Reducing conformity in society?

Faith

I'm writing a paper for psychology on conformity and one part of the question asks "In what ways may conformity be reduced?". Now, after writing 1000 words on different types of conformity, I can't see any real reason why we should attempt to reduce it. I mean, it works well in society because people obey rules like the speed limit. Do you think conformity is a bad thing?

Siogfinsceal

you cant reduce conformity exactly. Some people love to conform. It makes them feel secure and part of a group. Other people conform to things due to fear of rejection, others due to the way they were brought up. Some people conform because they just dont ever question the way things are.
Ive never been a conformist because its in my nature to question everything. I cant help it Ive always been that way I hate looking or being the same as everyone else. its wierd cos my mother is the most conforming person you could meet i drive her mad

Tobias Greeshman

You'll probably get better responses in the Psychology forum.

casanova_kid

To reduce conformity is to make people conform to a non conformity really. Conformity is what keeps society going, if people didn't not conform to what society thinks of as proper values, society would break down.

thelordofcheese

not that i'm any kind of head-ologist or anything, but isn't it more a case of conformity being an essentially bad thing, like you said, obeying the speed limit is an example of conformity being a positive thing, but when conformity means something like, say, treating people as second class citizens because of something trivial like skin colour, then it's not a positive thing.


or something, who knows, i could be talkking sh1te.

HelterSkelter

How about a person wearing a suit in work when they have no contact with customers, isn't that conforming?

muesli_offire

That may be one of the most diabolically crap assignments I have encountered on a psychology course yet. Should be fun to write though.

Adam

There is no conformity in soceity, soceity IS conformity.

Lets take three notoriously categorized groups: "D4's", "Scumbags" and "Goths"
(please dont turn this into a 'well i call them chavs' thread)

These three very different groups are prime examples in the sense that no D4 wants to be a scumbag, no scumbag wants to be a D4 and neither want to be goth! The three groups run as far from each other as possible, not wanting to conform with a certain group. The goths dont want to conform with the scumbags etc. etc.

Because of this there is minimal interaction between these groups. But within each group there is conformity, hence the group being a group!

Now imagine every body actually succeeding in NOT conforming to any group?
First of all its very difficult. Secondly there would end up being very little interaction between any two individuals because they dont conform! And from there soceity would crumble.

In short, interaction becomes conformity. If interaction is crucial to soceity, therefore so is conformity. Soceity is conformity.

seamus

I would say the biggest, if only thing you can do to reduce conformity (what a weird question to ask), is to increase education. As has been pointed out, most people tend towards conformity in some respects - it's part of beast inside us to be tribal and be a group hunter/gatherer.

Much conformity though is fuelled through fear and ignorance. It's safer and more comfortable to be part of the group when you're not entirely sure of yourself or your surroundings. You can be an idiot in a group, and you still have the support of the group, but if you're an idiot on your own you have the support of no-one. If you're on your own, but you're educated, you don't require the group as much to support you - you're more comfortable standing your ground.

Ban Uniforms in Schools

Faith

That's actually a really good point, I can't believe I didn't think of it!

You could also talk about about how the school syllabus encourages rote learning rather independent thinking.

My best advice though, would be to go to your college library and/or check some (e-)journals.

stevenmu

We could reduce conformity if we all became goths :v:

Sorry, in some ways conformity is a good thing. It helps us keep law and order and gives us a common morality to work within. It also gives us common frames of reference enabling us to communicate and relate to each and function as a society.

On the other hand conformity can be taken advantage of and abused by those who get to decide what we should conform to, such as big business and government. Ideally, people would be educated, and smart, enough to be able to decide for themselves when conformity is appropriate or not and then choose whether to conform or not. Some of the biggest and best advances in our society have come from people who've chosen not to conform, and some of the worst tragedies have happened because of people conforming (altough I'm sure the exact opposite of that equally applies).

simu

Faith wrote:

Now, after writing 1000 words on different types of conformity, I can't see any real reason why we should attempt to reduce it. I mean, it works well in society because people obey rules like the speed limit. Do you think conformity is a bad thing?

You need a certain level of it - people have to obey laws for society to work smoothly but too much conformity means authority goes unquestioned. Look at what happened with priests in 20th century Ireland as an example.

JC 2K3

Conformity destroys individuality, yet it is needed to a certain extent for a stable society. I really believe that in this country it is getting to the stage where people are simply idiots and big companies are reaping the rewards. My argument against it is that too much conformity makes people believe everything they see on TV or read in the newspaper and advertising becomes so powerful, especially towards young people.

jrey1981

Would the ultimate society without conformity be anarchy?

Thinkers such as Erich Fromm would argue that - as others have said - it is a fundamental human trait to need to "belong" and conform, and that this is one of the main weaknesses that leaves us open to being taken advantage of by politicians and corporations.

Edward Bernays, the father of PR, recognised that power would lie with those who used the techniques of propaganda - the potential of which was demonstrated by Hitler and Goebbels - for commercial means to cajole the masses into conforming.

We are told we have to conform from infancy - and have to go through the institutions of school and are supposed to progress to the modern overarching institution that is work.

There definitely needs to be better education and encouragement to think independently.

Look at Leaving Cert education for Gods sake - it is basically a Dickensian system of cramming facts to get points.

Rant over. Apologies...

Kernel

Conformity can be a good thing if there is a clear reason to conform and people understand and accept the reason to conform. However, more often we tend to conform because we are tractable and have no imagination. The question one needs to ask is this: How many things do I conform with, and why do I conform with them? If you never even question it, then you are blind. If you cant find a good reason to conform, and don't feel like you should conform, then you shouldn't and should rebel.

Rebellion and questioning is in the hearts of us all, and for good reason.

Kernel

To quote Rage Against The Machine:

Since the prehistoric ages and the days of ancient greece
Right down through the middle ages
Planet earth kept going through changes
And then no renaissance came, and times continued to change
Nothing stayed the same, but there were always renegades
Like chief sitting bull, tom paine
Dr. martin luther king, malcom x
They were renegades of their time and age
So many renegades

So true. If we never questioned conformity, we'd still have terrible attitudes to gays, other races and so much more... Refuse, Resist!

Sleepy

I'm reading an interesting book at the moment called "The Wisdom of Crowds" by James Surowiecki. It's central tennet is that a large, diverse group of people will invariably make better decisions than a single person or small group of people.

Without diversity (or a lack of conformity) in the group you get a degree of "group-lean" or "group-think". When you place this in the context of democracy, without diversity we'd end up making worse decisions in how we govern our society.

Might be useful to your paper to have a read of it.

Adam

Kernel wrote:

To quote Rage Against The Machine:

Since the prehistoric ages and the days of ancient greece
Right down through the middle ages
Planet earth kept going through changes
And then no renaissance came, and times continued to change
Nothing stayed the same, but there were always renegades
Like chief sitting bull, tom paine
Dr. martin luther king, malcom x
They were renegades of their time and age
So many renegades

So true. If we never questioned conformity, we'd still have terrible attitudes to gays, other races and so much more... Refuse, Resist!

And such a good song too!