Chapter 12: Social Psychology

interpersonal topics

(those that pertain to dyads and groups) include helping behavior, aggression, prejudice and discrimination, attraction and close relationships, and group processes and intergroup relationships.

Intrapersonal topics

(those that pertain to the individual) include emotions and attitudes, the self, and social cognition (the ways in which we think about ourselves and others)

Why do prejudice and discrimination exist?

- due to social learning and conformity to social norms, learned from parents, teachers, friends, media, and other sources of socialization, normalized in our cultures -they are created because of heuristics we use and we are exposed to these throughout life and we act on them

Stanford Prison Experiment- Cognitive dissonance and social roles

-Philip Zimbardo -24 males randomly put into guard or prisoner -rule was to maintain law and order -prisoners blindfolded, degraded, -first day was fine, second day prisoners rebelled, people began to take on the social roles assigned and act according to social norms -prisoners began to accept the norms that they were under tyranny, and they began to isolate, guards began to abuse power; shows why people can not get out of abusive relationships -changed ethical guidelines

Kitty Genovese- bystander effect

-discover the diffusion of responsibility: tendency for no one to help cause they think someone else already has or will (grows as more bystanders there are) -38 bystanders -stabbed by Winsted Mosely -stabbed separate three times -first call made 30 minutes later by 1 person who only decided to after much thought because they did not want to be involved -made it to lampost till stabbed and someone said leave her alone, went away, made it to close to building and stabbed again, lights came on again scaring attacker, made it to building and killed her there

Stanley Milligram Shocking experiment- Obedience

-inspired by Nazis who said they were just following orders -participants shocked individuals to help improve memory of learned (used confederates as learners) -2/3 complied -obedience varied with setting, who was in room, who they were around, who they were touching, how orders were delivered (direct vs. phone call) -found when humanity of learned increased that obedience decreased and when authority of experimenter increased obedience increased

prejudice

A negative attitude toward an entire category of people based soley on ones membership in a particular social group (FEELING)

What happened with Prisoner 416 in The Stanford Prison Experiment? He broke down on the very first night, and left the experiment early He felt as though he was losing his own identity and he went on a hunger strike, which the guards put him in the hole for The guards put him in the hole, but the other prisoners voted to let him out early, in exchange for not being able to sleep with their blankets for a night He successfully broke out of the prison

He felt as though he was losing his own identity and he went on a hunger strike, which the guards put him in the hole for

Sternberg's Triangular Theory of Love

Intimacy Passion Commitment liking=intimacy without passion or commitment companionate love= intamy + commitment without passion romantic love=intimacy + passion without commitment empty love= commitment without passion or intimacy fatuous love= passion + commitment without intimacy consummate love=passion + commitment + intimacy

What earlier study that also examined the effects of authority inspired the Stanford Prison Experiment? Berkeley's studies of experience Kahneman and Tversky's studies on heuristics Milgram's study on obedience The Stanford Prison Experiment was the first study of the effects of authority

Milgram's study on obedience

Which statement about social psychology is most accurate?

People's thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by social situations

How likely will persuasion affect attitude and change it described by

Peripheral Likelihood Model: indirect persuasion by associating that thing with positive messages, emotions, cues, I.E. celeb endorsements; does not require much effort or processing; less permanent of a change; audience does not have to be analytical or motivated; they may not even notice (product placement) central likelihood model: logic drive, uses the quality of data (facts) to convince and persuade people, a direct route to persuade; strong method and results in lasting change; audience must be analytical and willing to engage

Types of Prejudice and Discrimination

Racism (can be explicit or implicit), sexism (subtle and difficult to detect), ageism, homophobia

What was "the hole" in the Stanford Prison Experiment? The escape hole that some prisoners dug A term that prisoners used to describe their depression during the experiment The "holes" were the jail cells with cots that the prisoners stayed in Solitary confinement; prisoners were put into it as a punishment

Solitary confinement; prisoners were put into it as a punishment

What happened with the "jail break" in the Stanford Prison Experiment? The prisoners didn't riot, because the guards, who were afraid of a riot, started treating the prisoners fairly and respectfully The prisoners rioted and broke out of the prison, ending the experiment The prison riot didn't end up happening, and the guards had to rebuild the prison after they took it apart; they became even more domineering towards the prisoners The prisoners rioted, which ended up with the guards and prisoners sitting down together to discuss a peace treaty

The prison riot didn't end up happening, and the guards had to rebuild the prison after they took it apart; they became even more domineering towards the prisoners

Yale Attitude Change Approach- persuasion

The study of the conditions under which people are most likely to change their attitudes in response to persuasive messages, focusing on the source of the communication, the nature of the communication, and the nature of the audience sources 1. credible 2.attractive features of communication 1.subtely (the more subtle the better) 2.sideness (show multiple sides of argument) 3. timing (arguments stronger back to back) features of audience 1.attention 2.intelligence 3.self esteem 4.age

What was the major flaw in the Stanford prison experiment? The respondents wanted to leave, but Zimbardo would not let them. Zimbardo did not use a control group. The study went on too long. The students were not randomly assigned.

Zimbardo did not use a control group.

social inhibition

a decrease in performance in front of a crowd because they are usually unskilled in that thing

Discrimination

a negative action toward an individual as a result of ones membership in a particular group

Conformity

adjusting our behavior or thinking to coincide with a group standard normative social influence- people conform to feel good, be accepted by group informational social influence-people conform cause task is ambiguous and they think the group is competent and has the correct information *affected bu age, gender, socio cultural background

self-fulfilling prophecy

an expectation that causes you to act in ways that make that expectation come true (if you treat a gay man with differently in interview, they may take that cue and come off as rude to you and you confirm they are rude)

foot-in-the-door technique

asking for a small commitment and, after gaining compliance, asking for a bigger commitment; technique to persuade

dispositionism

behavior determined by internal factors of a person; their personality, their temperament

attitudes

evaluation of a person, object, idea has three components: affective (feelings), behavioral (effect of attitude on behavior), cognitive (beliefs and knowledge) *you can change your attitude *attitudes dictate your actions BUT actions can also dictate attitudes

Fundamental attribution error- Abu Ghraib Prisoner Abuses

everyone said wow these soldiers were horrible people, ignoring the situation that those abusive behaviors were encouraged and were ordered to; sitautional variables are very powerful in determining behavior

ingroup

group we identify with; leads to group bias and prejudice and discrimination cause outgroups perceived as different than us

social psychology

how people affect each other; how peoples thoughts, feelings, behaviors are influenced by social situations *the implied and actual presence of people is strong influence on our behavior and attitude

Implicit Associations Task

measures the associations we make implicitly and how strong they are; there are things associated in our memory even though we are not aware of it such as villains and foreign accents; this is because it goes into our semantic network, resting activation energy rises, form associations unknowingly, therefore we can have stereotypes in our semantic network made as we grow up BUT does not mean we have to act on them-that is a choice

Obedience

modifying opinion to comply with the demand by authority figure because they are usually concerned of the consequences of non compliance

Dr. Levine research about kindness

more likely in small towns and latin american countries

fundamental attribution error

observers tend to overestimate the role of disposition in determining behavior in strangers *error made more by UK, US, canada-individualistic countries vs Latin America, asia, Africa which are more collectivistic cultures actor-observer bias-the tendency to blame our actions on the situation and blame the actions of others on their dispositions self-serving bias-attribute successes to our dispositions and our failures to situation attribution- belief about the cause of a result criteria to make attributions: external vs internal, stable vs. unstable, and controllable vs uncontrollable just world hypothesis-the world is just and people get the outcomes they deserve --> leads to victim blaming

Festinger knob study- Cognitive Dissonance Theory

paid 20 dollars for people to turn knobs and lie and say it was interesting vs 1 dollar those paid 1$ thought it was more interesting because they tried to justify why they would do something so boring and lie for only a dollar, well it must have been interesting then, to reduce the dissonance; tried to justify it

confirmation bias

pay attention to info that is consistent with stereotype and ignore the info that is not

social facilitation

people do well on a task in front of others that they are good at (professional basketball)

aggresion

people seek to cause harm or pain to other people (can be hostile or instrumental) -due to evolution; in males to ensure the perpetuation of male genes -frustration aggression theory when humans prevented from reaching a goal so they grow frustrated and aggressive forms: bullying, cyberbullying

What is the main point of the quizmaster study? People will overlook obvious situational influences on behavior. People will attack other people by claiming situational influences are making them behave badly. People will defend themselves by claiming situational influences changed their behavior. People will overlook obvious dispositional influences on their behavior.

people will overlook obvious situational influences on behavior.

attraction

physical attraction based on culture and social attractive is universal

prosocial behavior

positive, constructive, helpful behavior why? 1.altruism: want to help when the costs even outweigh benefits (selflessness); person may feel good but that is consequence not cause 2.empathy-see others perspective and understand what they feel 3.egoism-to make ourselves feel good

determiner of relationships

proximity (whoever is close to you), homophily (whoever is similar to you), reprocity (we expect back what we contribute), self-disclosure (sharing personal info to make relations)

congitive dissonance

psychological discomfort from holding inconsistent attitudes, behaviors, cognitions, thoughts, beliefs, opinions (by Festinger) cognitive dissonance leads to justification effect in order to reduce the negative feelings (illustrated by Festingers boring knob study) *we only act to reduce the dissonance when the conflicting behaviors/cognitions affect our positive self image *actions that are causing dissonance cause you to change our attitudes can be reduced by 1. change behavior 2.change cognition (thoughts) by rationalizing or denying 3. adding new thoughts

behavior is a product of

situtation and disposition

Social Influences

social roles: pattern of behavior expected of a person in a given setting or group that is defined by culturally shared knowledge social norms: group expectation of what is appropriate and how you should behave and think scripts: knowledge about sequence of events expected in a specific setting

stereotype

specific beliefs or assumptions about individuals based solely on their membership in a group, regardless of their individual characteristics (generalized and well known culturally)

group polarization

tendency of group members to move to an extreme position after discussing an issue as a group (political rallies)

Groupthink

the mode of thinking that occurs when the desire for harmony in a decision-making group overrides a realistic appraisal of alternatives caused by: highly cohesive group, strives for harmony, has direct group leader, is isolated from having new viewpoints symptoms: they believe they are invulnerable and morally correct; they self censor to avoid disruption, they quash dissenting views, shield leader from dissenting views, illusion of unanimity, holding negative attitudes toward dissenters

bystander effect

the tendency for any given bystander to be less likely to give aid if other bystanders are present

social loafing

the tendency for people in a group to exert less effort when pooling their efforts toward attaining a common goal than when individually accountable; HOWEVER when it is a group setting where task is challenging and grades are not taken individually the performance of individual is usually increased

why does by-standing happen

two universal rules come in conflict: we ought to help and we ought to do what everyone else is doing

Asch study on line segments - conformity

used CONFEDERATES and did line segment test in groups, 76% of participants conformed to incorrect answer factors that made conformity more likely: 1. size of majority that said wrong answer (as this increases so does conformity, maxes at 5 people) Asch effect: A form of conformity in which a group majority influences individual judgments. 2. presence of another dissenter (conformity drops to 0) 3. public or private nature of it compliance-when someones opinion changes if it is made in public vs. private

scapegoat

when a group is frustrated because they were not able to achieve goal so take out frustration on outgroup

persuasion

when our attitudes change based on some sort of communication

fundamental attribution error - quizmaster study

where contestants ranked their own intelligence lower and the quizmasters higher; obviously overlooking an obvious situational factor (the quizmaster knew the answers)

situationsim

your behavior and actions are determined by environment and situation