The Asch Experiment

[SacRedMan]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRh5qy09nNw&feature=related

Does anyone know or ever heard of The Asch Experiment? Watch the video first.

The moral of this study is that because of the nature and power of groups, people will conform to a common consensus to avoid being seen as deviant. It had absolutely nothing to do with his own cognitive ability to answer correctly.

This maybe explains religion.

[Q]

This maybe explains religion.

What about political sects?

[jmpeer]

Yeah, I've heard of it, and I've done that before - go against my better judgement and give a wrong answer simply because the rest of the class did. Perhaps it has something to do with the positive and negative reinforcement strategies we use such as when Ken Robinson talks about how we fear being wrong in school at TED:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG9CE55wbtY
Or perhaps it has something to do with us learning by repetition:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIAoJsS9Ix8
They might have something to do with it.

[eyedrop]

It's always way easier to be wrong as a group, than be to be wrong as a single person.

If there is a 10% chance that I'm wrong I would always follow the groups wrong answer instead as there is then no social stigma to be wrong. Or in actuality I would wait untill the teacher say they were wrong and then hop in with my right answer if possible. Maybe I was just a coward back in my schooldays.