Lecture 2 Flashcards
What are the two aspects of the social self?
Self concept; how people come to know themselves, for example, IQ, height etc.
Self-esteem; How people evaluate themselves.
List 5 species that have self concept
Humans, dolphins, apes, elephants and magpies.
Describe Bem’s self perception theory
Its the idea that we develop attitudes by observing our own behaviour and concluding what attitudes caused it.
Describe Strack’s facial feedback and emotion study
People with a pen between their teeth scored a cartoon more positively because the pen causes them to smile. However, the people who had the pen between their lips rated it more negatively. This is an example of the self perception theory as people are observing their own behaviour to obtain the attitude towards the cartoon.
Describe Zajonc’s facial feedback and emotion study
The participants repeated a vowel 20 times. The vowel depended on which condition they were in. People who repeated ‘ah’ rated their current emotion more positively than those who repeated ‘u’.
Describe Well’s facial feedback and opinion study
The participants listened to a message in a headphone, whilst they listened to the message they had to either shake or nod their head. Those who nodded, agreed with the message more.
Discuss intrinsic motivation and give a study to back it up
If you like a CD but then someone says they will pay you 5 pounds every time you listen to it, then your motivation to listen to the CD will lower.
Lepper did a study and found that when rewarded, the children no longer enjoyed playing with the toy. This is because the intrinsic motivation changes to extrinsic motivation.
What is the overjustification effect?
When intrinsic motivation diminishes because an activity is associated with a reward/extrinsic factor. They’re no longer doing it because they like it. However, overjustification only occurs when people have a choice.
Briefly describe Festinger’s 1954 study
People evaluate their own emotions by comparing themselves to others.
Describe Schachter’s study about comparisons to evaluate one’s own emotions
Participants were injected with a drug, some were informed about the effects and others weren’t. They then spent time in a waiting room with a confederate that was either happy or angry. The participants that were uninformed copied the emotions of the confederate as they couldn’t explain how they were feeling. This supports the two factor theory of emotion; physiological arousal and social cues result in the emotions you feel.
Describe Schachter’s study about anxiety and affiliation
Participants where told they would receive a mild shock. They were told that they would receive a nasty or a pleasant one. Before the shock they could either wait alone or with someone who was also going to receive the shock. Those who believed they would get a nasty shock chose to wait with someone a lot more.
This was then repeated except the person they could wait with wasn’t going to receive the shock. They then no longer wanted to wait with the confederate. This is because they weren’t going through the same experience.
Define self esteem
An affective component of the self consisting of positive and negative self evaluations.
Describe a study about categories of thought
People wrote down their thoughts every time a bleeper went off. People thought about work the most and secondly had ‘no thoughts’. Also, it was found that people felt unpleasant when thinking about themselves. People then suppress or change their behaviour. However, alcoholics will just stay the same.
Discuss Beaman’s study on the effects of self focusing
Children took more sweets from a bowl in an empty room if there wasn’t a mirror. However, when a mirror was present, less sweets were taken. This is because they’re more self aware and conscious.
Is it good to use mirrors in shops to make people more self-aware?
Yes and no. Yes because it decreases shoplifting but no because it decreases sales as it makes people feel more self conscious and unpleasant.
