Asch Experiment
What is it?
Asch is an experiment that shows that people are more likely to conform to the majority opinion even if they know that it is wrong.
The Asch Experiment, conducted by psychologist Solomon Asch in the 1950s, was a series of studies designed to investigate the influence of social pressure on an individual's decision-making process. The main goal of the experiment was to understand the extent to which people conform to the opinions of a group, even when those opinions are clearly incorrect.
In layman's terms, the Asch Experiment aimed to explore whether people would go along with the majority's wrong answer just to fit in or avoid conflict.
Here's a simple example of how the experiment was carried out:
- A group of participants was brought into a room, with only one of them being the actual subject of the experiment. The others were "confederates" or actors instructed by the experimenter.
- The group was shown two cards: one with a single line (the "target line") and another with three lines of varying lengths (labeled A, B, and C).
- The task was simple: the participants had to decide which of the three lines (A, B, or C) matched the length of the target line.
- The catch was that the confederates were instructed to give the same wrong answer unanimously, while the actual subject gave their answer after hea ...