Asch Paradigm

What’s the deal with conformity? Everybody says its bad, but could it be good? Take WW 2 for example, conformity was expected because nonconformity was fatal. Clearly, conformity was a necessary good. For decades there was a superior notion that encouraged humans to be moralistic and righteous creatures and thus conformity provided the means to advance God's wishes. Though this belief was present in many monolithic practices, it clearly underscored the freethinker and subjected individual experiences and impulses to respect for divinity and attainment of "perfection".

So what's so bad about conformity? Why does the outcast have to always be the hero? In Brain and Behavior we studied psychologist Asch. The "Asch Paradigm" was a series of experiments that demonstrated an individual’s response to group pressure. The participants were asked to compare the lengths of 3 different lines. Expected to announce their answers aloud, the group answers a few questions correctly and then started saying incorrect answers that seemed slightly ambiguous. An example of the questions asked was which line is longer A or B? The pressure to conform, even to the wrong choice, seemed to overrule individuality. Asch, as I did, expected that most people would refuse to conform to a wrong answer, but when surrounded by others who agreed on the incorrect choice, participants too voiced the incorrect response. This discovery reveals the power that even a dissenting minority can have. When the participants were asked about their decision making process, the subjects attributed their performance to their own misjudgment or "poor eyesight".