Chapter 16: Social Behaviour Flashcards
If you have concluded that a friend didn’t accept your party invitation because she’s overworked, you have made an ______ about her behaviour
Attribution
What are attributions?
inferences that people draw about the causes of events or behaviour of themselves or other people
Why do people make attributions?
To understand life
What are internal attributions? (Heider)
say behaviour is caused by personal dispositions, traits, or abilities
behaviour is caused by internal factors
What are external attributions?
blaming behaviour on external sources such as situational demands and environmental constraints
True or false, according to Weiner, people often focus the stability of the causes underlying behaviour
True
Is luck a stable or unstable cause according to Weiner?
Unstable
Is ability a stable or unstable cause according to Weiner?
Stable
A common form of bias seen in observers is the “fundamental attribution error”what does it mean?
Observers have a tendency to overestimate the likelihood that an actors behaviour reflects personal qualities rather than situational
True or false, actors favour external attributions for their behaviour, wheras observers are more likely to explain the same behaviour with internal attributions
True
What is defensive attribution?
A tendency to blame victims for their misfortune so that you deny the probability of it happening to you
What is collectivism?
putting group goals ahead of personal goals in defining ones identity
opposite of individualism
What is the self-serving bias, and where is it most prevalent?
the tendency to attribute one’s successes to personal factors and ones failures to situational factors.. most prevalent in individualistic societies
What is a self-effacing bias? Where is it most prevalent?
tend to attribute their successes to help they receive from others, and when they fail, Japanese subjects tend to be more self-critical
What is an illusory correlation? when does it occur?
when people estimate that they have encountered more conformations of an association between social traits than they have actually seen.
“I’ve never met an honest lawyer”
True or false, attributions can be either internal or external
True
Explain the matching hypothesis
males and females of approx. equal attractiveness are likely to select eachother as partners
Romatic relationships are characterized by two types of love, what are they?
Passionate love: complete absorbtion/ sexual feelings
Compassionate love: warm, trusting and tolerant affection
What change did sternberg make to the original types of love hypothesis?
Changed compassionate love to 2 sub categories
Intimacy and commitment
What are the three types of attachment relationships in infancy?
secure attachment: comfortable with intimacy and autonomy
anxious ambivalent: when they’re anxious to be apart from their caretaker
avoidant attachment: never bond well with caretaker
True or false, according to Hazan and Shaver, people relive their early bonding with their parents in their adult romantic relationships
True
True or false, today researchers believe that attachment is best understood in terms of where people fall on “two continuous dimensions” What are they?
Attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance
attachment anx: worried about partners not being there when needed
attachment avoid: not being able to be intimate enough/closeness issues
True or false, anxious ambivalent individuals tend to report more highs and lows in their relationships
True
True or false, those with attachment anxiety promote excessive reassurance seeking
True
In cross cultural studies, what similarities have been found in terms of relationships?
What people look for in a partner
True or false, research suggests that virtual relationships are just as intimate or more than face-to-face ones
True
Explain the evolutionary perspective on attraction
certain aspects of good looks influence attraction because they are indicators of reproductive fitness
What do males and females look for in prospective mates according to the evolutionary theory?
Men: youthfullness/attractiveness
Women: Money and potential
True or false, in early days, social psych was defined as the study of attitudes
True
What three components did social psychologists traditionally view attitudes as being made up of?
cognitive component, affective component, and behavioural
cognitive: beliefs about an object of an attitude
affective: emotional feelings stimulated by an object of thought
behavioural: predispositions to act certain ways towards an att object
What is attitude strength?
how strong an attitude towards something is, how resistant to change it is
What is the accessibility of an attitude?
how often someone thinks about something and how quickly it comes to mind
What are ambivalent attitudes?
evaluations that include both positive and negative feelings about an object of thought
True or false, ambivalence increases as the ratio of positive to negative evaluations get closer to being equal
True
True or false, when ambivalence is HIGH an attitude tends to be more easily manipulated/persuaded
True
True or false, attitudes are mediocre predictors of behaviour
True
True or false, the avg. correlations between attitudes and behaviour is 0.41 ( wallace)
True
Why aren’t attitude-behaviour relationships more consistent?
- researchers failed to look at attitude strength, ambivalence & access
- attitudes are measured in general terms
Why are inconsistent relationships between attitudes and behaviour seen?
Because of social pressure, situational constraints
Whats the difference between explicit and implicit attitudes?
explicit: attitudes we hold consciously and can describe
implict: covert attitudes that are expressed subtlety, that we have little control over
Why are implicit attitudes a central issue in the study of prejudice?
Because most people have been taught that prejudicial attitudes are inappropriate
How are implicit attitudes measured?
IAT Implicit association tests
What 4 basic elements does the process of persuasion include?
source, receiver, message, and channel
source: person who sends communication
message: info transmitted from the source
channel: medium through which the message is sent
True or false, when speaking about source factors, persuasion tends to be more successful when the source has high credibility
True
What gives a person credibility?
Expertise or trustworthiness
True or false, persuasive messages tend to arouse fear in people
True
What does the truth effect or validity effect mean?
the finding that repeating a statement causes it to be seen as more valid or true
What is the exposure effect
the finding that repeated exposures to a stimulus promotes greater liking of the stimulus
What are the two theories of attitude formation and change?
Learning and dissonance
learning: attitudes learned from others
dissonance: inconsistency sends people in the direction of attitude change
What did Festinger say about the dissonance theory?
when you do something you don’t like but people tell you its interesting or give you incentive, you tend to like it more.. thus changing your attitude
What is counteractitudinal behaviour?
doing something that is inconsistent with your views
When does cognitive dissonance occur? (Festinger)
when related cognitions contradict eachother
think: teaching yourself to like something you hate
Explain Bems Self-perception theory
people often infer their attitudes from their behaviour
“A dollar isn’t enough to get me to lie, so I must have found the task enjoyable”
When doesn’t persuasion work well?
When a receiver is forewarned, when the sender advocates for something that is against the receivers original views, or when strong attitudes are targeted
True or false, according to Festinger, inconsistent attitudes cause tension and people alter their attitudes to reduce cognitive dissonance
True
What are social roles?
expectations about people in certain positions… how they should behave
What is conformity?
when people yield to imagined or real social pressure
What two key process appear to contribute to conforming?
Normative influences and informational influences
normative: conform for fear of negative social consequences
informaitonal: when ppl look to others to see how to behave
True or false, informational influence is all about being right, whereas normative influence is all about being liked
True
What is obedience?
when people follow direct commands, usually from someone in a position of authority
What are the two main criticisms of Milgrams obedience study?
they findings can’t be generalized to apply to the real world
the ethics, they didn’t know about the deception
How does Milgrams study hold up today? Are people still prone to obedience?
Yes they are still prone to obedience
Do obedience and conformity vary in different countries/cultures?
No, these characteristics seem to be very similar
What happened in the Stanford prison simulation?
students were randomly assigned to be prisoners or guards, it demonstrated that social roles have high impact on behaviour
True or false, Asch found that people often conform to the group, even when the group is wrong..
True
True or false, Asch found that conformity becomes more likely as group size increases up to 4 people then it quickly drops off
True
True or false, Milgram found that situational pressures can make decent people do indecent things
True
What is the bystander effect?
People are less likely to provide needed help when they are in groups
True or false, bystander effects are most likely in ambiguous situations
True, because people aren’t sure it’s an emergency
True or false, peoples productivity decreases when working in groups
True
What 2 factors contribute to low productivity in groups?
reduced efficiency resulting from loss of coordination between workers
they need effort rather than efficiency
What is social loafing?
reduction in effort by individuals when they work in groups
Is social loafing inevitable?
no
people with high motivation, agreeableness, and conscientiousness are less likely to participate
What are the two types of decision making issues in group decision making
Group polarization: discussions strengthens a groups point of view and makes it more extreme
Group think: group emphasize concurrence rather than critical thinking… an “infection” of decision making
Explain Stoners ‘risky shift’
groups arrive at riskier decisions than individuals
Why does group polarization occur?
group discussion often exposes group members to persuasive arguments, and when people find that others feel the same way, they tend to identify more
What causes group think?
group cohesiveness
“team spirit”
True or false, the evidence of group think tends to be mostly retrospective
True
What is social neuroscience?
integrates social psych to models of neuroscience to study mechanisms of social behaviour
Is social neuroscience fairly old or new?
New
True or false, social psychologists would say that the millenials are liberal minded detach-ees.
True
Can schemas be wrong?
Yes
What is affective forecasting?
Attempting to predict our future emotions..
Explain Erik Eriksons theory of identity foreclosure, why does it occur?
you shouldn’t make decisions for yourself in the future, because you’ll be different in the future and this incongruence may cause identity foreclosure.
What is a self-schema?
An idea about who you are, similar to a self-concept
True or false, self schemas effect how we process social information
True
What 4 factors can contribute to our self-concept?
- your roles: student, lover, sister.
- the social identities that we have
- comparisons we make with others
- our successes and failures
- we form and idea of ourselves by how others judge us
- the context
What is the difference between internal and external attributions?
internal: attribute behav. to internal causes like personality traits
external: we attribute behav. to external causes like situational demands or pressures
Why do we make fundamental attribution errors? Give 2 reasons
- situational pressures may not be obvious
- effortless
- people feel there are few situations so demanding that they negate freedom of choice
What is conformity?
submission and compliance
if you comply to an order, it is classified as obedient
Explain Sherifs mood linkage theory
if you’re around happy people, you’ll be happy
