CHAPTER THREE: SOCIAL BELIEFS AND JUDGEMENTS

Question 1

priming

Answer 1

activating particular associations in memory

Question 2

error-prone hindsight

Answer 2

when you wrongly believe you could have predicted something, even when you could not have known beforehand

Question 3

confirmation bias

Answer 3

tendency to search for information that confirms one’s preconceptions

Question 4

heuristics

Answer 4

mental shortcuts; strategies of thinking that enables quick, efficient judgements

Question 5

representativeness heuristic

Answer 5

judging something based on our mental representation of a category

Question 6

availability heuristic

Answer 6

judging something based on examples readily available in our memory

Question 7

counterfactual thinking

Answer 7

imagining alternative scenarios and outcomes that might have happened, but did not

Question 8

illusory correlation

Answer 8

the perception of a relationship where none exist, or a stronger relationship than actually exists

Question 9

illusions of control

Answer 9

believing you have more influence on events than you actually do

Question 10

belief perserverance

Answer 10

persistence of one’s initial conceptions, even after facing disconfirming evience

Question 11

misinformation effect

Answer 11

incorporating “misinformation” into a memory, after witnessing an event and receiving misinformation about it

Question 12

misattribution

Answer 12

mistakingly attributing a behaviour to the wrong cause

Question 13

dispositional attribution

Answer 13

attributing behaviour to the person’s disposition and traits

Question 14

situational attribution

Answer 14

attributing behaviour to the environment

Question 15

spontaneous trait inference

Answer 15

peoples actions are indicative of their dispositions and intentions

Question 16

fundamental attribution error

Answer 16

tendency for observers to underestimate situational circumstances and overestimate dispositional influences on others’ behaviour

Question 17

behavioural confirmation

Answer 17

self-fulfilling prophecy whereby peoples’ social expectations lead them to act in ways that cause others to confirm their expectations