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Conformity
A rather good 10 minute YouTube video presenting the results of several papers relevant to how conformity affects our thinking:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrNIuFrso8I
The papers mentioned are:
Sherif, M. (1935). A study of some social factors in perception. Archives of Psychology, 27(187), pp.17-22.
Asch, S.E. (1951). Effects of group pressure upon the modification and distortion of judgment. In H. Guetzkow (ed.) Groups, leadership and men. Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Press.
Asch, S.E. (1955). Opinions and social pressure. Scientific American, 193(5), pp.31-35.
Berns, G.S., Chappelow, J., Zink, C.F., Pagnoni, G., Martin-Skurski, M.E., and Richards, J. (2005) 'Neurobiological Correlates of Social Conformity and Independence During Mental Rotation' Biological Psychiatry, 58(3), pp.245-253.
Weaver, K., Garcia, S.M., Schwarz, N., & Miller, D.T. (2007) Inferring the popularity of an opinion from its familiarity: A repetitive voice can sound like a chorus. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(5), 821-833.
What techniques do other posters, here on LessWrong, use to monitor and counter these effects in their lives?
The video also lists some of the advantages to a society of having a certain amount of this effect in place. Does anyone here conform too little?
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Comments (3)
An obvious technique, which was mentioned in the video, is habituation: deliberately don't conform on things and it becomes easier.
I thought the point about how having something repeated by a single person is just as good as having many people say it was interesting. This seems like weak evidence that affirmations work, 'cause there's a chance that it wouldn't matter if you were the one repeating the thing to yourself.
See also the relevant OB post.
Do something conspicuous, bizarre, and inconsequential, to establish yourself as a noncomformist, then take advantage of the self-consistency effect and the social expectation that you will continue to be weird. For example, I sometimes wear a cloak.