Current issues in social psychology L1

Question 1

What is social psychology?

Answer 1

“The scientific investigation of how the thoughts, feelings, and behaviours of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others”

Question 2

What is human behaviour?

Answer 2

Overt (e.g. driving, fighting) and more subtle (e.g. non verbal behaviour).

Meaning attached to behaviour a matter of perspective.

Question 3

What is social behaviour?

Answer 3

Feelings, thoughts, beliefs, attitudes, intentions and goals:

Underlying processes -> cognitive processes -> neuro-chemical processes in the brain.

Question 4

What are the historical social psychological trends?

Answer 4

Folk psychology (latter part 1800s) – collective mind (Le Bon, 1895):

Societal way of thinking and group mind (e.g. crowds).

Tarde (1898) – Bottom up approach.

Durkheim – Social laws determined by society (Jones, 2013).

Allport (1924) – Experimental social psychology

Question 5

What are the social psychological trends in the US?

Answer 5

Political drivers (fascism in Europe)

European centers reestablished (cold war)

European focus on groups and inter-group behaviour

Question 6

What is the psychological strand of social psychology?

Answer 6

Logical empiricism
social cognition
Quantitative / hypothetico-deductive (e.g. experimental).

Question 7

What is the sociological strand of social psychology?

Answer 7

Social constructionist / humanistic

Language & culture

Qualitative / inductive (e.g. discursive).

Question 8

What are the disciplinary disputes?

Answer 8

Beyond ABC (Attitudes, Behaviour, Choice).

Models and concepts of social change restrictive: Focus on individuals and behavioural choices.

Ignores context: Policy makers have no guidance on policy.

Does not consider societal transformation - maintains status quo.

Practice theory.

Question 9

more critiques?/critique of the critiques?

Answer 9

ABC critique is an overly simplistic portrayal of social psychological models.

Sociological approach not useful for practical solutions.

Separation of disciplinary perspectives is unhelpful.

Individuals should be part of the solution alongside policy and social change.

Question 10

What are the methodological issues?

Answer 10

Scientific methods used to study social behaviour.

Hx formed on the basis of: theory; social phenomenon; event:

E.g. a cyclist is quicker if racing than solitary.

Empirical tests can falsify, but not prove, hypotheses:

Science must be falsifiable.

Methodological pluralism important – minimises possibility that finding an artifact of method.

Experimental, lab based:

Avoids confounds – other factors vary in line with IV.

Low in external validity, high in internal validity.

Field experiments:

Less control over variables, random assignment difficult.

Focus groups; interviews; surveys:

Response set – purposeful or unintentional.

Archival research / Secondary analysis of data:

Case studies:

Unusual or rare phenomena – hypothesis development.

Question 11

What is an online study?

Answer 11

Online energy calculator:

Communicates savings in: kwh, £, or CO2

(Spence et al, 2014)

Question 12

what are the three levels of demand characteristics?

Answer 12

aware of the hyopthesis - mistaken of about the hypothesis

Compliance - relictance (please or mean)

faking - imagining - phenomogical control (unconcious)

Question 13

How to decrease the chance of demand characteristics?

Answer 13

Deception, Distraction (Red herring technique) from study purpose.

Double blind studies:

Conditions unknown to both participants and researcher.

Funneled debrief:

Probe expectations.

Quasi controls:

Participants to behave as if they were in treatment group.

Question 14

What are the three types of sensitivity?

Answer 14

3 types of sensitivity:

Threat of disclosure: Costs of potential disclosure.

Social desirability: Adhere to social norms.

Intrusiveness: Topics perceived as private or taboo.

Question 15

Why do people lie on self report/ in reaction to sensitive questions?

Answer 15

Impression management.

Likelihood of truth.

Self-deception.

=> Maximise social approval, avoid dismissive reactions.

Question 16

How to minimise the risks associated with asking ensitive questions?

Answer 16

Adjust research setting,

e.g. no others present; anonymous; minimise presence of interviewer.

Validation studies – objective data.

Non-threatening question wording.

Assurance of data protection and confidentiality.

‘Bogus pipeline’ procedure.

False self reports will be revealed.

Anonymous response techniques.

Sometimes not trusted.

Question 17

What are the requirements for research ethics?

Answer 17

Need approval from local ethics committee.

Risk (primarily welfare of participant):

Harmful procedures, long-term effects.

Valid Consent:

Study info, written consent, withdraw at any point.

Rewards should be appropriate.

Hawthorne (observer) Effect.

Confidentiality:

anonymity, reporting, destruction of data.

Question 18

What happens when you breach research ethics?

Answer 18

Giving advice.

Deception:

Natural behaviour, naive pps. -> 50-75% of exp some degree.

No other non-deceptive means exists.

Deception not expected to cause harm.

Possibility of significant contribution to science.

Debriefing:

Explain rationale/context, justify deception, leave without effects.

Mood induction? Investigation of stressful experiences?

Question 19

What is behaviourism?

Answer 19

Behaviourism:

Behaviour associated with positive situations or outcomes is increased. Originated from:

Classical conditioning (Pavlov, 1927).

Operant conditioning (Skinner, 1938; 1958).

Neo-behaviourism (DeGrandpré & Buskist, 2000).

Includes (e.g.) beliefs, feelings, motives.

Social Modelling – we imitate behaviour that is reinforced in others (Bandura & Walters, 1977).

Exaggerate extent to which people are passive to the situation.

Question 20

What is cognitive psychology?

Answer 20

Cognitive Psychology (Miller, 2003; Sperry, 1993):

We actively interpret and change our environment through our thought; cognitive processes; representations.

Origins in Gestalt theory (Koffka, 1935):

Perception is different from what is.

Social Cognition currently dominant:

How cognitive processes and representations are constructed and influence behaviour (Frith, 2008; Frith & Frith, 2012; Happé, Cook & Bird, 2017):

E.g. attitudes, dual process models, schemas

Question 21

What is evolutiobary social psychology?

Answer 21

Evolutionary social psychology:

Based on general evolutionary psychology and Darwinian theory.

Useful traits are adaptations that have developed through natural selection.

Same for complex social behaviours: those that have survival value, e.g. cooperative, aggression, will be passed on.

Can our genes account sufficiently account for the complexity of human behaviour

Question 22

What is individualistic?

Answer 22

Our behaviour depends upon enduring individual differences and characteristics.

People behave differently in different situations.

If personality is behaviourally consistent, then how does it develop? How some do personalities interpret situations differently from others?

Question 23

what is the collectivist approach?

Answer 23

People internally represent socially constructed group norms that influence behaviour

Contrast with personality theories as top down from group to individual.

Social Identity Perspective.

Question 24

What is Neuroscience and biochemistry

Answer 24

Psychological processes happen in the brain and therefore must be associated with electro-chemical brain activity.

Why useful to know location of processes. What if these processes are distributed?

Mirror neurons.

Question 25

key critiques of behaviourism?

Answer 25

Exaggerates extent to which people are passive to the situation.

Question 26

key critiques of cognitivism

Answer 26

But may struggle to account for irrational or automatic behaviour.

Question 27

key critiques of evolutionary p

Answer 27

Can it really account for the complexity of social behaviour?

Question 28

key critiques of individualism

Answer 28

But people behave differently in different situations.

Question 29

key critiques of collectivism

Answer 29

Difficult to predict which groups people might identify with.

Question 30

key critiques of neuroscience

Answer 30

Does locating processes help us understand them?

Question 31

What is reductionism?

Answer 31

Overly reduces the complexity of an issue:

Explains a phenomena with language and concepts at an overly low level of analysis, e.g. society in terms of groups, cognition in terms of neuropsychology.

Breaking down a problem useful in analysis but must return to the problem to be useful.

Can leave the original question unanswered.

Accept existence of different levels of explanation.

Should also focus on constructing theories that formally integrate concepts from different levels.

Question 32

What is positivism (science as a religion)?

Answer 32

Uncritical acceptance of scientific method.

Devalues and ignores subjective and introspective data.

Study of humans – ourselves – therefore biased, cannot be objective.

Dealt with by employing rigorous scientific methods and theorising:

e.g. operational definitions – defining theoretical constructs in a way that allows measurement and re-testing.

Question 33

What is fraudulent with in science?

Answer 33

Invalid procedures for data handling.

Omission of data points.

Fabrication of data.

Cherry picking.

Data snooping.

‘Hark-ing’.

Why?

Overburdened reviewers.

Positive publication bias.

Benefits outweigh risks.

Question 34

what is Open science & replication

Answer 34

Open access to published research.

Data sharing:

Depositing anonymised data sets in shared repositories.

Pre-register studies – indicate analyses in advance:

Center for Open Science.

Time consuming, still relies on honest reporting

Replication:

Many Labs Replication Project (now Many Labs 2).

10 out of 13 effects replicated, 1 weakly supported, 2 not supported (both social priming).

Statistical developments – to detect fraudulent data.