Final answer:
The low error rate in Asch's line judgment task performed alone indicates that participants knew the correct answer, thus demonstrating that the task was simple and not ambiguous. The increased error rate in the group setting revealed the impact of social conformity.
Step-by-step explanation:
The question pertains to Solomon Asch's experiment on conformity, where participants had to identify which of three lines matched the length of a given standard line. When participants performed the line judgment task alone without the influence of the group, the error rate was low, indicating that the task itself was not difficult and that participants knew the correct answer. When in the presence of others who unanimously chose a deliberately wrong answer, the subjects were influenced by the pressure to conform, thus raising the error rate significantly.
Based on the overview of Asch's study, the error rate displayed by participants doing the task alone suggests participants did indeed know the correct answer, as the task was simple. The study also demonstrated the power of conformity when individuals are faced with the unanimous incorrect judgments of their peers. Asch found that social influence could significantly distort an individual's judgment, even in clear-cut situations.