PSYC 104 Final Flashcards
Affect
Emotion
Behaviors
What a person does, attitudes and behaviors tend to be related
Cognition
thoughts, realizations
Self-report
people report their attitudes directly, often use Likert scales
Attitude centrality
report attitudes about several topics within a domain, the more a topic is linked to other topics the more central the topic is to a person
Implicit attitudes
Attitudes we are not conscious of; Measuring implicit bias is preferred when the topic is very affected by social desirability
Social desirability
the desire to want to respond to a question in a way the person perceives to be socially
acceptable
Attitudes and behavior
Attitudes can predict behavior when the attitude is specific to the behavior; Stronger attitudes predict behavior better than weaker attitudes
Implicit attitudes test
Measures differences in response times between classifying certain groups. Faster response time indicates stronger association
Physiological reactions
Measure changes in physiological measures in response to an attitude object; eg: heartrate, sweat etc
Attitudes and predicting behavior
Attitudes only weakly predict behavior, there are other factors that affect behavior: norms, context, personality
Attitudes and predicting behavior (2)
Attitudes can predict behavior when the attitude is specific to the behavior, engagement with the target of the attitude aligns attitudes and behavior
Cognitive dissonance
A person is uncomfortable with conflicting thoughts, affects, and behaviors
Reducing cognitive dissonance
Change your cognition or affect, change your behavior, effort justification, spreading of alternatives, self-affirmation
Effort justification
reducing dissonance from a disappointing or unpleasant outcome by justifying decision with time, effort, or money devoted to it
Spreading of Alternatives
rationalizing a choice you have made to reflect greater confidence in the choice you made versus the choice you rejected
Unethical amnesia
may just not remember times in the past we acted unethically, so we don’t feel
dissonance
Induced (forced) compliance
inducing dissonance in someone by having the person behave in a way counter to their beliefs/attitudes, this dissonance leads the person to change their attitude (because they can’t
change their past behavior)
Cognitive dissonance in western cultures
Seen when choices are made for oneself; don’t experience much dissonance when making choices for others
Cognitive dissonance in Asian cultures
More cognitive dissonance when making choices for others; none when making personal choices
Bem’s self-perception theory
Attitudes are formed by our behavior; one is the observer of oneself
Festinger’s Cognitive Dissonance vs. Bem’s Self-perception Theory
Evidence that people experience arousal when they hold competing cognitions or behaviors; Weak attitudes may be inferred from behavior
System Justification theory
People are motivated to see existing sociopolitical systems as desirable, fair, and legitimate; Easier to maintain the status quo than effect change; use of stereotypes and victim blaming when system is threatened
Terror management theory
We are motivated by the fear of death, people don’t want to die and want to leave legacy behind when they do die; Fear of death motivates individual behaviors and ‘cultural
worldview’
Cultural worldview
Relates to self-esteem by considering how much a person contributes to their society and are important members of that society
Elaboration likelihood model
2 routes of persuasion: Central or peripheral; Many factors contribute to which route we use to process persuasive messages
Central route
Controlled processing; careful, deliberate thought
Peripheral route
Automatic processing; superficial, easy to process thinking; what is apparent; requires less time and energy
Source characteristics
Traits of the person communicating the message: attractiveness, credibility, confidence/certainty
Message characteristics
The content of the message effect how persuasive it is: quality, vividness, use of fear
Identifiable victim effect
Presenting audience with an example of a person (or animal) is more persuasive than statistics
Audience characteristics
Audience characteristics effect persuaded the audience will be: mood, age, desire to think things through
Need for cognition
preferring to think deeply, liking to solving problems, considering both sides
of an argument
Metacognition
Thoughts about our thoughts
Primary cognition
The first thought we have
Secondary cognition
the thought we have reflecting on the first thought; these cognitions can influence persuasion
Self-validation hypothesis
Feeling confident about our thoughts further validates those thoughts and those thoughts are more likely to be endorsed
Shared attention
when people know other people are also watching an event simultaneously,
they exhibit more controlled processing
Agenda control
media sources can manage what information we get and how that information is
interpreted
Resistance to Persuasion
Selective attention and selective evaluation
Selective attention
pay attention to information that confirms our attitudes
Selective evaluation
Evaluate and discount the validity of information counter to our attitudes, less critical of information that confirms our
attitudes
Thought polarization hypothesis
the more thought given to an attitude, the more entrenched and extreme the attitude becomes
Resistance
Publicly expressing one’s attitudes makes people less likely to change those attitudes; People with more knowledge about an attitude object are less likely to be persuaded
Attitude inoculation
when people who endorse an attitude are faced with a mild attack on that attitude that they can refute, the next time the attitude is strongly attacked they are less persuaded by the attack compared to if the
attitude was never mildly attacked before
Social influence
How people affect one another’s behaviors and attitudes
Conformity
Changing one’s behaviors or attitudes as a result of pressure
Compliance
fulfilling an explicit request made by another person
Obedience
Submitting to the demand of an authority figure
Automatic mimicry
Mindlessly imitating the actions of others
Ideomotor action
The mere thought of a behavior makes us perform that behavior
Informational social influence
sing other’s comments or behavior as information which influences the person
Normative social influence
influence resulting from avoiding being criticized, insulted, or shunned
Tight cultures
Strong norms; Intolerant of deviance from norms, dissent; More likely to have dictatorial/autocratic governments, regulate and monitor behavior, control media
Loose culture
Weak norms; More tolerant of deviance from norms, dissent
Reasons for compliance
There is good reason, Emotional appeals, Everyone else is doing it
Norm of reciprocity
the widely accepted idea that if someone does something for you, you should do something in return
Reciprocal concessions technique (door-in-the-face)
start with a large request, after being denied, ask for a smaller request
Foot-in-the-door technique
make small request, after compliance, make larger request (target request)
Negative state relief hypothesis
certain actions like compliance can relieve one of negative emotions and
let person feel better about oneself
Descriptive norm
behavior exhibited by most people in a given context
Prescriptive (Injunctive) norm
The way people are supposed to behave
Pluralistic ignorance
misperception of a group norm that results from observing people who are acting at variance with their private beliefs out of a concern for the social consequences; those actions reinforce the
erroneous group norm
Reactance theory
people disobey because of the negative feelings caused by a limit on their free will
Communal relationships
Feel responsibility for one another; Give and receive according to the Principle of Need; often long-term
Exchange relationships
Feel little responsibility for one another; Give and receive according to reciprocity and equity; Often short-term
Social exchange theory
People want to maximize their satisfaction; Interactions are based on getting rewards; If there are no interactions that will result in a reward, people will choose the interaction/relationship that minimizes the costs
Comparison level
expectations about what they will get from the relationship
Comparison level of alternatives
expectations about what they could get from other
relationships
Equity theory
People want relationships that are equitable, each person gives as much as they take; more important to individualistic cultures than collectivist cultures
Attachment theory
Early attachment with one’s parents influences relationship for the rest of a person’s life
Secure attachment style
easily forms relationships with others, able to form close relationships, can depend on others and others can depend on them, not concerned about
abandonment
Avoidant attachment style
hard to form relationships, hard to trust another person and depend on them, uncomfortable
with another person trying to become close with them
Anxious/ambivalent attachment style
very anxious about being abandoned, find others do not want to be as close as
they do, this need for intimacy may drive others away
Companionate love
Love between friends and family, built on trust, wanting to be around one another, sharing
activities
Compassionate love
love built on people attending to one another’s needs
Romantic/passionate love
Love built on intense emotion and sexual desire
Intimacy (romantic love)
feeling comfortable and secure with the other person, and incorporating traits, perspectives and experiences of the other person into one’s self-concept
3 factors of commitment
Satisfaction, lack of alternative partners, investment in the relationship
4 behaviors that contribute to an unsatisfying relationship
Criticism, defensiveness, stonewalling, contempt
Functional distance
Not just closest distance, but closest distance accounting for architectural design
Mere exposure effect
The more we are in contact with a person or thing, the more we like the person or thing
Status exchange hypothesis
we chose to be with someone who is higher status in one area (ex. family social status) and that person gets a status boost from us (ex. having higher educational attainment than partner)
Halo effect
Assuming physically attractive people also possess other positive traits
Stereotypes
Schemas or mental shortcuts that help us categorize a group of people
Dominance perspective
certain group memberships become most important when stereotyping
Integration perspective
all group memberships are accounted for in stereotyping
Compartmentalization
context determines whether one identity becomes the focus of stereotyping or whether an intersection of identities becomes the focus of stereotyping
Prejudice
Feelings or affective responses to a group or its members; Associated with a stereotype
Modern racism
not endorsing explicitly racist beliefs but still having animosity toward another racial group and feeling uncomfortable when interacting with that group
Ambivalent sexism/racism
Prejudice can be a mixture of positive and negative affect and beliefs
Benevolent sexism/racism
Positive views of target group members who maintain traditional roles and fulfill positive stereotypes; believing women need protection
Hostile sexism/racism
Disliking women nontraditional roles, feeling women/people of other
races are usurping men’s/their racial group’s power
Discrimination
Inappropriate and unjustified treatment of people based on the groups they belong to
Realistic group conflict theory
competition for resources between groups gives rise to conflict, which prompts prejudice, and discrimination
Ethnocentrism
believing your group is superior while vilifying other groups
Social identity theory
a person incorporates both individual accomplishments and group accomplishments from their group memberships into their identity
Basking in reflected glory
another group member’s or the group’s accomplishment are considered the individuals accomplishment
Paired distinctiveness
Illusionary correlation formed between two distinctive events
Self-fulfilling prophecies
expectations lead to unconscious behaviors that lead to expectations being
fulfilled
Subtyping
for examples of people who contradict stereotypes, a new subgroup is developed
Outgroup homogeneity effect
Tendency to see an outgroup as having more similar members than one’s
ingroup
Own-race identification bias
Tendency to be able to recognize and distinguish faces from one’s own race
than from another race
Stereotype threat
When knowledge of a stereotype about one’s group results in poor performance (confirming stereotype)
Attribution ambiguity
It can be difficult for a person to determine if they were discriminated against
What is the best approach to reducing prejudice and discrimination
Multicultural approach; NOT colorblind (can be used to mask discrimination
Contact theory
Prejudice can be reduced by have outgroup members interact with one another
Contact theory: 4 conditions for ideal contact
Institutional support, equal status, common goal, cooperation
Groups
A collection of people who are related in some way that makes them interdependent to significant degree
Why do we live in groups?
Survival, psychological need
Social facilitation
How the presence of others impacts one’s performance
Theory of mere presence
in the presence of others a person will preform dominant response
Evaluation apprehension
concern when others are evaluating a person
Social loafing
Tendency to exert less effort in a group task when individual contributions are not monitered
Group polarization
Tendency for group decisions to be more extreme than those made by individual
Risky shift
Group decision riskier than the average of decisions made by group members
Groupthink
Faulty thinking by members of highly cohesive groups in which the critical scrutiny that should be devoted to the issues at hand is subverted by social pressures to reach consensus
Approach/inhibition theory
theory maintaining that high-power individuals are inclined to pursue their goals and make quick judgments, whereas low-power individuals constrain their behavior and pay more attention to others
Deindividuation
Tendency to feel less sense of individual identity, and reduced self-regulation when in a large group
Individuation
Tendency to focus on oneself because of an enhanced sense of individual identity
Self-awareness theory
the theory that when a person focuses attention inward, they become concerned with self-evaluation and adhering to their values
Spotlight effect
the belief that more people are paying attention to one’s behavior or appearance than really are
