Final Flashcards
Describe Social Contagion
Process by which information, such as attitudes, emotions, or behaviors, rapidly spreads throughout a group from one member to another without rational thought and reason
Give examples of Social Contagion through History
Dancing Plague of 1518, Increase in Tics because of COVID, Superbowl (Riots in Boston after victory)
What is Wisdom of Crowds
Taking the average of many people’s judgments would get you closer to the truth than any individual was
When is Wisdom of Crowds smart?
Diverse Information, Independent Opinions, No Systematic Bias, Many People
When is Wisdom of Crowds harmful/bad?
Bias is amplified in crowd, Following crowd behavior (local rule: do what you see others doing), Conformity, Crystallization Phenomenon (When crowds of people look in a certain direction, causing everyone else to look the same way too)
Describe Werther Effect
A phenomenon that people copy suicidal behavior after a celebrity dies, using the same method. Copycats tend to be similar in age, and gender to models
Describe Information Conformity
When you believe you don’t have the complete information, and other people might know better
Describe Normative Conformity
Conformity to get along with others
Describe Stress’ relation to conformity
Stress increases conformity - it draws people together
List the Principles of Compliance
Social Validation, Authority, Consistency, Reciprocity, Friendship, and Scarcity
Describe “Click-Where” (fixed action patterns)
“Click-Where” (fixed action patterns): There’s a certain way, biologically and culturally, that humans get designed to respond to social situations
Describe “Foot in the door” effect
If you have a big ask, it can be useful to start with a relatively small ask - you exploit desire for consistency
Describe Exploiting Reciprocity
People like to return favors and make up for things that they do that feel awkward or wrong
Describe Exploiting Reciprocity
People like to return favors and make up for things that they do that feel awkward or wrong
Describe Cognitive Niche
Giraffe’s niche are the Savanna. Our niche isn’t a physical environment, but the stuff we can do because of our brains
Describe Cultural Niche
Humans have not evolved to be smarter than other animals, we’ve evolved to copy each other better than other animals
Describe Cultural Evolution
What we teach and learn, and culturally inherent
If culture makes us smart, but mere imitation isn’t enough, what’s the key?
- Biased Transmission: This occurs when one trait is more likely to be copied than another trait because of prestige and similarity (age, gender, etc.)
~ Useful filter on copying - Guided Variation
Describe Prisoner’s Dilemma
A situation where individual decision-makers always have an incentive to choose in a way that creates a less than optimal outcome for the individuals as a group
Why does Group Selection help cooperation
Group selection works because it motivates people to work together as there is a shared fate. You need low migration rates and strong selection pressure
How does Punishment help cooperation
If you are in a cooperative group, if a defector joins, the rational may be to set up punishments to deter negative behavior
Punishment does not always work as their is personal cost and risk. If you punish other people, you are susceptible to getting harmed, while everyone else free rides
How does Reciprocity help cooperation
Because we engage with one another repeatedly, we are motivated to cooperate with one another
How does Kin and “Cultural Kin” help cooperation
People want groups with shared values that are identifiable. We cooperate with ourselves
Describe Extended Phenotype
Kind of regular consequences of your behavior that natural selection intends. Natural selection might intend for us to change the behavior of people around us
Using punishment and reward as a way to change the behavior of somebody else
Describe Reasoned Response/Deterrence versus Adaptive Heuristic/Retribution
Reasoned Response/Deterrence: “If I punish, you will behave”
Adaptive Heuristic/Retribution: “Because you harmed you must suffer”
- Adaptive reason to have this retributive instinct would be because it changes people’s behavior in the future
Describe how moral luck relates to Adaptive Heuristic/Retribution
People are retributive based more on outcome then intentions - the example of crashing into a tree versus a girl while drunk (both are examples of drunk driving, and neither had the intention of doing either, but the outcome is what determines punishment)
Describe Deterrence and Retribution with the Levels of Analysis
Ultimate = Deterrence: At the ultimate level, we think punishment is designed to deter people from future wronging behavior or to teach them how to behave
Proximate = Retribution: At the proximate level, we think punishment is used to see people suffer for the wrongdoings that they did
What were the findings on killing (moral universals)
PTSD: Military personnel suffer from “moral injury” - the feeling of knowing that you harmed other people in a situation in which that’s what your country was asking you to do, and that’s how you are saving yourself and the people around you
People don’t want to kill people that is personal (right in front of them, the damage being visibly seen)
Describe personal moral dilemma (Dual Process Morality)
Personal moral dilemma: The harm that you are doing to somebody is very up close and personal
Automatic response: When we are aware we are harming or killing someone, we have an automatic emotional response that tells us not to do it (dorsolateral prefrontal cortex)
What is moral reasoning for according to Piaget and Fetlock?
Discovering truth (Piaget)
Manipulating People (Tetlock)
What did Haidt find about moral attitudes
Found insignificant differences between geography, culture, countries, etc. the biggest difference came from socioeconomic status. Low SES participants were more likely to agree the statements were morally wrong than High SES participants. High SES admit it’s weird, but so long as it doesn’t harm them or anyone else, they are okay with it
What do Liberal US respondents care more about (morality)
Liberal US respondents care more about harm and fairness, and less about being loyal to in-group, respecting authority, and protecting the sacred from degrading influences
What do Conservative US respondents care more about
Conservative US respondents showed a small and significant decrease in the importance of harm and fairness, a large and very significant increase in the importance of the remaining moral foundations
What explains why people punish people who cooperate in experiment games (prisoner’s dilemma)
Revenge, maximizing personal advantage, and punish non-conformists/conspicuous generosity
What are the features of a society that predict antisocial punishment?
Weak social norms of cooperation, rule of law, and democracy
How do we explain moral diversity?
Cultural Evolution: Different cultures have different norms and collective knowledge
How do cultures ensure that people get along and cooperate?
Solution 1: Bands
Emphasizes Reciprocity, Reputation, Shared Moral Identity
Basically… Long-term relationships + Small groups + Shared values
Solution 2: States
Outsource punishment to the state, outsource cooperation to the state, solving public good problems (national infrastructure), a connection to Liberalism
What is Imitation
Behavior where you can copy exactly or as exactly as you can even if you can’t make sense of why it was done that way
What is “Overimitation”
Toddlers imitate what an adult shows them. The theory is that the best way to learn culture is to copy others, even if it’s not obvious why it’s necessary
Describe how Toddler’s react to adults performing strange actions in experiments
Copies action precisely (imitates) if strangeness has no obvious explanation
Modifies action (emulates) if strangeness has an obvious, irrelevant explanation
Example: Experiment where experimenter turns on light with forehead and is not using their hands
What is Emulation and its problem
Copying the broad goal that a person has but coming up with your own way of solving the problem
Problem: If you only copy things insofar as you can understand why they work, then culture can’t help you improve beyond the things that you could already understand
