Social Psych Test 1

ethics

-ethical principles govern all research in psychology -any institution (universities) that seeks federal funding for psychological research is required to have and institutional review board (IRB) that reviews research before it's conducted

The three reason for accessibility of schemas

-past experiences (i.e history of alcoholism in family) -related to current goal (i.e currently studying for a psych test so mental illness being accessible) -recent experiences (something that happens right before, i.e. priming)

Probability Level (p-value)

A number calculated with statistical techniques that tells researchers how likely it is that the results of their experiment occurred by chance and not because of the independent variable or variables the convention in science, including social psychology, is to consider results significant (trustworthy) if the probability level is less than 5 in 100 that the results might be due to chance factors and not the independent variables studied

experimental method

Causality the method in which the researcher randomly assigns participants to different conditions and ensures that these conditions are identical except for the independent variable (the one thought to have a causal effect on people's responses) is variable X a cause of variable Y

Limits of Observational Method

Certain behaviors difficult to observe -Occur rarely -In private Archival analysis -Original may not have all information researchers need Does not allow prediction and explanation -Limited to description

Observational method

Description The technique whereby a researcher observes people and systematically records measurements or impressions of their behavior What is the nature of the phenomenon?

Social psychology had its origins in

Gestalt psychology

why is the construal so important?

People's behavior is affected by their interpretation of events, not only the events themselves.

Correlational method

Prediction two variables are systematically measured and the relationship between them- how much you can predict one from the other- is assessed From knowing X, can we predict Y

random assignment to condition

The process whereby all participants have an equal chance of taking part in any condition of an experiment; ensures researchers can be relatively certain that differences in the participants' personalities or backgrounds are distributed evenly across conditions

basic dilemma of the social psychologist

The trade-off between internal and external validity in conducting research; it is very difficult to do one experiment that is both high in internal validity and generalizable to other situations and people

dependent variable

The variable a researcher measures to see if it is influenced by the independent variable

How do social psychologists formulate hypotheses and theories?

They are inspired by previous theories and research, disagree with a previous researchers' interpretations of his or her study, and construct hypothesis and theories based on personal observations in everyday life

goal of social psychology

To identify universal laws of human behavior

cover story

a description of the purpose of a study, given to participants, that is different from its true purpose and is used to maintain psychological realism

archival analysis

a form of the observational method in which the researcher examines the accumulated documents, or archives of a culture (i.e. diaries, novels, magazines, and newspapers)

availability heuristic

a mental rule of thumb whereby people base a judgement on the ease which they can bring something to mind (people use these when making judgements about themselves and other people)

behaviorism

a school of psychology maintaining that to understand human behavior, one need only consider the reinforcing properties of the environment

gestalt psychology

a school of psychology stressing the importance of studying the subjective way in which an object appears in people's minds rather than the objective, physical attributes of the object

correlation coefficient

a statistic that asses how well you can predict one variable from another (ranges from -1 to +1 and a positive correlation means they are directly related and negative means they are inversely related)

meta-analysis

a statistical technique that averages the results of two or more studies to see if the effect of an independent variable is reliable

holistic thinking style

a type of thinking in which people focus on the overall context, particularly the ways in which objects relate to each other; this type of thinking is common in East Asian cultures (i.e. china, japan and Korea)

analytical thinking style

a type of thinking in which people focus on the properties of objects without considering their surrounding context; this type of thinking is common in western cultures

Suppose a researcher found a strong positive correlation between the number of tweets people send each day and their reported happiness. Which of the following is the best conclusion he or she can draw from this finding? a) Happy people are more likely to send a lot of tweets than sad people b)Feeling happy makes people want to tweet more c)There is a third variable that makes people happy and send a lot of tweets d) Sending tweets makes people happy

a) Happy people are more likely to send a lot of tweets than sad people

The observational method is best at answering which of these questions? a) How polite are people in public places? b) Are people from the Southern United States more polite in public places than people from the Northern United States? c) What makes people act politely or rudely in public places? d) Does music played in department stores influence how polite people are in those stores?

a) How polite are people in public places?

Thoughts have to be both ___ and ___ before they will act as primes

accessible, applicable

hindsight bias

after people know that something occurred, they exaggerate how much they could have predicted it before it occurred

self-fulfilling prophecy

an expectation of one's own or another person's behavior that comes true because of the tendency of the person holding it to act in ways that bring it about (automatic thinking)

A researcher is interested in whether moods vary by the day of the week. She codes the postings on thousands of Facebook pages to see whether people express more positive comments on some days than others. Which research method has she used?

archival analysis

which of the following comments does not illustrate the fundamental attribution error? a) A woman reads about high unemployment in poor communities and says, "Well, if those people weren't so lazy, they would find work." b) "The people who committed suicide at Jonestown were socially isolated and thus cut off from other points of view about their leader." c) A man says, "My wife has sure become a grouchy person" but explains his own grouchiness as a result of having a hard day at the office. d) "The people who committed suicide at Jonestown were mentally ill."

b) "The people who committed suicide at Jonestown were socially isolated and thus cut off from other points of view about their leader."

The correlational method is best at answering which of these questions? a) Does music played in department stores influence how polite people are in those stores? b) Are people from the Southern United States more polite in public places than people from the Northern United States? c) How polite are people in public places? d) What makes people act politely or rudely in public places?

b) Are people from the Southern United States more polite in public places than people from the Northern United States?

The experimental method is best at answering which of these questions? a) Are people who play violent video games more likely to be rude to someone who cuts in line in front of them? b) Does playing violent video games cause people to be more rude to someone who cuts in line in front of them? c) How aggressively do people drive during rush hours in major U.S. cities? d) Are people who play violent video games more likely to drive aggressively?

b) Does playing violent video games cause people to be more rude to someone who cuts in line in front of them?

Eleanor gets a bad grade on the first paper in her English class. To predict whether she will drop the course or stick with it, which question would a social psychologist be most likely to ask? a) How did she score on a personality test of persistence? b) What is her explanation for why she got the bad grade? c) How did she do in the English class she took the previous semester? c) What were her SAT scores?

b) What is her explanation for why she got the bad grade?

Limits of the correlational method

correlation does not equal (prove) causation

social psychologists

develop explanations of social influence through empirical methods (such as experiments)

field experiments

experiments conducted in natural settings rather than in the laboratory

personality psychology

explaining people's behaviors in terms of their traits -generally focus on individual differences that make them different from others

A researcher conducts a study with participants who are college students. The researcher then repeats the study using the same procedures but with members of the general population (i.e., adults) as participants. The results are similar for both samples. The research has established _______________ through ________________.

external validity, replication

construal

how people perceive, comprehend, and interpret the social world

people often focus too much on...

individual characteristics of what they observe and too little on base rates

base rate information

information about the relative frequency of members of different categories in the population

what was the main contribution of Gestalt psychology to social psychology?

it showed that the whole is larger than the sum of its parts

internal validity

keeping everything but the independent variable the same in an experiment (making sure that nothing besides the independent variable can affect the dependent variable)

what is a basic assumption that social psychologists make?

many social problems can be studied scientifically

represenativeness heuristic

mental shortcut whereby people classify something according to how similar it is to a typical case (statements are vague enough that virtually everyone can find a past behavior to [representative of] the feedback)

judgmental heuristic

mental shortcuts people use to make judgments quickly and efficiently *they do not guarantee that people will make accurate inferences about the world (they can be misapplied/inadequate)

schemas

mental structures people use to organize their knowledge about the social world around themes or subjects and that influence the information people notice, think about and remember

counterfactual thinking

mentally changing some aspect of the past as a way of imagining what might have been (i.e. "close calls") *conscious and effortful, but not always intentional and voluntary (i.e. obsessing over the past)

deception

misleading participants about the true purpose of a study or the events that transpire

there can be a disconnect between...

our conscious sense of how much we are causing our own actions and how much we really are causing them

Construal: self-esteem motive

people have a strong need to see themselves as good, competent and decent (people often distort their perception of the world to preserve their self-esteem)

automatic goal pursuit

people often pursue goals that have been recently primed, without realizing that this is why they are pursuing the goal

self-esteem

people's evaluations of their own self-worth (the extent to which they view themselves as good, competent and decent

Social Psychology

people's thoughts, feelings and behaviors are influenced by the real or imagined presence of other people

This (not schema/priming) can also influence our judgements and behavior

physical sensations (smelling, feeling, etc.) /priming metaphors between the mind and body

replications

repeating a study, often with different subject populations or in different settings

cross-cultural research

research conducted with members of different cultures, to see whether the psychological processes of interest are present in both cultures or whether they are specific to the culture in which people were raised sharpens theories, either by demonstrating their universality or by leading us to discover additional variables that help us improve our understanding and prediction of human behavior

surveys

research in which a representative sample of people are asked about their attitudes or behavior

why is the study of social psychology important?

social psychologists are fascinated by human social behavior and want to understand it on the deepest possible level (and to contribute to the solution of social problems)

social neuroscience

social psychologists are increasingly interested in the connection between biological processes and social behavior

applied research

studies designed to solve a particular social problem

basic research

studies that are designed to find the best answer to the question of why people behave as they do and that are conducted purely for reasons of intellectual curiosity

planning falacy

tendency for people to be overly optimistic about how soon they will complete a project, even when they have failed to get similar projects done on time in the past (they don't prime for past experiences)

evolutionary psychology

the attempt to explain social behavior in terms of genetic factors that have evolved over time according to the principles of natural selection

naive realism

the conviction that we perceive things as they really are (underestimating how much we are interpreting or "spinning" what we see)

accessibility

the extent to which schemas and concepts are at the forefront of people's minds and are therefore likely to be used when making judgements about the social world

psychological realism

the extent to which the psychological process triggered in an experiment are similar to psychological processes that occur in everyday life

external validity

the extent to which the results of a study can be generalized to other situations and to other people

we are governed by...

the imaginary approval or disapproval of our parents, friends and teachers and by how we expect others to react to us (social influence)

the level of analysis in social psychology

the individual WITHIN a group, institution, or society

ethnography

the method by which researchers attempt to understand a group or culture by observing it from the inside, without imposing any preconceived notions they might have (observational method)

Construal: social cognition motive

the need to be accurate to that they can make effective judgements and decisions (in actuality, individual typically act on the basis of incomplete and inaccurately interpreted information)

two central motives in steering people's construals

the need to feel good about ourselves and the need to be accurate

priming

the process by which recent experiences increase the accessibility of schema, trait, or concept (automatic thinking)

debriefing

the process of explaining to the participants, at the end of an experiment, the true purpose of the study and exactly what transpired

informed consent

the researcher explains the nature of the experiment to participants before it begins and asks for their permission to participate

social cognition

the study of how people select, interpret, remember and use information to make judgements and decisions

fundamental attribution error

the tendency to explain our own and other people's behavior entirely in terms of personality traits and to underestimate the power of social influence and the immediate situation

independent variable

the variable a researcher changes or varies to see if it has an effect on some other variable

what do social psychology and sociology have in common?

they are both concerned with group processes

what do social psychology and personality psychology have in common?

they both focus on the individual

people in both cultures are capable of...

thinking holistically or analytically, but the environment in which people live, or even that they have been recently primed, triggers a reliance on one of the styles

controlled thinking

thinking that is conscious, intentional, voluntary, and effortful

automatic thinking

thinking that is nonconscious, unintentional, involuntary, and effortless

The goal of social psychology

to identify psychological properties that make almost everyone susceptible to social influence, regardless of class or culture