Midterm definitions Flashcards
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
The scientific study of how individuals’ thoughts, feelings, and behaviour are influenced by the real or imagined presence of others
Person variables
Ideology temperament and personality
Situation variables
Culture social norms etc
SCIENTIFIC Study
relies on the scientific method
THE INDIVIDUAL
Focus is on the individual’s construal of specific events, their thoughts, feelings, behaviors
THOUGHTS, FEELINGS AND BEHAVIOR
ABC
Affect toward self, others, or various issues. Affect = feelings / attitude
Behaviours across a range of domains. i.e., aggression, helping behavior
Cognitions about the self, others, or various issues.How we think
First experiment considered to be Norman Triplett’s results
e made their performance better.
Milgram’s work on obedience to authority led to expansion and enthusiasm within the field. But it also led
debate on ethics of social psychological research and the dominance of experimentation in the field
Integrating emotion
automatic vs. controlled processes
Conceptual variable
abstract concept one may attempt to measure
Operational definition
how conceptual variable will be manipulated or measured
Descriptive Research
describe people and their thoughts, feelings, and behaviours. And Discovers trends and tendencies
Descriptive approachs
oObservational studies (of what is naturalistically occurring). oArchival studies. oSurveys – importance of random sampling
Correlational research
to learn about the relationship between two or more variables
Correlatin Advantages
an study the associations of naturally occurring variables that cannot be manipulated or induced.
Can examine phenomena difficult or unethical to create for research purposes.
Offers freedom in settings in which the variables are measured
Explaining Correlations
A causes changes in B (i.e., A (video games) -> B (aggression)) oB causes changes in A (i.e., B (aggression) -> A (video games)) oC causes changes in both A and B (i.e., C (family troubles) -> A (video games); C (family troubles) -> B (aggression))
Exsperments
to examine cause-and-effect relationships
essential characteristics of an experiment
oResearcher has control over the experimental procedures
oParticipants randomly assigned to different treatment conditions
Variables
Any characteristic of an object, event, or a person which can take two or more values
Independent Variables:
The factors experimenters manipulate to see if they affect the dependent variable
Dependent Variables
The factors experimenters measure to see if they are affected by the independent variabl
Subject Variables
characterize pre-existing differences among study participants (e.g., gender, race, culture, etc
different topics require
different types of research strategies
Relative to experimental studies, the primary disadvantage of correlation studies is
cause and effect cannot be determined with them.
