chapter 11- social psychology

Question 1

diffusion of responsibility

Answer 1

tendency for an individual to feel a diminished sense of responsibility to assist in an emergency when other bystanders are present

Question 2

social perception

Answer 2

way in which we perceive, evaluate, categorize, and form judgments about the qualities of other people

Question 3

primacy effect

Answer 3

the phenomenon that the first information we receive about a person often has the greatest influence on our perceptions of that person

Question 4

person schemas

Answer 4

generalized assumptions about certain groups or classes of people

Question 5

implicit personality theories

Answer 5

assumptions people make about how traits usually occur together in other people’s personalities

Question 6

central trait

Answer 6

a major characteristic

Question 7

halo effect

Answer 7

tendency to infer other positive or negative traits from our perception of one central trait in another person

Question 8

attribution theory

Answer 8

theory that we attempt to make sense out of other people’s behavior by attributing it to either dispositional (internal) or situational (external) causes

Question 9

fundamental attribution error

Answer 9

tendency to overestimate dispositional (internal) causes and to underestimate situational (external) causes of behavior

Question 10

false consensus bias

Answer 10

attribution bias caused by the assumption that most people share our own attitudes and behaviors

Question 11

illusion of control

Answer 11

attributional bias caused by the belief that we control events in our own lives that are really beyond our control

Question 12

attitude

Answer 12

any learned, relatively enduring predisposition to respond in consistently favorable or unfavorable ways to certain people, groups, ideas, or situations

Question 13

impression management

Answer 13

tendency of individuals to select carefully what information they reveal about their attitudes, depending on how they think such information will affect their image in the eyes of others

Question 14

stereotype threat

Answer 14

tendency to conform to negative stereotypes

Question 15

cognitive dissonance theory

Answer 15

theory that people experience psychological discomfort or dissonance whenever cognitions and behaviors are in conflict

Question 16

prejudice

Answer 16

negative, unjustifiable, and inflexible attitude toward a group and its members

Question 17

stereotypes

Answer 17

preconceived and oversimplified beliefs and expectations about the traits of members of a particular group that do not account for individual differences

Question 18

discrimination

Answer 18

the behavioral consequence of prejudice in which one group is treated differently from another group

Question 19

ingroup

Answer 19

the group in which people include themselves when they divide the world into “us” and “them”

Question 20

ingroup bias

Answer 20

tendency to see one’s own group in a favorable light

Question 20

outgroup

Answer 20

the “them” group when individuals divide the world into “us” and “them”

Question 20

implicit attitude

Answer 20

attitudes that may be socially undesirable and may influence one’s behavior without one’s knowledge

Question 21

implicit association test (IAT)

Answer 21

test that attempts to measure the strength of association between groups of people, specific individuals, policies, and products and the concepts of “good” and “bad”

Question 22

social influence

Answer 22

efforts by others to alter our feelings, beliefs, and behavior

Question 23

conformity

Answer 23

tendency to change or modify behaviors so that they are consistent with those of other people

Question 24

informational social influence

Answer 24

one basis of conformity in which we accept a group’s beliefs or behaviors as providing accurate information about reality

Question 25

normative social influence

Answer 25

social influence in which we conform not because of an actual change in beliefs, but because w think we will benefit in some way (gaining approval)

Question 26

compliance

Answer 26

form of social influence in which people alter their behavior in response to direct requests from others, which usually involve a degree of coercion

Question 27

foot-in-the-door technique

Answer 27

technique for encouraging compliance in which a person is first asked to agree to a relatively minor request that serves as a set-up for a more major request

Question 28

door-in-the-face technique

Answer 28

method for encouraging compliance in which an unreasonable request is followed by a more minor, resonable request, which is the requester’s goal in the first place

Question 29

obedience

Answer 29

social influence in which we alter our behavior in response to commands or orders from people perceived as having power or authority

Question 30

groupthink

Answer 30

a psychological drive for consensus at any cost that suppresses dissent and consideration of alternatives in-group decision making

Question 31

proximity

Answer 31

the geographical nearness of one person to another, which is an important factor in interpersonal attraction

Question 32

mere exposure effect

Answer 32

phenomenon by which repeated exposure to novel stimuli tends to increase an individual’s preference for such stimuli

Question 33

similarity

Answer 33

similarity of beliefs, interests, and values is recognized as a factor attracting people to one another

Question 34

reciprocity

Answer 34

tendency to respond to others in a way similar to how they respond to or treat us

Question 35

physical attractiveness

Answer 35

physical features that persons of the opposite sex find appealing

Question 36

interpersonal aggression

Answer 36

any physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt another person

Question 37

ethology

Answer 37

the scientific study of the evolution of animal behavior including humans

Question 38

sociobiology

Answer 38

a specialization within biology that seeks to understand the biological factors that underlie social behaviors in all animal species, including humans

Question 39

frustration-aggression hypothesis

Answer 39

theory that aggression is always a consequence of frustration, and that frustration leads to aggression