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Cultural issues in psychology

Classic studies in social influence

Some critics of psychology argue that it is ‘culture blind’, ignoring the influence of the society and culture in which we live. Andrew Stevenson aims to redress this alleged imbalance. In this issue, he considers whether classic studies of obedience and conformity apply cross-culturally.

Table 1 Is obedience culturally universal?

Source: Smith and Bond 1998

Social influence refers to processes by which people affect the actions and attitudes of others. This area of social psychology has traditionally focused on how much of our behaviour arises from the instructions of others (obedience) and the example of others (conformity). These were famously studied in the mid-twentieth century in the USA in what are regarded as classic experiments in social psychology. What do subsequent replications of these studies tell us about their global applicability?

If a system of death camps were set up in the US of the sort we had seen in Nazi Germany, one would be able to find sufficient personnel for those camps in any medium-sized American town.

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Psychology and social change

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Psychologists at work

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