Why is the Asch experiment important?

Solomon Asch conducted an experiment to investigate the extent to which social pressure from a majority group could affect a person to conform. He believed that the main problem with Sherif’s (1935) conformity experiment was that there was no correct answer to the ambiguous autokinetic experiment.Click to see full answer. Subsequently, one may also ask,…

Solomon Asch conducted an experiment to investigate the extent to which social pressure from a majority group could affect a person to conform. He believed that the main problem with Sherif’s (1935) conformity experiment was that there was no correct answer to the ambiguous autokinetic experiment.Click to see full answer. Subsequently, one may also ask, what were the results of the Asch experiment?Across all these papers, Asch found the same results: participants conformed to the majority group in about one-third of all critical trials. Asch found that the presence of a “true partner” (a “real” participant or another actor told to give the correct response to each question) decreased conformity.Furthermore, why is Solomon Asch important? Contributions to Psychology Solomon Asch is considered a pioneer of social psychology and Gestalt psychology. His conformity experiments demonstrated the power of social influence and still serve as a source of inspiration for social psychology researchers today. Asch also supervised Stanley Milgram’s Ph. Then, why is it important to conform? People conform to group pressure because they are dependent on the group for satisfying two important desires: the desire to have an accurate perception of reality and the desire to be accepted by other people. People want to hold accurate beliefs about the world because such beliefs usually lead to rewarding outcomes.Is the Asch experiment ethical? Evaluation of Asch Finally, Asch’s research is ethically questionable. He broke several ethical guidelines, including: deception and protection from harm. Asch deliberately deceived his participants, saying that they were taking part in a vision test and not an experiment on conformity.

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