CH 8-10: Altruism, Aggression, Attraction and Intimacy

Question 1

Altruism v Geniuine Altruism

Answer 1

Altruism- a motivational state with the goal of increasing another’s welfare

• Helping someone with a cost to yourself; the greater the cost, the greater the altruistic act
• Altruism can be thought of helping someone even when there is a benefit to oneself (just any prosocial behaviour)

Genuine altruism- increasing another’s welfare when there is zero benefit to the self –> debate of whether or not it actually exists

• Genuine altruism depends on the intentions of the actor (but you can never really know bc social desirability)

Question 2

All Theories of Altruism (TB and LEC)

Answer 2

• Social Exchange Theory (internal (includes mood) and external rewards)
• Social Norms (reciprocity norm, social responsibility norm)
• Kin selection (LEC)
• Signalling (LEC)
• Reciprocity (LEC)
• Group Selection
• Mood –> Social exchange theory (LEC)

Question 3

Self-Focused Theories of altruism (LEC) (4)

Answer 3

• kin selection
• reciprocity
• signalling
• mood

Question 4

Social Exchange Theory of Altruism:

Answer 4

• The theory that human interactions are transactions that aim to maximize one’s rewards and minimize one’s costs; we don’t consciously monitor costs and rewards, but such considerations can predict out behaviour
• *Rewards:**
• Rewards that motivate helping may be external (boost image, or hoping to receive appreciation) or internal (makes us feel good about ourselves)
• Since ‘we give what we get’ we are more eager to help someone attractive to us, someone whose approval we desire
• Public generosity boosts one’s status, while selfish behaviour can lead to punishment

Question 5

Social Exchange Theory of Altruism: Internal Rewards

Answer 5

• we are most aroused in response to others distress which motivates us to help the person
• *Guilt (feel-bad-do-good):**
• Our eagerness to do good after doing bad reflects (expunge guilt) both our need to reduce private guilt and restore our shaken self-image and our desire to reclaim a positive public image
• We are more likely to redeem ourselves with helpful behaviour when other people know about our misdeeds
• By motivating people to confess, apologize, help, and avoid repeated harm, it boosts sensitivity and sustains close relationships
• Inner rewards of prosocial behaviours can offset other negative moods as well
• exceptions to this include anger, and states that results in preoccupation like depression and grief
• *Mood (feel-good-do-good)**
• helpful when both sad and happy bc helping softens a bad mood and sustains a good mood
• positive mood = positive thoughts and self-esteem = positive behaviour
• Helping feels good and not helping feels bad –> feeling of shame when you could’ve easily helped
• Warm glow- helping makes you feel good, moral high ground
• Negative state relief- if you feel bad, you want to feel good, so you relieve bad feelings by helping
• Positive state maintenance- if you feel good, you want to maintain it, so you help

Question 6

Social Norms of Altruism (2)

Answer 6

• often we help others not bc its in our self-interest but bc its something we ought to do
• there are two norms that motivate prosocial behaviours: reciprocity norm and social-responsibility norm

Question 7

Social Norms: The Reciprocity Norm

Answer 7

• An expectation that people will help, not harm those who have helped them
• Reciprocity within social networks helps define the social capital- supportive connections, information flow, trust, and cooperative actions- that keeps a community healthy
• The norm operates most effectively as people respond publicly to the deeds earlier done to them –> fleeting one-shot encounters produce greater selfishness than sustained relationships
• When people can’t reciprocate, they may feel threatened and demeaned by accepting aid, so proud, high self-esteem-people are often reluctant to seek help –> receiving unsolicited help can take one’s self-esteem down a notch
• Asians, for whom social ties and the reciprocity norm are stronger than for NA, are more likely to refuse a gift from a casual acquaintance to avoid the felt need to reciprocate

Question 8

Social Norms: The Social-Responsibility Norm

Answer 8

• The belief that people should help those who need help, without regard to future exchanges; people will help those dependent on them
• This is more obvious in collectivist cultures, but in Western cultures, they often still help needy people –> however, they usually apply this norm selectively to those whose needs appear not to be due to their own negligence (so not to homeless ppl)
• The norm seems to be: give people what they deserve; if they seem to have created their own problems, then the norm suggests that they don’t deserve help
• Responses are closely tied to attributions; if we attribute the need to an uncontrollable predicament, we help, but if we attribute the need to the person’s choices = no help
• *Gender and receiving help:**
• Women if perceived as less competent and more dependent will receive more help than men (in accordance with the social-responsibility norm)
• Males might also be motivated by something other than altruism; mating motives increase men’s spending on conspicuous luxuries, displays of heroism, and men more frequently help attractive than unattractive women
• Women are also more likely to seek help; they are twice as likely to seek medical and psychiatric help and more often welcome help from friends

Question 9

Evolutionary Psychology Theories of Altruism (4)

Answer 9

• Evolutionary psychology contends that the essence of life is gene survival; our genes drive us in ways that have maximized their change of survival
• Genes that predispose individuals to self-sacrifice in the interests of strangers’ welfare would not survive in the evolutionary competition
• kin selection
• signalling
• reciprocity
• group selection

Question 10

Evolutionary Psychology: Kin Selection

Answer 10

• Evolution has selected altruism towards one’s close relatives to enhance the survival of mutually shared genes
• We show favouritism towards those who share are genes and are more likely to help those who are more related to us
• Compared with neglectful parents, parents who put their children’s welfare ahead of their own are more likely to pass on their genes (increases their future reprodutive success)
• Likelihood of helping goes down as relatedness goes down, and the difference becomes even more pronounced in life-or-death situations
• Parents more devoted to children than vice versa bc children have less at stake in the survival of their parent’s genes
• We feel more empathy for a distressed or tortured person in our in-group and even schadenfreude (secret pleasure at their misfortune) for rivals or out-group members

Question 11

Evolutionary Psychology: Signalling

Answer 11

• Public behaviours are signals to others of our reproductive and physical fitness, resources, and status
• These are hard to display, so our public behaviours are ways to “show off” taboo things (like being wealthy)
• Signals are often costly which provides further evidence of fitness –> the costlier the signal, the stronger the evidence of fitness/resources (donating $5 v $5 mill)
• Pronking in Springbok is a costly signal to show off strength and fitness –> only the young and fit males do it
• Many signals are costly (like peacock tail, or risk-taking behaviours) but show if you can survive w those costs, you are in good fitness
• Donating large sums of money or wearing name brand clothing is a costly signal, but it has a reputational benefit
• *Signalling and doorholding (Hauser et al., 2014)**
• Wanted to see if people help others who signal they are higher in emotional resources (good mood is a proxy of how things are going for you and what your resources are)
• Confederates displayed emotional signal and followed people into a building
• IV: emotional signal (happy, sad, neutral –> based on w pretend phone call)
• DV: the extent to which the P held the door open for the confederate
• The result was that people helped more when a good mood was signalled

Question 12

Evolutionary Psychology: Reciprocity

Answer 12

• Reciprocity works best in small, isolated groups, groups in which one will often see the people for whom one does favours
• Reciprocity and small favours are more likely to occur in small town or rural environments compared to big cities
• Direct reciprocity: you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours (quid pro quo)
• Indirect reciprocity: I’ll scratch your back, you scratch someone’s, and someone will scratch mine (what goes around comes around) –> focused on helping someone to improve your reputation (if you are known to be helpful ppl will be more likely to help you later on)
• *Prisoner’s Dilemma:**
• The basic/rational decision is to rat the other person out (to defect), never cooperate/help out
• When money is on the line however (not jail), most people cooperate = because of the norm of reciprocity (people act as if there will be an opportunity for reciprocity) –> as if experimenter will reward participants or others will see altruistic behaviour
• When participants play repeatedly, reciprocity rules –> doesn’t really go along w altruism but is consistent with reciprocity
• When partners start cooperating, they continue, once someone defects, the relationship is broken
• Keeping your reputation is high will increase your chances of survival (works to our benefit)
• no matter what the other prisoner decides, each is better off confessing than being convicted individually
• If also the other confesses, the sentence is moderate rather than severe
• On any given decision, a person is better off defecting (bc such behaviour exploits the other’s cooperation or protects against the other’s exploitation
• both parties realize they could mutually benefit, but unable to communicate and mistrusting they end up no cooperating
• Punishing another’s lack of cooperation might seem like a smart strategy, but can be counterproductive as it typically triggers retaliation, which means that those who punish tend to escalate conflict, worsening their outcomes, while ncie guys finish first
• What punishers see as a defensive reaction, recipients see as an aggressive escalation, and they might hit harder when hitting back (tit-for-tat)

Question 13

Evolutionary Psychology: Group Selection

Answer 13

• Why do we help strangers? When groups are in competition, groups of mutually supportive altruists outlast groups of non-altruists (back-scratching groups survive)
• This is most evident in social insects that function like cells in a body, such as bees and ants
• Humans exhibit in-group loyalty by sometimes sacrificing to support “us” against “them” –> natural selection is multi-level, and operates at both individual and group levels
• Effects can be mitigated: contact between different racial groups reduces expressions of racism, and may increase helping

Question 14

Overview of Theories of Altruism

Answer 14

• Each of the three theories proposes two types of prosocial behaviour: a tit-for-tat reciprocal exchange, and a more conditional helpfulness
• Each theory appeals to logic, yet each is vulnerable to charges of being speculative after the fact

Question 15

Genuine Altruism

Answer 15

• We can all be skeptical of some acts of helping, and helpfulness reliably makes helpers feel better
• Batson theorized that our willingness to help is influenced by both self-serving and selfless considerations
• Distress over someone’s suffering motivates us to relieve our upset feelings, either by escaping the distressing situation, or by helping
• Other-focused altruism- help others to increase their welfare, even when benefit to self is not apparent or even considered
• Empathic concern- other-oriented emotion (warmth, tenderness, compassion, sympathy) that drives us to reduce another person’s distress even when there is no benefit to oneself or when cost outweighs benefit (core of other-focused altruism)
• We feel more empathy to those we are attached to or those we identify with, and more empathy for a single person than a suffering aggregate (collapse of compassion –> occurs as people regulate their painful emotional responses to large tragedies)
• genuine sympathy and compassion motivate us to help others for their own sake
• In humans, empathy comes naturally (even in babies)
• Often distress, and empathy together motivate responses to a crisis –> when empathy is aroused, people help more than they escape the situation (to reduce their own distress)
• If we feel empathy but know that something else will make us feel better, we aren’t as likely to help

Question 16

Egotism v Altruism (Toi & Batson, 1982)

Answer 16

• Participants were told they were evaluating ‘pilot program’ for the university radio station
• Each students hears a tape about Carol Mercy (a struggling student in a wheelchair)
• 50% of Ps told to be objective as they listen
• 50% of Ps told to adopt that target’s perspective
• *IVs:**
• Empathy: objective or target’s perspective
• Guilt: same Psyc 100 section or not (guilt bc they will have to see her in class)
• *DV:** agreement to help –> does empathy make ppl agree to help Carol?
• The empathy condition should result in help regardless of guilt, but the objective condition should only result in help when there’s guilt (according to Batson’s theory)
• In the high empathy condition, helping was high regardless of guilt, but in the low empathy condition, helping was much higher when the guilt condition was present

Question 17

Five-Stage Model of Bystander Apathy

Answer 17

• Noticing
• Interpreting
• Assuming Responsibility
• Decide how to/if you can help
• help
• it is only at the last stage that we help
• each stage is like an obstacle that people need to get past before they will help

Question 18

Five-Stage Model of Bystander Apathy: Noticing

Answer 18

• It is bad manners to stare at others, so we aren’t constantly noticing everything
• In an experiment, solitary students, who often glanced idly about the room while working noticed smoke almost immediately while those in groups kept their eyes on the work and it took them longer to notice the smoke

Question 19

Five-Stage Model of Bystander Apathy: Interpreting

Answer 19

• interpreting the event as one requiring intervention
• Seeing smoke, you don’t want to embarrass yourself by being flustered, and seeing other people looking calm and indifferent will induce us to act in a similar manner (informational influence)
• Such misinterpretations can contribute to delayed responses and feed the illusion of transparency and result in pluralistic ignorance
• A groups passivity can affect members’ interpretations of a situation (thinking it is less severe than it was when looking at others lack of response = no action)
• The bystander effect is reduced in obviously dangerous situations as they are easy to interpret and people are more likely to help
• Pluralistic ignorance - a situation where a majority of group members privately reject a norm, but assume (incorrectly) that most others accept it –> a result of informational influence and conformity
• *The Good Samaritan Study:**
• Participants were students at the Princeton Theological Seminary
• Told that they would be giving a talk about the parable of the Good Samaritan OR job opportunities
• When they arrived at the lab, told that the talk would be in another building, and given time manipulation (late, on time, ahead of schedule)
• On the way to the building, they passed a confederate slumped in a doorway, moaning in pain
• DV – do participants (seminary students) help?
• Results:*
• When time pressure is low, majority will stop to help, especially when the good Samaritan talk is on their mind
• Time pressure really affects helping, as they don’t notice –> doesnt matter if it was the good Samaritan or other topic
• People’s interpretations also affect their reactions to street crimes –> get off of me idk you vs get off of me idk why I married you

Question 20

Five-Stage Model of Bystander Apathy: Assuming Responsibility

Answer 20

• As the number of people known to be aware of an emergency increases, any given person is less likely to help –> there is no safety in numbers for the victim even in dangerous situations
• In dangerous situations where a perpetrator is present and intervention requires physical risk, the bystander effect is less evident
• People who don’t respond are not apathetic or indifferent, but people deny the influence that the presence of others has on them
• When emergencies are very clear, those in groups are only slightly less likely to help those alone, but when emergencies were somewhat ambiguous, those in groups were far less likely to help than solitary bystanders
• Most people who live in large cities are seldom alone in public places, which helps account for why city people are often less helpful than country people –> compassion fatigue and sensory overload from encountering so many people in need, further restrains helping in large cities
• In large cities, bystanders are also more often strangers, whereas when bystanders are friends or people who share a group identity, increased numbers may also increase helping
• People in economically advanced countries tend to offer less help to strangers, and those in cultures marked by amiable and agreeable sympathy were more helpful
• Diffusion of responsibility - tendency for each group member to dilute personal responsibility for acting by spreading it among all other group members
• *Smoke Filled Room study:**
• Participants are completing a survey when smoke begins to pour into the room
• Alone v with 2 confederates
• DV: do Ps go get the experimenter?
• Diffusion of responsibility bc you can blame the outcome on others (I didn’t do anything, but neither did anyone else
• A little bit of pluralistic ignorance, but mostly diffusion of responsibility

Question 21

Five-Stage Model of Bystander Apathy: Decide how to/ if you can Help

Answer 21

• People can help in different ways, and whether or not they help depends on the type of help they can offer (relevant expertise)
• Two types of Ps: Students v nurses
• Maintenance person falls off a ladder
• DV: Do Ps approach and try to help?
• Results:*
• Nurses approach 90% of the time (they know how to help so they do so)
• Students approach 50% of the time
• But, students more likely to go get experimenter (don’t know how to help so they find someone that does)

Question 22

When do we help? (3)

Answer 22

• *Helping When Someone Else Does:**
• Prosocial models promote prosocial behaviours
• Models sometimes contradict in practice what they preach (“do as I say not as I do”)
• Children learn moral judgments from both what they hear preached and what they see practiced –> when exposed to these discrepancies they imitate: they say what the model says and do what the model does
• *Time Pressures:**
• A person not in a hurry may stop and offer help to a person in distress while a person in a hurry is likely to keep going
• Those in a rush are not necessarily more callous but, in a hurry, they don’t fully grasp situations and don’t notice others in distress –> behavior more influenced by context than by conviction
• *Similarity to the Victim:**
• Because similarity is conducive to liking, and liking is conducive to helping, we are more empathetic and helpful towards those similar to us
• This similarity bias applies both to how people dress and their beliefs
• More likely to trust and be generous to those who have similar features, shared b-day, name (in me I trust)

Question 23

Who Helps: Personality Traits and Gender

Answer 23

• *Personality Traits:**
• Modest relationships were found between helping and certain personality variables such as the need for social approval
• By large personality traits are unable to identify helpers although social contacts clearly influences willingness to help
• Attitude and trait measures seldom predict a specific act, which is what most experiments measure, in contrast to lifelong altruism of people like Mother Teresa
• Personality researchers have found individual differences and helplessness, and that these differences persist overtime and are noticed by a person’s peers –> some people are reliably more helpful
• those high in emotionality, empathy, and self-efficacy are most likely to be concerned and helpful
• Personality influences how particular people react to particular situations; those high in self-monitoring are attuned to the expectations of others and are especially helpful if they think helpfulness will be socially rewarded (others’ opinions matter less to internally guided low self-monitoring people)
• *Gender:**
• When faced with potentially dangerous situations in which strangers need help, men more often help
• It seems that gender norms (“women and children first”), more likely come into play in situations when people have time to reflect on social norms as opposed to acting instinctively on impulse (fast sinking v slow sinking ship)
• In situations such as volunteering to help an experiment or spending time with children with disabilities, women are slightly more likely to help
• Women have also been as likely or more than men to risk death, and when faced with a friend’s problem, women respond with greater empathy and spend more time helping

Question 24

Increasing Helping: Personal Appeal and Guilt

Answer 24

• one way to promote prosocial behaviour is to reduce those factors that inhibit it
• assisting people to interpret an incident correctly and assume responsibility should increase a persons involvement
• face-to-face comments boost reporting of a crime
• *Personal Appeal:**
• Personalized nonverbal appeals can also be effective as a personal approach makes people feel less anonymous, and more responsible
• Bystanders who identified themselves to one another (by age, name, etc.) are more likely to aid a sick person than were anonymous bystanders
• Helpfulness also increases when one expects to meet the victim and other witnesses again
• Anything that personalizes bystanders- a personal request, eye contact, stating one’s name, anticipation of interaction- increases willingness to help
• Personal treatment makes bystanders more self-aware, and, therefore, more attuned to their own altruistic ideals; circumstances that promote self-awareness (being watched, name tags) should also increase helping
• *Guilt and Concern for self image:**
• Awakening people’s guilt increases their desire to help
• Guilt-laden people are more helpful people

Question 25

Increasing Help: Teaching Moral Inclusion

Answer 25

• Moral inclusion refers to regarding others as within your moral concern; they include people who differ from themselves within the human circle to which their moral values and rules of justice apply
• Moral exclusion or omitting certain people from one’s circle of moral support justifies all sorts of harm and allows exploitation or cruelty to become acceptable and even appropriate towards those we regard as undeserving, or nonpersons
• Moral exclusion describes any of us who concentrate on our concerns, favours, and financial inheritance on “our people” to the exclusion of others
• We easily become number by impersonal big numbers of out-group fatalities –> hurricane that killed 50, 5000, 1000 had the same effect
• A first step toward socializing prosocial behaviour is to counter the natural in-group bias favouring kin and tribe by broadening the range of people whose well-being concerns us
• If everyone is part of our family, then everyone has a moral claim on us and the boundaries between “us” and “them” fade
• Inviting advantaged people to put themselves in others’ shoes, to imagine less advantaged people feel, also helps –> to ‘do onto other as others do onto you’ you need to take the other’s perspective

Question 26

Increasing Help: Modelling Prosocial Behaviour

Answer 26

• People reared by extremely punitive parents, chronic criminals, and many delinquents show must less empathy and principled caring that typify altruist
• If we see or read about someone helping, we are more likely to offer assistance
• Exceptional altruists have warm and close relationships with at least one parent who was a strong moralist or committed to humanitarian causes
• This prosocial value orientation led them to include people from other groups in their circle of moral concern and to feel responsible for others’ welfare
• Prosocial TV models have had greater effects than antisocial models
• Studies have also shown positive effects on attitudes or behavior from playing pro social video games and listening to pro social music

Question 27

Increasing Help: Learning by Doing

Answer 27

• Just as immoral behavior fuels and moral attitudes, helping increases future helping
• Children and adults learn by doing –> when children act helpfully, they develop health related values, beliefs, and skills
• Helping also contributes to satisfying their needs for a positive self-concept
• Community service and volunteer programs woven into a school curriculum have been shown to increase later citizen involvement, social responsibility, cooperation, and leadership
• Since attitudes follow behavior helpful actions promote the self-perception that one is caring and helpful, which in turn promotes further helping

Question 28

Increasing Help: Attributing Helpful Behaviour to Altruistic Motives

Answer 28

• Another clue to socializing pro social behavior comes from the over justification effect –> rewarding people for what they do anyway undermines intrinsic motivation
• Stating the principle positively: by providing people with just enough justification to prompt a good deed, we may increase their pleasure and doing such deeds on their own
• Rewards undermine intrinsic motivation when they function as controlling bribes, but an unanticipated compliment can make people feel competent and worthy –> people are therefore more likely to attribute things to altruism
• To predispose more people to help in situations where most don’t, it can also pay to induce a tentative positive commitment, from which people may infer their own helpfulness

Question 29

Increasing Help: Learning about Prosocial Behaviour

Answer 29

• Once people understand why the presence of bystanders inhibits helping, they become more likely to help in group situations
• Those who heard a lecture on bystander inaction were more likely to help someone in need at a later time

Question 30

What is Aggression

Answer 30

• Aggression is physical or verbal behaviour intended to cause harm –> excludes unintentional harm (car accident), any actions that may involve pain as an unavoidable side effect of helping someone (dental treatments, assisted suicide)
• Includes both physical aggression (hurting someone’s body), and social aggression (bullying, cyberbullying, insults, harmful gossip, or social exclusion that hurts feelings)
• Social psychology definition of aggression does not include microaggression (words or actions that unintentionally convey prejudice toward marginalized groups) as aggression must be intentional

Question 31

Types of Aggression (3)

Answer 31

• Hostile aggression-hurting someone because we are angry, and aims to injure
• Instrumental aggression- aims to injure, but is committed to the pursuit of another goal –> both can be physical or social
• E.g., bullying for being a homewrecker (hostile), or bullying to gain popularity (instrumental)
• Mugging is instrumental bc they are not angry at the other person they just want their stuff (not a means of taking their anger out)
• Relational aggression- aggression that harms someone else through the manipulation of friendships
• Deliberate act of sabotaging someone else’s relationship
• Harming someone’s ability to be socially included → causes harm be ostracism can be detrimental
• Subtype of the other 2 (can be hostile or instrumental)
• Most terrorism is instrumental aggression, as are most wars
• Adolescents who bully others are often engaged in instrumental aggression because they frequently seek to demonstrate their dominance and high status –> being mean and disliked can sometimes make you popular and revered
• Most murders are hostile –> half erupt from arguments, and others result from romantic triangles or brawls that involve the influence of alcohol and drugs

Question 32

Challenges to Studying Aggression

Answer 32

• Hard to study aggression in a lab due to ethical considerations (the anger needs to be taken out on other ppl such as on other participants
• Non-experimental (correlational studies) are more common
• Reverse causality is an issue –> ex. Whether more aggressive kids watch violent TV, or violent TV causes aggression
• Third variables –> something else causes violent behaviour and watching violent TV like neglectful parents
• Correlational studies will usually have reverse causality and will almost always have third variables (that are plausible, but can often be argued against)

Question 33

Studying Aggression in the Lab (The Ultimatum Game)

Answer 33

• *Self-report and scenario completion:**
• Insult half of the participants and then ask if it were real, how aggressively they would react
• Issues with self-presentation bias, and there is no way to know if they would actually act the way they say they would
• *Shocks, noise blasts, hot sauce, demanding yoga poses**
• Measures of aggression after confederate insulted you could be how many volts, how many decibels, how much hot sauce, and how long they require the person to hold a yoga pose
• Inferences about the confederate (they think the confederate likes yoga) causes issues
• Both internal (inferences) and external (whether how much hot sauce given actually translates to aggression IRL) validity issues
• *The Ultimatum Game (costly punishment):**
• Subject B is the participant (the decider)
• Rationally, the decider should be happy with whatever amount, bc any money is better than no money, but people would rather ‘spend’ $5 to harm the splitter and stick it to them (costly punishment)
• The price point at which the decider would stop accepting the money corresponds with the punishment
• Costly punishment: I want to harm this person, and I would spend x amount of money to achieve this
• The more money they ‘spend’, the more aggression —> someone who accepts $10 is less aggressive than someone who only accepts as low as $40 before rejecting

Question 34

Nature v Nurture Theories of Aggression (5) (LEC)

Answer 34

• *Nature:** evolutionary instincts, genes, testerone
• *Nurture:** Social learning theory, culture of honour

Question 35

All Aggression Theories

Answer 35

• Biological Theories of Aggression
• Evolutionary instinct
• Neural influences
• Genetic influences
• Biochemical influences (alcohol, testosterone, poor diet)
• Frustration-Aggression Theory
• Relative Deprivation
• Social Theories
• Social rewards of aggression
• Observational Learning
• Culture of Honour

Question 36

Biological Theory of Aggression: Instinct Theory and Evolutionary Psychology

Answer 36

• Freud speculated that human aggression springs from a self-destructive impulse and it redirects towards others the energy of a primitive death urge
• Lorenz saw aggression as adaptive rather than self-destructive
• The two agreed that aggressive energy involves instinctive behavior (innate), and if not discharged it can build up until it explodes or until an appropriate stimulus releases it
• the idea that aggression is instinctive fails to account for the variations in aggressiveness from person to person and culture to culture
• Aggression is sometimes rooted in basic evolutionary impulses –> throughout human history men especially have found aggression adaptive and purposeful aggression improved the odds of survival and reproduction
• Mating related aggression often occurs when male are competing with other males
• Aggression provides evolutionary fitness: use aggression to get resources
• There is a selfish gene theory of the relationship between genetic relatedness and aggression –> men are much more likely to harm stepchildren than genetic children
• And may also become more aggressive when their social status is challenged –> status based aggression helps explain why aggression is highest during adolescence and early childhood when the competition for status and mates is more intense

Question 37

Biological Theory of Aggression: Neural Influences

Answer 37

• When scientist activate brain areas that have been found to facilitate aggression, such as the hypothalamus, hostility increases, but when deactivated hostility decreases
• Brain scan studies found that in the prefrontal cortex, which acts as an emergency brake on deeper brain areas involved in aggressive behavior, was 14% less active than normal and murderers and 15% smaller in antisocial men
• Another study found that more aggressive and violent men had smaller amygdala
• Other studies have confirmed that abnormal brains can contribute to abnormally aggressive behavior
• Situational factors can also play a role: sleep deprivation reduces activity in the prefrontal cortex which is an area responsible for self-control, so in aggression prone individuals poor sleep can lead to violent and aggressive behaviour
• People with mental illnesses are more likely to be victims of violence than the perpetrators

Question 38

Biological Theory of Aggression: Genetic Influences

Answer 38

• Heredity influences the neural system’s sensitivity to aggressive cues
• Aggressiveness also varies among individuals; our temperaments-how intense and reactive we are-are partly brought with us into the world, influenced by our sympathetic nervous system’s reactivity –> a person’s temperament observed during infancy is likely to endure
• There’s a correlation between violent crimes and genetics –> identical twins and genetic siblings more likely to both be convicted of crimes
• A specific gene (MAOA-L) has been linked to aggression (warrior or violence gene) –> has been found that those with the genes were 13 times more likely to have repeatedly committed violent crimes, explaining up to 10% of severe violent crime in the country (finland)
• Studies have also found that aggressive behavior combines the MAOA-L gene with childhood maltreatment
• Neither by genes nor about environment alone predisposed later aggressive and antisocial behavior; rather genes predispose some children to be more sensitive and responsive to maltreatment

Question 39

Biological Theory of Aggression: Biochemical Influences: Alcohol

Answer 39

• Alcohol enhances aggressiveness by reducing people’s self-awareness, by focusing their attention on provocation, and by people’s mentally associating alcohol with aggression
• Alcohol also predisposes people to interpret ambiguous acts as provocations, it deindividuates and disinhibits
• Alcohol reduces anxiety and reduces inhibitions against aggression
• Fear & anxiety is what prevents us from acting out aggressively, and why we don’t act impulsively
• Aggression & esp hostile aggression is an impulsive behaviour (don’t fear consequences)
• Interferes with information processing that would override aggressive impulses
• Forget to think about the future
• Alcohol = system 2 inhibitor (not thinking deeply about the consequences)
• *“Alcohol myopia”**
• Reduces self-awareness and enhances de-individuation –> less of sense that people are watching you, and feel more like you are part of a crowd
• *How does alcohol impact emotions?**
• Enhance negative emotions like sadness (esp. w relationship hardships)
• Alcohol can magnify relationship conflict and make them more dramatic than they are
• Ppl were asked to recall an argument in their relationship before and after drinking either alcohol, a placebo, or a control
• They then asked after drinking how both they felt and how they thought their partner felt about the argument
• Expressed heightened levels of negative emotions for themselves and partner when drunk → event recalled before they were drunk, but being intoxicated make/ ppl perceive the event to be worse than it is

Question 40

Biological Theory of Aggression: Biochemical Influences: Testosterone

Answer 40

• Hormonal influences appear to be much stronger in lower animals than in humans, but human aggressiveness does correlate with testosterone
• Drugs that diminish testosterone levels in violent human males will subdue their aggressive tendencies and after people reach the age of 25, their testosterone and violent crime rates decrease together
• Those with high testosterone levels are more prone to delinquency, hard drug use, and aggressive responses to provocation
• People with brain structures indicative of greater testosterone exposure were more aggressive from childhood to adulthood

Question 41

Biological Theory of Aggression: Biochemical Influences: Poor Diet

Answer 41

• Prisoners who got extra nutrition were involved in 35% fewer violent incidents
• Many people have diets deficient in important nutrients such as omega-3 fatty acids (important for brain function) and calcium (guards against impulsivity)
• Those who drank more than five cans of non-diet soda a week or more likely to have been violent and carried a weapon
• Women and men who consumed more trans-fat were more aggressive even after adjusting for third factors
• To lower aggression, eat a diet high in omega-3 fatty acids, low in trans fats, and without sweetened drinks

Question 42

Biological Theory of Aggression: Biology and Behaviour Interact

Answer 42

• Traffic flows both ways: higher levels of distortion may cause dominant and aggressive behavior, but dominant and aggressive behavior also leads to higher testosterone levels
• Testosterone surges post celebration so it was found that the fans of winning rather than losing teams commit more postgame assaults
• Neural, genetic, and biochemical influences predispose some individuals to react aggressively to conflict and provocation, but there are ways to reduce human aggression

Question 43

Furstration-Aggression Theory

Answer 43

• The frustration-aggression theory posits that frustration triggers a readiness to aggress –> single best determinant
• Frustration grows when our motivation to achieve a goal is very strong, when we expected gratification, and when the blocking is complete
• The aggressive energy need not explode directly against its source; most people learn to inhibit direct retaliation, especially when others might disapprove or punish
• Displacement- the redirection of aggression toward a target other than the source of the frustration; generally the new target is a safer and more socially acceptable
• In experiments and in real life, displaced aggression is most likely when the target share some similarity to the instigator and does some minor irritating act that unleashes the displaced aggression
• Laboratory tests of this theory have produced mixed results: we are less likely to react aggressively toward someone who frustrates us if that person apologizes, accept responsibility, or otherwise tries to make amends
• Berkowitz revised his theory and theorized that frustration produces aggression only when people become upset–> when someone who frustrates us could have chosen to act otherwise, leading to feelings of anger
• *Critiques of the Frustation-Aggression Hypothesis:**
• Frustration/ goal-blocking does not always cause aggression
• If valid excuses or apologies are made for what caused the goal block, aggressive impulses decrease
• If frustration (goal-blocking) always leads to aggression, then apologies should not affect this (as the goal is still blocked)
• Frustration/goal blocking sometimes causes different responses like learned helplessness –> repeated experiences of negative situations cause people to give up and feel that it is futile to go towards their goal as it is out of their control

Question 44

Neo-Associanistic Account of Aggression

Answer 44

• Made to amend/ in response to the critique of the frustration-aggression theory
• If intervened at the anger stage, it can prevent aggression
• Anger management for example focuses on recognizing the signs of an aggressive response (all of the anger responses) and then come up with techniques to reduce the anger (deep breathing)

Question 45

Relative Deprivation

Answer 45

• Refers to the perception that one is less well off than others whom one compares oneself
• Frustration is not only caused by complete deprivation; more often frustration arises from the gap between expectations and attainments
• The most economically frustrated people are probably not the impoverished residents of third world countries who might not know any other way of life, but middle-class north Americans who aspire to be rich
• When being rich feels out of reach aggression may result
• The more income inequality, the more the gap between attainment in high SES and low SES, which increases relative deprivation
• As high SES sets the ‘goals’, low SES will experience a larger gap between goals and attainments
• Income inequality and homicides are positively related (due to the aggression associated with relative deprivation)
• Relative deprivation explains why happiness tends to be lower and crime rates higher in communities and nations with large income inequality; the greater the income gap the higher the sense that others are getting something you’re not
• Feelings of relative deprivation predict reactions to perceived in equities by minority groups, and explain why women who make less than men working in the same occupations may feel underpaid if they compare themselves with male rather than female colleagues
• The affluence depicted in television programs and commercials can turn absolute deprivation (lacking what others have) to relative deprivation (feeling deprived)

Question 46

Social Theories of Aggression

Answer 46

• Theories of aggression based on instinct and frustration assume that hostile urges erupt from inner emotions which naturally push aggression from within
• Social psychologists contend that learning also pulls aggression out of us

Question 47

Social Theories of Aggression: The Rewards of Aggression

Answer 47

• Aggression as revenge can feel satisfying; other rewards exist as well –> we learn that aggression often pays
• A child whose aggressive acts successfully intimidate other children will likely become increasingly aggressive
• Aggression can be instrumental in achieving certain rewards

Question 48

Social Theories of Aggression: Observational Learning

Answer 48

• Bandura proposed a social learning theory of aggression –> He believed that we learn aggression not only by experiencing its pay offs but also by observing others; we acquire aggression by watching others act and noting the consequences
• Alternative to behaviourism bc we don’t need to be reinforced ourselves
• In the Bobo doll experiment, all kids who saw adult aggression also were aggressive to dolls –> Gentle pay by adults = gentle play by kids
• Freudian catharsis proved wrong by Bandura→ he thought we all have aggression and if we keep it pent up, we will explode, but we can satisfy aggressive urges by watching sporting events/ other violent behaviours
• Bandura believed that everyday life exposes us to aggressive models in the family, in the subculture, and in the mass media

Question 49

Social Theories of Aggression: Observational Learning: The Family

Answer 49

• Physically aggressive children tend to have physically punitive parents, who disciplined by modeling aggression with screaming, slapping, and beating –> these parents often had parents who were themselves physically punitive
• A study found that those with more hostile parents were more aggressive
• Such punitive behavior may escalate into abuse, and 30% do later abuse their own children
• Even more mild physical punishment such as spanking is linked to later aggression

Question 50

Social Theories of Aggression: Observational Learning: The Culture

Answer 50

• The social environment outside the home also provides models
• In communities where macho images are admired aggression is readily transmitted to new generations
• The violent subculture of teenage gangs provides its junior members with aggressive models
• The broader culture also matters –> men from cultures that are non-democratic, high in income inequality, and focused on teaching men to be warriors are more likely to behave aggressively than those from cultures with opposite characteristics
• People learn aggressive responses by experience and by observing aggressive models
• a variety of experiences arouse us emotionally but whether we act aggressively depends on the consequences we anticipate
• Aggression occurs most likely when we are aroused and when it seems safe and rewarding to aggress

Question 51

Social Theories of Aggression: Observational Learning: Culture of Honour

Answer 51

• Southern US states are classified as “cultures of honour” –> patterns of settlers created this culture
• Herding culture (bc cattle had to roam free and cattle could be stolen) with great distance from law enforcement
• People had strong concerns about their reputation bc they had to enforce their own laws by fostering a reputation of being a tough guy, so people don’t steal your cattle
• This established a culture of honour where one has to sustain their reputation
• Insults negatively affect reputation, and therefore deserve retaliation which was normally via physical violence
• There is a high willingness to use violence to avenge perceived wrongs or insults, and it became a cultural (descriptive) norm that one should maintain a tough guy reputation
• Murder rates were higher in southern areas, especially if it was an argument-related murder
• *Study Procedure:**
• 83 male participants (42 Northern, 41 Southern) were asked to carry some materials to an office down a long hallway
• Confederate bumped into the participants, called them an asshole
• Facial expressions observed
• Scenario describing threat to honour (make up the ending to a story, fill in the blank)
• Cortisol & testosterone measured
• Results:*
• Aggressive facial expressions (scale of 1-7), proportion of participants who completed the story with mentions in violence, cortisol levels, testosterone levels were all higher in Southern participants
• None of these were clear measures of aggression, but they show what the descriptive norms in the South are
• *Culture of Honour In Canada:**
• Proximity to Mounty fort affects culture of honour –> the further away from a fort the redder the dot
• White = further from fort = less reliance on Mounty fort to establish rules, so likely a culture of honour is established
• Male death is higher in white circle areas
• This culture still persists –> there is more violence and more homicide in white circle areas
• NHL players in white areas are penalized more often than red (more aggressive on the ice)
• Living in a lawless area makes reputation maintenance important, and violence is an effective way to do so

Question 52

Influences on Aggression

Answer 52

• Aversive incidents: Pain, heat, attacks
• Arousal
• Aggression Cues (the Weapons Effect)
• Media Influences: Pornography and sexual violence, TV, Media’s effect on behaviour, thinking, video games
• Group Influences

Question 53

Aversive Incidents: Pain

Answer 53

• Both physical pain and psychological pain (i.e. frustration) have been found to increase aggression
• Pain heightens aggressiveness in humans, as demonstrated by feeling frustrated after stubbing a toe or feeling more irritable and annoyed when your hand is in painfully cold water rather than warm water
• It was proposed that aversive stimulation rather than frustration is the basic trigger of hostile aggression, though frustration is an important type of unpleasantness

Question 54

Aversive Incidents: Heat

Answer 54

• Temporary climate variations can affect behavior; offensive odors, cigarette smoke, and air pollution have all been linked with aggressive behaviour, but the most well studied environmental irritant is heat
• Compared to students who answered questionnaires in a room with a normal temperature, those who did so in an uncomfortably hot room reported feeling more tired and aggressive and expressed more hostility towards a stranger
• It is argued that climate change can affect large scale violence and war
• Many human maladies have been traced to climate fluctuations –> when climate changes agriculture often suffers leading to increased famine, epidemics, economic crises, and overall misery
• In lab –> dictator game results in more aggressive behaviour
• IRL: road rage is higher during the summer
• IRL: plunking batters –> more likely to hit someone w the pitch on hotter days
• IRL: violent behaviour is higher when it is hot
• *Why does heat increase aggression?**
• Heat makes you more impulsive, and aggression is an impulsive behaviour
• Heat makes you uncomfortable, cranky, and increases arousal, and you try to figure out what it is that is making you uncomfortable
• Misattribution of arousal –> end up thinking that the arousal is due to the people around us and not the heat, so people getting in our way results in more aggression when it’s hot

Question 55

Aversive Incidents: Attacks

Answer 55

• Being attacked or insulted by someone is especially conducive to aggression
• Several experiments confirmed that intentional attacks breed retaliatory attacks –> an eye for an eye mentality

Question 56

Influence of Arousal on Aggression

Answer 56

• We can experience an aroused bodily state in different ways
• *Jerome Singer:**
• When told the injection of adrenaline would cause effects such as body flushing and heart palpitations the men felt little emotion when waiting with either a hostile or euphoric person (Could attribute their sensations to the drug)
• when they were told the drugs produced no side effects they were angry when with the hostile person and amused when with the euphoric person
• Concluded that a state of arousal can be interpreted in different ways depending on the context
• Other experiments indicate that arousal is not as emotionally undifferentiated; being physically stirred up does intensify just about any emotion –> arousal fuels emotion
• Sexual arousal and other forms of arousal such as anger can amplify one another
• Love is never so passionate as after a fight or fright which is why popular date setting is a horror movie
• A frustrating or insulting situation heightens arousal and this arousal combined with hostile thoughts and feelings may form a recipe for aggressive behavior

Question 57

Aggression Cues (the weapons effect)

Answer 57

• Violence is more likely when aggressive cues release pent up anger, and it has been found that the sight of a weapon is such a cue
• The mere presence of weapons acts as a cue that can cause violence bc it has a priming effect as guns are associated with violence and aggression
• When you see a gun, it brings that schema to mind, and aggression seems more of a normal response
• In many studies the mere presence of weapons increased aggressive thoughts and behaviors, known as the weapons effect
• more murders are committed with handguns and that handguns in homes are far more likely to kill household members than intruders –> guns not only permit violence but can also stimulate it
• Laws restricting firearm sales and countries that banned handguns have lower murder rates and reductions in gun crimes
• Guns serve as aggression cues and also put psychological distance between aggressor and victim, and remoteness from the victim facilitates cruelty
• *Berkowitz and Lepage, 1967:**
• Male participants worked with a confederate on problems, evaluated each other by administering shocks
• Participants were randomly assigned to condition:
• Neutral condition (shocked by confed once)
• Anger condition (shocked by confed seven times)
• The participant could then shock the confederate, and near the shock machine there was: No object or a badminton racket or guns (12-gauge shotgun & .38 revolver) –> Other Ps weapons or just laying around (didn’t matter)
• DV: how many shocks the participant gives the confed

Question 58

Pornography and Sexual Violence

Answer 58

• Depictions of sexual violence is commonplace for pornography videos and in such videos, after initially resisting when a man persists the woman becomes aroused and by the end she is pleading for more –> this is obviously pure fantasy women do not respond in this manner
• viewing such fictional scenes the man overpowering and arousing a woman can have the following effects:
• *Distorted Perceptions of Sexual Reality:**
• Studies have shown that those who see films with mild sexual violence are more accepting of violence against women especially if they had been aroused by the films
• Men tend to show less sympathy for domestic violence victims and rate injuries as less severe
• *Aggression Against Women:**
• Evidence also suggests that pornography contributes to men’s actual aggression towards women
• Boys and girls aged 10 to 15 who had seen sexual violent content or six times more likely to be sexually aggressive towards others
• Teens and young adults who consumed more sexually explicit and sexually violent media were more likely to have been involved in dating violence and sexual violence
• Studies have found that people who watch pornography often were more likely to be sexually aggressive including both physical force and verbal coercion and harassment
• There is a strong correlation between sex offenders in increased pornography use

Question 59

Media’s Effects on Behaviour

Answer 59

• One technique commonly used with schoolchildren correlates their TV watching with aggressiveness –> the frequent result is the more violent the content of the child’s TV viewing, the more aggressive the child
• This extends also to social aggression; girls who watch more shows featuring gossiping and social exclusion more often display such behavior
• not that everyone who watches violent TV will become violent, but it is a risk factor
• *Media Viewing Experiments:**
• Berkowitz and Geen found that angry university students who viewed a violent film acted more aggressively then did similarly angered students who viewed non aggressive films –> studies confirm that viewing violence amplifies aggression
• In another study where one group watched a movie with characters using guns and another group watch a version that edited the guns out and then played in a room with toys including nerf guns –> although almost half of the kids picked up the gun, hardly any of the children who watched the edited version pulled the trigger but those who watched the unedited version pull the trigger at least three times
• The conclusion is especially so among people with aggressive tendencies and when an attractive person commits justified, realistic violence that goes unpunished and that shows no pain or harm (which is consistent with what is shown on TV)
• the opposite is also true: less exposure leads to less aggression
• *Why does Media Affect Behaviour?**
• Viewing violence produces arousal, and arousal tends to spill over –> one type of arousal energizes other behaviours
• Viewing violence disinhibits –> Like in Bandura’s experiment, viewing violence primes the viewer for aggressive behavior by activating violence related thoughts
• Media portrayals also provokes imitation

Question 60

Media Effects on Thinking (4):

Answer 60

• *Desensitization:**
• After repeated exposure to an emotion arousing stimulus the emotional response will eventually extinguish
• Regular viewers of violence on TV and in movies show a lessened response, compared to infrequent viewers, reacting to violence with a shrug rather than concern
• Media violence exposure decreases feelings of empathy for others
• *Social Scripts:**
• When we find ourselves in new situations, unsure how to act, we often rely on social scripts-culturally provided mental instructions for how to act
• After so many action films youngsters may acquire a script that is played when they face real life conflicts –> when challenged they may try to act like a man by being intimidating or eliminating the threat
• The more sexual content that adolescents view, the more likely they are to perceive their peers as sexually active, to develop sexually permissive attitudes, and to experience early intercourse
• Media portrayals implant social scripts
• *Altered Perceptions:**
• Television’s fictional worlds can mold our conceptions of the real world
• Studies have shown that heavy viewers are more likely than light viewers to exaggerate the frequency of violence in the world around them and fear being personally assaulted
• Media portrayals shape perception of reality and can make the world is scary place if you watch a lot of television
• *Cognitive Priming:**
• Research also reveals that watching violent videos prime aggression related ideas
• After viewing violence people offer more hostile explanations for other’s behaviors and interpret spoken homonyms with more aggressive meaning

Question 61

Video Games Effects on Aggression

Answer 61

• Gentle and Anderson offered some reasons why violent game playing might be more toxic than watching television as with game playing, players:
• Identify with and play the role of a violent character
• Actively rehearse violence instead of passively watching it
• Engage in the whole sequence of enacting violence
• Engage with continual violence and threats of attack
• Repeat violent behaviors over and over
• Are rewarded for filing tax
• Research that examines large samples of people shows up playing violent video games does, on average, increase aggressive behavior, thoughts, and feelings outside of the game (random assingment such that it wasnt that aggressive people play aggressive games)
• *Effects of playing violent video games:**
• Increases in aggressive behaviors –> children and youth play more aggressively with their peers, get into more arguments with their teachers, and participate in more fights
• Increases in aggressive thoughts –> those who played violent video games were more likely to have hostile attribution bias (see the world in blood red tinted glasses)
• Increases and aggressive feelings including hostility, anger, or revenge
• Habituation in the brain –> frequent gamers brains reacted less strongly to negative images as they become habituated to violence which numbs their reactions
• Greater likelihood of carrying a weapon
• Decreases in self-control and increases in antisocial behavior
• Decreases in helping others and empathy for others
• they become desensitized, so their perception of what counts as aggression may no longer include less severe but still harmful acts
• it challenges the idea of catharsis
• A meta-analysis of 381 studies (Anderson et al., 2010) concluded that exposure to violent video games is associated with: Increased aggressive behaviour, decreased prosocial behaviour, increased aggressive thoughts, increased aggressive emotions
• Other studies have concluded that there is no relationship with between video games and violence/aggression that matters

Question 62

Group Influences on Aggression

Answer 62

• If frustrations, insults, and aggressive models heighten the aggressive tendencies of isolated people, then such factors are likely to prompt the same reaction in groups
• Groups can amplify aggressive reactions partly by diffusing responsibility –> Diffusion of responsibility increases when there is distance between the aggressor and the victim and with increased numbers (the greater the number the more vicious)
• Groups magnify aggressive tendencies much as they polarize other tendencies
• Youth sharing antisocial tendencies and lacking close family bonds and expectations of academic success may find social identity in a gang
• As group identity develops conformity pressures and deindividuation increases
• Self-identity diminishes as one starts to identify with the group
• The frequent result is social contagion - group-fed arousal, disinhibition, and polarization
• Massacres are social phenomena fed by moral imperatives- mentality that mobilizes a group or a culture for extraordinary actions
• When circumstances provoke an individual’s aggressive reaction, the addition of group interaction will often amplify it
• Increased aggression both in the lab and in the real world is predicted by the following: Being male, aggressive or anger prone personalities, alcohol use, violence viewing, anonymity, provocation, the presence of weapons, and group interactions

Question 63

Reducing Aggression: Catharsis?

Answer 63

• The concept of catharsis is usually credited Aristotle who argued that we can purge emotions by experiencing them and that viewing the classic tragedies, enabled catharsis of pity and fear
• Displacement does suggest that catharsis makes sense as we are aggressive towards others who are similar to those who blocked our goals, but Bandura showed that we don’t get catharsis from watching other’s aggression, so maybe displacing anger on someone else causes catharsis (not just seeing the aggression
• In laboratory tests venting anger caused more aggression not less
• This has also been observed in real life experiments where Internet users who frequently visit rant sites were encouraged to express their anger –> the opportunity to express their hostility didn’t reduce it but actually increased in their happiness decreased
• Cruel acts begat cruel attitudes and little aggressive tasks can breed their own justification as people rationalize their actions for further aggression
• Retaliation may in the short term reduce tension and even provide pleasure, but in the long run it fuels more negative feelings
• *Punching Bag Study:**
• 600 Ps write an essay, it is graded harshly by another “P”
• IV: Punch punching bag (catharsis manipulation) vs listen to calming music vs sit there and relax and do whatever you want
• DVs:*
• Rate how angry you are
• Compete w other “P” in task where you can blast them with noise if you win
• Results:*
• Punching bag Ps were angrier
• Punching bag Ps aggressed more against other “P”
• Taking your anger out on the punching bad actually causes you to be more angry

Question 64

Reducing Aggression: Social Learning Approach

Answer 64

• Punishing the aggressor is consistently less effective then ignoring aggressive behavior and reinforcing nonaggressive cooperative behavior
• Prevent aggression before it happens by teaching nonaggressive conflict resolution strategies
• Bullying is reduced when parents or teachers monitor closely and when children are educated about what behaviors are considered bullying
• To foster gentler worlds we could model and reward sensitivity in cooperation from an early age, perhaps by training parents how to discipline without violence
• We should also reduce brutal dehumanizing portrayals in films and on television
• Other ideas for how to prevent aggression include emphasizing disgusting aspects of violence as people who are sensitive to disgust are less aggressive
• People who see moral rules as negotiable are more aggressive suggesting that teaching some non negotiable rules and moral reasoning might reduce aggressive behavior

Question 65

The importance of intimate relationships (6)

Answer 65

• Positive health outcomes: the more healthier relationships one has, the better their health outcomes
• Social support: the more healthier relationships one has, the more social support they receive
• Capitalization: receiving a positive reaction for something positive makes you feel even better –> need high quality relationships for that to happen
• Michelangelo Effect: when you know a person’s ideal self, you often that person as already being their ideal self, and you tend to treat them/behave like they are their ideal self, and that makes them become more like their ideal self (like a positive self-fulfilling prophesy)
• Goal Pursuit: friends know what your goals are and can steer you in the right path
• Self-expansion: as you increase in self-efficacy, you gain more control over your ability to pursue your goals, and you expand yourself and knowledge when you have satisfying relationships

Question 66

What leads to Friendship and Attraction? (3)

Answer 66

• proximity
• physical attractiveness
• perceived similarity

Question 67

Proximity Effect:

Answer 67

• the closer someone is, the more likely we are to start a relationship with them
• Caused by: higher probability of meeting people who are close in physical distance, anticipating interacting with someone boosts liking and familiarity
• proximity can sometimes breed hostility, but more often breeds liking

Question 68

Proximity: Interaction

Answer 68

• More significant than geographical distances functional distance-how often people’s paths cross (the closeness between places in terms of interaction opportunities)- breeds liking
• Interaction enables people to explore their similarities, to sense another person’s liking, and to perceive themselves as a social unit
• Romantic exposure is like imprinting; with repeated exposure to someone our infatuation may fix on almost anyone who has roughly similar characteristics and who reciprocates our affection –> identical twins rarely fall for the same guy
• Factor as to why proximity breeds liking is availability as there are more opportunities to get to know such a person, but there’s more to the situation than that
• Interaction opportunities determine relationships; the more opportunities the more likely friendship will occur
• Scheduling/routine can also determine whether people interact
• *Apartment layout:**
• Apartment 5 has mailboxes and stairs right next to it, so the tenant has the most friends
• Apartment 8 has the least amount of friends
• 4,3,2 tend to be friends, and 1&5 more likely to be friends with the top floor due to functional distance
• *Trainees at a program in Maryland:**
• Alphabetical order was the best predictor of friendship bc they sat in that order = proximity effect

Question 69

Proximity: Anticipation of Interaction

Answer 69

• Proximity enables people to discover commonalities and exchange rewards but merely anticipating interaction also boosts liking
• People will like a person that they are expecting to meet more and expecting to date someone also boosts liking
• Anticipatory liking-expecting that someone will be pleasant and compatible-increases the chance of a rewarding relationship

Question 70

Proximity: Mere Exposure

Answer 70

• Proximity leads to liking not only because it enables interaction and anticipatory liking but also, familiarity breeds fondness
• The mere exposure effect refers to simply being repeatedly exposed to all sorts of novel stimuli can boost people’s ratings of them
• Zajonc and nonsense syllables, Chinese ideograms –> when repeated over multiple trials they tended to like it more (repetition = familiarity = increased liking)
• Mita – photographs v flipped images -> we like the mirror image better but other people like the non-flipped bc that is what is more familiar
• We dislike the recording of our voice bc it sounds dissimilar to what it sounds like when we speak
• Attitudes toward social groups can be changed by mere exposure: when people read stories about transgender individuals accompanied by pictures, they become less afraid and more comfortable around transgender people
• People of differing nationalities, age, and languages prefer the letters appearing in their own names and those that frequently appear in their own languages
• The mere exposure effect violates the common sense prediction of boredom regarding repeatedly heard music or tasted foods –> familiarity doesn’t usually breed contempt but it actually increases liking
• Mere exposure effects are even stronger when people receive stimuli without awareness
• The mere exposure effect has adaptive significance as it is a hardwired phenomenon that predisposes or attachments end attractions that helped our ancestors categorize things and people as either familiar unsafe or unfamiliar and possibly dangerous
• The exposure effect colours are evaluations of others: we like familiar people and perceive them as happy and more trustworthy (also works the other way around: people we like seem more familiar)
• Mere exposure’s negative side is our wariness of the unfamiliar which may explain the automatic, unconscious, prejudice people often feel when confronting those who are different
• Advertisers and politicians exploit this phenomenon; when people have no strong feelings about a product or a candidate repetition alone can increase sales or votes

Question 71

Physical Attractiveness: Attractiveness and Dating

Answer 71

• woman’s physical attractiveness is moderately good predictor of how frequently she dates, and the same goes for a young man
• Men rate attractiveness as important while women more than men assign importance to honesty, humor, kindness, and dependability
• Attractive wives lead to happier husbands but attractive husbands had less of affect on women’s happiness
• People tend to pair off with people who are about as attractive as them
• People tend to select us friends and especially to marry those who are a good match not only to their level of intelligence, popularity, and self worth but also to their level of attractiveness (matching phenomenon)
• Good physical matches may also be conducive to good relationships–> study showed the similar attractiveness were more likely to have fallen more deeply in love later where couples dissimilar in attractiveness were more likely to consider leaving the relationship for someone else
• In cases where people have differing levels of attractiveness the less attractive person often has compensating qualities

Question 72

The Physical Attractiveness Stereotype

Answer 72

• Both adults and young children are biased towards attractive adults and attractive children respectively (adults also show a similar bias when judging children)
• Other things being equal we guess that beautiful people are happier, sexually warmer, more outgoing, intelligent, and successful
• We are more eager to bond with attractive people which motivates projecting desirable attributes, such as kindness and reciprocal attributions onto them
• Compared to people who are less attractive, physically attractive people are more likely to: marry, or re-marry, achieve good grades, attain prestigious occupations, get lighter sentences for crimes
• The physical attractiveness stereotype is the presumption that physically attractive people possess other socially desirable traits as well: what is beautiful is good (i.e. the halo effect)

Question 73

The Physical Attractiveness Stereotype: Halo Effect

Answer 73

• the belief that physically attractive people have a wide range of positive characteristics
• Kalick (1977) - Effects of plastic surgery –> more kind, sensitive, sexually warm and responsive, likable after surgery
• Frieze – MBA graduate study –> Attractiveness influences salary
• Men +$2,600, Women +$2,150 (for each additional scale unit of attractiveness, salary goes up by that amount)

Question 74

The Physical Attractiveness Stereotype: First Impressions

Answer 74

• Just because physical attractiveness is important does not mean that physical appearance always outranks other qualities
• Attractiveness most affects first impressions, but first impressions are important- increasingly more as societies become more mobile and urbanized and as contacts with people become more fleeting
• Attractiveness predicts happiness and social connections for those in urban rather than rural settings
• Attractiveness and grooming affect first impressions in job interviews especially when the evaluator is of another sex –> May help to explain why attractive people and tall people have more prestigious jobs and make more money
• Attractiveness is perceived promptly and then primes positive processing

Question 75

Is the physical attractiveness stereotype accurate?

Answer 75

• Physically attractive people do not differ from others in basic personality traits, such as agreeableness, openness, extraversion, ambition, or emotional stability –> attractive people are not more intelligent, dominant, happy, or mentally healthy
• But, attractive children and young adults are somewhat more relaxed, outgoing, socially polished, they are more comfortable and competent in social settings, and more socially skilled
• Physically attractive individuals also tend to be more popular, more outgoing, and more gender typed
• These small average differences between attractive an unattractive people probably result from self-fulfilling prophecies –> attractive people are valued and favored so they may develop more social self confidence
• *Attractiveness and social skills (Goldman and Lewis):**
• Males tend to not know how attractive they are while females do
• As attractiveness (as rated by others) increases, social skills (as rated by people who were talking on the phone so they can’t see how attractive the other person is) the more attractive
• the table shows correlation coefficients
• Practice effect: they have more practice in social settings, and more social interactions likely bc they are attractive and ppl want to be around them (both halo effect and self-fulfilling prophesy)

Question 76

Who is Attractive?

Answer 76

• Attractiveness is whatever the people of any given place in time find attractive which of course varies
• For cultures with scarce resources, for poor or hungry people, plumpness is considered attractive; for cultures and individuals with abundant resources, beauty more often equals slimness
• Attractiveness influences life outcomes less in cultures where relationships are based more on kinship or social arrangement than on personal choice
• Despite these variations there still remains to be a strong agreement both within and across cultures about who is and who is not attractive
• To be really attractive is to be perfectly average –> averaged looks best embody prototypes and thus are easy for the brain to process and categorize
• Averageness effect: the physical beauty that results from averaging the facial features of people of the same gender and approximately the same age
• Computer averaged faces also tend to be perfectly symmetrical which is another characteristic of attractive people

Question 77

Who is Attractive: Evolution and Attraction

Answer 77

• Evolutionary psychologists assume that beauty signals biologically important information: health, youth, and fertility –> demonsrates human preference for attractive partners as a reproductive strategy
• It actually does: men with attractive faces have higher quality sperm, women with hourglass figures have more regular menstrual cycles and are more fertile
• Evolutionary psychologists assume that evolution predisposes women to favor male traits that signify an ability to provide and protect resources
• Women’s emphasis on men’s physical attractiveness may depend on their goals: those focused on short term relationship prefers symmetrical men, whereas those focused on long-term find this less important (perhaps because physical attractiveness may come with more negative qualities like infidelity)
• Men everywhere are most attracted to woman whose waists are 30% narrower than their hips which is a shape associated with peak fertility
• Women prefer a male waist to hip ratio suggesting health and vigor and rate muscular men as sexier (which makes more sense evolutionarily)
• During ovulation, women show increased accuracy in judging male sexual orientation and increased wariness of outgroup men
• *Buss (1989) - Evolutionary psychology (gendered features)**
• Men prefer women with baby features signifying fertility
• Women prefer men with features that suggest maturity and dominance (e.g., square jaw)

Question 78

Who is Attractive: Social Comparison

Answer 78

• What’s attractive to you also depends on your comparison standards
• After looking at celebrities or viewing pornographic films satisfaction with one’s own partner - being sexually aroused may temporarily make a person of the other sex seem more attractive
• The lingering effects of exposure to unrealistic sexual depictions or perfect 10s makes a person’s own partner seem less appealing
• This is also the case with their own self perceptions
• Extraordinary comparison standards trick us into devaluing our potential mates and ourselves

Question 79

Who is Attractive: Attractiveness of Those we Love

Answer 79

• A teenager’s attractiveness is a weak predictor of her attractiveness at the ages of 30 and 50
• not only do we perceive attractive people as likable but we also perceive likeable people as attractive –> physical imperfections seem less noticeable once we grow to like a person
• discovering someone’s similarity to us also makes the person seem more attractive
• love sees loveliness: the more in love a woman is with a man, the more physically attractive she finds him and the more in love people are, the less attractive they find all others of opposite sex

Question 80

Similarity v Complementarity

Answer 80

• friends, engaged couples, and spouses are far more likely than people randomly paired to share common attitudes, beliefs, and values
• greater similarity btwn married couple = happier and less likely to divorce
• the more similar someone’s attitudes are to yours, the more you will like the person (liking begets liking)
• we also tend to see those we like as being like us (false consensus bias)
• disimilar attitudes = dislike = distance = increased dislike
• overtime dating partners or roommates become more similar bc its hard to like someone you are dissimilar to
• Attitude alignment helps promote and sustain close relationships, a phenomenon that can lead partners to overestimate their attitude similarities
• Whether people perceive those of another race as similar or dissimilar influences their racial attitudes often more than skin colour (cultural racism)

The research indicates that the overwhelming evidence is that similarity increases attraction

• P**ersonality: ppl w similar personalities pair together
• Fantom other test: same v opposite personality as participant
• They will want to meet “themselves” (filled out personality scales)
• Demographics: similar backgrounds get together –> roommates w shared political values stay friends longer
• Looks: ppl are attracted to people that look a bit like them
• *Matching Hypothesis:**
• The tendency to choose as partners those who are a match in attractiveness
• Does matching predict relationship success?
• Take photos of couple
• Outside observers rate them on 10 point scale
• Follow up w them a year later –> Still together? Or split up?
• Absolute difference in attractiveness x relationship success x couplehood status (the bigger the score, the bigger the gap in attractiveness)
• The hypothesis is that the bigger the attractiveness gap, the more likely the couple will break up, and this is true for casual and serious daters, but not so much for the married couples (they were already pretty well matched)
• Big gaps have already been broken up with before marriage

Question 81

Opposites Attract?

Answer 81

• We are physically attracted to people who sent suggests dissimilar enough genes to prevent inbreeding
• In attitudes and beliefs, as well as age, race religion, smoking behaviour, economic level, intelligence, and appearance, similarity still tends to prevail
• most people tend to be attracted to those who are outgoing
• as a general rule, opposites do not attract

Question 82

Liking those who like us:

Answer 82

• liking is usual mutual
• one person’s liking for another doeds predict liking in return

Question 83

Liking those who like us: Attribution

Answer 83

• If praise clearly violates what we know is true we may lose respect for the flatterer and wonder whether the compliment springs from ulterior motives, thus we perceive criticism to be more sincere than praise
• Our reactions to flattery depends on our attributions; if we perceive that there is no apparent ulterior motive, then we warmly received both flattery an flatterer
• People with low self-esteem focused narrowly on the literal meaning of compliments (saying you have a nice smile causes them to focus on thinking they only have a nice smile)
• People with high self-esteem attribute more abstract significance to their compliments

Question 84

Liking those who like us: Self-Esteem and Attraction

Answer 84

• People whose self-esteem are lower are hungrier for social approval –> why people sometimes fall passionately in love after rejection
• People with low self-esteem tend to underestimate how much potential partners will like and accept them, this expectation causes these individuals to behave in a less warm and friendly manner, which ultimately leads them to actually be less accepted by others
• Even in established relationships low self-esteem people underestimate how much their romantic partners value them, but when they’re focused on their own strengths they feel more secure in their relationships

Question 85

Liking those who like us: Gaining Another’s Esteem

Answer 85

• Aronson speculated that constant approval can lose value
• This suggests that an open honest relationship where people enjoy one another’s esteem and acceptance, and are honest is more likely to offer continuing rewards than one dulled by the suppression of unpleasant emotions
• In most social interactions we self censor our negative feelings and some people receive no corrective feedback –> this is ultimately not beneficial
• The most satisfied married couples tend to have idealized one another and approach problems without immediately criticizing their partners and finding fault
• Honesty has its place in a good relationship, but so does a presumption of the other person’s basic goodness

Question 86

Relationship Rewards (the reward theory of attraction)

Answer 86

• We are attracted to those we find it satisfying and gratifying to be with
• The reward theory of attraction states that those who reward us, or whom we associate with rewards, we like; if a relationship gives us more rewards than costs we like it and we want to continue it
• Not only do we like people who are rewarding to be with, but according to the second version of the reward principle, we also like those we associate with good feelings
• Conditioning creates positive feelings towards things and people linked with rewarding events –> more likely to like someone while enjoying food and music then while suffering from a headache
• This theory of attraction helps us understand why people everywhere feel attracted to those who are warm, trustworthy, and responsive
• The reward theory also helps explain some of the influences on attraction:
• Proximity is rewarding as it costs less time and effort to receive friendship benefits from someone who is close by
• We like attractive people because we perceive that they offer other desirable traits and because we benefit by associating with them
• If others have similar opinions we feel rewarded because we presume that they like us in return and those who share our views help validate those views
• We like to be liked and we love to be loved, thus, liking is usually mutual

Question 87

Passionate Love

Answer 87

• Sternberg viewed love as a triangle consisting of three components: passion, intimacy, and commitment
• Some elements are common to all loving relationships: mutual understanding, giving and receiving support, enjoying the loved one’s company
• Passionate love is a state of intense longing for union with another; passionate lovers are absorbed in one another, they feel ecstatic at attaining their partner’s love, and they are disconsolate on losing it
• Passionate love involves a mix of elation and gloom, tingling exhilaration and dejected misery
• Passionate love preoccupies the lover with thoughts of the other, involving the same reward pathways in the brain as addiction to substances
• what you feel not only when you love someone but when you are in love w someone

Question 88

A Theory of Passionate Love

Answer 88

• A given state of arousal can be steered into any of several emotions, depending on how we attribute the arousal
• In this view, passionate love is the psychological experience of being biologically aroused by someone we find attractive
• If passion is a revved-up state that’s labelled love, then whatever revs one up should intensify feelings of love –> argued that when revved-up men responded to a woman, they then easily misattributed some of their arousal to her
• Two-factor theory of emotion- arousal x its label = emotion
• According to this theory, being aroused by any source should intensify passionate feelings- provided the mind is free to attribute some of the arousal to a romantic stimuli
• couples who do exciting things together (adrenaline increase) stay together
• This suggests that passionate love is a biological as well as psychological phenomenon –> passionate love engages dopamine-rich brain areas associated with reward
• Love is also a social phenomenon; supplement sexual desire with a deepening friendship and the result is romantic love
• Passionate love = lust + attachment

Question 89

Passionate Love: Variations Among Culture and Gender

Answer 89

• In most cultures, love is a precondition for marriage, but in some, notably those practicing arranged marriages, love tends to follow rather than precede marriage
• Men tend to fall in love more readily and men also seem to fall out of love more slowly and are less likely than women to break up a premarital romance
• Its men who often first say “I love you”
• Once in love, women are typically as emotionally involved as their partners, or more so and are more likely to report feeling euphoric
• Women are also more likely to focus on the intimacy of their friendship and on their concern for their partner
• Men are more likely to think about the playful and physical aspects of the relationship

Question 90

Companionate Love

Answer 90

• Passionate love burns hot but eventually simmers down; the novelty and intense absorption in the other all fade
• If a close relationship is to endure, it will settle to a steadier, but still warm afterglow called companionate love- the affection we feel for those whom our lives are deeply intertwined; deep affectionate attachment
• The passion-facilitating hormones (testosterone, dopamine, adrenalin) subside, while the hormone oxytocin which supports feelings of attachment and trust remain
• Like any drug, the loss of romantic love triggers “withdrawal symptoms” and a person might feel empty without the person they long ago stopped feeling passionately attached to bc they focus on what was not working so they stopped noticing that was
• Unlike passionate love, companionate love can last a lifetime
• The cooling of passionate love over time and the growing importance of other factor such as shared values, can be seen in the feelings of those who enter arranged marriages v love-based marriages (more love after 5 years v less love, respectively)
• The cooling of intense romantic love often triggers a period of disillusionment, especially among those who believe that passionate love is essential both for a marriage and its continuation
• Asians tend to focus less on personal feelings and more on the practical aspects of social attachments, so they are less vulnerable to disillusionment
• Asians are also less prone to the self-focused individualism that in the long run can undermine a relationship and lead to divorce

Question 91

Attachment and Attachment Styles

Answer 91

• Love is a biological imperative and our need to belong is adaptive as cooperation promotes survival
• Different forms of a particular gene have been found to predict mammalian pair bonding –> in humans, genes associated with vasopressin activity predict marital stability
• Babies almost immediately prefer familiar faces and voices and form social attachments which serve as a powerful survival impulse
• Harlow: studied attachment in primates (warmth & comfort important in development of primates → may extend to humans)
• Bowlby: The first important relationship is with our mother/primary caregiver –> serves as a template to how ppl approach relationship, they form in the future
• Ainsworth: Strange situation (12-18 mos)
• Sensitive, responsive mothers who engender a sense of basic trust in the world’s reliability, typically have securely attached infants
• Attachment styles may be partially based in inherited temperament –> a gene found in Prairie voles that predisposes them to mate for life has been more commonly found in faithful, married men
• The effects of attachment can last a lifetime and attachment styles can have obvious impacts on relationships (i.e. resulting in more conflict)
• The most difficult pairing appears to be an anxious woman and an avoidant man; these couples showed the highest levels of stress hormones when they anticipated taking over a conflict, and found it to be difficult to give and seek care from their partner
• The anxious woman uncertain of her partners love seeks closeness, while the avoidant man is uncomfortable with closeness and distances himself

Question 92

Attachment: Strange Situation

Answer 92

1. Mom and infant in playroom
2. Mom, infant, and stranger
3. Infant and stranger
   * *4. Mom and infant reunion** –> critical stage bc different attachment styles will show different behaviours
4. Infant only
5. Infant and stranger
6. Mom and infant reunion

Question 93

Attachment Styles: Secure Attachment

Answer 93

• Attachment rooted in trust and marked by intimacy –> reliable caregiver (good, dependable bond)
• Seen in about 7/10 infants and nearly all adults
• Infants in a strange situation will play comfortable in mother’s presence, freely engage with stranger, get distressed if she leaves, and relaxes quickly when she returns
• This is the blueprint for one’s adult intimate relationships, in which underlying trust sustains relationships through times of conflict

Question 94

Attachment Styles: Avoidant Attachment

Answer 94

• Attachments are marked by discomfort over, or resistance to, being close to others; an insecure attachment style –> unavailable caretakers (baby is independent and apathtetic)
• Seen in 2/10 adults and infants
• Don’t explore, dont care if caregiver/stranger is there or not, not distressed when either person leaves and does not cling upon return

Question 95

Attachment Styles: Anxious/Ambivalent Attachment

Answer 95

• Attachment marked by anxiety or ambivalence, an insecure attachment style –> undependable, unpredictable caretaker
• Seen in 1/10 infants and adults
• In strange situations infants are more likely to cling tightly to mother, explore little, wary of stranger even when caregiver present, when she leaves, they are highly distressed, and when she returns they may be indifferent or hostile (mad that caregiver left in the first place), takes a long time to calm down

Question 96

Anxiety and Avoidance in Adult Relationships

Answer 96

• Anxiety: the extent to which a person worries about being abandoned or rejected by others
• Avoidance: the extent to which a person feels discomfort with closeness and emotional intimacy in relationships

Question 97

Adult Attachment Styles: Secure Attachment

Answer 97

• Secure adults find it easy to get close to others and don’t worry about being too dependent or abandoned
• low in anxiety and avoidance
• Optimistic beliefs about relationships
• Trust others
• Feel that they can handle threats
• Find it easy to get close to others
• Don’t fret about getting too dependent or being abandoned
• They enjoy sexuality in the context of a secure, committed relationship
• Their relationships tend to be satisfying and enduring

Question 98

Adult Attachment Styles: Avoidant Attachment

Answer 98

• Adults tend to be less invested in relationships and are more likely to leave them, they are also more likely to engage in uncommitted hookups and more likely to be unfaithful
• Individuals might be either fearful (uncomfortable getting close to others) or dismissing (more important for me to feel independent)
• Strive to maintain distance, control, and self-reliance in relationships
• Avoid negative emotional states –> whole goal is to avoid getting emotionally close and bc they believe losing the person and getting hurt is inevitable
• “Deactivating strategies” –> maintain distance to prevent distress in the event of a break up (not intimate and don’t open up)
• Low intimacy in relationships
• Tend to be less invested and more likely to leave

Question 99

Adult Attachment Styles: Anxious Attachment

Answer 99

• Adults are less trusting and are more possessive and jealous (clingy out of fear of the other person leaving)
• They may break up repeatedly with the same person
• May get emotional and angry during conflict, and their self-esteem fluctuates more based on feedback from others especially romantic partners
• Their eagerness to form relationships can hamper their efforts because others perceive their anxiety and the interaction becomes awkward
• Overdependence on partner for comfort and support
• “Hyperactivating strategies” –> aimed at creating incredibly close relationships as close as possible; attempting to elicit care from others early on
• Ironically, the behaviour of individuals high in anxiety may bring about the rejection that they fear

Question 100

Equity in Relationships

Answer 100

• Society teaches us to exchange rewards by the equity principle of attraction: what you and your partner get out of a relationship should be proportional to what you each put into it
• If two people receive equal outcomes they should contribute equally, otherwise one or the other will feel the relationship is unfair
• If both feel their outcomes correspond to the assets and efforts each contributes then both perceive equity
• Strangers and casual acquaintances maintain equity by exchanging benefits: I share my notes this time you share your notes next
• Those in an in during relationship such as roommates, and those in love do not feel bound to trade similar benefits, but feel freer to maintain equity by exchanging a variety of benefits and eventually stop keeping track of who owes whom

Question 101

Long-term Equity in Relationships

Answer 101

• Those involved in an equitable long-term relationship are unconcerned with short term equity
• People may even take pains to avoid calculating any exchange benefits
• Tit for tat exchanges boost people’s liking when the relationship was relatively formal but diminished liking when the two sought friendship –> not being calculating is a mark of friendship
• In a marriage, only when the others positive behavior is voluntary can we attribute it to love –> happily married people generally do not keep track of how much they are giving and getting
• People usually bring equal assets to romantic relationships, and if they are mismatched in one area they tend to be mismatched in some other area but in total assets they are an equitable match

Question 102

Perceived Equity and Satisfaction in Relationships

Answer 102

• Sharing household chores was ranked third among nine things people saw as a mark of successful marriages
• Those who perceive their relationship as inequitable feel discomfort: the one who has the better deal may feel guilty and the one who senses a raw deal might feel irritation
• When both partners freely give and receive, and make good decisions together, the odds of sustained, satisfying love are good
• Perceived inequity triggers marital distress but the traffic between equity and distress runs both ways: marital distress exacerbates the perception of unfairness`

Question 103

Self-Disclosure in Relationships

Answer 103

• Relationships where trust displaces anxiety and where we are free to open ourselves without fear of losing the others affections are characterized by self-disclosure
• As a relationship grows, self-disclosing partners reveal more and more of themselves to one another; their knowledge of one another penetrates to deeper levels
• Not only do we like those who disclose, but we tend to disclose to whom we like, and after disclosing to them, we like them more
• One way to feed intimacy and love is by talking about your emotions and views
• The most reliable finding for the cause and effects of self-disclosure is the disclosure reciprocity effect- disclosure begets disclosure; we reveal to those who have been open to us
• For those in love, deepening intimacy is exciting; this helps explain why those who remarry after the loss of disposed tend to begin the new marriage with an increased frequency of sex and why passion often rides highest when intimacy is restored following conflict
• Some people (women mostly) are especially skilled openers; they easily elicit intimate disclosures from others even when they don’t reveal very much of themselves –> they tend to be good listeners
• They are “growth-promoting” listeners- people who are genuine in revealing their own feelings, who are accepting of others feelings, and who are empathetic, sensitive, reflective listeners
• Having an intimate friend with whom we can discuss threats to our self-image seems to help us survive such stress
• The most self-revealing dating and married couples tend to enjoy the most satisfying and enduring relationships
• Women are more willing to disclose their fears and weaknesses than men –>both men and female tend to prefer female friends
• The result for many romantic partners is “self-other integration”: intertwined self-concepts

Question 104

Social Exchange Theory of Relationships

Answer 104

• Rational/economic model of relationships
• People make decisions about their relationships by weighing rewards and costs
• “Staying together” depends on:

1. satisfaction (how happy are you in the relationship?)
2. presence of attractive alternatives (can you do better?)

• These two factors can be crossed so that relationships can fit into 1 of 4 quadrants

Question 105

Investment Model of Relationships

Answer 105

• Refinement of the exchange theory: omits commitment which is the obligation to stay in a relationship/ the attachment to it
  1) Satisfaction is determined by:
• (a) rewards
• (b) costs

2) Commitment is determined by:

• (a) satisfaction
• (b) alternatives
• (c) investments –> whether you own property together, shared friends, family introduction, how many years you’ve been together )if you are tied in mutual investments, it can override the other two things)
• Commitment can move backwards; commitment can lead to disparaging alternatives, positive illusions about partner (increased satisfaction)
• Agnostic if shared investments is a is a good or bad thing
• Can lead to stay in an unsatisfactory relationship if you have a lot of investments and high commitment

Question 106

How Relationships End: Divorce

Answer 106

• Individualistic cultures have more divorce than do communal cultures –> individualists marry “for as long as we both shall love”, while collectivists more often for life
• Individualists expect more passion and personal fulfillment in a marriage, which puts greater pressure on the relationship
• Those who enter relationships with a long-term orientation and an intention to persist do experience healthier, less turbulent, and more durable partnerships
• Enduring relationships are rooted in enduring love and satisfaction but also in fear of the termination cost, a sense of moral obligation, and an inattention to possible alternative partners
• Those whose commitment to a union outlasts the desires that give birth to it will endure times of conflict and happiness
• People usually stay married if they:
• Married after 2 years, both grew up in stable 2-parent homes, dated for long before, enjoy a stable income from a good job, live in small town, did no cohabit or conceive before, are religiously committed, are of similar age, faith, and education
• If none of these things is true, for some, marital breakdown is an almost sure bet

Question 107

How Relationships End: the Detachment Process

Answer 107

• Our close relationships help define the social identity that shapes our self-concept and thus we experience both life’s best and worst moments when relationships begin and end, respectively
• Because humans often mate with more than one partner, we must have evolved psychological processes for cutting ties, a mechanism evolutionary psychologists dubbed the “mate rejection module”
• Among dating couples, the closer and longer the relationship and fewer the available alternatives, the more painful the breakup
• Distress over breaking the relationship up arises from guilt over hurting someone, from sadness over the heartbroken lover’s persistence, or from uncertainty over how to respond
• Among married couples breakup has additional costs: shocked parents/friends, guilt over broken vows, anguish over reduced income, less time with children
• When relationships suffer, those without better options or those who feel invested in a relationship will seek alternatives to exiting the relationship
• Some people cope with a failing relationship exhibit loyalty by waiting for conditions to improve
• Others exhibit neglect where they ignore the partner allow the relationship to deteriorate
• Others will voice their concerns and take active steps to improve the relationship by discussing problems, seeking advice, and attempting to change
• Healthy marriages are not devoid conflict but they are marked by an ability to reconcile differences and to overbalance criticism
• In successful marriages, positive interactions (smiling, touching, complimenting, laughing) outnumbered negative interactions (sarcasm, disapproval, insults) 1 to 5
• Same-sex couples are more positive when raising disagreements