A New Look at Social Influence: Exploring the Personality Predictors of Conformity

The current research took a new look at social influence by considering how personality may predict different types of conformity and the mediating motivational mechanisms involved. Across three studies (N = 2,121), I established whether agreeableness and conscientiousness predicted two different forms of conformity and whether each of these relationships were mediated by different motives. First, I hypothesized that agreeableness would predict conformity mediated by the motivation to affiliate, suggesting that it may be related to normative influence. Second, I hypothesized that conscientiousness would predict conformity mediated by the motivation to be accurate, suggesting that it may be related to informational influence. Study 1 tested whether there was an initial correlational relationship among agreeableness, conscientiousness, and self-reported conformity. Study 2 explored the effect of the mediators, the motives to affiliate and to be accurate, in predicting normative and informational influence, respectively. Finally, Study 3 tested the full mediational model of agreeableness and conscientiousness predicting conformity mediated by the motives to affiliate and to be accurate, respectively. The findings showed that agreeableness and conscientiousness significantly predicted conformity as measured behaviorally and by self-report. The results were less clear, however, about the role of the mediators of the motivation to affiliate and be accurate in these relationships. These findings extend the social influence literature beyond its traditional situational focus by examining how personality shapes conformity and the possible mechanisms involved in those relationships.