In 1950s Solomon Asch, a Polish-American psychologist conducted a series of experiments among some college students. He showed the participants in common, three cards with three lines in differing length and asked them to say which of them had similar lengths. In the first three trials all of them made the correct judgments as ‘they all differ’. Whereas, in the fourth trial, first participant responded as two of the lines matches which were obviously different. Then the group opinion also began to change. He concludes that 50% to 80% of participants in different studies of the same kind conformed to the opinions of the majority. According to Asch, the reason behind it was the influence to go along with the group out of the desire to be liked, accepted and approved by others (Asch, 1955).
Later, Wendy McKelvey and Nancy H. Kerr conducted two experiments on six persons in a group of friends and on other six persons in a group of strangers. They used procedures similar to Asch’s. They found that there was significantly less conformity in six-person groups of friends as compared to six-person groups of strangers. The reason was quite simple for them. Since friends already know and accept each other; they may experience less normative pressure to conform to the others in some situations. They would keep the individual identity and feel less influenced by a need to be loved or accepted by the others. But the strangers are more in need of acceptance, love and approval (McKelvey & Kerr, 1988).
There is a need in every individual to be approved, liked and accepted by others. The opposite of the same, such as a fear of the rejection from the others also is influential. These drives are common in all, but in various degrees. In social psychology, this influence is named as ‘normative influence’ i.e the group effects that arise from the individuals’ desire to be liked, accepted and approved by others (Gerrig & Zimbardo, 2009). As the above experiments prove, the influence of social approval can be crucial in every individual’s day-to-day decision making. When the desire to be loved or approved by the other is very high, an individual would be unconsciously or less consciously tempted to conform to the opinions of the other, even to the extent of sacrificing one’s identity. Social psychologists find reasons like them causing group-polarization and de-individuation. On the contrary, this influence can be positively and creatively used in the process of team-building to a certain extent.