How is the memory conformity effect influenced by the relative power of the individuals involved?

Abstract

When people remember together, what one person says can affect what others report. The size of this effect is dependent on characteristics of the people and how they express their beliefs. The power relationship among people affects much of their social cognition, including the size of this memory conformity effect. However, some research has shown people conform more to high power individuals and some research shows the opposite. The proposed research identified what we believe is an important difference in these studies in the type of power that was manipulated: evaluation versus managerial power. The proposed research will examine these using a 2 × 2 factorial design, plus a control group. The study is designed to be like how people learn new vocabulary in an education context.