Social Conformity Through The Ages Summary

Why do we act the way we do when around others? The answer is embedded in our psychology, as emulated in “Social Psychology: A Glimpse of Social Conformity Through the Ages,” a magazine article by Hossna Sadat, MA. This article talks about why we as human beings want to conform. This article explains how the behavior of others can be influenced by a stronger, more dominant social group.
The size of the dominant group can lead to its power. This is supported by, “The larger the group size, the more likely that influence will transpire.” (Sadat 2) and “This is where single 'naive' participants were mixed with a high number of confederates”…“ This technique allows confederates to manipulate 'naive' participant’s response to a given question.” (Sadat 2) Since the larger group has more people, it has more influence over those who are not in the group. To conclude, larger groups can sway more people because they have more voice.

The more self-confidence someone has, the smaller chance of them accepting conformity into a dominant group. This is explained when the author states, “Personality may affect conformity significantly. Molly Marshall says, ‘Some people are more self-confident and have higher self-esteem than others.’ Those who are confident are less likely to conform to others.” (Sadat 3) and “Conformity is far less pervasive in individualistic societies because democratic choices and laissez-faire viewpoints are somewhat considered.” (Sadat 3) Since the people in an individualistic society have a say, they feel more self-confident and in turn, don’t feel the need to conform as