Selective Social Conformity in Adolescents With Non‐Suicidal Self‐Injury: Differential Patterns Across Social Influence Sources and Judgment Contexts

INTRODUCTION: Social conformity among adolescents with non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) may vary depending on the characteristics of social information and the context in which social judgments are made. This study examined social conformity patterns in adolescents with NSSI across different social influence sources and judgment contexts. METHODS: Two independent behavioral experiments were conducted. Study 1 included 39 adolescents with NSSI and 50 healthy controls (HCs) and employed a risk perception task to examine conformity responses following social feedback from adolescents versus adults. Study 2 included an independent sample of 53 adolescents with NSSI and 40 HCs and used a facial attractiveness social evaluation task to examine conformity responses under the same two social influence source conditions. A cross-study joint analysis was conducted to compare source-related conformity patterns between the studies. RESULTS: In Study 1, adolescents with NSSI showed greater conformity effects following adolescent feedback than adult feedback, whereas HCs did not show a significant difference between feedback sources. In Study 2, adolescents with NSSI exhibited significantly lower conformity effects than HCs under both adolescent and adult feedback conditions. HCs showed stronger conformity effects following adolescent feedback than adult feedback, whereas adolescents with NSSI did not show a significant source-related difference. The cross-study joint analysis revealed a significant Rating Discrepancy × Participant Group × Social Influence Source × Study interaction, indicating that source-related conformity patterns differed significantly between the two studies. CONCLUSIONS: Social conformity among adolescents with NSSI was not uniformly enhanced across the two judgment contexts. Instead, conformity patterns differed in relation to social influence sources and between the two judgment paradigms. These findings extend research on peer-related influences in NSSI and provide experimental behavioral evidence for understanding how adolescents with NSSI adjust their social judgments following feedback from others.