Final Exam Flashcards
Guiding principle of cognitive perspectives
Developing understanding the psychological filters that people use to see and understand their world
Field-dependence
“See the forest, not the trees”. Field-dependents are people oriented and look for context when information is ambiguous.
Field-independence
“See the trees, not the forest”. Field-independents can ignore distractions, are autonomous (non-social preferences). They look for details when information is ambiguous.
Personal construct theory
Assumes that people think about the world like amateur (imperfect) scientists. People have hypotheses about the world, and test them against real-life data to see how they hold up.
George Kelly’s “personal constructs”
Function (help organize, interpret, predict people’s behaviour), bipolar dimensions (good-bad, just-unjust, predicatble-random), implicit (we are not aware of them)
Locus of control
General tendency to explain things in life (acceptance or denial of personal responsibility). Internal (I am in control), external (something else is in control).
Learned helplessness
If nothing ever goes your way, you come to believe that you are helpless; perceiving non-contingency between action and outcome.
Optimism/Pessimism
Concerns people’s expectancies for future
Defensive pessimism
High-success pessimists. Anxious prior to test situations, this anxiety motivates high performance.
Norem & Cantor (1986)
Defensive pessimists did better than optimists in terms of GPA, both were effective but utilized different strategies.
Realistic orientation
Imagining mix of desired and
undesired possible outcomes
Effects of orientations to post-natal adjustment to motherhood
Realists had lowest rate of post-natal depression, pessimists had highest, optimists in middle
Mastery orientation
Refers to implicit theories of intelligence (according to PCT) (fixed, immutable intelligence - entity theorists vs fluid, increasable intelligence - incremental theorists)
Implicit theories of personality
Refers to implicit theories of whether traits are fixed (entity theorists) or can be changed (incremental theorists)
Implicit theories of prejudice
Are prejudicial attitudes fixed (entity) or able to be changed (incremental)?
Carr et al.’s theory on implicit theories of prejudice
Test on amount of distance between chairs during white & black student’s discussion (malleable students engage in smaller distance), interaction was shorter in students with fixed mindset
Implicit theories of groups
Are political and social groups’ actions fixed or can their attitudes be changed?
Halperin et al. on Israelis and Palestinians
Entity theorists tended to agree that all members of other group are evil, should never be trusted, and had less support for compromise. Study participants who read that other groups can change were more likely to believe that other groups can change.
Self-concept
Knowledge structure which contains things (experiences, attitudes, hopes) about you. Works as a memory aid (we remember things attached to us!), decision-making guide (avoiding cognitive dissonance), provides dimensions on which to evaluate ourselves, motivates certain behaviour
Possible selves
Represent goals & incentives for future behaviour, providing evaluative & interpretive context for a current view of self, as well as focus and organization for the pursuit of goals.
Desired self
Desired possible selves motivate behaviour. They ought to be supported with strategies. Disadvantaged teens with interventions to support plausible possible selves showed higher grades, fewer absences, less depression, and less disruptive behaviour one year later.
Ideal self
Desired self. Presence promotes promotion: oriented toward gains. If ideal self is not consistent with current self: sadnesss, guilt.
Ought self
Self one ought to be. Presence promotes prevention: oriented toward safety and responsibility. If ought self is not consistent with current self: shame, anxiety.
Development of self at 18 months
Human babies recognize self in mirror
Development of self at 18-24 months
Child knows what they look like. They use pronouns, pretend play, and learn rules of behaviour.
Development of self at 2-3 years
Learns about own sex and age
Development of self at 3-12 years
What am I (not) good at? (Social comparisons - I’m better than you at… and private comparisons - I know things others don’t)
Development of self in teen years
Perspective taking - what do others think of me?
Clear self-concept is linked with… (Campbell et al., 1986)
Higher self-esteem, less anxiety and depression, higher conscientiousness
Self-concept clarity during adolescence
(Van Dijk et al., 2014)
Less anxiety and depression in next year, higher SCC correlated with open communication with parents
SCC and cultural context
In Western culture, which is more focused on “knowing thyself”. Lower SCC scores are more correlated with confusion. However, in Eastern culture, which is more focused on fitting in, harmony, lower SCC scores are more correlated with being attuned to social context.
Social identity
The self that others see in you (visible traits, style, roles, physical aspects of self- gender)
Self as an object
Culture has an influence on how we see ourselves
Self-objectification theory
Culture influences how we see ourselves, and media provides standards against which we compare ourselves. North American culture objectifies women to internalize an objectifier’s perspective on their own bodies. Self-worth becomes determined by appearance.
Identity narrative
Story of one’s life (agency, coherence, purpose)
Results of self-objectification
Self-esteem becomes contingent of living up to cultural ideals- appearance monitoring, restrained eating, shame, etc
Personalizing cognition
Stimuli causes person to remember event from own life
Objectifying cognition
Stimuli causes person to remember facts previously learned
Cognitive goals
Standards people use to evaluate themselves and others
