Social Psychology Review Questions Exam 2

T/F According to Asch, if I describe Jeremy as "Bright, friendly, witty, selfish, irresponsible." most people would form a somewhat favorable impression of him.

True

T/F Amnesiacs who cannot remember a choice they made 30 minutes earlier between two equally desirable objects, nevertheless show changes in attitude that are consistent with resolving post-decisional dissonance.

True

T/F Belief perseverance occurs in part due to a confirmation bias that leads us to recall from memory or seek out other new information that fits with our belief. Once the original basis for the belief is discredited, we may have already generated other confirming information that helps to maintain our belief.

True

T/F If Dimitri and Marie are friends, Marie likes Curtis, but Curtis and Dimitri dislike each other, then the triad is imbalanced.

True

T/F Lehman and Taylor studied college students who lived in Los Angeles, the site of an impending earthquake. In their interviews with students, they found that even well-educated people respond to the threat of catastrophe by doing nothing to prepare for it.

True

T/F People whose self-esteem is temporarily lowered are more likely to cheat than are those whose self-esteem is fine.

True

T/F Priming refers to the fact that recently activated or frequently activated concepts are more likely to readily come to mind and thus be used in interpreting social events.

True

T/F Smokers who smoked 1 to 2 packs of cigarettes a day were more likely to label themselves as "moderate smokers" rather than a "heavy smokers" IF they were more aware of the risks associated with smoking than if the were not.

True

T/F The primacy effect in impression formation occurs more when people are forming an impression as they get the information (an "on-line" impression) rather than waiting until further information has been collected (a "memory-based" impression).

True

T/F The tendency to overestimate the percentage of other people who agree with us on a given issue is referred to as the false-consensus effect.

True

T/F When verbal and nonverbal information are inconsistent, we are more likely to believe the nonverbal message.

True

T/F Wilson & Nisbett's research on the halo effect (see supplemental reading) suggests that people often are unaware of what is the real basis of their judgment of someone.

True

T/F Research on cognitive dissonance suggests that, all other things being equal, you will like a class more if you have to work hard to get an A than if the class is an easy A.

True; (justification of effort)

T/F Suppose you are induced to perform some counter-attitudinal behavior, such as saying to Dr. Budesheim how much you dislike his class. You will experience cognitive dissonance and change your attitude to be more unfavorable towards his class only if each of the following conditions exist: (1) you perceive that you freely chose to say that you disliked the class, (2) Dr. Budesheim seemed to believe you, (3) there was no significant reward for saying it, and (4) you can't take it back and tell him that you didn't really mean it.

True; (this has all the key ingredients: free choice, negative consequences, insufficient justification, and irrevocability/permanence)

Describe the significance of the following contextual factors on social judgment: a) contrast effects, b) priming, c) decision-framing, d) the order in which information is presented. Describe how these factors influence social judgments in everyday life and provide research evidence to support your answer.

a) contrast effects -change in how good something looks in comparison to a similar item b) priming - activates schemas through subtle cues c) decision-framing - how I word something d) the order in which information is presented -the things we learn first about a person are especially influential, but can be misleading

Suppose you were a subject in Milgram's experiment on obedience, but for some reason, you were never told that the other person in the experiment was a confederate who didn't really receive the electric shocks you delivered. Suppose that the next day you ran into the other person at a coffee shop. All other things being equal, how would you feel about that person if: a) you had gone all the way in delivering shocks to him or her? b) you had disobeyed the experimenter and refused to continue after delivering only a few mild shocks? Support your answer with relevant research and theory.

a) you will say he/she deserves it -if they wouldn't have kept getting the questions wrong b) you wouldn't feel dissonance - you know you stopped, so you feel like a good person for stopping

T/F First impressions are formed in a manner of seconds on the basis of a number of nonverbal and physical characteristics. However, these impressions are typically fleeting and often get dramatically changed once there has been an opportunity for social interaction to occur.

False; (no, first impressions are very predictive of the impressions we have of the person after extended interactions with the person).

T/F When attributing a person's behavior, Kelley argues that information about how other people behaved toward the same stimulus is distinctiveness information.

False; ( that would be consensus information)

T/F The actor-observer effect was exemplified by the fact that we tend to view other people's behavior as "depending on the situation" while we view our own behavior as due to some trait or characteristic that we possess. This is because we have greater knowledge of ourselves and the traits we have.

False; (just the opposite - we tend to view our own behavior as "depending on the situation" while we view others behavior as due to a specific trait)

T/F Senator Mudslinger airs an ad that says Senator Spickenspan lied on her income tax return. Senator Spickenspan becomes less popular in the polls. Senator Mudslinger later admits that the ad was in error. Voters reactions to Senator Spickenspan are likely to become even more favorable than they were before.

False; (no, see research on belief perseverance)

T/F According to the two-step process of making attributions, people automatically correct their attributions for behavior by considering situational constraints on their behavior.

False; (no, step 2 only occurs if the person has the time, energy, and motivation to consider potential situational factors)

T/F Self-enhancement (e.g., exaggerating one's abilities, accomplishments, and popularity) is of greater importance to people than verifying that one's self concept is accurate.

False; (not necessarily - remember the research we described about the cognitive-affective crossfire?)

T/F In Freedman's study, children who were given mild threats of punishment for playing with a robot toy refused to play with the toy while Freedman was present but began playing with it as soon as he left.

False; (that happened with strong threats, but not with mild threats)

T/F The fundamental attribution error is the fact that when there are two facilitating causes for behavior, we tend to downplay the importance of either potential cause.

False; (that is a description of the discounting principle)

T/F Like cognitive dissonance theory, self perception theory also argues that there is an unpleasant, tense psychological state, namely ambiguity or uncertainty that can motivate individuals to change their attitudes.

False; (there is no unpleasant "dissonant" state involved in the self-perception explanation)

T/F In Axom and Cooper's research on cognitive dissonance and weight reduction, they manipulated individuals' self-esteem and sense of self-efficacy.

False; (they manipulated choice and effort)

T/F After watching a news report of a plane crash, people are more likely to overestimate the frequency of plane crashes in general. This error in judgment is due to the representativeness heuristic.

False; (this is the availability heuristic)

T/F Paralinguistic cues are things like pupil dilation, smiling, and blinking

False; it is HOW you say something, so things like tone of voice, pitch, rate of speech, volume, etc.)

What are the three different ways to reduce cognitive dissonance?

1. change behavior to bring it in line with the dissonant cognition 2. justify the behavior by changing the dissonant cognition 3. justify the behavior by adding new (consonant)

What are the two different strategies of self-handicapping? How do men and women differ with respect to these strategies?

1. create obstacles that reduce the likelihood of success on the task (e.g., use of drugs and alcohol, reduced effort and failure to prepare) - men are more likely to create obstacles than women 2. don't create obstacles, but do create excuses (e.g., complain of not feeling well, point to negative events in recent past, bad moods, test anxiety, etc.) - women are more likely to create/find excuses than men

How does cognitive dissonance explain a husband beating up his wife while he still sees himself as a decent human being?

1. he thinks she deserved it 2. he was drunk

T/F A student comes from a poor neighborhood. The teacher assumes he is not smart and is less attentive and encouraging to the student. The student consequently does poorly. This scenario is an example of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

True

Describe at least 3 different studies on how we form impressions of others. If you had to write just 1-2 sentences summarizing as much as possible of our knowledge about first impressions (e.g., how they are formed, what they are based on, how long they last, etc.), what would you say?

• Asch study - When given positive adjectives and then negative adjectives about a person first, we are more likely to think they are a great person. When given negative adjectives and then positive adjectives about a person first, we are more likely to think this person isn't great. • Luchins study - Luchins did the same study as Asch, but told them not to form an impression until hearing all the adjectives. People weighed all the adjectives equally, rather than doing the primacy effect • Ambady and Rosenthal study - Asked student to evaluate teachers whether you had a full class with them or only had seen a few seconds of a class lecture of them. There was a strong positive correlation between brief impressions and teacher's end of the course evaluation • Todorov study - People were presented a second of a picture of politicians. They automatically made trait inferences of political candidates that accurately predicted which candidate won their election

Describe in detail Schachter and Singer's (1962) study on the self-perception of emotion.

• Participants were given an injection and told that it was a "vitamin supplement" • It was actually epinephrine (a.k.a., adrenaline) • Participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions: 1. Placebo—no epinephrine and therefore no arousal 2. Informed—get the epinephrine and informed about the side-effects 3. Uninformed—get the epinephrine and are not informed about the side-effects. 4. Misinformed- given the wrong information about the type of side-effects the epinephrine will do • Subjects put into a room to fill out a personal survey. • Confederate of the experimenter poses as another subject behaves in either a happy or angry fashion. • When subjects were misinformed or uninformed about the side effects of the shot, they began to feel like the confederate did. • Self-perception of one's own emotional state.

How did Aronson and his colleagues induce hypocrisy, and what was the effect of hypocrisy that they were measuring? Under what circumstances did hypocrisy have an effect and under what circumstances did it not have an effect?

• They induced college students to write a speech describing the dangers of AIDS and advocating the use of condoms every time a person has sex. • ½ of students were asked to read their speech for a videotape to be shown to high school students, ½ just wrote the speech. • In addition, ½ of each group was asked to think of times in which they failed to use a condom in their sexual encounters, ½ were not asked to reflect on their failures to use a condom. • Aronson and colleagues argued the group asked to make a videotaped speech to the high school students and who was made aware of their own hypocrisy would experience greater dissonance. • As a result, when each group was later given a chance to buy condoms for a greatly reduced price, a far greater percentage in this "high dissonance" condition (83%) bought condoms as compared to the other groups of subjects. • hypocrisy had more of an effect when they composed arguments and made a videotape And had to think of their times the failed to follow their own advice.

List and describe the mind's two thinking systems (according to your textbook) and what theory of attribution is most compatible with this description of how our minds work?

• automatic processing - refers to the unconscious (implicit) and involuntary operations that guide most of our behavior -well-learned associations or routines that our mental systems perform effortlessly, without awareness • controlled processing - the conscious (explicit) effort we make in dealing with novel problems - it's slower and sequential - controlled processing cannot do tow things at once • the Two-Step Process of Attribution is most compatible with this description of how our minds work -occurs when people analyze another person's behavior by 1. first making an automatic internal attribution 2. thinking about possible situational reasons for the behavior, after which one may adjust original internal attribution

Describe the following 3 concepts: belief perseverance, confirmation bias, and the self-fulfilling prophecy. How are each of these involved in the impression formation process?

• belief perseverance - one's belief or impression persists despite learning that the information upon which it was based is false • confirmation bias - the tendency to seek, interpret, and create information that verifies one's existing beliefs • self-fulfilling prophecy - the process by which one's expectations about a person eventually lead that person to behave in ways that confirm those expectations

What are the three types of information we use to explain other people's behavior, according to Kelley's Covariation Model of attribution? What is the major criticism of this model?

• consensus information -the information regarding how other people besides the actor treat the target • distinctiveness information -the information about how the actor treats other people besides the target • consistency information - the information about how the actor treats the target across time and different situations •• the covariation model assumes that people make causal attributions in a rational, logical fashion; THIS IS NOT TRUE

Describe the difference between the "augmenting principle" and the "discounting principle."

• discounting principle - the role of a given cause in producing a given effect is discounted (or diminished) if the plausible facilitating causes are also present • augmentation principle - the role of given cause in producing a given effect is augmented (or increased) if other inhibitory factors are also present

List the three main forms of nonverbal behavior, and give examples of each

• facial cues -facial expressions of emotion -EX: smiling, making an angry face • kinesic cues - also known as "body language" -EX: posture, body movement •paralinguistic cues - this refers to vocal cues, i.e., how one speaks rather than the content of what one is saying -EX: rate of speech, pitch, volume

What are heuristics? Under what circumstances are we likely to rely on them when making social judgments? Describe at least two heuristics and how they influence our thinking in daily life. Give examples of research demonstrating these effects.

• heuristics are mental operations that provide rules rules of thumb that guide problem solving and making judgments • we use heuristics when we: -don't have time to think carefully about an issue -are so overloaded with information that it becomes impossible to process the information fully -the issues at stake are not very important to us -lack the required knowledge for making a reasoned decision -let our emotions and wishful thinking get in the way • representativeness heuristic- when we focus on surface similarities to make inferences • availability heuristic- the tendency to predict the likelihood of an event, or judge how risky it is, based on how easy it is to bring specific examples to mind • affect heuristic- our feelings are valuable sources of information so when we tap into our feelings to shape our evaluations of people or ideas we are using an affect heuristic •

What is the difference between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation? Give an example of something you are intrinsically motivated to do and something you are extrinsically motivated to do. How are these two types of motivation related to the overjustification effect? How do these motivations parallel findings about the use of mild or severe punishment?

• intrinsic motivation - desire to engage in an activity because you enjoy it or find it interesting, not because of external rewards or pressures EX: reading a book for fun • extrinsic motivation - desire to engage in an activity because of external rewards or pressures, not because we enjoy thetas or find it interesting EX: being required to read a book to get a good grade in a class •over justification effect -people come to view their behavior as motivated by extrinsic reasons rather than intrinsic ones, diminishing their intrinsic motivation

Describe the difference between "self-enhancement" and "self-verification." Describe how these two motives can conflict and describe research illustrating how we resolve a clash between these two motives. Describe how one of these concepts might explain why an abused spouse stays in a relationship with an abusive partner.

• self-enhancement - the need to hold a positive view of the self and to protect oneself from negative feedback - we are often motivated t attain and maintain high self-esteem -we have developed ways of protecting our self-esteem • self-verification - also called self-consistency -the need to maintain a stable self conception - a theory that suggests that people have a need to seek confirmation of their self-concept, whether or not that self-concept is positive or negative

What is meant by "the psychology of inevitability"? How can it be explained by cognitive dissonance theory? Illustrate your answer with an example from real life and describe at least one piece of research that demonstrates this phenomenon.

• self-justifying responses to dangerous and inevitable events can be comforting in the short run • but when they keep us from taking steps to enhance our safety such responses can, in the long run, prove deadly -can relate to the self-fulfilling prophecy

Define the "bias blind spot," and describe an example of it.

• the belief that we are more objective and less biased than most other people EX: When I am late to a meeting, I make an excuse saying "it was traffic", but when someone else is late we are upset and don't understand why they would be late

Describe the fundamental attribution error and at least one study that illustrates it.

• the tendency to overestimate the extent to which a person's behavior is due to internal, dispositional factors and to underestimate the role of situational factors • Jones and Harris study about people having to write either a pro-castro or anti-castro essay • those that read the essay thought that what the writers wrote was what they actually believe, even though they were forced to do it

Describe two self-biases, providing research evidence that demonstrates their effects. Of what value are such biases?

• unrealistic optimism -also called optimistic bias -the tendency for most people to consider their risks to be less than that of their peers •self-centered bias -tendency to take more than one's share of responsibility for a jointly produced outcome • false-consensus effect -the tendency to overestimate the incidence or commonality of one's opinions, undesirable traits of unsuccessful behaviors •false-uniqueness effect -the tendency to underestimate the commonality of one's desirable traits or successful behaviors

What is "loss aversion?" Describe how you might use this phenomenon when trying to persuade people to get their flu shots.

• when given a choice, people are more likely to try to avoid loss than to try to achieve gains EX: if you don't get the flu shot you will be losing money because you will get the flu and not be able to go to work.

List and briefly describe the 5 key social motives that Aronson discussed in Ch. 2.

•belonging - the most important of all the central social motives - our desire for stable, meaningful, connections with others • understanding others and predicting accurately - we want to be able to predict what will happen and make sense of the things that do happen • control -the feeling that we have the autonomy and competence to direct our own actions and make things happen • need to matter - people want their lives to matter -- whether it's to one person, to their families, or to the world • trust - as social animals, we cannot survive without trusting other people

Describe the essential difference between self-perception theory and cognitive dissonance theory.

•self-perception theory - the idea that when our attitudes and feelings are uncertain or ambiguous, we infer these states by observing our behavior and the situation in which it occurs •cognitive dissonance theory -a drive or feeling of discomfort, originally defined as being caused by holding or more inconsistent cognitions, subsequently extended to include performing an action that is discrepant from one's attitudes, beliefs and opinions