When visiting a country for the first time, Jamal followed the lead of the locals to ensure that he was abiding by the country’s unspoken rules and customs. His actions were primarily guided by which kind of social influence?

Question

BlackTom AI · Accepted Answer

We start by restating the scenario: Jamal visits a country and follows the locals’ lead to ensure he is abiding by unspoken rules and customs. This centers on conforming to social norms to be accepted by the group.
Option discussion:
- Without provided answer choices, we can compare the two common forms of social influence relevant here:
  1) Informational social influence: this occurs when people look to others for information about what is true or how to behave in uncertain situations, essentially adopting others’ beliefs because they believe those beliefs are correct.
  2) Normative social influence: this happens when people conform to the expectations of others to gain social approval or avoid disapproval, i.e., to fit in with a group’s norms and norms about behavior.

Applying this to the scenario, Jamal is not primarily seeking information about the factual state of the world but is trying to align his behavior with local norms to avoid social sanctions or to be accepted. That is characteristic of normative influence, which is driven by the desire for acceptance and appropriate social conduct rather than by a belief that others are providing correct information.

Why the informational option would be inappropriate here: informational influence would involve adopting the locals’ beliefs or actions because Jamal is uncertain and assumes the locals know better in terms of factual or contextual knowledge. In the described case, the emphasis is on obeying unspoken rules and customs, a social-approval mechanism, not on obtaining new information about reality.

Potential pitfalls if one confuses the two: mistaking respect for local knowledge (informational) with a drive to conform for belonging (normative). The key distinction lies in the motivation—truth-seeking versus social acceptance—and the behavior it yields.

Since there are no additional answer options provided to compare against, the core takeaway is that following local norms to be accepted aligns with normative social influence, whereas using locals as a source of factual information would align with informational social influence.

PSY 1 S25 Mini Exam #4

When visiting a country for the first time, Jamal followed the lead of the locals to ensure that he was abiding by the country’s unspoken rules and customs. His actions were primarily guided by which kind of social influence?

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