Chapter 3: Social Cognition Flashcards
What is SOCIAL COGNITION?
how people think about themselves and the social world; more specifically, how people select, interpret, remember, and use social information to make judgements and decisions
What is AUTOMATIC THINKING?
thinking that is generally nonconscious, unintentional, involuntary and effortless
What are SCHEMAS?
mental structures people use to organize their knowledge about the social world and that influence the information people notice, think about, and remember
What is ACCESSIBILITY?
the extent to which schemas and concepts are at the forefront of people’s minds, and are, therefore, likely to be used when making judgements about the social world
What is a SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECY?
the case whereby people have an expectation about what another person is like, which influences how they act toward that person, which then causes that person to behave consistently with their original expectations
What is EMBODIED COGNITION?
the process by which bodily sensations activate mental structures such as schemas
What are JUDGEMENTAL HEURISTICS?
mental shortcuts people use to make judgements quickly and efficiently
What is the AVAILABILITY HEURISTIC?
a mental shortcut whereby people base a judgement on the ease with which they can bring information to mind
What is the REPRESENTATIVENESS HEURISTIC?
a mental shortcuts whereby people classify something according to how similar it is to a typical case
What is BASE RATE INFORMATION?
information about the frequency of members of different categories of the population
What is the ANALYTIC THINKING STYLE?
a type of thinking in which people focus on the properties of objects without considering their surrounding contexts; common in Western cultures
What is the HOLISTIC THINKING STYLE?
a type of thinking in which people focus on the overall context, particularly the ways in which objects relate to one another; this type of thinking is common in East Asian cultures
What is CONTROLLED THINKING?
thinking that is conscious, intentional, voluntary, effortful
What is COUNTERFACTUAL THINKING?
mentally changing an aspect of the past as a way of imagining what might have been
What is the OVERCONFIDENCE BARRIER?
people tend to have too much confidence in the accuracy of their judgements; their judgements are not usually as correct as they think they are
