Social psychology – underthemystery.com

The Robbers Cave Experiment – Conflict between groups

Muzafer Sherif argued that intergroup conflict (i.e., conflict between groups) occurs when two groups are in competition for limited resources. This theory is supported by evidence from a famous study investigating group conflict: The Robbers Cave Experiment. In the mid-1950’s Muzafer Sherif and others carried out the Robbers Cave experiment on intergroup conflict and co-operation […]

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Stanford Prison Experiment

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Zimbardo and his colleagues (1973) were interested in finding out whether the brutality reported among guards in American prisons was due to the sadistic personalities of the guards (i.e., dispositional) or had more to do with the prison environment (i.e., situational). Do guards have to behave sometimes aggressively, because they are dealing with people who

Social psychology, Stanford prison experiment

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Milgram experiment

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One of the most famous studies of obedience in psychology was carried out by Stanley Milgram, a psychologist at Yale University. He conducted an experiment focusing on the conflict between obedience to authority and personal conscience. The experiments began in July 1961. Milgram was interested in researching how far people would go in obeying an

Milgram experiment, Social psychology

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Conformity experiment

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In 1951 Solomon Asch conducted an experiment to investigate the extent to which social pressure from a majority group could affect a person to conform. Asch used a lab experiment to study conformity, whereby 50 male students in the USA participated in a ‘‘vision test’’. He told them it was a vision test. Asch put

Conformity experiment, Social psychology

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Cognitive Dissonance

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Leon Festinger Cognitive dissonance was first investigated by Leon Festinger, arising out of a participant observation study of a cult which believed that the earth was going to be destroyed by a flood, and what happened to its members – particularly the really committed ones who had given up their homes and jobs to work

Cognitive dissonance, Psychology, Social psychology

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Bystander Effect

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Psychology, Biology Or Both The term bystander effect refers to the tendency for people to be inactive in high danger situations due to the presence of other bystanders. Thus, people tend to help more when alone than in a group. The implications for this theory have been widely studied by a variety of researchers, but

Bystander effect, Psychology, Social psychology

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