovici, minorities can exert influence by taking a consistent and unwavering position. • Hollander claims that to exert influence, a person should first conform, then dissent. • Majority influence is greater on direct and public measures of conformity, but minorities show their impact in indirect or private measures of conformity. • By forcing other group members to think more openly about a problem, minorities enhance the quality of a group’s decision making. • People gain courage to resist conformity pressures after watching others do the same. Culture and Conformity • Just as cultures differ in their social norms, so too does the extent to which people are expected to adhere to those norms.
- 7. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 232 • Research shows that people from collectivist cultures conform more than people from individualistic cultures. COMPLIANCE • A common form of social influence occurs when we respond to direct requests. Mindlessness and Compliance • People are more likely to comply when they are taken by surprise and when the request sounds reasonable. The Norm of Reciprocity • We often comply when we feel indebted to a requester who has done us a favor. • People differ in the extent to which they use reciprocity for personal gain and are wary of falling prey to this strategy. Setting Traps: Sequential Request Strategies • Four compliance techniques are based on a two-step request: the first step sets a trap and the second elicits compliance. • Using the foot-in-the-door technique, a person sets the stage for the “real” request by first getting someone to comply with a smaller request. • In low-balling, one person gets another to agree to a request but then increases the size of the request by revealing hidden costs. Despite the increase, people often follow through on their agreement. • With the door-in-the-face technique, the real request is preceded by a large one that is rejected. People then comply with the second request because they see it as a concession to be reciprocated. • The that’s-not-all technique begins with a large request. Then the apparent size of the request is reduced by the offer of a discount or bonus. Assertiveness: When People Say No • Many people find it hard to be assertive. Doing so requires that we be vigilant and recognize the traps. OBEDIENCE • When the request is a command and the requester is a figure of authority, the resulting influence is called obedience. Milgram’s Research: Forces of Destructive Obedience • In a series of experiments, participants were ordered by an experimenter to administer increasingly painful shocks to a confederate. • Sixty-five percent obeyed completely but felt tormented by the experience.
- 8. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 233 • Obedience levels are influenced by various situational factors, including a participant’s physical proximity to both the authority figure and the victim. • Two other aspects of Milgram’s procedure contributed to the high levels of obedience: (1) participants did not feel personally responsible, and (2) the orders escalated gradually. • In more recent studies, people exhibited high rates of obedience when told to inflict psychological harm on another person. Milgram in the 21st Century • Milgram’s studies have remained relevant and controversial into the 21st century. • Researchers note that a situational explanation for acts of destructive obedience does not forgive them. • A recent “partial replication” of Milgram’s shock study suggests that most people are still fully obedient today. Defiance: When People Rebel • Just as processes of social influence breed obedience, they can also support acts of defiance because groups are more difficult to control than individuals. • Provision of a situational explanation for cruel behavior does not excuse that behavior THE CONTINUUM OF SOCIAL INFLUENCE Social Impact Theory • Social impact theory predicts that social influence depends on the strength, immediacy, and number of sources who exert pressure relative to targets who absorb that pressure. Perspectives on Human Nature • There is no single answer to the question of whether people are conformists or nonconformists. • There are cross-cultural differences in social influence, and values change over time even within specific cultures. KEY TERMS collectivism (p. 270) compliance (p. 271) conformity (p. 257) door-in-the-face technique (p. 276) foot-in-the-door technique (p. 273) idiosyncrasy credits (p. 268) individualism (p. 270)
- 9. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 234 informational influence (p. 260) low-balling (p. 275) minority influence (p. 267) normative influence (p. 260) obedience (p. 279) private conformity (p. 262) public conformity (p. 262) social impact theory (p. 289) that’s-not-all technique (p. 276) Terms LECTURE AND DISCUSSION IDEAS Idea 1. Nazi Germany Some have argued that the one individual who has had the biggest historical impact on the field of social psychology is Adolf Hitler. As Chapter 1 discussed, numerous landmark social psychological investigations were inspired, at least in part, by the circumstances of World War II, including research on persuasion and attitude change, stereotyping and prejudice, aggression, and conformity and obedience. One example of the research inspired by Nazi Germany is Stanley Milgram’s studies of obedience. Milgram, like so many others, wondered how so much destructive obedience was possible. And this raised subsequent questions: How vulnerable are people in general to the potentially destructive commands of an authority? What factors make us more, or less, vulnerable? Examine this background further by assigning or simply discussing readings or films concerning the obedience observed in Nazi Germany. Particularly relevant to Milgram’s research is the case of Adolf Eichmann. As is discussed in Chapter 7, Eichmann, one of the most notorious of the Nazi war criminals, was described by his interrogator as “utterly ordinary” (Arendt, 1963; Lifton, 1986; Von Lang & Sibyll, 1983). Assign excerpts from one or more of these cited sources. Discuss the implications of cases like Eichmann’s for a social psychological understanding of obedience. Consider showing excerpts from the award-winning 1993 film Schindler’s List as well. Discuss how some of the same underlying processes can be observed in numerous dramatic as well as mundane examples since the 1940s. Some of the dramatic examples are mentioned in the textbook or in the Lecture and Discussion Ideas to follow. Another dramatic illustration can be found in the film The Wave (see Multimedia Resources below), in which a high school teacher uses his authority to create a fascistic group of students, demonstrating how vulnerable we all are to some of the underlying forces that helped make possible the obedience found in Nazi Germany. Particularly relevant and powerful is the scene toward the end of the film in which the teacher stuns the students by revealing the identity of the person responsible for this movement to be Hitler. Consider asking the students to come up with their own examples of instances in the news or in their own lives in which people obeyed almost blindly the commands of an authority. Arendt, H. (1963). Eichmann in Jerusalem: A report on the banality of evil. New York: Viking. Lifton, R. J. (1986). The Nazi doctors: Medical killing and the psychology of genocide. New York: Basic Books.
- 10. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 235 Von Lang, J., & Sibyll, C. (Eds.). (1983). Eichmann interrogated (R. Manheim, trans.). New York: Farrar, Straus, & Giroux. Idea 2. Jonestown Assign readings concerning the development and self-destruction of the community organized by Jim Jones known as “Jonestown.” Jones was an extremely charismatic man who was able to use numerous techniques of social influence to his advantage. He was a minister who built a small following into a national organization of churches, called the Peoples Temple. Jones elicited a tremendous degree of commitment from his followers, to the point where they gave all of their money and property to him. When the government began questioning various financial aspects of the empire that Jones was building, he brought his congregation to the isolated reaches of Guyana, South America, where he established the community bearing his name. Eventually, a congressman from California flew to Jonestown to investigate reports of U.S. citizens being held against their will in this community, and he and several others were killed by Jones’s aides. Jones then explained to the members of the community that they would soon be under attack by outside forces, and that the only honorable solution for them would be to commit mass suicide. Most of the people there followed Jones’s orders and drank the poison Jones offered them (indeed, there were many instances in which parents gave their children the poison before taking it themselves), although some were killed by Jones’s assistants. More than 900 people died in this 1978 tragedy. When news of this tragedy spread, people around the world were shocked at the level of obedience shown by the hundreds of people who followed Jones. There are a number of important social psychological points that can be made concerning the Jonestown tragedy: • Discuss the various types of power that Jones was able to develop, and how he developed them. • Discuss examples of strong informational influence and normative influence in Jonestown. • Compare the isolation of Jonestown with the situation faced by participants in Sherif’s study concerning the autokinetic effect. • Examine how the processes underlying important compliance techniques, such as the foot-in-the- door technique and the norm of reciprocity, were influential in Jonestown. • Compare the authority of Jones with that of the experimenter in Milgram’s research. • Discuss how social impact theory could be used to explain what happened in Jonestown. Other relevant concepts from the textbook that can be integrated into this discussion include social comparison theory (Ch. 3), attribution (Ch. 4), self-fulfilling prophecies (Ch. 4), persuasion (Ch. 6— e.g., one-sided messages, the role of fear, persuasion via the peripheral route), cognitive dissonance (Ch. 6), groupthink (Ch. 8), group polarization (Ch. 8), pluralistic ignorance (Ch. 10), the sunk cost principle (Ch. 13), and leadership (Ch. 13). There are several readings and films concerning Jonestown. We have found that assigning excerpts from the book Awake in a Nightmare: Jonestown, the Only Eyewitness Account, by Feinsod (1981), is particularly effective. It is based on the vivid account of a survivor of Jonestown. Unlike some of the more explicitly psychological treatments of the story, this book simply relates the experiences and observations of Odell Rhodes, who was initially swept up by the charisma and apparent expertise of Jim Jones, went to Jonestown, and began to observe Jones and his followers spiral out of control. Students can be challenged to think for themselves in applying relevant social psychological concepts and principles to this reading. An alternative approach is to assign a reading that does much of this thinking for the students, such as Osherow’s (1984) informative social psychological analysis of Jonestown. See the Multimedia Resources section below for video ideas concerning Jonestown.
- 11. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 236 Feinsod, E. (1981). Awake in a nightmare: Jonestown, the only eyewitness account. New York: Norton. Osherow, N. (1984). Making sense of the nonsensical: An analysis of Jonestown. In E. Aronson (Ed.), Readings about the social animal (Fourth Edition, pp. 68-86). New York: W. H. Freeman. Idea 3. The My Lai Massacre The event that has come to be known as the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War can serve as a powerful case study of conformity and obedience, as well as of aggression (see Ch. 11). In this incident, a platoon of U.S. soldiers brutally killed an entire village of innocent men, women, and children in the village known to Americans as My Lai. These men had been given orders to destroy what they believed to be an enemy stronghold, but it soon became clear that the U.S. soldiers had received the wrong information and were killing defenseless civilians. Despite this realization, the killing and brutality continued. You can assign and discuss excerpts from R. Hammer’s (1970) book, One Morning in the War, to help students appreciate the scope and consequences of conformity and obedience (as well as aggression) in this incident. Hammer’s book provides a detailed account of what led up to the massacre and what happened during the massacre itself. Discuss the roles of informational and normative influence in the tragedy. Point out examples of public and private conformity. Discuss what factors made the soldiers so vulnerable to conformity and obedience pressures. Discuss how some of the processes of self-perception and self-presentation that underlie various compliance techniques (such as the foot-in-the-door technique) may also have played an important role in Vietnam in general and My Lai in particular. Discuss the argument made by Lt. Calley and others who participated in the killing that they were just following orders and should therefore not be held responsible for their actions, and have students debate the issue of whether they should have been punished for their actions. On the one hand, students should see how the explanation of “just following orders” has been used to justify awful actions throughout history, as in Nazi Germany. On the other hand, students should recognize the pressures of war and understand how the military cannot be effective if orders are questioned. Consider showing excerpts from two relevant videos, Remember My Lai and Disobeying Orders (see the Multimedia Resources section), to add some provocative material to this discussion. Integrate into the discussion of My Lai concepts from other chapters in the textbook, such as aggression (Ch. 11—e.g., frustration-aggression, displacement of aggression and scapegoating, aggression cues, heat, arousal, excitation transfer, reinforcement, and modeling), self-awareness (Ch. 3), expectations (Ch. 4), attribution (Ch. 4), stereotypes and prejudice (Ch. 5), cognitive dissonance (Ch. 6), group processes (Ch. 8), bystander intervention (Ch. 10), leadership (Ch. 13), and stress (Ch. 14). An excerpt from the popular film directed by Oliver Stone, Platoon, can provide a vivid fictional depiction of this kind of massacre. The film Saving Private Ryan shows some related kinds of behavior by American troops in World War II. Hammer, R. (1970). One morning in the war: The tragedy at Son My. New York: Coward-McCann. Idea 4. Conformity Across Cultures Discuss the differences between individualistic and collectivistic cultural orientations. Contrast the connotations of “conformity” in the United States—with its history of valuing “rugged individualism”—with those in collectivistic cultures, such as in many parts of Asia and Africa. In Korea, for example, the word “conformity” is understood to mean maturity and inner strength. Ask the students to explain how conformity can be construed to mean qualities such as maturity and inner strength, sensitivity, flexibility, and a willingness to put aside selfish concerns for the good of the group.
- 12. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 237 Assign or summarize readings that examine cross-cultural differences that are relevant to the issues of group norms and conformity. Kim and Markus (1999) propose that East Asians conform because conforming makes them feel connected to others in their culture, a desirable outcome. In contrast, they say, Americans view conformity in terms of relinquishing control and being pushed around, a negative outcome. In a series of studies they found that East Asians preferred nonunique abstract figures, whereas Americans preferred unique ones; that East Asians, when shown four orange pens and one green one, chose an orange one, whereas Americans chose the only green one; and that Korean magazine ads were more likely to use a conformity appeal with statements like, “Seven out of ten people use this…”, whereas American magazine ads were more likely to use a uniqueness appeal with statements like, “Choose your own view…” Markus and Kitayama (1991) contrast a maxim familiar to many Americans, “It’s the squeaky wheel that gets the grease,” with a maxim more familiar to people in Asia (such as Japan and China), “The nail that sticks up shall be hammered down.” Discuss the implications of these differences for the issues raised in Chapter 7. In what ways should the social psychological principles underlying concepts such as public versus private conformity be similar or different across cultures? Would the two-step compliance techniques be more or less likely to work in collectivistic cultures than in individualistic cultures? In one recent study, Petrova, Cialdini, & Sills (2007) found that US participants were less likely than Asians to comply with an initial, modest request. But that those (US participants) who chose to comply were more likely than their Asian counterparts to show consistency by agreeing to a subsequent, larger request. How would your students explain that finding? And would they expect the obedience levels found in Milgram’s research in this country to have been much higher in collectivistic settings? What if the participants were children? Shanab and Yahya (1977) found a 73 percent rate of obedience in a study that duplicated Milgram’s procedure but used 6- to 16- year-old Jordanian children. Also, consider the implications of these cross-cultural differences for how people perceive those whose behaviors are or are not consistent with group norms. Discuss how interactions between individuals from different cultural backgrounds may be affected by different conceptions of and attitudes about conforming to group norms. Kim, H., & Markus, H.R. (1999). Deviance or uniqueness, harmony, or conformity? A cultural analysis. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 77, 4, 785-800. Markus, H.R., & Kitayama, S. (1991). Cultural variation in the self-concept. In J. Strauss and G. R. Goethals (Eds.), The self: Interdisciplinary approaches (pp. 18-48). New York: Springer-Verlag. Petrova, P.K., Cialdini, R.B., & Sills, S.J. (2007). Consistency-based compliance across cultures. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 43, 1, 104-111. Shanab, M.E. & Yahya, K.A. (1977). A behavioral study of obedience in children. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35, 530-536. Idea 5. Informational and Normative Influence In Chapter 7, informational influence is defined as “influence that produces conformity when a person believes others are correct in their judgments.” Normative influence is defined as “influence that produces conformity when a person fears the negative social consequences of appearing deviant.” Distinguishing these two types of social influence is important for a better understanding of how and why conformity should be strong or weak in various situations. Discuss these two types of influence and ask students to provide examples from their own lives that illustrate these phenomena. Bring to class your own examples. Ask the class to discuss when they feel particularly vulnerable to each type of
- 13. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 238 influence. Discuss various research findings about conformity in the textbook and have the students analyze the extent to which either or both of these types of influence played an important role. If you discuss some of the historical examples mentioned in the previous lecture/discussion ideas, such as the Jonestown mass suicide or the My Lai massacre, discuss the roles of informational and normative influence. For example, Jim Jones was able to exert a tremendous amount of informational influence on his followers through “miraculous” demonstrations of his knowledge and expertise (often through trickery). Moreover, by cutting off his followers from the rest of the world and from dissenting opinions, he was able to create a situation in which his followers were very vulnerable to informational influence from each other. In addition, by creating a strong, pervasive sense of group identity, such as by fostering “us against the world” thinking, Jones was able to create a situation in which his followers would feel tremendous normative pressure to behave and think as everyone else in the group did. Consider discussing the potential roles of informational and normative influence in relation to topics from other chapters, such as social comparison theory (Ch. 3), stereotyping (Ch. 5), persuasion (Ch. 6), group processes such as group polarization or groupthink (Ch. 8), helping in emergency situations (Ch. 10), jury decision making (Ch. 12), and economic decision making (Ch. 13). This would both emphasize the importance and ubiquity of these types of influence but also help the students see and think beyond chapter divisions, encouraging them to process the information in the textbook at a deeper level. Also discuss some situations in which informational and normative types of influence may work against each other, as is suggested by the dual-process perspective concerning minority influence. Idea 6. Minority Influence Discuss the ways in which minorities can use the knowledge derived from research on minority influence to increase their influence in society. Examine Moscovici’s model of minority influence, presented in the text, in terms of its applicability to various social movements, such as those concerning civil rights, protests against wars, etc. Consider showing the classic film Twelve Angry Men, which depicts a lone juror (played by Henry Fonda) struggling against the pressure put on him by the other eleven jurors to change his vote so they could reach a unanimous verdict, but one by one, he convinces them to reconsider their position (this movie is discussed briefly in Ch. 12); discuss the potential role of minority influence in juries. Contrast the single- and dual-process accounts of majority and minority influence. Why, according to the dual-process approach, do minorities elicit conformity through informational influence whereas majorities do so through normative influence? Why is “style” so important in minority influence, according to Moscovici? Ask students to discuss their own experiences, either as the minority in a group or as observers of a vocal minority in a group. In these experiences, what factors increased or decreased the likelihood that the minority position would have an impact on the majority? Was much normative pressure exerted to keep the minority from defecting to the majority position? Idea 7. Pervasive Pressures to Conform: The Influences of Peers and the Media The fear of embarrassment caused by deviating from a (perceived) group norm can be very powerful among college students. Discuss with the class some of the sources and consequences of conformity pressures. Two pervasive and influential sources with which most college students are familiar are peers and the media. Discuss each of these factors as they affect private as well as public conformity. It is difficult to overestimate the extent to which peers exert conformity and compliance pressures on each other. These pressures can be very specific and explicit, as when children pressure other children to engage in particular acts of mischief, or they can be fairly subtle, as when an individual is pressured to avoid achieving more than his or her friends. Styles of dress and appearance, ways of presenting
- 14. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 239 one’s personality to others, various attitudes and ways of speaking are just a few of the countless dimensions on which peers exert social influence. More subtle than peer pressure, but not necessarily less pervasive or powerful, are the influences of media depictions of people in television shows, films, advertising, news programs, etc. We are exposed to images from the media throughout our lives, in doses too staggering to comprehend. These images both reflect and help shape various norms and standards. Sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally, the media present messages of what are taken to be the normative ways for people of particular generations or categories to look, think, and behave. To help create a meaningful discussion of these issues, consider assigning or summarizing the articles by Jennings (Walstedt) and colleagues (1980) and Geis and colleagues (1984). These researchers have conducted experiments concerning the effects of television commercials on women’s likelihood of conforming, as well as on their self-confidence and career aspirations. Students tend to find these articles thought provoking. If some students suggest alternative explanations for the results of these studies, you should encourage this kind of critical thinking and challenge the students to think of methods of testing these issues in ways that would be less subject to such alternative explanations. More important, the articles raise important and interesting questions about the effects of advertising and whether or not advertisers should be held responsible for these effects. The film Still Killing Us Softly, which has been suggested for other chapters (e.g., Chapters 4 and 11), raises similar questions in a very powerful way. Crandall’s (1988) article, “Social Contagion of Binge Eating,” is also very thought provoking and relevant to students’ lives and to the issues raised in Chapter 7. Crandall’s research examines the extent to which binge eating in college sororities may result, in part, from social influence pressures that the students exert on each other. Eating disorders are all too prevalent on college campuses, and students should be particularly interested in this topic. Crandall’s article has the added benefit of offering a review of some of the relevant literature on norms in groups, social impact theory, and related topics. Crandall, C. S. (1988). Social contagion of binge eating. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 55, 588-598. Geis, F. L., Brown, V., Jennings (Walstedt), J., & Porter, N. (1984). TV commercials as achievement scripts for women. Sex Roles, 10, 513-525. Jennings (Walstedt), J., Geis, F. L., & Brown, V. (1980). Influence of television commercials on women’s self-confidence and independent judgment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 38, 203-210. Idea 8. The Norm of Reciprocity The norm of reciprocity is the social rule that says that we should treat others as they have treated us. The text describes several research studies that have shown how this norm can be used to trap people into compliance (e.g., Regan, 1971, Greenberg and Westcott, 1983, Rind and Strohmetz, 2001). In an amusing application of the norm, which is not mentioned in the text, Kunz and Woolcott (1976) sent out Christmas cards to a large number of total strangers. Twenty percent of the recipients felt obligated enough to send back cards to people they did not know. When the title Dr. was added in front of the sender’s name, the percentage was even higher. In a more outrageous application of the norm, on a whim, a young man sent a wedding invitation to the Sultan of Brunei (whom he’d never met), and the Sultan sent his regrets and an extremely generous check. There are many other times when the norm of reciprocity comes into play outside of the research lab. For example, the Hare Krishnas give out flowers and charities send out address labels in the hope of getting a contribution; stores give out calendars and food samples; health clubs offer free workouts; real
- 15. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 240 estate firms offer free appraisals; and wineries give visitors free tastes of wine. All of these techniques increase compliance by spurring interest in the product as well as by activating the norm of reciprocity. Ask students if they can think of other examples of the norm of reciprocity. When have they been on the receiving end? Did they feel obligated to reciprocate? Did they ever take advantage of the norm themselves to get others to comply? Greenberg, M. S., & Westcott, D. R. (1983). Indebtedness as a mediator of reactions to aid. In J. D. Fisher, A. Nadler, & B. M. DePaulo (Eds.), New Directions in Helping: Vol. 1. Recipient Reactions to Aid. New York: Academic Press. Regan, D. (1971). Effects of a favor and liking on compliance. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 7, 627-639. Rind, B. & Strohmetz, D. (2001). Effect on restaurant tipping of presenting restaurant customers with an interesting task and of reciprocity. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 31, 1379-1385. Idea 9. Six Factors in Compliance According to Robert Cialdini (2004), the reciprocity norm is only one of six tendencies that incline people to say “yes” to a request. Writing in Scientific American, Cialdini elaborates on five additional psychological factors that lead to compliance. (Some of these factors are also covered in Chapter 6 of the text, as characteristics of the source and message that increase persuasion.) First, there is consistency. Most individuals do not wish to be seen as hypocrites; they are strongly motivated to appear and to be consistent in their attitudes and behaviors. If they make a commitment, they want to follow through on it. So, for example, to increase contributions to the handicapped, one researcher elicited people’s signatures on a petition supporting the handicapped two weeks prior to asking them for donations. In this case, consistency was established via the foot-in-the-door technique. The second tendency is the need for social validation. The larger the number of people who are involved in an action, the more that action becomes socially validated and therefore an example for others to follow. If we hear that all our neighbors signed a petition for the building of a new school, we are much more likely to sign on it, too. That’s partly why the term “best seller” has a powerful influence on our buying habits: we think, “If everyone else is buying it, it must be good.” The third factor is liking. We tend to say “yes” to those we like, and we especially like our friends. That’s the logic used by Tupperware and several other companies whose sales are made exclusively at “home parties,” where friends are gathered together to buy the products from the friend who hosts the “party.” Liking is not limited to those we know. We can also feel a liking for strangers. We are particularly inclined to like attractive people. That’s why one study found that good looking political candidates received more votes than less attractive candidates. We also tend to like those who appear similar to us in some way. In one study, where donations were solicited on a college campus, simply having the solicitor say the phrase, “I’m a student, too” resulted in a doubling of the contributions. Another way that strangers can worm their way into our hearts is by complimenting us. We like those who seem to like us, whether their compliments are genuine or not. In the same vein, we like those who appear to fight on our behalf. So, automobile sales managers frequently play the role of “villains,” so that their salespeople can appear to be siding with the customer. Authority is the fourth element in compliance. That’s why, when people watch a commercial, they are more easily persuaded when the person touting the benefits of some product is a doctor, even if the doctor is only an actor with a white coat.
- 16. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 241 The last factor is scarcity. Things become more valuable to us if we perceive that they are scarce. That’s why the terms “one-of-a-kind” and “for a limited time only” are so often used by advertisers. Students can probably provide many more examples where advertisers make use of these factors to induce compliance. You might also ask them to think about how each of these tendencies to comply is adaptive from an evolutionary point of view; how they have helped human beings to best survive within a social milieu throughout their history. Cialdini, R.B. (2004) The science of persuasion. Scientific American, 14, 1, 70-77. Idea 10. Putting Compliance Techniques to a Good Use Ask students to imagine that they are troubled that a good friend is a very heavy smoker. In small groups, have them discuss how they could use compliance strategies, such as the foot-in-the-door technique, low-balling, the door-in-the-face technique, the norm of reciprocity, and exploitations of mindlessness to get their friend to quit smoking. Let each group share some of their ideas with the rest of the class. Discuss how several processes seem to underlie most of these strategies. For example, self-presentation concerns can play important roles in all of the compliance techniques mentioned above. Another self- related process—self-perception—plays a critical role in the success of the foot-in-the-door technique. Assimilation and contrast effects are evident in several techniques, such as low-balling and the door-in- the-face technique. Discuss the ways in which commitment breeds further commitment. Examples can be seen in studies of the foot-in-the-door technique and low-balling, but also in Milgram’s research on obedience (i.e., by gradually escalating the voltage, the participants make a long series of commitments, none much greater than the previous one); in events such as those in Jonestown and My Lai; in some cognitive dissonance manifestations, such as effort justification (Ch. 6); and in the sunk cost trap (Ch. 13). Finally, discuss the role of awareness and knowledge of these traps in people’s ability to resist them. This is a nice point about the power of education: the more the students learn about these phenomena, the less vulnerable they should be to them. Idea 11. Two Additional Compliance Techniques Students might be intrigued to learn about two additional compliance techniques that are not mentioned in the text. The first is called the pique technique. According to the pique technique, a subject is more likely to comply with a request that he or she would normally turn down automatically, if that mindless refusal is interrupted and the subject’s curiosity is piqued by a strange or unusual request. In the study that introduced the technique (Santos, Leve, & Pratkanis, 1994), it was found that subjects were significantly more likely to comply with panhandlers’ quirky requests (for 17 or 37 cents) than with the more ordinary ones (a quarter or any change). Ask your students if they have ever been on the giving or receiving end of the pique technique. Possible milieus for the technique include telemarketing, trick or treating, fund-raising, magazine advertising, or any other circumstance where one person is mindlessly set to say “No” and another is trying to forestall the refusal with an intriguing departure from the expected request. Discuss what makes the technique work. What is it about having our curiosity piqued that makes us more likely to comply? According to the authors, the technique works because it interrupts mindless refusal and gets a person to think. Increased thought about an appeal then leads to increased liking for the person making the appeal, which increases the likelihood of compliance.
- 17. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 242 The second technique is called the “but you are free” technique. This is a compliance procedure whereby the subject is asked to do something and is then immediately told, “But you are free to accept or refuse.” In one study (Guéguen & Pascual, 2005), subjects were more likely to agree to respond to a survey when they were told that they were free to refuse than when they were just asked to respond to the survey. In earlier studies, the technique was found to be effective in increasing the amount of charitable donations and number of visits to a humanitarian website. Ask students to discuss why such a request would increase compliance. The authors theorize that the phrase “but you are free to accept or refuse” makes people feel more personally involved in the task at hand. It also activates a feeling of freedom, and knowing that they have a choice makes people more amenable to going along with a request. Guéguen, N., & Pascual, A. (2005). Improving the response rate to a street survey: An evaluation of the “But you are free to accept or refuse” technique. The Psychological Record, 55, 297-303. Santos, M. D., Leve, C., & Pratkanis, A. R. (1994). Hey buddy, can you spare seventeen cents? Mindful persuasion and the pique technique. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 24, 755-764. Idea 12. Disobedience on a Personal Level According to the text, disobedience that is not criminal but is morally, politically, or religiously motivated is always a collective act. Do your students agree with the statement? Have there been times when they or someone they know chose to individually disobey a law that they felt was morally, politically, or religiously unjust? Other than criminal, political, religious, or moral, what other motives might there be for disobeying laws? Ask students if they ever personally disobeyed laws regarding minor transgressions, such as speed limits or parking. To what do they attribute their disobedience of such laws? Are the reasons external (e.g., thought they could get away with it)? Or internal (e.g., thought the law was unreasonable)? One study (Sanderson & Darley, 2002) found that people were likely to obey such laws for both external and internal reasons (i.e., fear of getting caught and respect for the law). Recent efforts to decrease drug use by increasing penalties for the possession and sales of narcotics have been largely unsuccessful, at least in part because people feel that such laws are illegitimate and therefore disobey them. How do students feel about recent laws concerning seat-belt use, cell-phone use, or smoking? When should the government criminalize such behaviors, and when should it leave such decisions up to individuals? Do students ever disobey such laws and to what do they attribute such disobedience? Are there other behaviors that they feel should not come under government regulation? Sanderson, C. A., & Darley, J. M. (2002). “I am moral, but you are deterred”: Differential attributions about why people obey the law. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 32, 375-405. Idea 13. Milgram’s Research on Obedience to Authority We have five words of advice to all instructors of social psychology courses: show the Milgram film, Obedience. Viewing this film (see Multimedia Resources below), which documents Milgram’s classic studies of obedience in the early 1960s, is one of the most powerful, memorable experiences that students will ever have in the classroom. After showing the film, have the students read the original article Milgram published about this research; this article is included in Readings in Social Psychology: The Art and Science of Research, the book of readings that is available with the textbook. You may consider warning the students before you show the film that it may be stressful for some of them to watch. During the film, take note of students’ reactions. Is there much laughter, particularly
- 18. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 243 early in the film? Do the students seem to sympathize with the participants? After the film, discuss their reactions. If some students laughed, why did they laugh? Could it have been for similar reasons as many of the participants in Milgram’s research? Discuss what factors did and did not significantly affect the levels of obedience observed in this research. Naive viewers always assume that personality differences must account for most of the variance in determining who obeyed and who didn’t; emphasize to them that such differences had little effect relative to situational factors. Discuss social impact theory and how it can explain the effects of the various manipulations used. Ask the class if the obedience observed in Milgram’s research was a function of the culture and time in which the research took place. Point out how there might be greater obedience in cultures that are more collectivistic in orientation, and note more recent studies and events that illustrate very high levels of obedience. Discuss how the experimenter in Milgram’s studies had relatively little power compared to people in many other situations, such as government officials, some teachers, parents, some peers, doctors, judges, the police, etc. Discuss the five types of power that are identified in Lecture and Discussion Idea 15, and ask the students which of these types of power was exerted by the experimenter. If you discuss Jonestown, explain that the power of Milgram’s experimenter paled in comparison to that of Jim Jones. Ask students if they think that they might have shown full obedience if they had been participants in this research. Very few students believe that they would have. Explain how this is likely to reflect the fundamental attribution error (Ch. 4). From the perspective of a distant observer, it is impossible to appreciate how powerful the situational pressure was on the participants, and therefore we tend to attribute the participants’ behaviors to their dispositions rather than to the situation. Consider assigning articles by Bierbrauer (1979) or Safer (1980) on this point. To help facilitate discussion, consider conducting Activity 8. Discuss the debriefing used by Milgram to try to alleviate the strain that participants were under and to make them feel less awful about what they had learned about themselves (see the next Lecture and Discussion Idea below). Finally, discuss the irony of the fact that conformity can help individuals resist obedience. That is, participants in Milgram’s research were much less likely to obey the experimenter’s commands if they first witnessed others resist the experimenter. Explain how this is consistent with social impact theory. Bierbrauer, G. (1979). Why did he do it? Attribution of obedience and the phenomenon of dispositional bias. European Journal of Social Psychology, 9, 67-84. Safer, M. A. (1980). Attributing evil to the subject, not the situation. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 6, 205-209. Idea 14. Discussing the Ethics of Milgram’s Research on Obedience to Authority After reading and discussing Milgram’s studies on obedience, have the class consider the ethical implications of the research. Discuss the criticism that Milgram received for conducting the research, and have students debate the issue of the scientific value of the research versus experimenters’ ethical responsibilities to participants. Consider assigning or summarizing Baumrind’s (1964) article critiquing the ethics of Milgram’s research. Ask the students to imagine that they were on a review board that had to decide whether Milgram’s research could be conducted. How would they make their decisions? Explain to the students that the APA guidelines on the treatment of human participants were developed after Milgram’s research and that, given these guidelines, Milgram’s research would probably not be allowed to be conducted today.
- 19. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 244 Baumrind, D. (1964). Some thoughts on ethics of research: After reading Milgram’s “Behavioral study of obedience.” American Psychologist, 19, 421-423. Idea 15. Five Types of Power French and Raven (1959) identified five types of power. Distinguishing among these five types can be very useful in understanding how and when obedience and compliance are likely to be produced. Compare the bases from which the experimenter in Milgram’s research derived power with the bases from which doctors, politicians, military officers, and leaders like Jim Jones do; such a comparison can be used to illustrate why the results of Milgram’s research may underestimate, rather than overestimate, people’s susceptibility to obedience in the face of a powerful authority. (1) Coercive power concerns the potential to deliver threats and punishment. Majorities may have coercive power. The military and police have coercive power. Parents have coercive power over their children. Teachers have some coercive power over their students. Jim Jones began to rely heavily on his coercive power toward the end of the Jonestown experience. The experimenter in Milgram’s research had very little, if any, coercive power. (2) Reward power concerns the potential to deliver positive reinforcement. Teachers, parents, employers, and wealthy individuals are among those who derive power from the ability to give rewards. As Jim Jones began to recruit individuals for his Peoples Temple and persuade them to join him in going to South America, he used reward power extensively. The experimenter in Milgram’s research had very little, if any, reward power. The participants received their payment whether or not they obeyed the experimenter. (3) Expert power is derived from a reputation for being very knowledgeable about a particular issue or area of concern. Doctors have expert power in their areas of specialization. Teachers and researchers may have expert power in their areas of study. Through his demonstrations and lectures, Jim Jones established expert power early on, and he used this power throughout the history of Jonestown, including at the ultimate moment when he convinced his followers that suicide was the only honorable response to their situation. To the participants in Milgram’s research, the experimenter probably had some degree of expert power, especially when the study was demonstrated at the prestigious Yale University laboratories. (4) Legitimate power is derived from a particular role or position that one has. This power is usually limited to a particular domain in which one has a position of authority. Teachers have legitimate power over their students in the classroom, but not outside of school. A judge derives a great deal of legitimate power from the courtroom, but the power does not go with the judge when he or she leaves the court. As the man responsible for the Peoples Church and for the community named after him, Jim Jones had a great deal of legitimate power in Jonestown. The experimenter in Milgram’s research had legitimate power in the context of the experiment. (5) Referent power is derived from being admired and liked, even revered. A celebrity may have a great deal of power over fans because they admire him or her so much. A role model may be able to exert a considerable amount of social influence over those who look up to him or her. Jim Jones, who was called “Dad” by his followers, had a tremendous degree of referent power among his followers. The experimenter in Milgram’s research had no referent power. French, J. R. P., Jr., & Raven, B. H. (1959). The bases of social power. In D. Cartwright (Ed.), Studies in social power (pp. 150-167). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
- 20. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 245 Idea 16. Social Influence in Psychotherapy and Criminal Investigations A very provocative and controversial issue that you might consider raising concerns how therapists, counselors, police detectives, and others may—intentionally or not—use their power and social influence to change the beliefs or behaviors of vulnerable individuals in subtle but very powerful ways, possibly to the point where such individuals develop false memories or believe that they have particular psychopathologies. This is a very controversial and sensitive issue that you should handle with great care, but it raises some fascinating questions about social influence, power, compliance, conformity, and social impact theory, as well as about memory and confessions (Ch. 12), self-perception (Ch. 3 & Ch. 6), cognitive dissonance (Ch. 6), and the power of expectations and self-fulfilling prophecies (Ch. 4 & Ch. 5). Because some of these issues are raised in Chapter 12 concerning both criminal confessions and witnesses’ memories, you might consider waiting until students read that chapter before you hold this discussion, but these issues clearly are relevant to Chapter 7 as well. To get this discussion started, assign or summarize some of the following readings: Loftus’s (1993) article, “The Reality of Repressed Memories,” which argues that most (and perhaps all) “recovered” memories (i.e., memories of events that allegedly were repressed from consciousness for many years and are then recalled many years after the events in question, either through therapy or by exposure to some triggering cue or event) are not real memories but rather are constructed at the time of “recall” and often stem from the suggestions made by a therapist or other people. Spanos’s (1994) article, “Multiple Identity Enactments and Multiple Personality Disorder: A Sociocognitive Perspective,” which makes a similar point about multiple personality disorder—that is, that the increased prevalence of this disorder may be a function of the suggestions of therapists, the media, and others. Like the Loftus article, the Spanos article suggests that the dramatic symptoms experienced by many individuals may be due to processes of social influence, such as conformity and compliance. Wright’s (1994) book, Remembering Satan, which details the infamous 1993 case involving Paul Ingram and his family in Olympia, Washington. Paul was accused of and confessed to a series of horrific crimes against his wife and children involving, among other things, Satanic ritual abuse. Wright’s fascinating and disturbing book provides gripping details about the case and suggests that much, and perhaps all, of what Paul remembered about these incidents was due to his desire to obey the investigators and comply with the wishes of those around him. Any of these sources can be used to make a point about the potential of conformity, compliance, and obedience to alter people’s memories and self-concepts. Each of these readings, however, is open to criticism and debate. It is important to discuss with the class the other side of these issues—that is, that the prevalence of actual physical and sexual abuse is shockingly high, that students should be wary of the tendency to “blame the victim,” and that a backlash may emerge against victims and survivors who call attention to these experiences. The point you should make is not that social influence does or doesn’t explain the majority of cases involving recovered memory or multiple personality disorder, but rather that the power of conformity, compliance, and obedience can be so great that such consequences are possible. For an opposite take on the issue, refer to a study by Bernstein, Laney, Morris, and Loftus (2005) on how false beliefs can be implanted to benefit individuals who are trying to lose weight. This study details how participants were led to develop the false memory that strawberry ice cream made them ill when they were children. Afterward, the participants manifested food avoidance to strawberry ice cream.
- 21. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 246 Bernstein, D.M, Laney, C., Morris, E.K., & Loftus, E.L. (2005). False beliefs about fattening foods can have healthy consequences. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America; 9/27/2005, 102, 39, 13724-13731. Loftus, E. (1993). The reality of repressed memories. American Psychologist, 48(5), 518-537. Spanos, N. (1994). Multiple identity enactments and multiple personality disorder: A sociocognitive perspective. Psychological Bulletin, 116 , 143-165. Wright, L. (1994). Remembering Satan. New York: Knopf. Idea 17. The Stanford University Prison Simulation One of the most controversial studies ever conducted in social psychology was that of Philip Zimbardo and his colleagues (Haney et al., 1973; Zimbardo et al., 1973) in which a prison experience was simulated. A mock prison was established in the basement of the psychology department building at Stanford University, and a group of young men volunteered to participate in a two-week study of prison life. The participants were divided randomly into groups of either “prisoners” or “guards.” The study is described in Chapter 12 of the textbook. Although it can be discussed in the context of the prison experience (Ch. 12) or group dynamics (Ch. 8), perhaps the most dramatic lesson of the research concerns the shocking levels of conformity and obedience observed. A group of normal, healthy young men conformed to the roles that were assigned them, and they in turn influenced each other to the point where the guards became more and more hostile and sadistic and the prisoners became more and more compliant and weak. Discuss the factors that led to these results. Discuss the implications of the study in terms of conformity to group norms, and to roles dictated by one’s job or status. You may find it particularly effective to show the film of this study (see Multimedia Resources below), or excerpts from this film, after showing and discussing the film of Milgram’s research on obedience. The transition from the early-1960s crew cuts and displays of respect for authority seen in the Milgram film to the early 1970s long hair and vulgarity is jarring, but the persistence of social influence seen across these studies seems all the more powerful and dramatic as a result. Any discussion of the Stanford Prison study should include a discussion of the ethics of the research. Whereas the ethics of Milgram’s research are debatable, most social psychologists consider the Stanford study to be unacceptable according to current ethical standards in research. The study should have been terminated much sooner than it was, given the behaviors and emotions displayed by the participants. Zimbardo makes an important point about how the researchers themselves got caught up in their own roles and failed to appreciate that their “prison” was not a prison but part of a research study, thereby letting the study go on longer than it should have. Haney, C., Banks, W. C., & Zimbardo, P. G. (1973). Interpersonal dynamics in a simulated prison. International Journal of Criminology and Penology, 1, 69-97. Zimbardo, P. G., Banks, W. C., Haney, C., & Jaffe, D. (1973, April 8). The mind is a formidable jailer: A Pirandellian prison. New York Times Magazine, pp. 38-60. CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES Activity 1. The Fate of the Deviant To better understand why people are so likely to conform, one must appreciate what happens to individuals who deviate from a group norm. The present activity is designed to examine this issue, as
- 22. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 247 well as to illustrate some of the dynamics of groups and communication. This activity can be conducted in the context of both Chapter 8 (Group Processes) and Chapter 7. Background. This activity is based on a study by Schachter (1951) in which groups of participants discussed the case of a juvenile delinquent named Johnny Rocco. The group read about Johnny’s family history and delinquent behaviors, and they discussed what would be the best way to encourage Johnny to become an upstanding young adult. The groups consisted of naive participants and three confederates. One of the confederates (the deviant) consistently disagreed with the group’s opinion about how to handle Johnny. For example, if the majority of the group advocated a very supportive, warm environment for Johnny, the deviant argued that such an environment would only make it easier for Johnny to continue to misbehave and that what Johnny really needed was an environment in which he would be quickly and sternly punished for any and all transgressions. Another confederate (the slider) began by disagreeing with the group consensus but then gradually came around to the majority, eventually fully supporting the majority opinion. A third confederate (the mode) voiced the majority opinion throughout. Schachter found that the groups tended to try to reach consensus right away, and that they devoted a lot of their energy to trying to persuade the deviant to change his opinion. After a while, when it was clear the deviant would not yield, the other group members tended to ignore and reject him, in essence re- forming the group so as to exclude this deviant. When the groups were asked to assign group members to various jobs, the deviant consistently was given the worst job. It is important to note that the groups were not instructed to reach unanimity; rather, the groups seemed to spontaneously adopt this as a necessary goal. It is also interesting to note that the groups tended to like the slider quite a bit. Rather than perceiving him to be “wishy-washy” or “spineless,” the groups tended to see the slider as someone who was smart and mature enough to recognize the superiority of the majority’s opinion. Overall procedure. The goal of this activity is to have students participate in or observe groups discussing an issue. Within these groups, one of the group members is actually a confederate who consistently deviates from the majority opinion. Depending on time, class size, and logistics, there are many different ways to conduct this activity. In addition, there are many different kinds of “dependent measures” that can be used. We suggest that the groups should consist of six students, one of whom is a confederate playing the role of the deviant. You or an assistant should play the role of the moderator of the group. Ideally, the students in the group should not know each other well. It is particularly important that the confederate should not be known well by the other students in the group. The confederate should be shown all the materials in advance of the class and given time to prepare to play the role of the deviant. You may consider having a second confederate in these groups play the role of the slider, although this is not necessary for the activity. The individuals in the group should be seated in a semicircle. The deviant should always sit in a seat that is one seat away from either end of the semicircle. The group should read the brief (fictitious) case history of the juvenile delinquent (we have changed the name from Johnny Rocco to Bobby James and we have changed several of the details to make them seem more contemporary). This case history can be found in Handout 7.1a; distribute copies of this handout to the group members. After the group members read the case, the moderator should go around the semicircle and ask each member of the group to state his or her name and to indicate which of several “treatments” for Bobby he or she would recommend from the kindness-punishment scale. This scale can be found in Handout 7.1b; distribute copies of this handout to the group members. The moderator should call on students one at a time around the semicircle so that the deviant is called next-to-last. Most of the students who read this case chose a treatment for Bobby that is closer to the “kindness” end of the scale than to the “punishment” end. The modal responses tend to be items #3 or #4 on Handout 7.1b. The deviant should take the opinion most deviant from the rest of the group. Typically, this means
- 23. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 248 the most extreme “strong discipline” approach. (If the average response is midpoint position #4, the deviant should take position #7.) See Handout 7.1c for some instructions you can give to the confederate a few days before the activity to help him or her prepare for this role. Except at the very beginning of the activity, the confederate should not initiate discussion but should instead respond when he or she is brought into the discussion. Let the discussion run for 7–10 minutes. The moderator should begin the discussion by asking the group to discuss the case and the best way to handle Bobby, and then, unless it is absolutely necessary, the moderator should not say a word until it is time to end the discussion. At the end of the discussion, the group members should be given another copy of Handout 7.1b and be asked once again to indicate which treatment for Bobby they would recommend. After they have completed this task, you may want to distribute copies of Handout 7.1d to the group members. This handout asks the group members to evaluate the discussion and each other on several dimensions. Logistics. In addition to having groups discuss the case, you should have other students observe the groups and take notes of communication patterns, changes of opinion, etc. This you can do by using one-way mirrors or by videotaping the group discussion (you should make the discussants aware that they are being, or will be, observed by the other students). You can also consider having the group simply discuss the case in front of the room, but this can be a bit intimidating to the group members, some of whom may try to “perform” for their live audience. Another decision to make is how many group discussions you will conduct. You may have one group discuss the case and the rest of the students in class observe, or you may have several groups discuss the case separately, along with several groups of students observing these groups. This latter approach would probably require that the activity be done outside of class time as a special “lab.” We have used this latter approach many times, and it has worked quite well. For purposes of clarity, we assume that you will take the simplest approach: have six students (including one confederate) discuss the case while the rest of the class observes. Observations. Even if the group will be discussing the case in front of the rest of the class, in the same room as everyone else, have the group first read about the case in another room or in the hallway outside of your classroom. While these students are outside the classroom, explain to the rest of the class what this activity is all about. Describe the Bobby James case to them briefly, distribute copies of the kindness-punishment scale (Handout 7.1b), and tell them about the confederate. Tell the students who the confederate is and instruct them to watch the other group members’ reactions to this confederate when the confederate first offers his or her opinion about how best to handle Bobby. Tell them to watch the dynamics of the group. That is, do the other group members ignore and reject the confederate? Do they spend a lot of time trying to change the confederate’s mind? How much informational and normative influence do the group members try to use on the confederate? How uncomfortable does the confederate seem? Do the individuals become locked into their original opinions, or do they show some flexibility? Does anyone offer an opinion at the end of the discussion that deviated from her or his initial opinion? Assign each observer the task of observing one discussant; the observer should count the number of times this individual speaks in the group. These observations should be split between the first half of the discussion and the second half of the discussion. Unless you have a very small class, there will be multiple observers for each discussant. There are likely to be discrepancies among the observers about how many times a particular discussant spoke (e.g., does “Yeah” count as one?) so take the average from among the observers in these cases (and you can make a point about the importance of using multiple observers and trying to achieve interrater reliability—see Chapter 2). If the group discussion takes place right in front of the observers, tell the observers not to laugh, make any noises, or in any way distract the group members or tip them off as to what is going on—particularly concerning the presence of a confederate. Finally, tell the observers that the entire class, including the discussion group
- 24. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 249 members, will talk about what happened in the discussion at the conclusion of the exercise. Instruct the observers to discuss their observations honestly—except that they should not say anything indicating that the deviant was a confederate until you reveal this. Post-discussion discussion. When the group has finished its discussion and completed the questionnaire (Handout 7.1d), have the discussants sit with the rest of the class and begin a general discussion of the group dynamics observed. Ask the observers to note anything they thought was interesting or noteworthy about the discussion or the group dynamics. Ask the discussants to indicate how they felt the discussion went and whether or not they found anything interesting in the process or content of the discussion. While this is going on, look at the responses given by the discussants on Handout 7.1d, and calculate the proportion of the group members (excluding the confederate) who picked the confederate as the least likeable group member. Also note which jobs they selected for the confederate and which types of movies they thought the confederate would favor. Chart the amount of time that the confederate talked during the first and second halves of the discussion. One typical result is that the confederate speaks a lot during the first half of the discussion because so much attention is directed toward the confederate, but then speaks much less during the second half of the discussion when the others begin to ignore the confederate. This does not always happen, however. We have seen many instances in which the other students never stop pressuring the confederate during the discussion, and we have seen a few instances in which the group rejects the confederate quite early in the discussion and ignores him or her throughout. Ask both the observers and the discussants to comment on what happened in this particular instance. Report the results of the questionnaire. Did the group members tend to dislike the confederate? Did they tend to assign the confederate jobs that would require little interaction with other people? What types of movies did they think the confederate would like? Are there any interesting patterns in these inferences and evaluations? (Because of ethical considerations, don’t reveal the responses made about any of the other discussants.) To the extent that the group had “ganged up” on the confederate, ask them why they did this and how they felt during it. Ask them why they tried to reach a consensus even though they had never been instructed to do so. If the group members did not spend much time trying to persuade the confederate, ask them why they did not. If not revealed yet, tell the group members about the confederate. Be sure to emphasize that the confederate had been coached about what to say and how to say it, and that the rest of the students should not commit the fundamental attribution error (Ch. 4) and infer that the confederate believes anything he or she said while playing the role of the deviant. Explain Schachter’s (1951) study and its results. Compare the results of Schachter’s study with the results of this activity. We often find that when the discussants initially offer their opinions about how to handle Bobby, they tend to be fairly unsure of themselves. After all, they have just finished reading the case and had virtually no time to consider the various options. And yet, after ten minutes of discussion, few students change their opinions (that is, as long as their initial opinions were close to the majority opinions). If this happens in your class, ask the discussants and observers to speculate about why it happened. Discuss psychological reactance and ask the class to consider whether it played a role. Similarly, discuss the power of making a public commitment to a position, and how it plays a role in many important phenomena, such as in cognitive dissonance (Ch. 6), continuing to invest resources in a failing course of action (Ch. 8 and Ch. 13), and in two-step compliance techniques such as the foot-in- the-door (this chapter [Ch. 7]). Also, we have observed that very few groups discuss ways of handling Bobby other than those mentioned on the kindness-punishment scale. The discussants are not told that they have to stick to this scale when discussing the case, and yet almost all do. This is another example of a norm that develops quickly and has a great deal of influence on the discussants. Discuss how the conformity pressures exerted on a deviant in a real group situation are often much greater than those observed in this activity because real groups would be more motivated to achieve
- 25. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 250 consensus (so that the groups could function more smoothly in general), they would be less inhibited (because they would not be observed by a psychology class), the groups would probably have more cohesiveness, and the decisions would have more importance to them. With this in mind, ask the students to discuss how difficult it can be to deviate from a group norm. Ask them to discuss the potential benefits of having a “devil’s advocate” in any group (see the discussion of groupthink in Ch. 8), and have them discuss why groups fail to take advantage of these potential benefits because of the pressures they put on such individuals. What if this bombs? This activity is fairly bombproof because of the many interesting points to discuss, as indicated above. Even if the questionnaire results are not interesting, and even if the group dynamics do not replicate Schachter’s findings, you can discuss any of a number of fascinating points. For example, ask the confederate to discuss how it felt when he or she deviated from the majority. What different techniques did the discussants use to try to persuade each other? If the discussants were very polite to each other and did not try to exert any informational or normative influence, ask them (and the observers) why this was so. Discuss whether particular norms were established early in the discussion about how the discussion should proceed. We often find this to be a particularly interesting phenomenon: some groups begin by attacking each other, and the discussion remains heated throughout. Other groups begin by being very non- confrontational, and the discussants remain polite throughout—sometimes running out of things to discuss after only a few minutes. It seems that the one or two people who first speak in the discussion can set the tone for the rest of the discussion. This could be an interesting point to make. As we noted above, another norm that is established early on concerns whether or not the group restricts itself to the kindness-punishment scale. In any case, caution the class against inferring too much from a non-replication of Schachter’s findings because in this activity there was only one group observed. The most difficult type of “bomb” to defuse in this activity would be if there is no consensus to begin with, so that there is no consensus against which the confederate can deviate. We recommend that you simply let the discussion begin anyway (with the confederate advocating position #7) and sit back and see what happens. Does the group try to form a norm during the discussion or not? If so, then you can discuss this process and relate it easily to the issues raised in Chapter 7. If not, ask the class to discuss why this was the case, and explain the factors that make it more likely that conformity pressures would arise, such as if the group had higher status, if there were greater cohesiveness, if the group members believed they would be meeting several times rather than just once, if the consequences of their decisions were greater, and so on. In this way, the activity can provide a valuable lesson about the factors that are relevant in determining the extent to which conformity pressures are likely to emerge in groups. Schachter, S. (1951). Deviation, rejection, and communication. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 46, 190-207. Activity 2. Compliance Experiment This simple activity provides a test of the effectiveness of the foot-in-the-door and door-in-the-face techniques. The students will be the experimenters and use these compliance techniques on students outside the class. This activity can be conducted before or after the students have read Chapter 7. Depending on the size of the class and the size of the campus, you should have each student in class approach (outside of class) either one or three same-sex students whom he or she does not know well. If the class size is large and the number of students on campus is small, you should have each student approach only one person; otherwise, have the students approach three other students.
- 26. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 251 Distribute copies of Handout 7.2a, Handout 7.2b, and Handout 7.2c to the students. If your students will be collecting data from only one student each, then distribute the handouts randomly so that each of your students receives only one handout. If your students will be collecting data from three other students each, then each of your students should receive one copy of each handout. Explain that they are to approach one (or three) student(s) from outside the class whom they do not know, and that they are to follow carefully the instructions on the handout(s). Tell them to return the completed handouts at the next class. Handout 7.2a is for the control condition. The students in this condition are simply to ask another student if he or she would be willing to volunteer for an experiment. Handout 7.2b concerns the foot- in-the-door technique; before asking the student if he or she would be willing to volunteer for an experiment, they are to ask the student to answer a couple of questions. Handout 7.2c is for the door- in-the-face condition; before asking the student if he or she would be willing to volunteer for an experiment, they are to ask the student if he or she would be willing to volunteer for an experiment that would require a large amount of time. In this latter condition, the respondents are expected to reject the first request, after which they are asked to respond to the “real” request. Results and discussion. The prediction is that a higher proportion of students will comply with the request to volunteer for the study in the foot-in-the-door and the door-in-the-face conditions than in the control condition. In the years in which we have conducted this exercise, the door-in-the-face condition has always elicited much more compliance than the control condition, and the foot-in-the-door condition has often, although not always, elicited about as much compliance as the door-in-the-face condition. Our experience was echoed by a recent study (Rodafinos, Vucevic, & Sideridis, 2005) that compared the effectiveness of the two techniques, and found that the door-in-the-face technique produced significantly more compliance than did either the foot-in-the-door technique or a control condition. Calculate the proportion of respondents in each condition who did and did not comply with the request to volunteer for the experiment. Also calculate these proportions separately for men and women (we have found that female respondents approached by female students tend to be more likely to comply with the request than are male respondents approached by male students). Discuss the results with the class. Did either or both of these two-step compliance techniques elicit more compliance than the control condition? Why or why not? Discuss the psychological processes underlying the effectiveness of these techniques. In this exercise, self-presentation concerns may be greater than in some experiments that have investigated these techniques because the person who made the initial request (either the first couple of questions in the foot-in-the-door condition or the large request in the door-in-the-face condition) was the same person who made the second request. In some experiments testing the foot-in-the-door technique, for example, the experimenters were different, and time had passed between the first and second request; in these experiments, the foot-in-the-door technique tends to be very effective, suggesting that self-perception processes may play a critical role in the success of the technique. In the present activity, however, the role of self-perception processes may have been relatively weak due to the kinds of questions initially asked. Discuss the roles of perceptual contrast and reciprocal concessions in the door-in-the-face technique. What if this bombs? Although there’s a very good chance that at least one of the two compliance techniques will work, it is possible that neither technique will elicit more compliance than the control condition. This could result if the compliance in the control condition was particularly great. If this is the case, it is easy to explain the results. That is, explain that there was a ceiling effect; in other words, there was too little room for the effectiveness of the compliance techniques to be measured—either because the students they approached were too nice or because the experimenters were too attractive or likeable for the respondents to reject (your students should appreciate the latter interpretation); in this event, plan to alter the compliance request the
- 27. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 252 next time you conduct the study on this campus. On the other hand, if the compliance rates across conditions are very low, explain that the request may have been too high and that a more reasonable request would have been better able to capture the differences between conditions. In any case, if the results are not impressive, emphasize to students that there probably were sampling biases, lack of random assignment to conditions, and other biases. Potential sources of random error or systematic bias include the following: your students may have tended to approach other students who seemed particularly nice; the differences among the experimenters’ interpersonal styles, attractiveness, choice of respondents, etc., may have been too great, thus overwhelming the differences between the conditions; your students’ expectations about the responders’ reactions may have affected their reactions. After offering these explanations, discuss the results of studies that have illustrated the effectiveness of each technique, and focus on a discussion of why these techniques often work. Rodafinos, A., Vucevic, A., & Sideridis, G.D. (2005). The effectiveness of compliance techniques: Foot in the door versus door in the face. The Journal of Social Psychology, 145, 2, 237-239. Activity 3. Norm Formation in Judgments of an Ambiguous Stimulus This simple activity is designed to conceptually replicate the classic research by Sherif (1936) concerning norm formation in groups. In this activity, present students with ambiguous stimuli, and have them judge the stimuli privately, without anyone in the group discussing or revealing their estimates, or publicly, with everyone in the group announcing their estimates to the others. The prediction is that there should be much more variability in the students’ private judgments than in their public judgments. Ideally, you should conduct the activity before the students read Chapter 7. Background. In his classic research on norm formation in groups, Sherif exposed participants to a very ambiguous stimulus and asked them to make judgments about the stimulus. As is discussed in the textbook, the stimulus in Sherif’s research was a point of light that seemed to move in an otherwise pitch-black room. From the perspective of the participants, the degree to which the light moved was extremely ambiguous. Sherif found that when participants gave their estimates orally in small groups, the groups formed a norm in these estimates to which most of the participants conformed. That is, there was a great deal of variability when participants made their estimates privately, and much greater consensus when they made them in the groups. General procedure. This activity can be done in a few different ways. The most ambitious procedure would be to divide the class into two groups, and separate the groups so that they cannot hear each other (e.g., put one-half of the students in a different room). Have one group do the task in the private condition and the other in the public condition (between-subjects procedure). If this is not practical, however, have all the students participate in both conditions, one after the other (within-subjects procedure). Each of these procedures is explained below. Between-subjects procedure. Present the same stimulus to both groups (see below for a discussion of the stimuli that can be used). One group of students should be told to take out a blank piece of paper and write their judgments on the paper, without discussing their judgments with each other. In order to increase the chances of collecting some interesting data, consider repeating the procedure with a different stimulus. The other group of students should be asked to give their estimates out loud, one by one, as you record them. Here, too, consider repeating the procedure with a different stimulus. Within-subjects procedure. The activity may have the best chance of yielding significant results if the private condition is conducted first and the public one next. Thus, give the students the instructions for the private condition (i.e., tell the students to take out a blank piece of paper and write their judgment
- 28. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 253 on the paper, without discussing their judgments with each other), and present the stimulus to them. Then, tell the students that for the next task they should not write down their judgments but will instead be asked to state their judgments orally. Then, present the second stimulus. Ask several students, one at a time, to indicate their judgments. After about a dozen or more students have indicated their judgments, have the remaining students write down their judgments. One potential problem with this within-subjects procedure is that students may begin to suspect when you switch from a private judgment to a public one that you are interested in conformity. If you believe that your students are likely to think this way, consider conducting these two judgment tasks in the opposite order. If you do this, be sure that the two stimuli are very different from each other so that there are no lingering effects from the first judgment task. Stimuli to be judged. Any perceptual judgment that is very ambiguous without a proper frame of reference (as in Sherif’s study) will do. For example, you could bring in a large jar of peanuts or jellybeans, or show a figure consisting of hundreds of dots, and ask the students to estimate the number of peanuts, jelly beans, or dots. Or you can videotape the side of the road as you drive past (obviously, the same person should not be driving and shooting the camera, so you’ll need assistance with this one) going at least 30 miles per hour, play the tape, and ask the students to estimate how many miles per hour you were traveling. Montgomery and Enzie’s (1971) research suggests that judgments of time intervals work well for this activity. That is, tell the students something like, “I’m going to try a little exercise here. Everyone please close your eyes and leave them closed until I tell you otherwise.” Take note of exactly when you give this request, and wait for everyone to close their eyes. Then continue, “I’d like you to visualize the following things as clearly as you can, without opening your eyes.” Then list a series of items—any will do. After some specific interval of time (e.g., 37 seconds), tell the students to open their eyes. Then ask the students to estimate the amount of time that passed between the point when you told them to close their eyes and the point when you told them to open them. If you conduct this activity using a within-subjects procedure, there will be two stimuli to be judged. Either you can use similar (even identical) stimuli for the two tasks (e.g., two dot-estimation tasks, with a fairly similar number of dots in both tasks), or you can use very different tasks (e.g., a dot-estimation task and a time interval estimation). Each approach has its advantages and disadvantages. One advantage of using similar stimuli is that the difficulty of the judgment should be fairly constant, and so differences in the variability of the responses are more likely to be a function of the condition (private vs. public) than of the different stimuli presented. A disadvantage of this approach is that the first judgment may affect the second judgment. Thus, it is up to you. We personally offer the following recommendations. First, if you conduct the private condition first and the public one second, use similar stimuli for both. Second, if you use the time interval estimation for both, do the procedure a bit differently than the way stated above. That is, tell the students that you are going to ask them to judge an interval of time. Tell them when the interval begins and when it ends, and be sure to tell them not to count to themselves (tell them also not to look at their watches or a clock). It would be ideal to distract them with an activity (such as a memory task) during the time interval so that they cannot count how much time has elapsed. Third, if you do the public condition first and the private condition second, use two very different judgment tasks. This latter approach may be the overall best choice, given its simplicity and low-risk. Results and discussion. Compare the amount of variability in the students’ estimates in the private condition and the public condition. If there is less variability in the public condition, then the results conceptually replicate Sherif’s. Another interesting pattern of data to look for concerns the estimates given by students in the public condition who were not called on to give their estimates orally. If you had these students write down their estimates after they had heard the other students’ estimates, examine whether their estimates tended to be consistent with the estimates given orally. If they were,
- 29. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 254 this would illustrate the role of informational influence independent of normative influence in this situation. Discuss the general issue of how norms form in groups. Ask the students to speculate on how the processes of norm formation might be different depending on the task in which the group is involved. Discuss the roles of informational influence and normative influence. Ask the students to consider how the activity would have been different if the stimulus were not so ambiguous—that is, if it were more like the task faced by the participants in Asch’s (1951) classic research on conformity and independence. What if this bombs? If the results are not consistent with predictions, ask the students if any of them experienced reactance and, therefore, purposely resisted being influenced by the estimates given by others. Ask the students if any felt that they were influenced by the estimates given by others. Discuss how both of these reactions are examples of social influence, albeit in opposite ways. If you used the within-subjects procedure, point out the flaws in this procedure and explain how a between-subjects procedure would be a better way to examine conformity in this kind of study if you could get a large enough sample of participants. Ask the students what factors would have made them more vulnerable to conformity in the public condition, such as a more difficult judgment task, a greater motivation for accuracy or for fitting in with the others, if they had been making these judgments in a setting other than a social psychology class, etc. In this way, the activity can be used as a starting point for a good discussion of the variables that are important to conformity and group norm formation, even if the results are not supportive. Montgomery, R. L., & Enzie, R. F. (1971). Social influence and the estimation of time. Psychonomic Science, 22, 77-78. Activity 4. Observing Norms for a Day This activity is designed to help students think about the prevalence of norms in their everyday lives, and it can be used as a starting point for a discussion about the types of norms that groups form and the various pressures to conform to these norms that the students face every day. Have the students keep notes for a day about the norms of behavior that they observe around them. This can be done in a fairly unstructured way: for instance, simply instructing the students to have a notebook with them from morning until night for one day and to record in the notebook any and all observations of group norms, pressures to conform, compliance requests, etc. Give the students examples of some norms—perhaps from your own observations that morning or the previous day. Have the students bring their notebooks to class, and either collect them and examine them for interesting examples, patterns, contrasts, etc., or simply have the students discuss some of these norms and observations in class. In addition, or instead, consider having students use Handouts 7.3a-d. Each handout asks students to note whether they observe particular kinds of norms at various points in their day. Distribute copies of the handouts to the students. Consider having the handouts folded and stapled or taped and telling the students not to open or read the handouts until first thing in the morning of the day in which they are to make their observations. Tell them to follow the instructions and to explain their responses. That is, if the handout asks whether they observed a particular norm of behavior in a particular setting, the students should not simply respond, “Yes,” but should instead explain these observations. As with the notebooks, you may want to collect the completed handouts and examine them or simply have the students discuss some of these in class. How much similarity is there among the various students’ observations? That is, did they detect the same norms? Did some students perceive norms that seemed to contradict those perceived by others? Have students describe some of these norms in more detail, and ask them to imagine what it would be
- 30. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 255 like to violate them. What would make them more or less likely to resist normative influence and deviate from some widely accepted norms? Ask students to discuss their experiences with conforming to some of these norms despite feeling that the norms were wrong or inappropriate. Also ask them to discuss their experiences with resisting some norms. What if this bombs? This activity cannot bomb. It should elicit some interesting observations and facilitate the beginning of a discussion about norms and conformity. To increase the chances that students will understand how to make their observations, give them some examples from your own observations in your dealings with colleagues or from your memories of being a student. If you are worried that your students will be shy or hesitant about mentioning their observations in class, have them turn in their observations and choose an interesting mix to report to the class. Activity 5. Violating Norms This activity is designed to help students think about conformity by making them experience, firsthand, what happens when they violate simple, taken-for-granted norms. This activity can be conducted before or after the students have read Chapter 7. The instructions to be given to the students for this exercise can be found in Handout 7.4. Either distribute copies of this handout to the students or read the instructions to them. When the students come to the next class after having violated their norms, either collect their notes and read some anonymous highlights to the class (if you plan to read their notes, you should tell the students this in advance, and give them the option of indicating on their notes that they don’t want you to read them aloud), or ask the students to read their notes to the class. Discuss the kinds of norms that were violated. How did students choose the norms that they violated? Why did they select those and not others? Did the students deviate from particular norms in a moderate way, or did they go out on a limb and act fairly wildly? Why? How did the students feel before, during, and after their norm violations? Did these reactions vary as a function of the types of norms violated or as a function of the personalities of the students? What reactions did others have? Did friends react differently from strangers? Do the students now have a better sense of what it feels like to stand out from the crowd in violation of an accepted norm? What if this bombs? As long as the students follow the instructions (and you should caution them again about not doing anything that will get them into trouble), this activity cannot bomb. No matter what the students’ reactions or observations are, an interesting discussion should ensue. If the students remark that violating these norms did not seem to be that big a deal, ask them why this was so, and try to get a sense of whether their norm violations were particularly innocuous. If they were, ask the students why they resisted choosing norm violations that would make them stand out more. Activity 6. Private or Public Conformity? According to the text, private conformity involves true acceptance or conversion, whereas public conformity refers to a superficial change of behavior. The difference between the two being that the behavioral change noted in private conformity continues long after others are not there to observe it. Handout 7.5 asks students to decide if an event constitutes private or public conformity, or a combination of both. After students complete the handout individually, follow with a class discussion to reach consensus. What if this bombs? This activity is bombproof. Some of the examples are clear-cut in their display of private or public conformity. Others are more complex and will likely stimulate a discussion.
- 31. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 256 Activity 7. Sequential Request Strategies Handout 7.6 asks students to identify the sequential request strategy that is being used in various scenarios from among these four strategies that are discussed in the text: Foot in the door ⎯ where a small request is followed by a much larger one (Items 3 and 6) Low-balling ⎯ where a secured agreement is followed by an enlarged request by revealing hidden costs (Items 1 and 7) Door in the face ⎯ where a rejected very large request is followed by a more reasonable one (Items 5 and 8) That’s not all ⎯ where a somewhat inflated request is immediately followed by a decrease in the size of the request through an offer of a discount or bonus (Items 2 and 4) What if this bombs? This activity is bombproof and presents an opportunity to stress the similarities and differences between foot in the door and low-balling, and door in the face and that’s not all. Activity 8. Predictions and Inferences about Milgram’s Obedience Research This activity is designed to get students thinking about Milgram’s research, to help them appreciate how surprising the results were, and to help raise points for discussion concerning the power of the situation and the fundamental attribution error. This activity must be done before students have read Chapter 7 or learned about Milgram’s research. If many of the students have learned about Milgram’s research already, such as in a previous course, we recommend that you do not conduct this activity. Procedure. Show the beginning of the film Obedience, which illustrates Milgram’s classic research on obedience to authority. Show the film up to the point where the procedure has been explained fully and the first participant shown in the film has refused to continue with the experiment. At this point, stop the film and distribute copies of Table 7.4 from the text. This table lists the learner’s protests in the experiment as a function of the level of shock. Explain to the students how after 330 volts the learner would fall completely silent and not respond. Then, distribute copies of Handout 7.7a to the students. This handout asks the students to make predictions about the results of the study depicted up to that point in the film. Ask the students to complete the handout. When they have completed it, show the rest of the film. At the conclusion of the film, distribute copies of Handout 7.7b. This handout asks the students to make inferences about the participants in the research, and to indicate their perspective concerning its ethics. Discussion. Discuss the students’ predictions. What were the average predictions? To what degree did the students underestimate the level of obedience found in the research? Calculate the averages separately for those who had heard of or read about this research and those who had not. How accurate were the former students? How accurate were the latter? Examine the averages for the questions on Handout 7.7b. Having learned that most of the participants obeyed the commands of the experimenter to the point of thinking that they might be doing great physical harm to the “learner,” do the students appreciate the power of the situation enough that they admit that they might have done the same thing? Few students do. Discuss this phenomenon with them. Explain the role of the fundamental attribution error in these judgments. (As stated in Lecture/Discussion Idea 13, the fundamental attribution error helps explain how observers of this research fail to appreciate how powerful the situational pressures on the participants were, so they tend to attribute the participants’ behaviors to their dispositions rather than to the situation. Consider assigning or summarizing articles by Bierbrauer [1979] or Safer [1980] on this point—see Lecture/Discussion Idea 13.) Did the students tend to think that their classmates were
- 32. CONFORMITY © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 257 more likely to obey than they themselves were? In this way, did the students all rate themselves as better than average? Distribute copies of Table 7.4 from the textbook. Begin a discussion of why there was so much obedience in the study and what factors caused the levels of obedience to increase or decrease. Discuss the issues raised in Lecture/Discussion Idea 13. What if this bombs? As long as the students are not familiar with the Milgram research when they do this exercise, this activity is virtually bombproof (you might want to ask for a show of hands to see how many of your students are familiar with Milgram’s work before you do this activity). It would be just short of miraculous if naive students predict accurately the levels of obedience found in Milgram’s study. It is also quite implausible that a large proportion of the students would indicate that they probably would have obeyed all the way in the study. If the students are indeed accurate in their predictions and indicate that they would have obeyed the experimenter’s commands, ask the students why they made these predictions and inferences. Compliment your students on being better judges of human nature than the psychiatrists whom Milgram had originally asked to make such predictions—their average prediction was that only about one in a thousand participants would obey all the way—and for being better judges than the thousands of individuals who have made similar inferences since that time. If your students were being serious with their responses, then their responses reflect an uncanny appreciation of the power of the situation and of people’s vulnerability to conformity and obedience. Take advantage of this by having the students discuss the issue. The reason this would not be a “bomb” is that you should have a terrific discussion about this issue, and you will not have to work to convince the students of the validity of the points that Milgram’s research makes. Activity 9. Conformity and Compliance in Advertising To help students recognize the ubiquity of normative and informational influences, have the students evaluate advertising—on television, in newspapers and magazines, or both—in terms of what kinds of social influence are implicit or explicit. That is, are ads designed to make people feel deviant simply because they are not consuming a particular product? Are slogans such as Nike’s “Just do it” designed to make people feel guilty or embarrassed for not taking the challenge? When and how do ads use high- status or attractive people to produce conformity pressures? When and how do ads use people who look or seem similar to their audience to produce conformity pressures? When and how do ads try to use reactance to their advantage? What ads use compliance techniques such as the “that’s-not-all” technique? What ads exploit the norm of reciprocity, mindlessness, etc.? Have the students bring to class at least one copy of a print ad or description of a TV ad concerning conformity and at least one concerning compliance. Discuss what these ads illustrate about the issues raised in Chapter 7. To what extent do the students think that the people who made the ads used conformity or compliance pressures intentionally? How effective do the students think these techniques would be, and why? How easy was it to find such ads (i.e., how prevalent are they)? What if this bombs? This activity is bombproof. There is an inexhaustible supply of appropriate ads, and students should find this activity interesting and somewhat eye-opening. To get the discussion rolling, you might consider bringing in and discussing examples that you found. Activity 10. Strategies to Elicit or Resist Conformity and Compliance: Role-Playing If you have students who like to perform, you might consider this activity, which can be conducted before or after the students have read Chapter 7. Ask for volunteers to act out how they would behave
- 33. CHAPTER 7 © 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part, except for use as permitted in a license distributed with a certain product or service or otherwise on a password-protected website for classroom use. 258 in various situations involving conformity and compliance. Handout 7.8 lists a half-dozen different scenarios. Select a scenario, and have each volunteer or group of volunteers (depending on the scenario) come to the front of the class and play their role. Have the observers (i.e., the rest of the class) take notes about the kinds of strategies used by the volunteers. If the class has read Chapter 7, ask the students to examine whether the strategies involve normative influence, informational influence, the norm of reciprocity, low-balling, etc. After the role playing has been completed, discuss the students’ observations, as well as the volunteers’ decisions about how to act, and ask the volunteers to describe how they felt playing their roles. Discuss the probable effectiveness of these different strategies, and explain what variables would make these strategies more or less likely to be effective. What if this bombs? As long as you have the volunteers to do this activity, it is fairly bombproof. The role-playing should be amusing as well as educational, and it should be very effective in facilitating discussion. The only potential problem is if volunteers freeze and cannot act out their parts. If you are concerned about this possibility, assign small groups of students for each scenario, tell the group what the scenario is, and give them a few minutes to discuss their strategies and to choose a confident person or persons from the group to act them out. Activity 11. Demonstrations of Obedience in Class Two ideas for activities designed to demonstrate how students are willing to obey seemingly irrational commands by an instructor are detailed in the Activities Handbook for the Teaching of Psychology. The first of these was proposed by Hunter (1981). In this exercise, the instructor (preferably a guest instructor) should begin class by giving the students a series of instructions to change seats, stand up, raise hands, etc. The goal of the activity is to demonstrate to students that they were willing to obey a series of increasingly bizarre commands because of the authority they ascribed to the instructor. This can be a good starting point for a discussion of research findings such as Milgram’s. Hunter details points for discussion, including the ethics of this activity. Lutsky (1987) presents another demonstration designed to illustrate the power of conformity and obedience. The gist of this activity is that you should ask the students to write a paper about conformity and obedience (Lutsky suggests that the paper be about Jonestown), and that during the class in which the papers are due, you should tell the students to take out their papers and rip them up. Four confederates should at this point rip up what appear to be their papers. If other students follow suit, you should take note of this but then quickly tell the students to stop, and then distribute tape to allow the students to repair their torn papers. Ask the students how many were about to rip up their papers, how many were considering it, and how many were sure that they would not have ripped up their papers. Lutsky reports that when he used this exercise in his class, a majority (64 percent) of the naive students did or was just about to rip up their papers when he yelled “Stop!” to bring the activity to an end. Like Hunter (1981), Lutsky details points for discussion—including ethics, among others. We (the authors of this manual) are somewhat less comfortable doing either of these exercises in our own classes, primarily out of concern about the potential ill-will caused by these kinds of manipulations of students during class, but we know of others who have tried one or the other of these exercises quite successfully. What if this bombs? If the students resist the commands of the instructor, all is not lost because this result would be an interesting point of departure for a discussion about factors that make people more or less susceptible to obedience and conformity. What pressures were the students feeling, and what gave them the courage to defy the commands? What kinds of changes to the procedure might have made them obey? Would they have obeyed similar commands from a different kind of instructor (e.g., older, colder, someone from a different course [who would not be as much under suspicion that they might be running an “experiment” on them], etc.)?
- 34. Exploring the Variety of Random Documents with Different Content
- 35. quickly, and look around. He had heard a slight noise in the bushes near him. He raised his head and listened an instant, then leaned toward the right, and then toward the left, without perceiving anything; for the savage was lying flat on the ground, behind a pile of branches. Feeling entirely reassured, he again raised his gun to take aim. At the same moment, the Indian, with an infernal smile, raised himself from the earth, and, just as Joseph was preparing to immolate another enemy, he brandished his knife. A last shot was heard, a last Indian fell; but Joseph had also fallen, struck to the heart by the cowardly fiend. The wretch then proceeded to scalp him, after which he plundered him of his clothes, in which he arrayed himself.” V.—LAMENTATION. “Paralyzed with horror and fright, we thought no longer of saving ourselves. My sister, in her despair, pressed her baby to her heart, and threw herself at the foot of a crucifix, which she seized in her hands, and mutely covered it with tears and kisses, while I, too, utterly overcome, threw myself on my knees beside her, and mingled my tears and prayers with hers. Poor mother! she did not tremble for herself, but for her child—that dear little angel, whom she loved so tenderly, whom she so adored. It was indeed a beautiful babe, scarcely eighteen months old, and had already begun to lisp ‘Mamma.’ ‘O my God!’ cried my sister between her sobs, ‘if I must die, I willingly give up my life; but save, oh! save my child!’ Then, embracing it, and bathing it in her tears, she clasped it to her heart, and sank to the floor insensible. Although more dead than alive myself, I tried to sustain her, and had her in my arms, when Joseph’s murderer entered, followed by his cruel companions. Without uttering a word, he advanced toward us, and violently snatched the child from its mother. She had not heard them enter the room, but, when they tore the child away from her, she shuddered and suddenly recovered her consciousness. The savages, exasperated at having lost seven of their comrades, now only thought of blood and
- 36. vengeance. The assassin of Joseph, holding the child at arm’s length, looked at it with the diabolical expression of a serpent charming his victim before striking him. It was an angel in the grasp of a demon. The monster smiled—Satan alone could have laughed as he did. The baby, as if to supplicate his pity, smiled also, with that angelic expression of innocence that would have moved the most hardened and obdurate of hearts. But he, seizing it by the leg, whirled it round for an instant, and then—oh! horror!—dashed its head against the heavy edge of the huge stove. Its brains spattered over its mother’s face. Like a tiger she sprang at the murderer of her child. Maternal love gave her superhuman strength, and, seizing him by the throat, she buried her fingers in his flesh. He tottered; his face turned black, and he fell heavily to the floor, suffocated by the strength of her desperate grasp. She would have undoubtedly strangled him, had not another savage at that instant struck her a blow on the head with his hatchet. My poor sister! her death was indeed a cruel one, but her agony only lasted a moment—her troubles are ended, and she is now in heaven. But I—what will become of me? You see the condition that I am in. O my God, my God! have pity on me.” And the young girl, wringing her hands in despair, threw herself sobbing into my arms, pressed me to her heart, and implored me not to abandon her into the hands of these brutal savages. But, oh! what is more heart-breaking than to witness misfortune without the power of alleviating it! We spent the night in weeping and trying to encourage her, but I could not help feeling at the time that it was cruel to inspire her with a confidence that I had not; for I knew these savages too well. I knew that the monsters never abandoned their victims. The next day, my father tried in every way to conciliate them, and then interceded in behalf of the young captive. He offered any amount of ransom for her, but in vain; nothing would tempt them. The effects of the liquor had not entirely worn off, and they were sullen and obstinate. My father used in turn prayers and threats to move them; but neither presents, prayers, nor threats could rescue her from their merciless hands. The wretched girl threw
- 37. herself at their feet, and, embracing their knees, besought them to listen to her supplications; but the monsters only replied to her entreaties by bursts of laughter; and, in spite of her prayers, and sobs, and supplications, they carried her off with them.[186] “Alas!” said Mlle. Baby, looking sorrowfully at the young officer, “are you surprised now at my sadness, and that I could not smile and be gay after having witnessed such a scene?” “The demons!” exclaimed the officer, stamping his foot in horror and indignation. “This infamous, bloodthirsty race should be exterminated—exterminated to the last man. Why did I not know this sooner? Yesterday, a Potawatamie came to my quarters to sell some furs. He asked three times as much as they were worth, and I declined buying them. He hung around for some time, annoying me very much, until I finally ordered him to leave. He refused to do so; then, losing all patience with the fellow, I rose from my seat, and, leading him to the door, I kicked him out. He went away muttering, and threatening me with his knife. I had a stick in my hand, and I now regret that I did not knock him down.” “How imprudent!” said the young girl. “You ought not to have provoked that Indian; don’t you know that a savage never forgets an injury? He may wander around the fort for a year, spying all of your movements, watching your footsteps, tracking you everywhere, hiding in the woods and among the rushes in the river, until an opportunity offers, and he will approach with all the finesse and cunning of a serpent, spring upon you like a tiger, and strike you a death-blow, when you least expect it. I see that you go every day out of the fort to fish on the banks of the river. I advise you not to go any more; it is not safe, and something terrible might happen to you.” “Pshaw!” said the young officer, “you are too timid. I saw the fellow leave this morning with a number of warriors belonging to his tribe; they were going to Quebec to sell the furs, which they could not dispose of here.”
- 38. VI.—THE DREAM. The clock in the salon had just struck one. Mme. Baby and her daughter were seated sewing in the deep recess of an open window, with a little work-table in front of them. M. Baby had gone away that morning, to look after some land that he had just bought on the other side of the river. The streets were deserted; nearly all the inhabitants of the fort were at work in the fields in the vicinity. The heat was intense. Not a breath agitated the trees in the garden, whose motionless branches drooped languidly toward the earth, as if imploring a refreshing breath or a drop of dew. A negro servant was spreading some linen out to dry on the bushes, and put to flight, in her perambulations, some chickens that were panting with the heat under the sheltering foliage of the trees and shrubs. The silence was only broken by the buzzing of insects, and the noisy whirr of the grasshopper as it danced through the sunlight. The open window, filled with bouquets, looked into the garden, and the pale, melancholy face of Mlle. Baby could be seen between them, bending over an open flower which imaged her loveliness in its fragrant corolla. “Mamma,” said she at last, raising her head, “do you think papa will be away a long time?” “I think he will be back in four or five days at the latest,” replied her mother. “But why do you ask such a question?” “Oh! because I am so anxious to have him back again. I want him to take us immediately to Quebec, instead of waiting until next month. The trip will divert my thoughts; for, since those Indians were here the other day with that poor girl they had captured, I have not had a moment’s piece of mind. She is always before my eyes. I see her everywhere; she follows me everywhere. I even saw her in my dream last night. I thought I was sitting in the midst of a gloomy and immense forest, near a wild, rushing river that dashed over a precipice into a bottomless chasm a few steps from me. On the opposite bank, which was covered with flowers, and charming to behold, stood the young captive, pale and tranquil, in a halo of soft, transparent light. She seemed to be in another world. She held in
- 39. her hands an open book, and, bending towards me, she slowly turned over the leaves. She turned at least sixteen; then she stopped and looked at me with an expression of the greatest sorrow and distress, and made a sign to some one, who then seemed to be standing near me, to cross the torrent. At the signal, all his limbs trembled; his knees knocked together, and his eyes dilated, his mouth gasped with terror, and a cold perspiration stood upon his forehead. He tried to draw back, but an invincible power drew him toward the abyss. He turned toward me, and besought my help most piteously. I experienced the greatest commiseration for him, and tried in vain to extend my hands to help him; invisible cords bound all my limbs, and prevented any movement whatsoever. Vainly he tried to cling to the cliffs along the shore; a relentless force impelled him towards the abyss. He had already reached the middle of the stream, whose deep and foaming waters roared around him, as if impatient to swallow him up. He tottered at every step, and came near losing his equilibrium; but, rallying his strength, he struggled on. At last a great wave broke over him, and he lost his balance. His feet slipped; he looked toward me with a glance of the most inexpressible anguish, and fell. In an instant, he was borne to the brink of the precipice; he threw out his hands, and grasped at a piece of rock that jutted out of the water, burying his fingers in the green and slimy moss which covered it. For an instant, he hung on with the strength of despair; his body, stopped suddenly in its precipitate course, appeared for an instant above the waves. The foam and spray enveloped it like a cloud, and the wind from the fall blew through his dank and dripping hair. His dilated eyes were fastened on the rock, which little by little receded from his convulsive grasp. Finally, with a terrible shriek, he disappeared in the yawning gulf below. Transfixed with agony and horror, I looked across at the young captive; but she, without uttering a word, wiped away a tear, and silently pointed to the last page in the book, which seemed to me to be covered with blood. I screamed aloud with fright, and awoke with a start. My God! will it be a page in my life?”
- 40. VII.—BLOOD. Scarcely had Mlle. Baby finished speaking, when the sound of hasty footsteps was heard at the door, and a man, covered with blood, and with a terrified look, rushed in. It was the young officer. His right arm was broken, and hanging at his side. “Hide me quickly,” cried he. “I am pursued by the Indians.” “Up in the attic, quick,” said Mme. Baby to him, “and do not stir for your life.” In another moment, the savages had entered the room; but, before they could say a word, Mme. Baby pointed to the next street, and they went out again quickly, believing that the officer had escaped in that direction. The admirable composure of Mme. Baby had completely deceived them. Not a muscle of her face betrayed her excessive agitation, and, happily, they did not have time to notice the mortal pallor of the young girl, who, still leaning among the flowers on the window-sill, had almost fainted away. It was one of those moments of inexpressible anguish when a chill like death strikes the heart. Mme. Baby hoped that the savages, fearing the superintendent, would not dare to force themselves into the house; and yet, who could stop them if they did, or who could foresee what these barbarians, once having tasted blood, might do? She hoped that their fruitless efforts might induce them to abandon their search, or, if they persisted, that she would have sufficient time to obtain help, in case they again entered the house. Making a sign to a servant who was at work in the garden, she ordered him to run as fast as he could, and notify some men belonging to the fort of the danger which threatened them. Some anxious minutes elapsed, but the savages did not return. “Do you think they have really gone?” asked the young girl, in a low tone. A faint glimmer of hope appeared in her countenance. “Even if they should return,” answered Mme. Baby, “they would not dare ...”
- 41. She did not finish, but leaning toward the window, she tried to catch the sound of human voices which were heard in the distance. Was it the help that she expected, or was it the voices of the Indians coming back? She could not distinguish. The sound drew nearer and nearer, and became more distinct as it approached. “They are our men,” exclaimed Mlle. Baby. “Don’t you hear the barking of our dog?” And she drew a long breath of relief, as if an immense weight had been taken from her heart. Mme. Baby did not reply; a faint smile played over her lips. She, too, had heard the dogs barking; but another noise that she knew only too well had also reached her ears. Very soon the voices became so distinct that it was impossible to be deceived any longer. “Here they are, here they are!” shrieked the young girl, sinking into a seat near the window, as the different-colored feathers with which the savages decorated their heads appeared between the trees. “Don’t tremble so,” said Mme. Baby in a quiet voice to her daughter, “or you will betray us. Look out of the window, and don’t let them perceive your emotion.” Courage and coolness at a critical moment are always admirable, but when a woman possesses these qualities, they are sublime. Calm and impassive, without even rising from her seat, Mme. Baby tranquilly continued her work. The most practised eye could not have detected the smallest trace of emotion, the least feverish excitement or agitation, on her commanding and noble countenance. A heroine’s heart beat in her woman’s breast, and it was thus that she awaited the arrival of the savages. “Tell us where you have concealed the white warrior,” cried the first one who entered the room. It was the Potawatamie whom the young officer had so imprudently offended. He was dripping with perspiration, and out of breath with his long and fatiguing quest. You could see the rage and exasperation of his disappointment in his ferocious glances, his scowling brow, and the excitement that made every feature quiver. “Comrade,” replied Mme. Baby, in a tranquil tone of voice, “you know the superintendent well; and, if you have the misfortune to misbehave in his house, you will get into trouble.”
- 42. The Indian hesitated a moment, then said, in a feigned mildness of voice, “My white sister knows that the Potawatamie loves peace, and that he never makes the first attack. The white warrior is on the war-path, or the Potawatamie would not have pursued.” “I have not hidden the white warrior,” answered Mme. Baby. “It is useless to search here; you had better look elsewhere, or he will escape you.” The Indian did not reply, but, looking at Mme. Baby with a smile, he pointed to a little stain on the floor that no one but an Indian would have discovered. But the sharp eye of the savage had detected there a trace of his enemy. It was a drop of blood, which Mme. Baby had taken the precaution to wipe away most carefully. “My sister has told the truth,” said the Indian, in an ironical tone. “The white warrior has not passed this way; that drop of blood, I suppose, she put there to persuade the Indian that she had concealed the white warrior.” Then, assuming a more serious tone, he continued: “My sister, know well that the Potawatamie will do the white warrior no harm; only show us where he is hidden, and we will go away; we only want to take him pris ...” He stopped, and, bending his head forward, looked through an open window at the other end of the apartment; then, giving a hideous yell, he rushed across the room, and leaped out of the window that opened into the garden. His ferocious companions followed him, howling like a troop of demons. Without seeing what had happened, Mme. Baby understood all. The young officer, hearing the Indians return, and believing himself lost, had the imprudence to jump out of one of the windows into the garden. He ran toward a covered fountain in the centre of the parterre to hide, when the Indian perceived him. How can I describe the scene which followed? The pen drops from my hand. In two bounds, they had reached him, and one of the savages, striking him a terrible blow with his fist, sent him reeling to the ground. He fell on his broken arm, and the excruciating pain caused him to utter a deep groan. They then seized hold of him, and bound his hands and feet. Poor young man! what resistance could he make to his cruel enemies, with a broken arm, and totally
- 43. disabled and weakened by the loss of blood. He called for help, but the echoes in the garden only answered his cries, and redoubled the horror of the scene. Mlle. Baby, bereft of her senses, threw herself at her mother’s feet, and, hiding her face on her knees, she covered her ears with her hands, to shut out, if possible, from sight and hearing the frightful tragedy. While the rest of the savages were tying their victim down, the Potawatamie drew out his knife, and deliberately commenced to sharpen it on a stone. His face betrayed no excitement whatever; not even the horrible pleasure of gratifying his vengeance, which caused his heart to palpitate with an infernal joy, could change his stoical countenance. “My brother the white warrior,” said he, continuing to whet his knife with the utmost coolness, “knows very well that he can insult the Potawatamie with impunity, because the Potawatamie is a coward, and would rather run than fight.... Does my brother now wish to make peace with his friend, the Potawatamie? He can speak if he wishes, and name his terms, for he is free.” Then, suddenly assuming a ferocious air, he straightened himself up, and, fixing his inflamed eyes on the young officer, said: “My brother the white warrior can now chant his death- song, because he must die.” And brandishing his knife, he plunged it into his throat, while another of these monsters caught the blood in a little copper kettle. The rest of the savages then kicked and stamped upon the body with the most infernal yells and contortions. The death-rattle of the poor victim, mingling with these howls, reached the ears of the young girl, and she shook in a convulsion of horror. At last it all ceased. The victim had been immolated. Pushing aside the corpse with his foot, the Potawatamie, followed by his companions, came again toward the house. “Ha! ha! so you would not tell us where your friend, the white warrior, was?” cried the Indian, as he entered the room. “Very well, since you love him so much, you shall drink his blood.” Mme. Baby, pale as a marble statue, drew herself up firmly. “You can kill me,” said she, “but you can never make me drink it!” The young girl had fainted, and was lying at her mother’s feet. They seized hold of Mme. Baby, and tried
- 44. to force open her mouth; but failing in their efforts, they threw the contents of the vessel in her face, and left the house.[187] VIII.—THE SERPENT. Several months had elapsed since the events had taken place which we have just narrated. It was night. In the centre of the garden, a simple black cross had been erected on the spot where the unfortunate young man had been massacred. No inscription revealed to the passer-by either the name of the victim or the fatal circumstances of his death. Alas! it was written for ever in characters of blood on the hearts of the family. Every evening, the superintendent, with his wife, children, and servants, assembled at the foot of this cross, to pray for the repose of the soul of his unfortunate friend. On this especial evening, all the family had as usual visited the grave, and returned to the house, except the young girl, who, dressed in deep mourning, still remained kneeling at the foot of the sombre monument. She was very pale, and there was an expression of the most ineffable sadness on her face. The evening dew had almost entirely uncurled her long ringlets, which now hung in disorder around her cheeks. You might have mistaken her for a statue of grief. From the clear, high heaven above, the moon poured floods of melancholy light. Its dreamy rays fell on the sod at the foot of the cross and on the face of the young girl like a thought from beyond the tomb—like a silent and grateful sigh from the innocent victim whose memory had left so tender and anguishing an impression in her soul. Her lips moved in ardent prayer—prayer, that celestial solace of the grief-stricken heart, the smile of the angels through the tears of earth. For a long time she thus silently held communion with her God, breathing out her prayers with sighs and tears, as she knelt at the foot of this cross, on the sod still damp with the victim’s blood. At last she rose, and was about to leave, when, raising her eyes for a moment, she thought she saw a shadow moving across an opening in the wall of a shed near by. A cloud, at that moment passing over the moon, prevented her from
- 45. distinguishing what the object was. She waited a moment until the cloud had passed over, when what was her astonishment to see a human face in the aperture! It must be a robber, she thought, and yet she knew positively that the gate was well secured. “He will find himself nicely caught when the servants come to lock up,” said she to herself. By degrees, however, the head was pushed more and more through the air-hole, and gradually emerged from the obscurity. At the same moment, the moonlight fell clear and full on the face. The young girl actually shivered. She recognized it but too well; it was impossible to be mistaken. It was he; she recognized perfectly his copper skin, his hard, ferocious features, and his yellowish eyes, rolling in their sockets. It was indeed the Potawatamie, the murderer of the young officer.[188] Her first thought was flight, but an invincible curiosity fastened her to the spot. The Indian continued to work through the aperture; one arm was already out, and he held something in his hand which she could not discern. He tried for a long time to get through the air- hole, which was too small for his body. Finally, while making a last effort, he suddenly turned his head, and fixed his eyes with a very uneasy expression on a little bush near him. He seemed undecided what to do; then, letting go the object, he rested his hand on the ground, and, pushing it against the earth with all his strength, tried to force himself back again through the hole. But his broad shoulders, compressed on both sides by the wall, held him like a vice, and he could neither move one way nor another. Then his uneasiness increased, and he looked again anxiously toward the bushes. A slight rustling of the leaves was then perceptible, and a small head emerged slowly from the shadow of the branches, and extended itself toward the savage. It was a rattlesnake.[189] Immovable and with fixed eyes, the Indian watched the least movement of the reptile, which advanced softly and cautiously, as if aware of the strength and power of his redoubtable adversary. When within a few feet of the savage, it stopped, raised itself up, and, throwing out its forked tongue, sprang toward his face; but, before he could touch him, the Indian, as quick as thought, gave him a
- 46. violent blow with the hand that was free, and the reptile fell a short distance from him. Then he began again to make every effort to disengage himself; but in vain. The snake, now furious, advanced a second time to recommence the attack, but with more caution than before. Approaching still nearer to his enemy, he threw himself forward with much greater violence, but without success; for the hand of the savage sent him rebounding further off than before. The Potawatamie then gathered all his strength for a final effort of liberation, but of no avail: he remained fast in the opening of the air- hole. Quick as lightning, the reptile, now foaming at the mouth, with blazing eyes, and jaws swollen with rage, his forked tongue extended, sprang with renewed strength toward his prey. His scaly skin glistened and sparkled in the silvery light of the moon, and the slight noise made by his rattles resembled the rustling of parchment, and alone broke the silence of the night. This mortal combat in the stillness of night, between a serpent and a savage more subtle than the serpent, had an indescribable fascination; it was more like a contest between two evil spirits, in the shadow of night, over some unfortunate victim. The serpent now approached so near the Indian that he could almost have seized him with his hand; he raised himself a last time, and, throwing back his head, sprang forward. The savage, guarding himself carefully with his one hand, had followed with his eyes the least movement of the writhing body. It was plain to see that the final fight had begun, and could only terminate in the total vanquishment of one or the other of the combatants. At the instant that the snake sprang like an arrow upon his enemy, the Indian raised his hand; but this time the attack of the reptile had been so rapid and instantaneous that, before he could strike him a blow, his fangs had entered his cheek. A hoarse cry died away in the throat of the savage, who, seizing the serpent with his hand before he could escape, raised him to his mouth, and in his rage tore him to pieces with his teeth. A vain reprisal—the blow had been struck. A short time after, the most horrible cries and fearful convulsions announced that the mortal venom had entered his veins. The victim writhed with despair in the midst of his excruciating agony. It was thought at first that he had finally succeeded in
- 47. getting out; but subsequently they found the body, enormously swollen, still held in the aperture of the air-hole. His bloodshot eyes were starting from their sockets, his face as black as ink, while his gaping mouth revealed two rows of white teeth, to which still clung the fragments of the reptile’s skin, and flakes of bloody foam. Providence had indeed terribly avenged the assassination of the young officer.
- 48. THE JESUITS IN PARIS. A walk in the direction of the gloomy though now as ever fashionable Faubourg St. Germain is not exactly one that a non- fashionable person would ordinarily choose; nor does the Rue de Sèvres in that quarter hold out any particular inducement for a foot- passenger to traverse it. However, it was to the Rue de Sèvres that, on the 18th of January, 1873, I bent my steps; for at one o’clock precisely I had an appointment to keep there with a Father of the Compagnie de Jésus; and No. 35 in that street is the society’s headquarters. I crossed the Seine at the Pont Royale, and soon found myself in the main artery of the faubourg—the well-known Rue du Bac. I splashed along with omnibuses that seemed determined to do their best to destroy the roughly macadamized carriage-road; by huge gaps in the façade, where the pétroleuse had been at work, and where the dull-red walls looked as if the destroying element were still lurking about them; by blue-coated and blue-hooded policemen, who scrutinized one to an extent that made you debate within your mind whether you had or had not picked the pocket of a passer-by, or lately become affiliated to the Internationale. On, by the “Maison Petit St. Thomas”—a large dry-goods establishment, the name of which may bring back perhaps to some of our lady readers the pleasant season passed a few years since in Paris, with its gay fêtes and agreeable shopping excursions. On, till the plate-glass of the store windows becomes less costly, and the fish and the charcuterie, or ham and sausage shops, become more plentiful. On, till at last, to
- 49. right and left, “Rue de Sèvres,” in bold white letters on a blue ground, tells me that I have reached my destination. To save time, I thought it necessary to ask some one where the particular house that I wanted was situated. I looked at a sergent de ville, but his glances repelled me. I turned towards a cabman, but I fancied he expected something more than I was prepared to give him; and then, not in despair, but in the natural order of things, I had recourse to the inevitable Parisian chestnut-man, who (I having taken the precaution of buying two sous’ worth of damply-warm chestnuts) willingly gave me all the information that I required. The exterior of No. 35 Rue de Sèvres is as much like that of any other house in Paris as you can well imagine. There is a certain number of feet of stucco, relieved by oblong windows; and there are two large portes cochères, or folding-doors, far apart from one another, and looking incapable either of being opened or closed; although, in point of fact, the one leads to the church, and the other to the convent. I entered, of course, by the last-named portal, and, passing through the usual French courtyard, knocked at a glass door, from whence it was evident that a brother porter within held communication with the world without. I presented my letter of introduction to him, and, while he was making arrangements for the transmission of it to the rightful owner, because it was raining heavily, and because I saw only one door open, I entered by that door, and found myself uninvited and unwittingly in the conciergerie, or porter’s lodge, itself. The concierge and his occupation afforded me a good deal of amusement, or, to speak less lightly, a good deal of room for thought during part of the three-quarters of an hour that I was destined to wait for the arrival of the priest with whom I had the engagement. He has under his control the management of ten brown wooden handles, attached to ten wires, which wires are connected with ten different doors in different parts of the establishment.
- 50. If a person want a confessor, he pulls the wire connected with the church. If a lady desires advice, another pull opens the parlors to her. If a priest wishes to come from the convent, another pull in another direction is necessary. And as these pulls (except in the last case) are invariably followed by a message sent through a speaking- tube by the same brother porter, to inform the priest of the fact that he is wanted; and as through the before-mentioned glass door and otherwise he receives all letters, and answers all queries, both from within and without, he has, I take it, a pretty hard time of it. I had been too much absorbed at first to observe what was taking place around me; but, after a little, I began to remark that the priests, in passing to and fro through the conciergerie, bestowed upon me more glances of earnest inquiry than I thought my personal appearance actually warranted. At last the mystery was solved by one father being so good as to tell me that seculars generally waited in the parlors. I bowed, thanked him gratefully, and went; but not before I had discovered that, if the pigeon-holes for letters be a true test, there were fourteen or more priests resident in the Rue de Sèvres at that particular time. I was not sorry for the exchange of place. It was strangely interesting to be sitting in those rooms where, so short a time since, the Communists, under the command of an energetic young gentleman named Citoyen Lagrange, took prisoner the good Superior Father Olivaint and his Père Procureur, M. Caubert. Strange to sit in those parlors, and gaze upon the large and well- photographed portraits of those two men and martyrs, and to notice the remarkable likeness existing between them. How both had the same square forehead and firmly set, powerful mouth; and how both looked—as they were—soldiers ready to die under the banner for which they fought. Ne pleurez pas sur moi,[190] cried Father Olivaint to the solitary group of sympathizers whom he met on his way to the Préfecture de Police.
- 51. No! mon père, we weep not, but rather thank God that the grand old spirit of martyrdom has not yet died out among us! Besides the thoughts which the past suggested to me, it was interesting to note the living occupants of the rooms. One silver- haired old gentleman, whom I afterwards found out to be the self- same Père Alexis Lefebvre whom Lagrange left in charge of the house, telling him to keep it au nom de la Commune, was holding a very serious conversation with two or three gentlemen, the red ribbons in whose button-holes declared them to be chevaliers de la Legion d’Honneur. Another father was having quite a small reception of middle-aged married ladies, who probably had, or desired to have, sons either at the College of Vaugirard or at that of S. Geneviève. Another—but stay! here is my particular father, to whose kindness I owe it that I have been enabled to write this paper. The Society of Jesus is so well known to the citizens of New York that it would be superfluous for me to give any lengthened description of the general principles of government upon which the order is based. Suffice it to say, for the benefit of the uninitiated, that, in common with other religious, they have a head resident at the Roman court; provincials under him, among whom the supervision of the different stations is divided; and superiors of individual houses. It is peculiar, however, to the Society of Jesus that each provincial has attendant upon him an officer called socius, whose care it is to look after the pecuniary business of the province, and in many kindred ways to assist his chief; but this office, I am informed, does not confer any additional rank upon the holder. The case is different, however, with some other officials of the society, called “consulters,” who, as their name implies, are chosen from among the number of the elder and more experienced brethren. The house in the Rue de Sèvres was reopened in the year 1853, after having been considerably enlarged. The main building consists of a plainly-built quadrangle, on the north side of which, and in immediate connection with it, stands the
- 52. church, dedicated to the sacred name of Jesus. Running along all the inner sides of the quadrangle, both on the ground and the other two floors, is a lofty, well-ventilated corridor or cloister, adorned here and there, after the usual manner of convents, with religious paintings. The piece of ground forming the natural centre of the quadrangle is laid out with shrubbery, though without pretension to anything more than neatness. On the ground floor are situated the refectory, the kitchens, and other offices; while the first and second floors are devoted exclusively to the use of the fathers. The cells, like the corridors, are lofty and well ventilated, but so simple in their arrangement as to require no description. The priests, in the true monastic spirit, sweep and keep clean their own rooms and even the cloisters; and, from the general air of cleanliness and order that pervades the place, it is evident that the work is well done. This walk through the cloisters of the Jesuit house in Paris would be uninteresting were it not for the remembrance of one ne’er-to-be-forgotten room; and for the sake of the names printed upon the cell doors, bringing back as they do to one’s mind the recollection of past times and weary troubles; and the near presence of men so many of whom have distinguished themselves in working for the cause of holy church. Tread softly, and be silent now, as ye approach yonder door that bears no printed name; for the key that turns the jealous lock will disclose that to thy gaze which should excite thy intensest feelings of humility! It is the “Martyrs’ Room,” where are kept the relics of the five heroic men, each one of whom “pro lege Dei sui certavit usque ad mortem et a verbis impiorum non timuit; fundatus enim erat supra firmam petram.”[191] Anatole de Beugy was arrested with the Père Ducoudray. “Voilà un nom à vous faire couper le cou,” cried the officer in charge of the party of arrest.
- 53. “Oh! j’espère,” replied the father calmly; “que vous ne me ferez pas couper le cou à cause de mon nom.” I imagine that the officer did not think more highly of F. de Beugy after this. In fact, all through the time of his imprisonment, his captors seem not to have liked him or his indomitable sang froid. His coat is there, in this “Martyrs’ Room” (a secular one, by the bye), and it is pierced with seventy-two Communist bullets—truly, a very palpable proof of his enemies’ animosity. When the Père Olivaint was on his way to execution, as he descended the stairs of the prison of La Roquette, he found—how naturally!—that he had his breviary tightly grasped in his hand. “They have me,” perhaps he thought, “but they need not have this”; and he presented the book to the concierge of the prison, who had shown him some kindness. God knows what motives the man had, but an officer of the National Guard snatched it from his hand, and threw it into the flames of a fire near by. The concierge recovered the breviary, or what remained of it, and it is now in the “Martyrs’ Room.” He who can look upon this relic without emotion must have a very hard heart indeed! Do any of us ever think that the spirit of penance—corporal penance—is dying out amongst us? There are instruments of self- mortification in this “Martyrs’ Room” that will convince us to the contrary. It is not a miracle—unless the world and life be all a miracle—if, when men die wondrous deaths, wonderful things should follow upon those deaths; and when we see a marble tablet in this “Martyrs’ Room” telling how, not eighteen months ago, at Mass-time, when the priest invoked the saints whose relics lay beneath the altars in the church, a child was healed of a grievous disease, we must not be surprised. “Ecce ego vobiscum sum omnibus diebus usque ad consummationem sœculi.”[192]
- 54. The beds from La Roquette are here—pieces of sacking, stretched out by a contrivance something similar to that made use of in the formation of camp-stools. Here are the little silver cases in which the fathers concealed the Blessed Sacrament, to be at last, as each anticipated, his viaticum. But enough.... The church, as I before stated, is situated on the north side of the quadrangle. It is Gothic, and of fair proportions, consisting of a choir and two aisles. The only side chapel worthy of note is that where repose the bodies of the PP. Olivaint, Ducoudray, Clerc, Caubert, and De Beugy, murdered on the 24th and 26th of May, 1871, by the Communists of Paris. The walls, the floor, the whole chapel, in fact, is literally covered with wreaths of blood-red immortelles; while in front of what, in the event of their canonization, will be the “Martyrs’ Altar,” are five white marble slabs, bearing upon them the names of the five victims, together with the incidents and date of their deaths. My kind guide—the priest whom I have elsewhere described as being “my particular father”—having now shown me all that was necessary of the house and chapel, returned with me to his cell, and, in some very interesting conversations then and on my succeeding visits, soon gave me an idea of the important works undertaken by his society in Paris. “We are,” said he, “quite a military order. Fighting is as much our business as it is the soldier’s; and I will even go so far as to say that he is no true Jesuit who does not fight. Of enemies, as you may imagine, there is no lack whatever; but, undoubtedly, here our bête noire is socialism; for you know in Paris, as indeed elsewhere, it has ever been our aim to undertake, if possible, the education of the male portion of society. And this, unfortunately, happens to be the favorite work of the socialists also; for, however faulty their code of moral philosophy may be in other respects, they have at least grasped the fact that to educate the affluent youth of a country is to form the intellect of a rising generation. However,” concluded my
- 55. instructor laughingly, “we have never been very popular in European society.” “No,” I answered abstractedly; for I was thinking just then of the sacred name which the order bears—of him who was “Virum dolorum et scientem infirmitatem”;[193] and my thoughts reverted to the martyr shrine that I had so lately seen in the chapel. “But perhaps you, who have in such a special manner enrolled yourselves under the banner of the sacred name of Jesus, have received of him a greater share than others of the shame of the cross.” The father’s reply was a very practical one. “My dear sir,” said he, “nothing of the kind. The world dislikes us because we persist in teaching, and because it knows perfectly well that all our teaching is impregnated to the core with that particular kind of Catholicity which it hates—the Catholicity, I mean, whose first principle is devotion and implicit obedience to the Holy See.” It will be seen, therefore, from the foregoing fragment of conversation, that the Jesuits’ work in Paris is for the most part the Catholic education of the upper classes. The fathers in the Rue de Sèvres do, in one way and another, a good deal of work, although but little, perhaps, of a character that directly identifies itself with the peculiar animus of the order to which I have alluded. They are popular as confessors, and this involves a good deal of labor. They direct two confraternities of men, each numbering respectively upwards of two hundred members. One is for the fathers of families, and the other for young men. Each society meets in the chapel upon alternate Thursdays for Mass and instruction. Again, the Jesuits render every assistance that lies in their power to the parochial clergy; and thus the fathers become, now conductors of missions, and now Lenten or Advent preachers. At the Rue de Sèvres are given retreats, not only to their own brethren and the secular clergy, but also, and on a large scale, to private individuals—men whom care has driven to seek refuge in the contemplation of the treasures laid up for them in heaven.
- 56. Jesuits, whose duty calls them to places en route to which Paris becomes a natural resting-place, find a haven in the Rue de Sèvres. The provincial resides here when he is in Paris; and, finally, a few men who, at a moment’s notice, are available to be sent anywhere to meet a sudden emergency, make for the time this most interesting house their home. In a dark, narrow street in close proximity to the Pantheon—in a street that, in its unlikeness to some other parts of the city, reminds one of the Paris of history—is situated the College of S. Geneviève. This is the chief educational establishment of the order; the other being that of the school of the Immaculate Conception at Vaugirard —a village on the southwest side of Paris. In concluding this chapter in the life of what, next to holy church itself, must ever be considered the most wonderful organization that the world has ever seen, I cannot do better than append a brief account of the character of the work done in these two houses. The Ecole S. Geneviève, founded in the year 1854, proposes for its object the preparation of youths for admission into the various professional colleges in France. That the work is a success may be seen in the fact that, in 1872-1873, sixty-four students were actually admitted from thence to the military academy at St. Cyr, while twenty-three more were declared “admissibles”; that the same school sent sixteen boys to the Ecole Centrale, to be educated as engineers, seven to the Ecole Navale, and twenty-three to the Polytechnique; and, lastly, that, exclusive of these, many more have been admitted into other similar establishments in Paris or elsewhere. The aggregate number of students appears, from the statistics put into my hands, to exceed four hundred and fifty. The present rector of S. Geneviève is the immediate successor of the Père Ducoudray; and it is a noteworthy fact that three out of the five men killed under the Commune were connected with the school; the other two being PP. Caubert and Clerc. The services of the last- named father must have been extremely valuable; for, previous to his admission to the Society of Jesus, he had been for many years a naval officer.