Exam 4 Social Psych

Question 1

What is social psychology?

Answer 1

how individuals think about, interact with, and are influenced by other people.

Question 2

What’s the difference between social psychology and personality psychology?

Answer 2

Social Psych power of the situation, that people are strongly influenced by the social setting

While Personality psych believe in the power of traits, that people are strongly influence by their internal personality traits

Question 3

When is socail psych more likely to influence personality psych or vice versas

Answer 3

Powerful situations can overwhelm personality (e.g., peer pressure).

Personality takes over in weak situations (e.g., sitting alone).

Question 4

What is the power of the situation?

Question 5

What is social cognition? Why is it important in social psychology?

Answer 5

How we perceive, remember, and interpret information about ourselves and others.

Important becaise we are relying on what we already know to make since of the world

Question 6

What is an attribution?

Answer 6

is an explanation for the cause of a behavior or outcome (either for us or other people).

Question 7

What’s the difference between an internal and external attribution?

Answer 7

Internal (personality): something inside the person caused the event.

External (situation): something outside the person caused the event

Question 8

Why do attributions matter?

Answer 8

Attributions can help us understand other people’s personality

Question 9

Internal vs. External attributions

Answer 9

Internal attributions tell you something about a person’s personality.

External attributions don’t tell you anything about personality.

Question 10

What is the fundamental attribution error

Answer 10

The tendency to underestimate the effects of a situation on a person’s behavior and overestimate the effects of the person’s disposition

The belief that behavior always reflects a person’s personality.

Question 11

Why is the fundamental attribution error important?

Answer 11

We’re not taking into consideration the power of the situation to influence people’s behavior.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of blaming the victim for their problems, when that is not always the case.

Question 12

What is actor-observer bias?

Answer 12

we make attributions about ourselves that protect our self-esteem.

Question 13

What is a schema, and how do they affect our social cognition?

Answer 13

Mental frameworks that organize your knowledge on a specific category. (what we know)

also help us simplify things

Question 14

What are self-schemas

Answer 14

beliefs about ourselves.

Question 15

What are scripts

Answer 15

how an event should take place.

Question 16

What are stereotypes

Answer 16

schemas about groups of people

Question 17

Why are schemas problematic when applied to people?

Answer 17

People are more varied than objects. Stereotypes are simply not accurate.

Objects have easily examined, objective qualities. People have hidden, unobservable traits.

Question 18

What did Kelley (1950) do

Answer 18

Had two groups of students observe the same lecture but are given different descriptions of the speaker before his talk. (One said cold and said warm)

Question 19

What did Kelly (1950) find

Answer 19

The lecturer was rated better when he was rated warmly

Question 20

What is an attitude

Answer 20

are feelings influenced by beliefs, which predispose people to have specific reactions to objects, people, and events.

Question 21

What do attitudes do

Answer 21

When other influences are minimal, attitudes that are stable, specific, and easily recalled can affect our actions.

Question 22

What is cognitive dissonance

Answer 22

discomfort that people feel when they behave in ways that are inconsistent with their attitudes or conception of themselves.

People are motivated to reduce these unpleasant feelings of dissonance.

Question 23

How do we reduce cognitive dissonance

Answer 23

Changing your attitude or behavior, making them consistent again.

Acquiring new information that helps reduce the dissonance.

Reducing the importance of the beliefs or attitudes, eliminating the conflict.

Question 24

What is the foot-in-the-door technique and how does it use cognitive dissonance?

Answer 24

Make a small request, and then later ask for something larger People are more likely to comply if you do this.

Question 25

What is social influence?

Answer 25

the effect that the words, actions, or mere presence of other people have on us

two types conformity and obedience

Question 26

What is conformity?

Answer 26

doing what everyone else is doing.

Question 27

Informational influence

Answer 27

you don’t know what to do.

Question 28

normative influence?

Answer 28

you want a group to like you.

Question 29

What did Asch (1955) do

Answer 29

The line judging task was completed 18 times.
The participants working for the experimenter uniformly gave incorrect answers 12 times.
The real participant heard everyone’s answers before he gave his.

Question 30

What did Asch (1955) find

Answer 30

About 75 % of participants gave at least one incorrect answer during the study after hearing other people give incorrect answers.

People will lie in order to fit in with a group.

Question 31

Why do people conform and obey?

Answer 31

They feel incompetent or insecure.
Their group has at least three people.
Everyone else agrees
They admire the group’s status and attractiveness.

Question 32

What is obedience?

Answer 32

When behavior is influenced due to the direct commands of an authority figure.

Question 33

Why do people obey authority figures?

Answer 33

Because of learning, Heuristic and normative

Question 34

learning

Answer 34

we’re trained to follow authority figures.

Question 35

Heuristic

Answer 35

authority figures know what they’re doing.

Question 36

Normative

Answer 36

you want to fit in.

Question 37

What did Milgram (1963) do

Answer 37

“Learning experiment” on punishment and memory
“Teacher” is participant
“Student” is a confederate, must memorize word pairs the teacher provides.
“Student” mistakes must be punished with shocks that escalate in strength.

Question 38

What did milgram find?

Answer 38

Over 60 % of participants shocked the student at the maximum voltage.

Question 39

Why do conformity and obedience matter?

Answer 39

People are vulnerable to social influence, especially if there’s strong normative pressure or the presence of an authority figure.

This kind of social influence can cause normal, ordinary people to conform to falsehoods or obey orders to commit cruel acts.

Question 40

Why do people need groups?

Answer 40

Provide valuable assistance
Provide social interaction
Define our idenity

Question 41

What is social facilitation?

Answer 41

Occurs when a group observes you performing a task and effects your performance

Easy, well-learned task? You perform better

Difficult, poorly-practiced task? You perform worse

Question 42

What is social loafing

Answer 42

When your in a big group the group causes decreased physiological arousal which generally leads to less effort and poorer performance.

(Found in group projects)

Question 43

What is deindividuation

Answer 43

Occurs when you’re in a large mob of people whose influence overwhelms your sense of identity
Feelings of anonymity
High levels of arousal
Reduced self-awarness
Focus on group norms

Usually results in the mob engaging in destructive behavior

Question 44

What is group polarization

Answer 44

Group disscussions with like-minded others strengthen members’ prevailing beliefs and attitudes.

Hear supporting arguments that polarize your opinion.
Express stronger opinions to fit in with the group.

Question 45

What is groupthink

Answer 45

People are driven by a desire for harmony within a decision-making group, with this desire overriding realistic appraisal of alternatives.

Question 46

Why do group processes matter

Answer 46

You will always work in groups
The collective effort can produce good results
You also need to recognize that groups can cause bad outcomes.

Question 47

How does role-play affect attitudes?

Answer 47

You get a new role and at first it feels like your pretending, but eventually you change yourself it fit the role and becomes you

Question 48

central route to persuasion?

Answer 48

occurs when interested people’s thinking is influenced by considering evidence and arguments.

Question 49

peripheral route to persuasion

Answer 49

occurs when people are influenced by incidental cues, such as a speaker’s attractiveness or an adds that pulls at the heart strings

Question 50

What is social contagion?

Answer 50

The tendancy to do what other people in a group (ex yawn, same posture, ect)