ECC PSY 100 Chapter 12 Social Psychology.pptx

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Social Psychology

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Social Psychology

• _{Social Psychology – study of how a person’s} thoughts, feelings, and behavior are

influenced by others and the environment. • _{Sense of Self – Your sense of who you are in}

relation to others.

– _{Unique sense of identity, influenced by social,}

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Person Perception

• _{Person Perception – Mental processes we use} to make judgments or drawn conclusions

about characteristics or motives of others.

– _{Done rapidly, almost instantly. Judge factors such}

as attractiveness, likeability, competence, trustworthiness, etc…

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Person Perception

• _{Principle 1: Your reactions to others are}

determined by your perceptions of them, not who they really are.

• _{Principle 2: Your self-perception also}

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Person Persuasion

• _{Principle 3: Your goals in a particular situation} determine the amount and kinds of

information you collect about others.

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Attribution

• _{Attribution – Inferring the causes of people’s} behavior, including our own.

– _{Helpful in coming to conclusions and guiding your}

own behavior.

• _{Fundamental Attribution Error – Tendency to} attribute the behaviors of others to internal or personal characteristics, while ignoring the

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Attribution

• _{Hindsight Bias – Tendency to overestimate}

one’s ability to have foreseen or predicted the outcome of an event.

– _{“I could have told you that would happen” or “I}

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Attribution

• _{Just-World Hypothesis – Assumption that the} world is fair and that therefore people get

what they deserve and deserve what they get.

• _{Self-Serving Bias – Tendency to attribute}

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Attitudes

• _{Attitude – Learned tendency to evaluate an object, person,}

or issue, in a particular way.

– _{Can be}_{positive, negative, or ambivalent} – _{Contains three components:}

• _Cognitive_{– Beliefs, thoughts, ideas about the}_{attitude object} • Behavioral – Predisposition to act in a particular way

• _Emotional_{– Feelings and emotions about the}_{attitude object}

• _{Intuitively, people assume that we act in accordance}

without attitudes. However, this is not always the case.

– _{I.e. you may generally have a negative attitude towards cheating}

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Attitudes

• _{When are people more likely to behave in}

accordance with our attitudes:

– _{When there is a favorable outcome for doing so.} – _{When your attitudes are extreme or frequently}

expressed.

– _{When your attitudes have been formed through direct}

experience.

– _{When you are very knowledgeable about the subject.} – _{When you have a vested interest in the subject and}

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Cognitive Dissonance

• _{Developed by Philip Zimbardo (1965).}

• _{Cognitive Dissonance – An unpleasant state of} psychological tension or anxiety (dissonance) that occurs when two thoughts or perceptions (cognitions) are inconsistent.

– _{Generally this tension is so unpleasant that we are}

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Cognitive Dissonance

• _{Cognitive Dissonance commonly occurs in} situations where your behavior and your attitudes are in conflict.

– _{In this situation you have two opposing cognitions:} • _{Your original attitude}_versus_{the realization that your}

behavior contradicts that attitude.

– Since we can’t go back in time and change our behaviors, what can we change to reduce the dissonance?

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Cognitive Dissonance

• _Example:

– _{Researcher has participants perform menial tasks (sorting}

papers by alphabetical order) for 3 hours.

– _{After the experiment the participants are paid various amounts}

of money to lie to the next participant in the study.

• _{½ participants get $50}

• _{½ participants get 50 cents.}

– _{The researcher asks them to lie about their attitudes about the}

experiment to the next participant waiting in the lobby and tell them they enjoyed the experiment.

– _{After lying, how do you think the two groups ($50 vs 50 cents)}

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Cognitive Dissonance

• _Result:

– _{After lying participants who were paid $50}

maintain a negative attitude toward the study but say they lied because of the money

– _{Participants who were paid 50 cents often report a}

similar attitude as the one they lied to the next participant with – a generally positive attitude towards the experiment

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Implicit and Explicit Attitudes

• _{Explicit Attitudes – Conscious preferences and biases towards}

attitude objects that is often expressed outwards.

– _{Saying “I don’t like to drink milk because it is weird to drink milk from}

another animal” is an explicit attitude. You are aware of the attitude, can express it, and understand why the attitude exists.

• _{Implicit Attitudes – Preferences and biases toward attitude}

objects that are automatic, spontaneous, unintentional, and generally unconscious.

• _{Both Implicit and Explicit attitudes play a significant role in}

prejudice.

– A negative attitude toward people belonging to a specific social group.

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Overcoming Prejudice

• _{The Robbers Cave Experiment:} – _{Headed by Mazuafer Sherif (1961)}

– _{Randomly assigned boys at a summer camp into two}

groups.

– _{The two groups arrived in separate busses and lived in}

separate parts of the camp.

• _{Separated into the “Eagles” and the “Rattlers”.}

– _{After a week of separation between the groups, the}

researchers arranged for them to meet in a series of competitive games.

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Overcoming Prejudice

• _{The two groups immediately became rivals as} a result of competition (and competition for resources/rewards).

– _{Competition created an extremely intense rivalry:} • _{Eagles burned the Rattlers’ flag, Rattlers trashed Eagles’}

cabin, etc…

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Overcoming Prejudice

• _{The researchers tried to bring them together} by having them engage under peaceful

circumstances.

– _{Watching a movie together, eating in the same}

dining hall, etc…

– _{DID NOT WORK – actually made it easier for the}

two groups two fight with each other (i.e. massive food fights during dinner).

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Overcoming Prejudice

• _{Finally, the researchers created a series of}

situation in which the two groups needed to cooperate to achieve a common goal.

– _{I.e. the researchers sabotaged the water supply and}

the two groups had to work together to fix it.

• _Through_{joint efforts}_{, rivalry diminished and the}

groups became good friends.

• _{Working together to achieve a common goal}

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Conformity

• _{Conformity – Adjusting your opinions, judgment,}

or behavior so that it matches other people, or the norms of a social group or situation.

– _{Conformity is}_{extremely powerful}_{in manipulating}

attitudes, perception, etc…

• _{Everyone conforms to some degree, it is}

inescapable.

– _However,_{how far}_{will we conform just to be in sync}

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Conformity

• _{Solomon Asch wanted to answer this question by}

asking his own: Would people still conform to the group if the group opinion was clearly wrong?

• _{76% of individuals conformed with group judgment}

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Conformity

• _{Why did people conform in such a way?}

– _{Two likely factors:}

• _{Normative Social Influence – Behavior that is motivated}

by the desire to gain social acceptance and approval.

– Leads to directly conforming to achieve acceptance into the group.

• _{Informational Social Influence – Behavior that is}

motivated by the desire to be correct.

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Obedience

• _{Stanley Milgram developed one of the most}

influential studies in psychology to understand the concept of obedience.

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Obedience

• _{Milgram’s Study:}https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6GxIuljT3w

• _{Asked psychiatrists, college students,}

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Obedience

• _{Without forcefully keeping the “teacher” there, and}

by only delivering statements that expect obedience as well as looking like an “authority” figure, 65% of “teachers” administered the maximum shock value.

• _{For comparison: When the “teacher” is required to}

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Obedience

• _{When teachers were allowed to act as their} own authority and freely choose the shock level, 95% of them did not go above 150v.

– _{Indicates they are responding to the orders from}

an authority figure.

• _{“Teachers” were more likely to defy the}

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Helping Behavior

• _{Kitty Genovese}

– _{Assaulted outside of her apartment building.}

– _{Was stabbed by the assailant before he walked off}

– _{Assailant returns and stabs Kitty a second time before driving} away.

– _{Assailant returns again and stabs her to death at foot of her} steps outside her apartment building.

– _{An estimated 38 people witnessed the murder, spanning 3} different attacks over 30 minutes without calling the police or attempting to help her individually.

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Helping Behavior

• _{Why did nobody attempt to help?}

– _{Bystander Effect – The greater the number of people}

present, the less likely each individual is to help someone in distress. Often due to a diffusion of

responsibility, but can occur for other reasons as well (i.e. “If nobody else is helping then maybe it isn’t

actually an emergency).

– _{Diffusion of Responsibility – The presence of other}

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Helping Behaviors

• _{Factors that increase the likelihood of} bystanders helping:

– _{“Feel good, do good” effect.} – _{Feeling guilty}

– _{Seeing others who are willing to help}

– _{Perceiving the other person as deserving help} – _{Knowing how to help}

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Helping Behaviors

• _{Factors that decrease the likelihood of} bystanders helping:

– _{The presence of other people} – _{Diffusion of responsibility}

– _{Being in a big city or very small town} – _{Vague or ambiguous situations}

– _{When the personal costs for helping outweigh the}

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Influence of Groups on Individual Behavior

• _{Social Loafing – People occasionally expend} less effort on a task when it is a group effort.

– _{The grater number of people involved in a}

collective effort, the lower each individual’s input.

– _{How to decrease social loafing:} • _{Group with people you know.}

• _{Make the social loafer a “highly valued” member of the}

group.

• _{Make the task that someone is loafing on “meaningful”}

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Influence of Groups on Individual Behavior

• _{Social Facilitation - Tendency for the presence} of other people to enhance individual

performance.

– _{When other people are around, we generally}

perform tasks better.

– _{For example: When a group watches and applauds}

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Influence of Groups on Individual Behavior

• _{Deindividuation – Reduction of self-awareness}

and inhibitions that can happen when a person is part of a group whose members feel

anonymous.

– _{Anonymity in groups can lead individuals to reduce}

inhibitions and lead to engaging in the “group’s” behaviors, rather than our own.

• _{For example: Deindividuation is common in riots where} people think they are anonymous, thus joining the

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