Applied Social Psychology 2 Flashcards
Social influence
We are all strongly influenced by those around us.
- potential basis for behaviour change.
Nudge
Examples of attempts to utilise social psychology to bring about behaviour change include ‘nudge’ approach- aims to bring about behaviour change by making changes to environment of individual.
Behavioural insight team attempted to apply nudge approach by using social norms:
- telling people the majority of others have already paid their taxes to address late payments.
- most effective way of encouraging organ donation was prompting thoughts about reciprocity.
Social norms
Research suggests however that our perceptions of the behaviours of other people are often inaccurate:
- substance use; sexual health; illegal downloading; recycling; bullying.
These misperceptions can be due to a number of factors such as attribution errors.
Social norms: alcohol
Moreno et al 2012: people will assume others are heavier consumers of alcohol if that person has an alcohol reference on their facebook page.
Nicholls 2012: alcohol companies are actively using social media and social psychological principles to bring about behaviour change (getting you to buy their products).
Efficacy & challenges
Some criticisms of the social norms approach to reducing alcohol behaviour (eg. Foxcroft et al, 2015):
- low number of randomised control trials.
- variability of methodological rigour.
- lack of clarity on how the social norms campaign was implemented.
However findings are consistent- young adults overestimate alcohol use of their peers.
Environmental behaviour
Behaviour economics = study of how people make financial decisions.
Research also focusses on barriers that might prevent behaviour change from occurring:
- status quo bias identified by Thaler (1991), which people tend to chose option which is seen as the default, rather than going with a ‘new’ option.
- eg. if recycling is not seen as the norm, people are less likely to do it.
Cialdini 2006: observed signs asking people not to take wood from Arizona National Park increased thefts.
Dangers of mentioning norms: environmental behaviour
Boomerang effect = reverse consequences due to an attempt of persuasion.
eg. if someone was told they recycle more than their neighbours, the danger may be they reduce their level because they feel they are doing more than enough.
Schultz et al 2007- attempted to counter this effect by providing indicators of social approval (those who recycle more are praised).
- a danger of expressing negative social approval may resent this and disengage with the group.
Cooperation: environmental behaviour
Cooperation can also prompt behaviour change.
If people identify with a group they’re more likely to act in ways that benefit the group.
- for example individuals who strongly identify with their community are more likely to conserve water during a shortage (Van Vugt 2001).
Project CHARM
Also possible to use competition to prompt behaviour change.
- In the bActive study, people appeared to be actively competing with others to get the highest number of steps.
However competition could be counterproductive: could create divisions between groups or create negative attitudes.
- may decrease self-esteem and confidence.
Social marketing
Similar to commercial marketing but used to bring out change for social good.
Could be argued that the term is quite poorly defined (often confused with social psychology).
- social marketing is the vessel you use to deliver the behaviour change content, which may be based on social psychology principles.
Reactance
Refers to the fact that people do not like to be told what to do (Brehm & Brehm).
Especially when we feel our personal freedom is challenged.
Strong attempts to make people conform may push them to do the opposite.
Imhoff & Erb 2009- argued we are driven to assert out own uniqueness.
