14

Question 1

Social psychology

Answer 1

scientific study of how people’s
thoughts, feelings, and actions are affected by others.

They examine how the nature of situations in which we find ourselves
influences our behaviour in important ways.

Question 2

Persuasion

Answer 2

is the process of changing attitudes.

Question 3

Attitudes

Answer 3

is the valuations of a particular person, behaviour, belief, or concept.

Question 4

The ease with which attitudes can be
changed depends on 3 factors:

Answer 4

1. Message source
2. Characteristics of the message
3. Characteristics of the target

Question 5

Characteristics of the message:

Answer 5

What the message is like.

Generally, two-sided messages (which include both the communicator’s position and the one they are arguing against) are more effective than one-sided messages, assuming the arguments for the other side can be effectively refuted and the audience is knowledgeable about the topic.

Question 5

Message source

Answer 5

The characteristics of a person who delivers a persuasive message, known as attitude communicator.

Communicators who are physically and socially attractive—think athletes
and celebrities—produce greater attitude change than those who are less attractive.

Question 6

Characteristics of the target:

Answer 6

Once a communicator has delivered a message, characteristics of the target of the message may determine
whether the message will be accepted.

Intelligent people are more resistant to persuasion than are those who are less intelligent.

magnitude of the differences in resistance to persuasion between men and women is not large

Question 7

Link Between Attitudes and Behaviour

Answer 7

Attitudes influence our behaviour, but our behaviour also influences our
attitudes.

Question 8

Cognitive dissonance

Answer 8

is the conflict that occurs when a person holds two contradictory attitudes or thoughts (referred to as
cognitions).

When an individual experiences cognitive dissonance, they often adjust their attitude rather than their behaviour.

Question 9

How does one reduce the arising dissonance?

Answer 9

The theory predicts that participants will reduce dissonance by adopting more positive attitudes toward the task.

Question 10

People will be motivated to reduce their dissonance by one of the following methods

Answer 10

1. Modifying one or both cognitions
2. Changing the perceived importance of one cognition
3. Adding the additional cognitions
4. Denying that the two cognitions are related to each other

Question 11

Social cognition

Answer 11

is the cognitive processes by which people understand and make sense of others and themselves.

Question 12

schemas

Answer 12

Social psychologists have learned that individuals have highly developed schemas, sets of cognitions about people and social
experiences.

Ex. a schema for “mother” includes the characteristics of warmth, nurturance, and caring.

Question 13

Schemas allow us to organize

Answer 13

the way in which we recall, recognize, and categorize information about others, as well as make predictions of what others are like on the basis of relatively little information, since we tend to fit people into schemas even
when there is not much concrete evidence to go on.

Question 14

Ex. Our schema for “teacher,”

Answer 14

generally consists of several characteristics: knowledge of the
subject matter he or she is teaching, a desire to impart that knowledge, and an awareness of the student’s need to understand what is being said.

Question 15

Regardless of their accuracy, schemas

Answer 15

are important because they organize the way in which we recall, recognize, and categorize information about others.

Moreover, they allow us to make predictions of what others are like on the basis of relatively little information, since we tend to fit people into schemas even when there is not much concrete evidence to go on.

Question 16

Impression formation

Answer 16

is the process by which an individual organizes information about another person to form an overall impression of that person.

Question 17

Central traits

Answer 17

are major traits utilized to form an overall impression of others, the presence of which alters the meaning of other traits.

Ex. consider your impression of someone described as “cold” and industrious vs. “warm” and Industrious.

Question 18

We make impressions remarkably quickly!

Answer 18

Using what have been called “thin slices of behaviour,” we are able to make judgments of people in mere seconds that are accurate and that match those of people who make judgments based on longer snippets of behaviour.

Question 19

Attribution theory

Answer 19

is the theory of personality that seeks to explain how we decide, based on samples of an individual’s behaviour, what the specific causes of that person’s behaviour are.

Question 20

In seeking an explanation for behavior, one central question we
must answer is

Attribution Processes:
Understanding the Causes of Behaviour

Answer 20

whether the cause is situational or
dispositional.

Question 21

Situational causes

Answer 21

are perceived causes of behaviour that are based on environmental factors.

Question 22

Dispositional causes

Answer 22

are perceived causes of behaviour that are based on a person’s internal traits or personality characteristics.

Question 23

Halo effect

Answer 23

is the phenomenon in which an initial understanding that a person has positive traits is used to infer other uniformly positive characteristics.

Ex. Harry is intelligent, kind, and loving. Is he also conscientious? If you were to guess, your most likely
response probably would be yes.

The opposite would also hold true (Ex. Learning that Harry was unsociable and argumentative would
probably lead you to assume that he was lazy as well).

However, because few people have either uniformly positive or uniformly negative traits, the halo effect
leads to misperceptions of others.

Question 24

Self serving bias

Answer 24

is the tendency to attribute one’s successes to personal, dispositional factors and one’s failures to environmental, situational factors. Ex. If you get an A on a test, you may think it’s due to your hard work, but if you get a poor grade, it’s due to the professor’s inadequacies.

Question 25

Assumed-similarity bias

Answer 25

is the tendency to think of people as being similar to oneself, even when meeting them for the first time. Given the range of people in the world, this assumption often reduces the accuracy of our judgments (It is why we are shocked when people behave in ways that are different from us). Ex. An honest person is particularly shocked to be lied to; a trusting person is particularly shocked by a betrayal.

Question 26

Fundamental attribution error

Answer 26

is the is the tendency to over-attribute others’ behaviour to dispositional causes and the corresponding failure to recognize the importance of situational causes. Ex. We are more likely to jump to the conclusion that someone who is late to class is disorganized or unmotivated (a dispositional cause) rather than to assume that the lateness is due to situational factors, such as the bus running behind schedule. These conclusions are not necessarily wrong, but just indicate an over-reliance on dispositional cues when evaluating others’ behaviour (As such, some psychologists prefer the term correspondence bias over fundamental attribution error, since our attributions may, at times at least, be correct).

Question 27

Social influence

Answer 27

is the process by which the actions of an individual or group affect the behaviour of others. Pressures to conform can be painfully strong and can bring about changes in behaviour that otherwise never would have occurred.

Question 28

Conformity

Answer 28

is a change in behaviour or attitudes brought about by a desire to follow the beliefs or standards of other people. Even very subtle social pressures can result in conformity

Question 29

The characteristics of the group Conformity

Answer 29

The more attractive a group appears to its members, the greater is its ability to produce conformity.

Question 29

Conformity Conclusions

Answer 29

1. The characteristics of the group 2. The person’s relative status (social rank): 3. The situation in which the individual is responding: 4. Unanimity of the group:

Question 30

The person’s relative status (social rank): Conformity

Answer 30

the lower a person’s status in the group, the greater the power of the group over that person’s behaviour.

Question 30

The situation in which the individual is responding Conformity

Answer 30

Conformity is considerably higher when people must respond publicly than it is when they can do so privately.

Question 31

Unanimity of the group Conformity

Answer 31

Groups that unanimously support a position show the most pronounced conformity pressures.

Question 32

Yet, having just one person present who shares the minority point of view (a social supporter)

Answer 32

is sufficient to dramatically reduce conformity pressures.

Question 33

Social supporter

Answer 33

A group member whose dissenting views make nonconformity to the group easier.

Question 34

Groupthink

Answer 34

is a type of thinking in which group members share such a strong motivation to achieve consensus that they lose the ability to critically evaluate alternative points of view. It is most likely to occur when a popular or powerful leader is surrounded by people of lower status. Moreover, groupthink often occurs in groups that are particularly cohesive.

Question 35

Groupthink almost always produces

Answer 35

negative consequences

Question 36

Compliance

Answer 36

is behaviour that occurs in response to direct social pressure.

Question 37

Techniques that are likely to lead to compliance are often used in sales and marketing include:

Answer 37

Foot-in-the-door technique * Door-in-the-face technique * That’s-not-all technique * Not-so-free sample

Question 38

Foot-in-the-door technique:

Answer 38

Small request followed by a larger request.

Question 39

Door-in-the-face technique:

Answer 39

Large request followed by a smaller request. If you refuse the large request, you are likely to be compliant with the smaller request, which seems reasonable in comparison.

Question 40

That’s-not-all technique

Answer 40

Offering a deal at an inflated price. You are more likely to comply if you feel you are getting a special deal.

Question 41

Not-so-free sample:

Answer 41

When someone gives you something, you feel social pressure to reciprocate.

Question 42

The norm of reciprocity

Answer 42

is the well-accepted societal standard dictating that we should treat other people as they treat us (i.e., the need for reciprocation—in the form of a purchase).

Question 43

Obedience

Answer 43

is a change in behaviour due to the commands of others.

Question 44

Stanley Milgram

Answer 44

conducted a classic study on obedience. The experimenter’s orders were accepted, then, because the participants thought that they personally could not be held accountable for their actions—they could always blame the experimenter.

Question 45

Philip Zimbardo

Answer 45

wondered whether direct orders were even necessary, or whether indirect pressure, derived from social roles and the power of the situation, would be enough to make people act in ways that most would consider immoral. Stanford Prison Experiment

Question 46

Lucifer Effect

Answer 46

(the tendency for ordinarily good people to do extraordinarily bad things). He argued that we all have the capacity for both good and evil within us, and the behaviour we engage in will depend on the situation we find ourselves in (and on whether or not we choose to act).