Exam 1 Flashcards
Social Psych, Self, Biases, Psych basics
Social Psychology (what is it)
The study of individuals in social situations
- Scientific study of how people think, influence, and relate to one another
father of social psychology
Kurt Lewin
main sub areas of social psych
cognition, influence, relations
descriptive methods
- observational research (or naturalistic)
- correlation/survey research
correlational research + it is often done through…
looks at the relationship of two or more vars (no causality)
- uses the correlation coefficient (r)
–> questionnaires or interviews
experimental methods
lab + field experiments
good and bad of correlational research
Pros: easy to collect data, high external val.
cons: unmeasured vars, no causality, low internal val
understanding correlations
- a relationship can still exist without being positive or linear
- positive = no sign, negative = sign in front
- no correlation = unrelated vars
Experimental/lab
- manipulated IV, measured DV
- Controlled extraneous vars
- causal relationships
- high internal, low external
- random assignment
good and bad of the lab method
pros: assess causality, high internal val, experimental realism
cons: generalizability?, mundane realism?, low external val
experimental realism
does the participant feel like they are engaging in something real (produced results depend on emotional/cognitive realism)
random assignment
everyone in the study has a shot at being in any condition
random assignment vs sampling
everyone in the population you want to study has a shot to be in it
control condition
IV is not manipulated opposed to the experimental condition where it is (by researchers in lab method)
Major advantage of experimental designs
CAUSALITY –> IV impacts DV
Mundane realism
How well does the experiment exemplify the real world? is it realistic and reflective of real-world circumstances?
Generalizability
can the results of a study be attributed to the real world, different populations, or people in the real world effectively…high external validity = good generalizability
hind sight bias
the belief that the outcome was obvious after the experimental result occurs
is social psychology common sense
individuals can predict outcomes of research no better than chance
- there are always exceptions
- social psych looks at the AVERAGE performance across groups
- hindsight bias
Replicability/reproducibility crisis
the growing belief that the results of many scientific studies cannot be reproduced and are thus likely to be wrong
replication
ability to reproduce/repeat an experiment to confirm the findings…to determine the extent to which they are generalizable across time, different settings, and people.
- EXTERNAL VALIDITY
Open Science Collaboration
- 2015, Brian Nosek
attempted to directly replicate 100 studies from several top-ranked journal studies - replication rate was low and effects were smaller (36% replicated)
Famous failed replications
- marshmallow + kids
- pencil between teeth + mood
- feet/posing on decision making
Marshmellow test
Famous replication fail
- told a child that they could eat a marshmellow right now or wait and get more –> decision making/delayed gratification
- stronger study but weaker correlation (by half)
- none after demographic vars
pencil and pen on mood study 1988
failed replication attempt
- pencil in between teeth –> increased mood
- pen in between lips –> decreased
- 17 replications –> none successful (over 2000 participants)
Feet Posing and Leaning on desk study
famous failed replication study
- doing feet apart and leaning on desk will increase riskier deiciosn making
- saw higher testosterone and cortisol at first
- unsuccessful attempts later on
reduce the replication crisis
- pre-registered studies
- reporting effect sizes and confidence intervals for statistical tests
- recruiting large samples
the self
we are the center of our social world
spotlight effect
the belief that everyone is focused and observant of you…you think more people are concerned/attentive to another person’s behavior
- Gilovich (2000) –> FANILOW t-shirts but estimated amount of people that noticed was higher than the actual
“every one is looking at the coffee stain on my shirt omggg” is an example of
spotlight effect
illusion of transparency
illusion that our concealed emotions leak out and can be easily read by others
- driven partly by spotlight effect
self-reference effect
- we process infor more quickly and remember it better when it related to us in some way
- remembering bias
the self-concept
what we know and understand about ourselves
- thoughts, beliefs, felling about the self
- organized through schemas
- malleable and open to change
- myers and twinge
SELF schemas
mental representations/templates that help people organize and interpret information about themselves
- derived from experience, predict the future, guide processing, shapes self-perception, motivation, and behavior
Self schema examples
- athletic self schema –> pay attention to sports
intellectural self schema
what impacts self-concept
- genetic influences (twin studies)
- social experiences
self esteem
the sum of all our self views across various domains
- schadenfreude = joy at anothers misfortune
self-efficacy
how competent we feel on a task
- self efficacy language was more successful than self esteem language in performance on children
self serving bias
a tendency to perceive oneself favorably
- bias blind spots
- ex: ethics, health, attractiveness, driving, virtues, professional competence, intelligence, etc
- subjective topics give leeway for cognitive negotiation
self serving attributions (bias)
attributing positive outcomes to oneself and negative ones to external factors (situation, etc)
Satvinksy said (2005)
people working in a group each estimated their total percentage of contribution and it totally more than 100%
illusory optimism
making ourselves immune to the bad/misfortune…no need to take precautions
defense pessimism
anticipates problems and motivates effective coping
- can promote precaution and inspired hard work
false consensus effect
we find support for our positions by overestimating how much others agree
(related to confirmation bias/similar)
self-handicapping
people sabotage their chances for success by creating impediments that make success less likely
- fears of failure = cause
- self-protective aim
- protecting one’s self-image through handy excuses
why self-handicapping
- avoid work/preparation
- lower initial expectations to boost the outcome
- give the opponent the advantage
- attach failure to something external and temporary
self presentation
tactics driven by our wanting to present a desired image both to an external audience and to an internal audience (ourselves) –. you change the way you behave with different people
self-monitoring
adjusting/changing the way you behave with different people/to each situation
(low self-esteem related)
Social role
set of behaviors, attitudes, functions and responsibilities associated with a particular position in society
(ex: moms clean/cook)
preconceived notions
playacting that becomes reality when these roles solidify
Social comparison
others help us define the standards by which we define ourselves…where you stand relative to others…evaluations of self based on others
-upward vs downward comparisons
ex: “am i rich” by looking at rich people
- incomplete information –> social media withholding to create a + image
success and failure
our daily experiences may lead to empowerment or to lower self esteem
Looking Glass Self (Cooley + Mead)
we perceive ourselved based on how we believe others perceive us
- our reflection of how we think we appear to others
Individualism
own needs and goals are important to self/identity/life
- western cultures
- autonomous to self
- prioritize own goals
- personal attributes
collectivism
group identities…interrelated self
- prioritizes goals of one’s group
- group identies
- Eastern/Asian cultures
Culture and Cognition implications (why)
Self-worth + changes to self-esteem
Ocean picture
4 Green and 1 Orange pencils
Date someone your friends and family dont like?
Nisbett (2003) Study
Culture and Cognition - ocean picture shown and ppl from different cultures had to recall what they see. Americans saw the central, big fish while Eastern cultures commented on the background + relationships
- holisitic thinking in collectivist cultures –> affects the attributions perceived
Self Knowledge
analyzing why we deal the way we do can make our judgements less accurate
predicting our behavior
planning fallacy, affective forecasting, impact bias
planning fallacy
underestimation of time to complete a task
affective forecasting
our ability to predict how we will feel about something in the future –> over estimate the nature of feelings/reactions (impact bias)
impact bias
focus on just one event (not on other good/bad/neutral events)…underestimate psychological immune systems
WHY? - to bounce back from social issues undermined (no faith in resilience)
synthesized happiness
the happiness we make/put effort into creating
natural happiness
the happiness we get from facing/accepting reality (natural happiness)
is high self esteem a good thing?
pros: fosters resilience, good feelings, mental health, motivation, GPA performance
Baumeister said that success is weakly correlated to high self esteem
Baumeister on self esteem
weak causal evidence for academic success and work performance and self esteem
- effects are small and limited
- the real focus is on self-control, discipline, and efficacy to do a task in kids
correlates of low self esteem
- anxiety, depression, loneliness
- negative viewpoints
- remember other worst behaviors
- dont want to be seen positively –> want people to view them the way they see themselves
- less satisfying relationships
high self esteem correlates
- good mental health
- good feelings that are sustained
- resilience
- motivation
narcissism
overly positive or inflated view of the self
- selfish, egotism, entitlement, vanity, self-confidence
grandiose narcissism
a type of narcissism that is heightened…these people dont value social relationships at all or condier others
NPI
Narcissistic personality inventory
- no clinical cut off (cant diagnose)
- narcissism measure
- high score = greater narcisistic behavior/values
Can we judge who likely to be a narcissist?
NPI scale but cannot use to diagnose
- both adaptive (ex leadership) and maladaptive (ex grandiosity) are components of Narcissists
narcissism myths
- narcissism is just “really high” self esteem
- narcissists are insecure and have low self esteem
- narcissists really are better looking/smarter, etc
- some narcissism is healthy
can narcissists change?
(Hepper et al 2014)
- perspective taking
- putting yourself in someone else’s shoes increases needed empathy
Twenge and Campbell 2009
Compares past and present college student responses on NPI from 1979-2006
results –> students in the 2000s scored greater than those from the 20th century
–> increase in narcissism but wetzel research shows slight decline
above average effect
a tendency to think we are better than most others
- stronger in traits that are subjective AND desirable skills/behaviors
unrealistic optimism / optimism bias
(sharot 2012)
people generally predisposed to feel more optimistic about their own lives…you perceive yourself as more likley to gain positive life events than negative ones
optimism bias benefits and dangers
- anxiety of danger/failure forced motivation to take effective actions
- need enough optimism for hope
- reflection of actions and caution
false concusses
overestimating the commonality of opinions, and undesirable/unsuccessful behaviors
- that no one watched Jem and the holograms growing up
false uniqueness
underestimating commonality of abilities and desirable/successful behaviors
- That I had a 4.6 GPA (everyone here had that)
humble bragging
people may use SNS’s to boost their self-image and manage impressions (Campbell)
Managing impressions
Daniel Kahneman’s 2 systems
system 1 = automatic
- functions automatically, outside awareness, gut feeling (implicit)
- influences more of our decisions because it takes less time and is more accessible
system 2 = controlled
- deliberate, reflective, conscious, (explicity)
priming
activating particular associations in memory
marickle et al 2001 + sharrif et al 2016
subliminally flashed the word “bread” –> faster to detect the word butter vs unrelated words
- ex: religious ppl are more exposed to religious words and are more likely to help people
embodied cognition
the mutual influence of bodily sensations on cognitive preferences and social judgements
- people who ate alone judged room temperature as colder than with others
confirmation bias
tendency to search for information that confirms your own viewpoint
- eager to verify own beliefs
- ideological echo changes (confining sources)
belief perseverance
persistence of initial conceptions despite evidence to the contrary
- once accepted it is difficult to acknowledge as falsehood
- based on own experiences, not fact –> harder to change because you’ve “witnessed”
Ross et al (1975)
distinguishing real vs fake suicide notes
- fake feedback in 3 conditions
- debriefed on fake feedback
- Results –> participants are susceptible to deceit –> ethical considerations of deception, suggestion that certain beliefs about the self can persist long term
misinformation effect
incorporating false information into memory after receiving misleading information
- THEY’RE EATING THE DOGS
Overconfidence phenomenon
more confident than correct
overestimating accuracy of beliefs
driven by –> confirmation bias + the idea is still culpable in reality
fischoff et al 1977
knowledge test
participants were 100% sure but only 70-80% correct
Finding –> confidence doesn’t correlate with correctness
areas of concern with overconfidence phenomenon
jury decision making (ricky jones), medical outcomes, child welfare, government decisions
Jury Decision making and overconfidence
confident eyewitnesses are convincing to juries + are influential in conviction
- ricky jones dspite alibi due to line up
- 70% of cases
- 350 cases with long sentences are then exonerated by DNA
Witnesses and confidence what to do?
get a statement and look at a lineup right away
avoid distortion or should be noted if memory is not tested immediately
law enforcement should look at
- # of times the witness’ memory is tested
- double blind
- suspect stand out (more likely to be picked)
- confidence statement
- you DONT have to pick someone in a lineup
overconfidence remedies
- prompt feedback
- make people aware through good reasons and judgements
heuristics
mental short cuts or general rules of thumb…used when
- faced with too much info
- unimportant decisions
- limited time for decisions
used because they are efficient and lead to good decisions in reasonable time
representativeness heuristic
People classify something based on how similar it is to a typical case
the “probably” of an event (or sample) is determined by the degree to which it is
- similar in characteristics to population
- salient features of the process (typical situation)
EX: Gambling –> you want a low number so you throw the dice lightly
base rate
information about the frequency of members of different categories in the population
***the real probability that something exists or will occur
EX: Classics vs farmer based on description but participants pay less attention to the situation (way more farmers that classic scholars)
Coin Flip
which sequence of 4 coins is more probable? different pattern but same number of heads and tails
–> majority chose the more sporadic pattern because it SEEMS more likely that your wouldn’t get 2 tails and 2 heads in a row
Kahneman and Tversky (Lawyer Engineer)
Experimentally manipulated the base rate
- asked the probability that the description represented engineer or a lawyer
- given descriptions of 100 professionals written by psychologists based on interviews (both E and L)
- participants read randomly selected descriptions but some were told…
- there are 30 E and 70 L while others were told the reverse
- people chose to ignore the base rate and prioritze the description content –> easy/accessible descriptors to base decision-making
when do we use the base rate info?
- when that is the only given info
- when people feel like the judgement they are making is relevant to base rate (it matters)
availability heuristic
a mental rule of thumb whereby people base a judgement on the ease with which they can recall relevant examples
Kahneman and Tvresky R study
availability heuristic
asked participants if there were more words that started with “r” or where “r” was the second letter
–> most said “started with r” because it was easier to support with examples…easier to recall
biased samples
created by personal experience and the media (general exposure AND self-selected)
media influence
general media
+
self selected media –> we choose and that can give biased perceptions of things
Ex: shark attacks,
Anchoring and adjustment
impacts perspectives towards others. Another persons situation anchors or thinking and then adjusts our behavior and response
counterfactual thinking
imagine alternative scenarios and outcomes (after the case)
upward –> how they could turn out better
downward –> how they could turn out worse
illusory correlations
the perception of a relationship where none exists, or the perception of a stronger relationship than what actually is
illusory correlation contributors
it is easier to notice the time when two things happen together than when one does or neither do…more retrievable in our minds (availability heuristic)
- 2 distinct pairs
attribution
process by which people explain events, their behavior, and behavior of others
- there are a variety of frameworks
- fritz Heider (father of attribution)
locus of causality (heider + attributions)
understanding attribution frameworks
internal/dispositional –> to the person
- ex: effort, motivations, attitudes, skills, etc
external/situational –> outside the person’s ability
- ex: the test was hard
misattribution
we may attribute behavior or events to the wrong source
- common in men in powerful positions
inferring traits
we often assume or infer that people’s actions indicate their intentions and dispositions
spontaneous trait inference
effortless, automatic inference of a trait after exposure to someone’s behavior (QUICK/implicit)
Ex: the man is running after a lady in an alley –> immediate though is shes getting robbed
Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE)
also known as correspondence bias
- the tendency for observers to believe that people’s behavior matches their dispositions
- situation = underestimated
- disposition = overestimated
Jones and Harris 1967
FAE
Students read pro and anti castro debater speeches
- key condition read either prose and was then told that a student was forced to write from that perspective
- DV = decide is the student was pro or anti castro in real life
- Result ==> students inferred the debater had the assigned leanings (they corresponded)…situation not taken into account only the dispositional content
why do we commit FAE?
- Perspective and situational awareness
- cognitive capacity
- culture
Actor observer difference (/bias)
tendency to attribute own behavior to external factors while attributing other’ behavior to internal factors
Camera perspective
refers to the viewpoint from which a scene is observed or presented
Lassoter + turnem –> when the confession tape focuses on the suspect, the confession seems more genuine opposed to focused on the interregator the confession seems more coerced
cognitive capacity
we often have limited time/capacity when judging others –> spontaneous dispositional inferences
Culture and FAE
- more common in individualistic cultures
- we assume people not situations cause events
- collectivist = more holistic (more situational correctivness)
Dispositional attributions
attention is focused on us (self-awareness)
Ex: mirror and taking a test prevents cheating
situational attributions
time has passed
opporunity to observe others in different context (OTHER)
Gender differnces in attributions
in the face of failure –> women are more so dispositionally attributed (internal) while men are situationally attributed (external factors)
opposite for success
Self Fulfilling Prophecy
a belief that leads to its own fulfillment…a perceiver goes into an interaction with an expectation about the target –> the perceiver’s expectations affect the situation causing said expectation to come true
Rosenthal and Jacobson (1968)
bloomers vs non bloomers and told the teachers
- bloomers were said to have more potential so teachers treated them with more inspiration and positive reinforcement
- pre and post IQ test showed that the bloomers’ scores > nonbloomers because of self fulfilling prophecy on the teachers account
Experimental bias
(rosenthal and jacobson)
sometimes participants live up to what they believe experimenters expect of them (social desirability effect)
critical evaluation of SFP
no accumulation with time (at least no in the classroom)
this behavior/effect dissipates
SFP and breaking the cycle
- effects appear to be small
- SFP is higher among at-risk stigmatized groups
- teachers positive expectations boost low self-esteem
