Asch’s Experiment: How Far We Get Carried Away

Asch’s experiment is one of the best known in social psychology when speaking in agreement with the group. The simplicity of its procedure and the generalizability of its results have laid the foundations for studies on how the majority can influence our decisions and even our perception of the world.

Curious? In this article we are going to describe one of the simplest, most fascinating and enlightening experiments in the history of psychology.

Solomon Asch and his influence on social psychology

Solomon Asch, born in Warsaw in 1907, is the main reference in social psychology in terms of conformity studies. He focused his studies on the influence of the group on the individual, contributing to the creation of some concepts, such as the halo effect and the primacy effect.

However, the experiment that marked his career was carried out in 1951. In this study, Asch hoped to show that people can go against the tide when they understand that the majority are wrong.

Yet alas, capricious reality! He found just results that supported the opposite hypothesis. In the next section you can read how this experiment was designed. Its simplicity and all subsequent ramifications forever changed the paradigm of the study of social influence.

Asch’s experiment: how far we get carried away

Asch’s experiment was simple. Users had to use their sight to answer a question with three answer options. The procedure was as follows:

• Groups of 7 to 9 people were formed, where all, except the critical subject, were accomplices of the experimenter.
• All subjects were presented with two cards: one with a reference line and one with three options, each a line of different length. Only one of those three lines was the same as long as the reference line.
• In the early trials, all the accomplices gave the correct answer, but at some point they all began to agree on an answer that was not. For example, if the line that was the same as the one on the reference card was A, everyone said it was C.

At this point, what do you think the critical subject would answer? The logical thing would be to think that, although everyone is wrong, this person will answer the one they think is correct. Well, it was not like that: when all the accomplices agreed to choose a clearly incorrect option, many of the subjects answered the same as the group.

The results paradigm

How is this possible? In a task as simple as looking at a line and deciding which of the others is the same; in principle, there is no room for error, you see what you see. This is where Asch’s most important discovery comes into play, and it is that many of the subjects claimed that they  saw a line as long as the first, when clearly it was not.

That is to say, not only is the opinion of the individual modified by what the majority says, but the physical perception itself is sensitive to its  influence . The criticism made is that, since it is such a minor task, the subject could answer the same as the others for the simple interest of avoiding the dilemma.

Reflections on Asch’s experiment

These results dictated a very important question to social psychology: to what extent are we willing to change our opinions, decisions and even our perceptions due to the influence of others?

In this sense, the basic approach of the experiment favors generalization to everyday situations : leisure marked by groups of friends, professional careers highly conditioned by the opinion of the family, even social hatreds such as racism or machismo.

It is important to leave the idea on the table of how important we consider certain things to be against them. Many times, the manipulation of the system consists of trivializing certain aspects of life to achieve the conformity of the individual.

We may all not want to get wet in going against the grain when it comes to the length of a line, but what about when it comes to voting or not? For example, is fashion so important as to condemn a man wearing a skirt?