Psych Ch 13: Social Behavior

nonverbal expressiveness

-judgments about social status, intelligence, personality traits

fundamental attribution error

-*actor-observer bias* -refers to observers' bias in favor of internal attributions in explaining others' behavior -observers have a curious tendency to overestimate the likelihood that an actor's behavior reflects personal qualities rather than situational factors. Why? one reason is that situational pressures may not be readily apparent to an observer -its not that people assume that situation factors have little impact on behavior -rather its that attributing others' behavior to their dispositions is a relatively effortless, almost automatic process -explaining people's behavior in terms of situational factors, on the other hand, requires more thought and effort -the circumstances that have influenced an actors behavior tend to be moe apparent to the actor -hence, actors are more likely than observers to locate the cause of their behavior in the satiation -in general, *actors favor external attribution for their behavior (self serving bias), whereas observers are more likely to explain the same behavior with internal attributions*

group polarization

-occurs when group discussion strengthens a group's dominant point of view and produces a shift toward a more extreme decision in that direction -does not involve widening the gap between factions in a group, as its name might suggest -group poarlization can contribute to consensus in a group

attributions of success and failure

-Bernard Weiner concluded that people often focus on the stability of the causes underlying behavior -according to Weiner, the *stable-unstable* dimension in attribution cuts across the enteral-external dimension, creating four types of attributions for success and failure -Imagine that you're contemplating why you failed to get a job that you wanted. You might attribute your set back to internal factors that are stable (lack of ability) or unstable (inadequate effort to put together an eye-catching resume). Or you might attribute your setback to external factors that are stable (too much outstanding competition) or unstable (bad luck) -If you got the job, your explanations for success would fall into the same four categories: internal-stable (your excellent ability), internal-unstable (your hard work to assemble a superb resume), external-stable (lack of top-flight competition) and external unstable (good luck)

love as attachment

-Hazan and Shaver: adult romantic relationships mimic infant attachment -attachemnt patterns influence relationship quality and sexuality -romantic love is an attachment process -that is, peoples intimate relationships in adulthood follow the same form as their attachment in infancy -according to their theory, a person who had an anxious ambivalent attachment in infancy will tend to have romantic relations marked by anxiety and ambivalence in adulthood -people relive their early bonding experiences with their parents in their adult romantic relationships -*secure adults* (56% of the subjects) found it relatively easy to get close to others, descried their love relations as trusting, rarely worried about being abandoned, and reported the fewest divorces -*anxious-ambivalent adults* (20%) reported a preoccupation with love accompanied by expectations of rejection and described their love relations as volatile and marked by jealousy -*avoidant adults* (24%) found it difficult to get close to others and described their love relations as lacking intimacy and trust -research eventually showed that attachment patterns are reasonably stable over time -thus, evidence suggest that individuals' infant attachment experiences shape their intimate relations in adulthood -*securely attached individuals* have committed, satisfying, interdependent, well adjusted, and longer lasting relationship compared to people with anxious ambivalent or avoidant attachment styles -people with different attachment style are predisposed to think, feel and behave differently in their relationships -*anxious ambivalent* people tend to report more intense emotional highs and lows in their romantic relationships-they also report that they have more conflicts with their partners, that these conflicts are especially stressful and that the conflict often have a negative impact on their relationship -in a similar vein, *attachment anxiety* promotes excessive reassurance seeking- the tendency to persistently ask for assurances from partners that one is worthy of love -attachement style also appear to be intimately related to people's patterns of sexual interaction -people with *secure attachment* tend to be more comfortable with their sexuality, more motivated to show love for their partner during sex, more open to sexual exploration, and less accepting of casual sex -people high in *attachment anxiety* tend to have sex to reduce their feelings of insecurity and are more likely to onset to unwanted sex acts and less likely to racine safe sex -people high in *avoidant attachment* tend to engage in more casual sex in an effort to impress their peers -they are also ore likely to use sex to manipulate their partners

dissonance theory

-Leon Festinger's ______ assumes that inconsistency among attitudes propels people in the direction of attitude change -coax participants into doing something that was inconsistent with their true feleigns- that is, to engage in *counteradditudinal behavior* -feelings the get when our behavior doesn't fit our attitudes -ex. smoking and knwongin theres a family history of smoking -you can change your behavior or change your belief/justify your behavior

Zimbardo

-Stanford Prison Simulation to invesitage why prisons tend to become abusive, degrading, violent environments -wanted to see how much the power of the situation would shape the behavior of normal average participants -the guards became mean, malicious and abusive in fulfilling their responsibilities -few prisoners showed signed of emotional disturbance and had to be released early -they mostly became listless, apathetic and demoralized -they attributed behavior the enormous influence of social roles -they also attributed behavior to the compelling power of situational factors -the stark difference in their behavior had to be due to the radical different situations that they found themselves in -the study demonstrated the power of situations to overwhelm people and elicit from them unexpectedly cruel, yet situationally appropriate behavior -he concluded that situational pressures can lad normal, decent people to behavior in sinister, repugnant ways

passionate love

-a complete absorption in another that includes tender sexual feelings and the agony and ecstasy of intense emotion -has its ups and downs: its associated with large swings in positive and negative emotions -studies indicate that passionate love is a powerful motivational force that produces profound changes in peoples thinking emotion and behavior -interstingly, brain imaging research indicates that when people think about someone they are passionately in love with, these thoughts light up the dopamine circuits in the brain that are know to be activated by cocain and other addictive drugs -perhaps that explains why passionate love sometimes resembles an addiction

Obedience

-a form of compliance that occurs when people follow direct commands, usually from someone in a position of authority

prejudice

-a negative attitude held toward members of a group

defense attributions

-a tendency to blame victims for their misfortune, so that one feels less likely to be victimized in a similar way -in attempting to explain the calamities and setbacks that befall other people, our tendency to make internal attributions may become even stronger -lets say you have a friend that gets mugged and severely beaten -you may attribute the mugging to your friend's carelessness or stupidity rather than to bad luck. why? because if you attribute your friend's misfortune to bad luck, you have to face the ugly reality that it could just as easily happen to you -to avoid such disturbing thoughts, people often attribute mishap to victims' negligence -hindsight bias

cognitive dissonante

-according to Festinger ______ exists when related cognitions are inconsistent- that is, when they contradict each other -thought to create an unpleasant state of tension that motivates people to reduce their dissonance- usually by altering their cognitions -also at work when people turn attitudinal somersaults to justify efforts the haven't panned out, a syndrome called *effort justification* -ex. people who wait in line for an hour or more to get into an exclusive restaurant often praise the restaurant afterward even if they have been served a mediocre meal -they dynamic of dissonance appear to underlie may important types of attitude changes

external attributions

-ascribe the cause of behavior to situation demands and environmental constraints

internal attributions

-ascribe the causes of behavior to personal dispositions, traits, abilities and feeling

explicit attitudes

-attitudes that we hold consciously and can readily describe

learning theory

-can help change attitude formation -attitudes may be learned form parents, peers, the media, cultural traditions and other social influences -the affective or emotion component in an attitude can be created through classical conditioning, called evaluative condition -evaluative conditioning consists of efforts to transfer the emotion attached to an unconditioned stimulus to a new conditioned stimulus -advertisers routinely try to take advantage of evaluative conditioning by pairing their products with stimuli that elect pleasant emotional response such as extremely attractive models, highly likable spokespersons and cherished events -operant conditioning may come into play when you openly express and attitude -another person's attitude may rub off on you through observational learning

group

-consist of two or more individuals who interact and are interdependent

implicit attitudes

-covert attitudes that are expressed in subtle automatic responses that people are little conscious control over -were dissolved in research on prejudice and their role in various types of prejudice continues to be the main focus of current inquiry -why are implicit attitudes a central issue in the study of prejudice? because in modern societies most people have been taught that prejudicial attitudes are inappropriate and something to be ashamed of. -Today, the vast majority of people reject racial prejudice, as well as prejudice against women, the elderly, gays and those who are disable or mentally ill. -At the same time, people grow up in a culture where negative stereotypes about groups have been widely disseminated -although most of us want to be unbiased, research has shown that such negative ideas can seep into our subconscious mind and contaminate out reaction to others

culture and attributional tendencies

-cultural difference in individualism vs collectivism influence attributional tendencies as well as other aspects of social behavior -in comparison to individualistic cultures, collectivist cultures place a higher priority on shared values and resources, cooperation, mutual interdependence and concern for how one's actions will affect other group members -generally speaking, North American and Wester European cultures tend to be individualistic, whereas Asian, African, and Latin American cultures tend to be collectivist -How does individualism vs collectivism relate to patterns of attribution? The evidence suggest that collectivist cultures may promote different attributional biases than individualistic cultures -for example, people from collectivist societies appear to be less prone to the fundamental attribution error than those from individualistic societies -in western cultures, people are viewed as autonomous individuals who are responsible for their actions -westerners typically explain behavior in terms of people's personality traits and unique abilities -in contrast, collectivist, who value interdepend and obedience are more likely to assume that one's behavior reflects adherence to group norms

attractiveness

-desirable characteristics associated with good looking people -e.g baby faced people viewed as more honest

groupthink

-occurs when members of a cohesive group emphasize concurrence at the expense of critical thinking in arriving at a decision -does not produce very effective decision making -can lead to major blunders that may look incomprehensible after the fact

an evolutionary perspective on attraction

-good looks can be indicators of sound health, good genes, and high fertility, all of which can contribute to reproductive potential -facial symmetry seems to be a key element of attractiveness in highly diverse cultures -facial symmetry is though to be valued because a variety of envidrnemal insults and developmental abnormalities are associated with physical asymmetries -Thus, asymmetry may serve as a marker of relatively poor genes of health -another facet of appearance that may transcend culture is women's waist-to-hip ratio -men seem to prefer women with a moderately low waist to hop ratio which roughly corresponds to an hour glass figure -this factor appears to be a meaningful correlate of females' reproductive potential, as it signals that a woman is healthy, young and not pregnant -humans are programmed by evolution to behave in ways that enhance their reproductive fitness, evidence indicates that men generally are more interested than women in seeking youthfulness and physical attractiveness in their mates because these traits should be associated with greater reproductive potential -women place a greater premium on prospective mates' ambition, social status and financial potential because these traits should be associated with the ability to invest material resources in children

group productivity

-individuals productivity often does decline in larger groups two factors: -reduced efficiency resulting from the loss of coordination among workers' efforts -effort rather than efficiency- self loafing

attributions

-inferences that people draw about the causes of events, others' behavior and their own behavior -people make ____ mainly because they have a strong need to understand their experiences -Fritz Heider asserted that people tend to locate the cause of behavior either within a person, attributing it to personal factors, or outside a person, attributing it to environmental factors -For example, if a friend's business fails, you might attribute it to his or her lack of business sense ( an internal personal factor) or to negative trends in the nation's economic climate (an external, situational explanation) -internal and external attributions can have a tremendous impact on everyday interpersonal interactions. -blaming a friend's business failure on poor business smarts as opposed to a poor economy will have a great impact on how you view your friend. -only inferences -your ___ many not be the correct explanation for events -ultimately represent guesswork about the causes of events

discrimination

-involves behaving differently usually unfairly toward the members of a group LOOK AT NOTES

collectivism

-involves putting group goals ahead of personal goals and defining one's identity in terms of the groups one belongs to

individualism

-involves putting personal goals ahead of group goals and defining one's identity in terms of personal attributes rather than group membership

evolutionary perspective on bias in person perception

-many of the biases seen in social perception were adaptive in humans' ancestral environment -evolutionary theorists attribute the human tendency to automatically categorize others to our distant ancestors' need to quickly separate friend form foe -they assert that humans are programmed by evolution to immediately classify people as members of an in-group- a group that one belongs to and identifies with, or as a member of an out-group- a group that one does not belong to or identify with -in- group members tend to be viewed in a favorable light whereas outgrip members tend to be viewed in terms of various negative stereotypes -these negative stereotypes move out- groups out of one's domain of empathy -evolutionary psychologists ascribe much of the bias in person perception to cognitive mechanisms that have been shaped by natural selection

effects of physical appearance

-many studies have shown that judgements of others' personality are often stated by their appearance, especially their physical attractiveness -people tend to ascribe desirable personality characteristics to those who are good looking -attractive people tend to be seen as more sociable, friendly, poised, warm and well adjusted than those who are less attractive -research suggests that little correlation exists between attractiveness and personality traits -why do people inaccurately assume that a connection exists between good looks and personality? one reason is that extremely attractive people are vastly overrepresented in the entertainment media, where they are mostly portrayed in highly favorable light. Another reason is that one's perceptions are swayed by one's desire to bond with attractive people -Recent research has found that people have a strong tendency to view good looking individuals as more competent than less attractive individuals -good looking people tend to secure better jobs and earn higher salaries than less attractive individuals -physical attractiveness boosted their actual income by 10-20% -another study found that intelligence was more strongly related to earnings than good looks. but the correlation of 0.24 between attractiveness and income was not trivial -observers are also quick to draw inferences about people based on how they move, talk and gesture- that is, their style of nonverbal expressiveness -moreover, these inferences tend to be fairly accurate -one recent study found that participants were able to make meaningful inferences about stimulus persons' extraversion, openness to experience, agreeableness, and self esteem based on simple photographs

similarity effects

-married and dating couple tend to be similar in age, race, religion, social class, education, intelligence, physical attractiveness, values and attitudes -the similarities principle operates in both friendships and romantic relationships, regardless of sexual orientation -in a longitudinal study of best friends, researchers found that similarity among friends in 1983 actually predicted their closeness in 2002 -the most obvious explanation for these correlations is that similarity causes attraction -lab experiments on attitude simiarlity, conducted by Donn Byrne and his colleagues, suggest that similarity does cause attraction -however, research also suggest that attraction can foster similarity -for example, Davis and Rustbelt found that dating partners gradually modify their attitudes in ways that make them more congruent, a phenomenon called *attitude alignment* -moreover, people in stable, satisfying intimate relationship tend to subjectively overestimate how similar they and their partners are -wanting to believe that stye have found a kindred sprit, they tend to assume that their partners are mirrors of themselves

illusory correlation

-occurs when people estimate that they have encountered more confirmation of an association between social traits than they have actually seen -people also tend to underestimate the number of disconfirmations they have encountered -memory processes can contribute to confirmation biases in person perception in a variety of ways -often, individuals selectively recall fats that fit with their stereotypes

conformity

-occurs when people yield to real or imagined social pressure -SOlomon Asch devised a clear procedure that reduced ambiguity about whether subjects were conforming, allowing him to investigate the variable that govern conformity -a group of seven subjects are shown a large card with a vertical line on it -they are then asked to indicate which of the three lines on the second card matches the original :standard line" in length -all 7 subjects are given a turn at the task -they each announced their choice to the group -the subject in the sixth chair doesn't know it, but every else in the group is an accomplice of the experimenter - the line judgements are easy and unambiguous -so if the participant consistently agrees with the accomplices, he isn't making honest mistakes- he is confirming -aberage across all 50 participants, found that the young men confirmed on 37% of the trials -the subjects varied considerably in their tendency to conform -of the 50 participants, 13 never caved in to the group while fourteen conformed on more than half the trials -one could argue that the results show that people confronting a unanimous majority generally tend to resist the pressure to conform -he found that group size and group unanimity are key detereminats of conformity -little conformity was seen when a subject was pitted against just one person -but conformity increased as group size went up to four and then it leveled off -group size made little difference if just one accomplice "broke" with the others, wrecking their unanimous agreement -the presence of another dissenter lowered conformity to about one quarter of its peak, even when the dissenter made inaccurate judgements that happened to conflict with the majority view -apparently, the participants just needed to hear someone else question the accuracy of the groups confusing response why do people conform? Two key processes appear to contribute: *normative influence* and *informational influence* -when people wanted to go against the other people their *amygdala* lit up (fear)

normative influence

-operates when people conform to social norms for fear of negative social consequences -people often conform or comply because they are afraid of being criticized or rejected -about being liked

informational influence

-operates when people look to others for guidance about who to behave in ambiguous situations -using others as a source of information about appropriate behavior is a sensible strategy -about being right

elaboration likelihood model

-originally proposed by Richard Petty and John Cacioppo -assertst that there are two basic "routes" to persuasion -the *central route* is taken when people carefully ponder the content and logic of persuasive messages -the *peripheral route* is taken when persuasion depends on non message factors such as the attractive and credibility of the source or on conditioned emotional response -ex. position who campaigns by delivering carefully researched speeches that thoughtfully analyze complex issues is following the central route of persuasion -a politician who depends on marching bands, flag waving, celebrity endorsements and emotional slogans is following the peripheral route -both routes can lead to persuasion -according to this model, the durability of attitude change depends on the extent to which people elaborate on (think about) the content of persuasive communications -studies suggest that the central route to persuasion leads to more enduring attitude change than the peripheral route and that attitudes change through central processes produced behavior better than attitudes changed through peripheral processes

bystander effect

-people are less likely to provide needed help when they are in groups than when they are alone -evidence that your probability of getting help declines as group size increases -SUBJECTS WHO WERE ALONE PROVIDED HELP 75% OF THE TIME -In contrast, subjects in the presence of others provided help only 53% of the time -they concluded that the main condition in which the bystander effect is reside occur when the need for help is clear -ex. the bystander effect is less likely when someone is in obvious physical danger -it is also less likely if the bystanders are friends rather than strangers -bystander effects are most common in ambiguous situations because people look around to see whether others think there an emergency -if everyone hesitates, their inaction suggest that theres no real need for help -the diffusion of responsibility that occurs in a group is also important -if you're by yourself when you encounter someone in need of help, the responsibility to provide help rests squarely on your shoulders -if other people are present, the responsibility is divided among you - you may say "someone else will help"

source factors

-persuasion tends to be more successful when the source has high credibility -either expertise or trustworthiness gives a person credibility -*expertise* tends to be more influential when an argument is ambiguous or when the receiver is not motivated to pay close attention to the argument. -people try to covey their expertise by mentioning their degrees, their training and their experience or by showing an impressive grasp of the issue at hand -*trustworthiness* can be even more important. Many people tend to accept messages from trust worthy sources with little scrutiny -Trustworthiness is undermined when a source, such as the corporation president, appears to have something to gain -in contrast, trustworthiness is enhanced when people appear argue against their own interests -*likability* also increases the effectiveness of a persuasive source -some factors at work in attraction therefore have an impact on persuasion -thus, the favorable effect of *physical attractiveness* on likability can make persuasion more effective -people also respond between to sources who are *similar* to them in ways that are relevant to the issue at hand

key factors in attraction

-physical attractiveness - the matching hypothesis -similarity effects -reciprocrity: involves liking those who show that they like you -self verification: people seek feedback that matches and supports their self concepts -self enhancement: when a partner helps one feel good about oneself

attitudes

-postive or negative evaluations of objects of thought -objects of thought may include social issues, groups, institutions, consumer products, and people -made up of three components: a cognitive component, an affective component and a behavioral component -it gradually became apparent that many attunes do not include all three components -*cognitive component* of an attitude is made up of the beliefs that people hold about the object of an attitude -the *affective component* of an attitude consists of the emotional feelings stimulated by an object of thought -the *behavioral component* of an attitude consists of predispositions to act in certain ways toward an attitude object -attitudes vary along several crucial dimensions, including strength, accessibility and ambivalence -strong attitudes are generally seen as ones that are firmly held, but they are actually durable over time and have a powerful impact on behavior -the accessibility of an attitude refers to how often one thinks about it and how quickly it comes to mind -highly accessible attitudes are quickly and readily available -attitude accessibility is correlated with attitude strength ,as highly accessible attitudes tend to be strong -however, the concepts are distant and there is no one to one correspondence -ambivalent attitudes are conflicted evaluations aha include both positive and negative feel gins about an object of thought -like attitude strength, attitude ambivalence has been measured in various ways -generally speaking, ambivalence increase as the ratio of positive to negative evaluations get closer to being equal -when ambivalence is high, an attitude tends to be less predictive of behavior and moe pliable in the face of persuasion

hindsight bias

-probably contributes to the tendency to blame the victim for their misfortune, but blaming the victims also help people maintain their belief that hey live in a just word -such a mindset fosters the idea that they're unlikely to experience similar troubles -thus, people who strongly endorse the notion that the world is just are especially likely to engage in victim derogation -the bias toward making defensive attributions can have unformatted consequences -blaming victims for their setbacks causes them to be seen in a negative light -thus, undesirable traits are unfairly attributed to them -this bias could lead one to assume that burglary victims must be careless, that people who get fired must be incompetent, that poor people must be lay, that rape victims must be promiscuous and so on

the matching hypothesis

-proposes that males and females of approximately equal physical attractiveness are likely to select each other as partners -supported by evidence that dating and married couples tend to be similar in level of physic attractiveness -research suggests that attractive people expect to date more attractive individuals and unattractive people expect to date less attractive partners

interpersonal attraction

-refers to positive feelings toward another -social psychologists use this term broadly to encompass a variety of experiences, including liking, friendship, admiration, lust and love

group cohesiveness

-refers to the strength of the relationships linking group members to each other and to the group itself

physical attractiveness

-researchers found that the quality of communication during the date did have some effect on females' interest in friendship -the key determinant of aromatic attraction for both sexes though was the physical attractiveness of the other person -consistent with this finding, research has shown that attractive people of both sexes enjoy greater mating success than their less attractive peers -many other studies have shown the importance of physical attractiveness in the initial stage of dating and have shown that it continues to have influence as relationships evolve -although people prefer physically attractive partners in romantic relationships, they many consider their own level of attractiveness in pushing dates -what people want in a partner may be different from what they have to settle for -the matching hypothesis proposes that males and females of approximately equal physical attractiveness are likely to select each other as partners -less attractive people place less weight on physical attractiveness than this who are good looking

message factors

-should you present a *one sided argument* that ignores possible problems -or should you present a *two sided argument* that acknowledges concern about other problems and then down play the magnitude of these problems -the optimal strategy depends on a variety of considerations, but overall, two sided arguments tend to be more effective -just mentioning that there are two sides to an issue can increase your credibility with an audience -persuasive messages frequently attempt to arouse fear -studies involve a wide range of issues have shown that messages that are effective in arousing fear tend to increase persuasion -fear appeals are most likely to work when your listens view the dire consequences that you describe as exceedingly unpleasant, fairly probable if they don't take your advice and avoidable if they do -frequent repetition of a message also seems to be an effective strategy -the *truth effect* refers to the finding that simply repeating a statement cause it to be perceived as more valid or true -if you repeat something enough, people start to believe it -the truth effect may depend on the mere exposure effect

receiver factors

-some people are more easily persuaded but researcher have not found any personality traits that are reliably associated with susceptibility to persuasion -other factors such as forewarning the person about a persuasive effort, generally seem to be more influent than his or her personality -to some extent this forewarning reduces the impact of their arguments -studies show that stronger attitudes are more resistant to change -strong attitudes may be tougher to alter because they tend to be embedded in network of beliefs and values that might also require change -finally, resistance can promote resistance -when people successfully resist persuasive efforts to change specific attitudes, they often become more certain about those attitudes

stereotype threat

-stereotypes effect performance in that group -overcome this by your mindset -growth vs fixed mindset

social psychology

-the branch of psychology concerned with the way individuals' thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by others -study how people are affected by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others

factors in persuasion

-the fact that attitudes aren't always good predictors of a persons behavior doesn't stop others from typing to change those attitudes -everyday you're bombarded by efforts to alter your attitudes -the process of persuasion includes four basic elements: source, receiver, message and channel

mere exposure effect

-the fining that related exposures to a stimulus promotes greater liking of the stimulus

message

-the information transmitted by the source

channel

-the medium through which the message is sent

source

-the person who sends a communication

receiver

-the person whom the message is sent

person perception

-the process of forming impressions of others -people show considerable ingenuity in pricing together clues about others' characteristics -however, impressions are often inaccurate because of the many biases and fallacies that occur in person perception -can be distorted by physical appearances (attractiveness and nonverbal expressiveness)

self loafing

-the reduction in effort by individuals when they work in groups as compared to when they work by themselves -measured the sound output produced by subjects who were asked to cheer or clap as loud as they could -subjects were led to believe that hey were working alone or in a gourd of tow or six, when in fact individual output was actually measured -when partipnats thought that they were working in larger groups, their individual output declined -social loafing and the bystander effect appear to share a common cause: diffusion of responsibility in groups -as group size increases, the responsibility for getting a job done is divided among more people

companionate love

-warm, trusting, tolerant affection for another whose life is deeply intertwined with one's own

Milgram

-watned to study this tendency to obey authority figures -troubled by how readily the citizens of Germany ha followed the order of Hitler even when the orders require morally repugnant actions such as the slaughter of millions of Jews -65% went to the highest level of shock -No participants stooped cooperating before the learner reached the point of pounding on the wall, but five quit at that point -only fourteen out of worthy subject defied the experimenter before the full series of shock was completed

stereotypes

-widely held beliefs that people have certain characteristics because of their membership in a particular group -the most common stereotypes in our society are those based on gender, age and membership in ethnic or occupational groups -people who subscribe to traditional gender stereotypes tend to assume that some are emotional, submissive illogical and passive, while men are unemotional, dominant, logical and aggressive -age stereotypes suggest that elderly people are slow, feeble, rigid, forgetful and asexual -notions that Jews are mercenary, Germans are methodical, and Italian are passionate are examples of common ethnic stereotypes -occupational stereotypes suggest that lawyers are manipulative, accountants are conforming, artists are moody and so forth -stereotyping is a normal cognitive process that is usually automatic and saves on the time an effort required to get a handle on people individually -stereotypes save energy by simplifying our social world -however, this energy saving often comes at some cost in terms of accuracy -stereotypes tend to be brand overgeneralization, ignoring the diversity within social groups and fostering inaccurate perception of people -most people who subscribe to stereotypes realize that not all members of a group are identical -for instance, they may admit that some men aren't competitive, some Jews aren't mercenary and some lawyers aren't manipulative -however, they may still tend to assume that males, Jews and lawyers are more likely than others to have the characteristics -Even if stereotypes mean only that people think the terms of slanted probabilities, their expectations may lead them to misperceive individuals with who they interact

social roles

-widely shared expectations about how people in certain positions are supposed to behave -the students in the stanford prison simulation

kinds of love

1. passionate love 2. companionate love -passionate and companionate love may coexist -they don't however necessarily go hand in hand -research suggest that as a general rule, companionate love is more strongly related to relationship satisfaction than passionate love