Psych Unit 9
attitude formation and change
Attitudes are formed about everything we encounter. Positive, negative, and neutral attitudes may arise toward anything;;; Learning theory Foot in the door phenomenon Cognitive dissonance theory Self perception theory Elaboration likelihood theory (Peripheral route, )Central route
Factors that influence people's perception of themselves
Better than average phenomenon False consensus False uniqueness Self handicapping Overconfidence effect
A belief and feeling that predisposes you to respond in a particular way to people, events, and objects Positive or negative evaluations of objects or thought
Components of Attitude: Cognitive Component: Your thoughts and beliefs about the subject Affective Component: How the object, person, issue, or event makes you feel Behavioral Component: How attitude influences your behavior
biases in attribution
Fundamental attribution error Defensive attribution- just world hypothesis Self serving bias
A group is a collection of individuals who interact with each other and are interdependent. The basic functions of groups are: to get work done and to handle relationships among group members.
Group phenomena: Groupthink Group polarization Social facilitation Social inhibition Social loafing Deindividuation
Informational Social Influence *influence resulting from one's willingness to accept others' opinions about reality
Here, the naïve individual (#6) display obvious concern about the majority's erroneous judgment.
6. Self fulfilling prophecy the process by which a person's expectations about someone can lead to that someone behaving in ways which confirm the expectations. schemas cause us to subtly lead people to behavior in line with our expectations a prediction that causes itself to become true There are two types of self-fulfilling prophecies: Self-imposed prophecies occur when your own expectations influence your actions. Other-imposed prophecies occur when others' expectations influence your behavior. All opinions you value can cause this prophecy.
If a woman starts dating someone under the assumption that they are not really "relationship" or "marriage material," she will likely not take the relationship seriously and refrain from investing much time or effort into it. This lack of investment may cause her partner to have doubts, and feel that she is distant and unavailable, thus why should they stick around and invest in hard conversations? When her partner leaves, she might think that she was ultimately proven right—the partner wasn't relationship material. However, her assumption likely influenced her behavior to not expect much and that initial seed caused the relationship to flounder.
4. Self handicapping tendency to set up a reason or excuse for failure when we think we will fail we put ourselves at a disadvantage so that if we fail, we have an excuse and if we succeed, we look even better than normal because we did so in the face of great odds against us Self-handicapping is a cognitive strategy by which people avoid effort in the hopes of keeping potential failure from hurting self-esteem.
If you self-handicap (with alcohol or any other strategy known to undermine performance - procrastination) and you fail, you protect your sense of competence, because you can externalize the blame to the alcohol or procrastination
Criticisms of the Stanford Prison Experiment In the years since the experiment was conducted, there have been a number of critiques of the study. Some of these include: Ethical Issues Lack of Generalizability Other critics suggest that the study lacks generalizability due to a variety of factors.6 The unrepresentative sample of participants (mostly white and middle-class males) makes it difficult to apply the results to a wider population. Lack of Realism The study is also criticized for its lack of ecological validity.7 Ecological validity refers to the degree of realism with which a simulated experimental setup matches the real-world situation it seeks to emulate.8 While the researchers did their best to recreate a prison setting, it is simply not possible to perfectly mimic all of the environmental and situational variables of prison life. Because there may have been factors related to the setting and situation that influenced how the participants behaved, it may not really represent what might happen outside of the lab.
In his lectures Zimbardo mentions the "slippery slope of evil." The list is as follows: 1. Mindlessly taking the first small step.2. Dehumanization of others.3. De-individuation of self.4. Diffusion of Personal Responsibility5. Blind obedience to authority6. Uncritical conformity to group norms.7. Passive tolerance to evil through inaction or indifference.
deindividuation: The loss of identity as a result of participation in a larger group, which lessens the sense of personal responsibility for one's actions. Can lead to increase in aggression. The loss of self-awareness and self-restraint occurring in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity. Zimbardo : "a complex process in which a series of social conditions lead to changes in perception of self and other people" "behavior that is normally restrained and inhibited is released in violation of established norms of appropriateness"
Loss of self-awareness and self-restraint. Examples: Riots, KKK rallies, concerts, identity-concealed online bullying. Happens when people are in group situations involving: 1) Anonymity and 2) Arousal.
milgram experiment
Ordinary people are likely to follow orders given by an authority figure, even to the extent of killing an innocent human being. Obedience to authority is ingrained in us all from the way we are brought up. People tend to obey orders from other people if they recognize their authority as morally right and/or legally based. This response to legitimate authority is learned in a variety of situations, for example in the family, school, and workplace.
A person in the street asks me directions, which I give. They then ask me to walk a little way with them to make sure they don't get lost. In the end, I take them all the way to their destination. Foot in the door You believe cheating is wrong. You cheat on a test. Because of tension, you begin to believe the teacher is so bad that it ok to cheat. Cognitive dissonance The "Got milk?" campaign of the 1990s featured celebrities pictured with milk mustaches to convince people to buy milk. Elaboration likelihood- Peripheral Route
Parents and children tend to have similar political attitudes because of repeated exposure to attitudes and reinforcement of those attitudes in the home Learning Environmental advocates may show people evidence of rising temperatures, melting glaciers, rising seas, and northward shifts in vegetation and animal life to convince others of their arguments. Elaboration likelihood- Central route Sometimes, we're just not sure how we feel about something. For example, when you first meet someone, you might not be sure whether you like them or not. If you do something to help them out, you're likely to conclude that you do like them. In fact, there have been many studies that show that you're more likely to like someone based on how much you've helped them, versus how much they've helped you! Self perception theory
Foot-in-the-door phenomenon Tendency for people who have first agreed to a small request to comply later with a larger request Escalating actions fuel the attitudes, and each successive act is easier to agree to
People asked to place a small "Be A Safe Driver" placard in their windows were 60% more likely to comply with a request, two weeks later, to allow a large poorly-lettered "DRIVE CAREFULLY" billboard to be placed in their front yards (Freedman & Fraser, 1966).
group polarization: the enhancement of a group's prevailing inclinations through discussion within the group group decisions tend to be more extreme than what its individual members would want to take responsibility for personally When people of similar views form a group together, discussion within the group makes their views more extreme. Thus, different groups become MORE different, more polarized, in their views.;;; People in these groups may have only encountered ideas reinforcing the views they already held.
People seek out and share ideas with others who have similar interests and values; the internet has increased group polarization. Exclusive groups allow like-minded individuals to exchange ideas and radicalize one another's opinions. The internet gives people the opportunity to hide their identities too. Group polarization and deindividuation can increase extreme and aggressive views. SEPARATION + CONVERSATION= POLARIZATION
According to Zimbardo and his colleagues, the Stanford Prison Experiment demonstrated the powerful role that the situation can play in human behavior. Because the guards were placed in a position of power, they began to behave in ways they would not usually act in their everyday lives or other situations. The prisoners, placed in a situation where they had no real control, became submissive and depressed.
Situational pressures can lead normal, decent people to behave in sinister, repugnant ways;;; Evil does not require monstrous characters; all it takes is ordinary people corrupted by an evil situation: ordinary soldiers who follow orders to shoot, ordinary students who follow orders to haze initiates into their group, ordinary employees who follow orders to produce and market harmful products (Zimbardo)
Attribution Theory: We explain others' behavior with two types of attributions: Stable v. unstable refers to whether potential causes of behavior are relatively enduring/permanent or variable/temporary. Internal v. external refers to whether the attributed causes are within the person (personal or dispositional)or outside the person (situational, caused by a setting, event, or other people.)
Some blamed the New Orleans residents for not evacuating before the predicted hurricane Others attributed their inaction to the situation... not having cars or being offered bus transportation
The best odds of our helping someone occur when
The person appears to need and deserve help The person is in some way similar to us We have just observed someone else being helped We are not in a hurry We are in a small town or rural area We are feeling guilty We are focused on others and not preoccupied We are in a good mood
Robbers Cave - conflict and peace: In the Robbers Cave field experiment, 22 white, 11-year-old boys were sent to a special remote summer camp in Oklahoma, Robbers Cave State Park. The boys developed an attachment to their groups throughout the first week of the camp by doing various activities together like hiking, swimming, etc. The boys chose names for their groups, The Eagles and The Rattlers. During a four-day series of competitions between the groups prejudice began to become apparent between the two groups (both physical and verbal). During the subsequent two-day cooling off period, the boys listed features of the two groups. The boys tended to characterize their own in-group in very favourable terms, and the other out-group in very unfavourable terms. Sherif then attempted to reduce the prejudice, or inter-group conflict, shown by each group. However, simply increasing the contact of the two groups only made the situation worse. Alternatively forcing the groups to work together to reach common goals, eased prejudice and tension among the groups. This experiment confirmed Sherif's realistic conflict theory (also called realistic group conflict theory), the idea that group conflict can result from competition over resources.
There is a lot of evidence that when people compete for scarce resources (e.g. jobs, land etc.) there is a rise in hostility between groups. Sherif and colleagues tried various means of reducing the animosity and low-level violence between the groups. The Robbers Cave experiments showed that superordinate goals (goals so large that it requires more than one group to achieve the goal) reduced conflict significantly more effectively than other strategies (e.g., communication, contact). Positive relations can only be restored if superordinate goals are in place.;;; Superordinate goals are challenges that would benefit both groups and that require two groups to cooperate with one another.The are shared goals that override differences among people and require their cooperation; When he arranged for the camp water supply to "fail," all 22 boys had to work together to restore water. To rent a movie in those pre-DVD days, they all had to pool their resources. To move a stalled truck, the boys needed to combine their strength, pulling and pushing together. Having used isolation and competition to make strangers into enemies, Sherif used shared predicaments and goals to turn enemies into friends. What reduced conflict was not mere contact, but cooperative contact.
Finding dispositional versus situational causes for poverty and unemployment can have important consequences for our attitudes and actions. Whether we help and how we help🡪 depends on our answers to two questions: Who is responsible for the problem? Who is responsible for the solution?
When we see someone who is in dirty clothes and asking for money, what do we assume is the cause of the person's behavior? Too lazy or incompetent to get a job? Lost home due to medical bills and now unable to get in a condition to compete for scarce jobs?
social facilitation: improved performance of simple or well-learned tasks in the presence of others; Experts excel, people doing simple activities show more speed and endurance in front of an audience... but novices, trying complex skills, do worse.
Why would the presence of an audience "facilitate" better performance for everyone but newcomers? Being watched, and simply being in crowded conditions, increases one's autonomic arousal, along with increasing motivation for those who are confident, and anxiety for those who are not confident.
passionate love: a complete ______ in another that includes tender ______ feelings and the ______ and ______ of intense ______; associated w large swings in positive and negative emotions; powerful motivational force that can charge ppl's thinking and behavior -- lights up dopamine circuits (addiction)
absorption, sexual, agony, ecstacy, emotion
elaboration likelihood model: model of ______ ______, asserts that there are 2 basic "______" to ______: ______ and ______; originally proposed by richard petty and john cacioppo
attitude change, routes, persuasion, central, peripheral
stereotypes: widely held ______ that ppl have certain ______ bc of their ______ in a particular ______; most common are based on gender, age, and ethnicity; ex: women are emotional, old ppl are weak, lawyers are dishonest; normal, ______ cognitive process that saves energy and simplifies our ______ world; often broad ______
beliefs, characteristics, membership, group, automatic, social, overgeneralizations
just-world hypothesis/defensive attribution: a tendency to ______ ______ for their ______, so that one feels less likely to be ______ in a similar way; "he should have known better"; allows us to avoid the ugly reality that these things could just as easily happen to you -- to avoid these disturbing thoughts, ppl often attribute mishaps to victims' ______; hindsight bias probs contributes to this tendency, but blaming victims also helps ppl maintain their belief that they live in a ______ world;;; The tendency to blame the victims for their misfortune, so one feels less likely to be victimized in a similar way When we make attributions which defend ourselves from the notion that we could be the victim of an unfortunate outcome, and often also that we could be held responsible as the victim People's attributions about the victims are motivated by both harm avoidance (this is unlikely to happen to me) and blame avoidance (if it did happen to me, I would not be to blame). If we see ourselves as more similar to the victim, therefore, we are less likely to attribute the blame to them. If, on the other hand, we identify more with the perpetrator, then our attributions of responsibility to the victim will increase
blame victims, misfortune, victimized, negligence, just
central route to persuasion: taken when ppl ______ ponder the ______ and logic of ______ messages; ex: a politician who campaigns by delivering carefully researched speeches; leads to more ______ attitude change than peripheral; attitudes changed thru central processes predict behavior ______ than attitudes changed thru peripheral processes
carefully, content, persuasive, enduring, better
obedience: a form of ______ that occurs when ppl follow ______ ______, usually from someone in a position of ______
compliance, direct commands, authority
normative influence: operates when people ______ to ______ norms for fear of ______ ______ ______; people conform/comply bc theyre afraid of being ______/______; all about being ______
conform, social, negative social consequences, criticized, rejected, liked
soloman asch's research: investigated the variables that govern ______; men purposely answering incorrectly to an obvious question (cards w vertical lines), seeing whether subject will conform or state the right answer; dramatic demonstration of humans' propensity to ______; group ______ and group ______ are key determinants of conformity
conformity, conform, size, unanimity
learning theories of attitude formation/change: attitudes may be learned from parents, peers, the media, cultural traditions, and other social influences; evaluative conditioning --> transferring the ______ attached to a US to a new CS; advertisers do this by using attractive models; ______ conditioning --> ppl agreeing w ur attitude can reinforce it, and vice versa; ______ learning takes place --> opinions sway other ppls' attitudes
emotion, operant, observational
illusory correlation: occurs when ppl ______ that they have encountered more ______ of an ______ between ______ traits than they have actually seen; ppl see what they expect to see (stereotypes), and they also tend to ______ how ______ they see it; ppl also tend to ______ the number of ______ they have encountered (ex: ive never met an honest lawyer);
estimate, confirmations, association, social, overestimate, often, underestimate, disconfirmations
attitude: positive or negative ______ of objects of thought; objects of thought = social issues (gun control), groups (liberals), institutions, consumer products, and pplA belief and feeling that predisposes you to respond in a particular way to people, events, and objects Positive or negative evaluations of objects or thought
evaluations
social roles: widely shared _____ about how ppl in certain _____ are supposed to _____; we have role expectations for sales ppl, students, tourists, prisoners, guards, and more
expectations, positions, behave
self-serving bias: how social psychologists describe human's tendency to blame ___ forces when bad things happen and to give ourselves credit when good things happen; although it can mean evading personal ___ for your actions, self-serving bias is a defense mechanism that protects your ___
external, responsibility, self-esteem
in-group bias: a group that one belongs to and identifies with; in-group members tend to be viewed in a ______ light; this crucial categorization is thought to structure subsequent ______
favorable, perceptions
informational influence: operates when ppl look to others for ______ about how to behave in ______ ______; ex: at a nice restaurant, watching others to see which fork to use; all about being ______
guidance, ambiguous situations, right
person perception: the process of forming ______ of others; you engage in this when interacting w other ppl; these impressions are often ______ bc of ______
impressions, inaccurate, biases
dissonance theory of attitude formation/change: (festinger); assumes that ______ among ______ propels ppl in the direction of ______ ______; cognitive dissonance exists when related cognitions are inconsistent -- when they contradict each other; creates a state of ______ that motivates ppl to alter their ______; sheds light on why ppl sometimes come to believe their own ______
inconsistency, attitudes, attitude change, tension, cognitions, lies
attributions: ______ that ppl draw ab the causes of events, others' behavior, and their own behavior; if you conclude that a friend turned down your invitation bc shes overworked, you have made an attribution about the cause of her behavior; ppl make attributions bc they have a strong need to understand their experiences; Made when: Unusual events grab attention Events have personal consequences There is suspicion about the motives underlying someone's behaviors
inferences
fundamental attribution error: refers to ______'s ______ in favor of ______ attributions in explaining others' ______; observers tend to ______ the likelihood that an actor's behavior reflects ______ ______ rather than ______ factors; situational pressures may not be readily ______ to an observer; requires more thought and effort to explain ppl's behavior in terms of situational factors rather than it does to attribute people's behavior to their dispositions (effortless, automatic)
observers, bias, internal, behavior, overestimate, personal qualities, situational, apparent
out-group bias -- homogeneity: a group that one does not belong to or identify w; this crucial categorization is thought to structure subsequent ______; out-group members tend to be viewed in terms of various ______ ______ that move outgroups out of one's domain of ______; thus, one feels ______ in not ______ them or in ______ against them
perceptions, negative stereotypes, empathy, justified, liking, discriminating
internal attributions: ascribe the causes of behavior to ______ ______, traits, abilities, and feelings; if a friends business fails, you might attribute it to their lack of business sense (an internal, personal factor); impacts everyday interpersonal interactions
personal dispositions
receiver factors: some ppl are easier to ______ than others; ______ the person about a persuasive effort seems to be more influential than ______; considerations that stimulate counterarguing in the receiver tend to increase ______ to ______; stronger ______ are more ______ to change; resistance can promote resistance
persuade, forewarning, personality, resistance, persuasion, attitudes, resistant
source factors: ______ tends to be more successful when the source has high ______ -- comes from ______ or ______, also likability, physical ______; ppl also respond better to sources who are ______ to them in ways that are ______ to the issue at hand
persuasion, credibility, expertise, trustworthiness, attractiveness, similar, relevant
peripheral route to persuasion: taken when ______ depends on ______ factors, such as the ______ and ______ of the source; ex: a politician who depends on marching bands and celebrity endorsements
persuasion, nonmessage, attractiveness, credibility
matching hypothesis (interpersonal attraction): proposes that males and females of approximately equal ______ ______ are likely to select each other as ______; supported by evidence that dating/married couples are often the same level of attractiveness; less-attractive ppl place less weight on physical attractiveness than those who are good-looking
physical attractiveness, partners
evolutionary explanation of attachment: asserts that ______ appearance determines ______ bc certain aspects of good looks can indicate good ______, genes, and fertility, which all contribute to ______ ______; facial symmetry (a key element of ______ across cultures) is valued bc environmental insults and developmental abnormalities are associated w physical asymmetries; men are more interested than women in seeking youthfulness and physical attractiveness in a mate bc these are associated w greater reproductive potential
physical, attraction, health, reproductive potential; attractiveness
physical attractiveness (interpersonal attraction): refers to ______ feelings toward another; applies to liking, friendship, lust, and love; key determinant of ______ attraction is ______ attractiveness; attractive ppl enjoy greater ______ success than unattractive ppl
positive, romantic, physical, mating
social loafing: factor contributing to low _____ in groups; related to effort; a reduction in effort by individuals when they work in groups as compared to when they work by themselves; common cause w bystander effect: diffusion of responsibility in groups; not inevitable -- less likely when individual contributions are indentifiable; Ever had a group project, with a group grade, and had someone in the group slack off? If so, you have experienced Social Loafing: the tendency of people in a group to show less effort when not held individually accountable. a decreased effort by individuals when they work in groups as compared to working by themselves; when an individual feels less responsibility and correspondingly does less
productivity
love as attachment: ______ love is an attachment process -- ppl's intimate relationships in ______ follow the same form as their attachments in ______; anxious ambivalent attachment in infancy --> anxious relationships in adulthood; secure adults, anxious ambivalent adults, avoidant adults; infant attachment experiences shape intimate relations in adulthood
romantic, adulthood, infancy
similarity effects: married/dating couples tend to be ______ in age, race, religion, social class, intelligence, attractiveness, values, etc; occurs in both ______ and ______ relationships; ______ causes ______, sometimes ______ fosters ______
similar, friendships, romantic, similarity, attraction, attraction, similarity
external attributions: ascribe the causes of behavior to ______ demands and ______ constraints; if a friends business fails, you might attribute it to negative trends in the economy (an external, situational explanation); impacts everyday interpersonal interactions
situational, environmental
philip zimbardo's research: designed the ______ ______ ______ to investigate why prisons tend to become abusive, degrading, violent environments; wanted to see how much the power of the ______ would shape the ______ of normal, average participants; 24 college students, half guards, half prisoners -- guards became controlling and abusive, prisoners became apathetic and demoralized; attributed participants' behavior to the enormous influence of ______ ______
standford prison simulation, situation, behavior, social roles
stanley milgram's research: wanted to study the ______ to ______ ______ figures; troubled by nazis following horrible orders in WWII, wanted to determine the extent to which ppl are willing to follow authority orders; wanted to identify the factors that lead ppl to follow commands that violate their ethics, such as commands to harm an innocent stranger via shocks; concluded that obedience to authority is even more common than he had anticipated -- supported thesis that ______ factors exert great influence over ______
tendency, obey authority, situational, behavior
companionate love: ______, ______, tolerant ______ for another whose life is deeply ______ w one's own; more ______ related to relationship ______ than passionate love
warm, trusting, affection, intertwined, strongly, satisfaction
conformity: occurs when ppl ______ to real or imagined ______ ______; ex: maintaining a well-groomed lawn only to avoid complaints from your neighbors rather than genuinely preferring a nice lawn
yield, social pressure
