Morality and conformity: The Asch paradigm applied to moral decisions

Abstract

Morality has long been considered an inherent quality, an internal moral compass that is unswayed by the actions of those around us. The Solomon Asch paradigm was employed to gauge whether moral decision making is subject to conformity under social pressure as other types of decision making have been shown to be. Participants made decisions about moral dilemmas either alone or in a group of confederates posing as peers. On a majority of trials confederates rendered decisions that were contrary to judgments typically elicited by the dilemmas. The results showed a pronounced effect of conformity: Compared to the control condition, permissible actions were deemed less permissible when confederates found them objectionable, and impermissible actions were judged more permissible if confederates judged them so.