Psychology 1a - Social Psychology

Question 1

Define attitude

Answer 1

A positive or negative evaluative reaction
toward a stimulus, such as a person, action, object, or
concept e.g. can include behaviour such as healthy eating

Question 2

When do attitudes influence behaviours more?

Answer 2

Attitudes influence behaviour more strongly when

situational factors that contradict our attitudes are weak

Question 3

Describe the theory of planned behaviour

Answer 3

• Intention is affected by attitude (beliefs/evaluation), subjective norm (other peoples attitudes), and perceived behavioural control (internal/external factors)
• Intention results in behaviour alongside perceived behavioural control

Question 4

What is cognitive dissonance?

Answer 4

• A conflict or unease created by two opposing opinions

- Eg. smokers know smoking has health risks, but still smoke

Question 5

How can dissonance be resolved? Use smoking as an example.

Answer 5

• Change behaviour: In the case of smoking, this would
  involve quitting, which might be difficult and thus avoided
• Acquire new information: Such as seeking exceptions
  e.g. “My grandfather smoked all his life and lived to be 96”
• Reduce the importance of the cognitions (i.e. beliefs,
  attitudes). A person could convince themself that it is
  better to “live for the moment”

Question 6

How are messages to change attitudes made more effective?

Answer 6

• Reaches recipient
• Attention grabbing
• Easily understood
• Relevent and important
• Easily remembered

Question 7

What characteristics are important for persuasive messengers?

Answer 7

• Credible (eg. doctors)
• Trustworthy (eg. objective)
• Appealing (eg. well presented)

Question 8

What is framing?

Answer 8

• Whether a message emphasises the benefits or losses of that behaviour
• When we want people to take up behaviours to detect health problems or illnesses, loss-framed messages are more effective
• When we want people to promote prevention behaviours (eg. condom use), gain-framed messages may be more effective

Question 9

Define stereotype

Answer 9

• Generalisations made about a group of
  people or members of that group, such as race, ethnicity,
  or gender.
• Or more specific such as different medical
  specialisations (e.g. surgeons)

Question 10

Define prejudice

Answer 10

To judge, often negatively, without having relevant facts, usually about a group or its individual
members

Question 11

Define discrimination

Answer 11

Behaviours that follow from negative

evaluations or attitudes towards members of particular groups

Question 12

What did Lawrie et al. (1998) find?

Answer 12

GPs were reluctant to take on patients with a mental health history despite it being well controlled than diabetes patients

Question 13

Define social loafing

Answer 13

The tendency for people to
expend less individual effort when working
in a group than when working alone (diffusion of responsibility)

Question 14

When is social loafing more likely to occur?

Answer 14

When

• The person believes that individual performance is not being monitored
• The task (goal) or the group has less value or meaning to the person
• The person generally displays low motivation to strive for success
• The person expects that other group members will display high effort

Question 15

How does gender and culture affect social loafing?

Answer 15

• Occurs more strongly in all-male groups

- Occurs more often in individualistic cultures

Question 16

When may social loafing disappear?

Answer 16

• Individual performance is monitored
• Members highly value their group or the task goal
• Groups are smaller
• Members are of similar competence

Question 17

Describe Asch 1956 study

Answer 17

• Conformity
• Compare a standard line to comparison lines and determine which is the same length
• Actors said the wrong answer, which influenced the participants (unaware the actors were actors) to also say the incorrect answer
• Conformity

Question 18

List the factors that affect conformity

Answer 18

• Group size (increases with group size, no increase over five group members)
• Presence of a dissenter (one person disagreeing with others to reduce conformity)
• Culture (greater in collectivistic cultures)

Question 19

Explain bystander apathy

Answer 19

• When in a group, bystanders will look at the response of others in the group before making a decision as to whether to help or not.
• When alone, we are more likely to assess the situation appropriately

Question 20

Describe the Darley and Latane experiment

Answer 20

• Participants were invited into the lab under the pretext they were taking part in a discussion about ‘personal problems’
• Participants were all in separate rooms in the lab and
  communicated via an intercom system
• One participant was an actor, and acted as though they were having a seizure
• 87% helped if they believed it was just them and the other student. When in a group of 4 people, 31% helped, above 4 hardly anyone helped.
• People were unlikely to act after 3 minutes of not acting
• Bystander apathy

Question 21

What was the response of participants in the Darley and Latane experiment after the experiment concluded?

Answer 21

• Compared to those who did report the emergency, those
  that didn’t appeared in distress; many were sweating, and
  had trembling hands.
• They reported shame and guilt for not helping.
• Reasons given include not wanting to expose themselves
  to embarrassment or to ruin the experiment which, they
  had been told depended on each participant remaining
  anonymous from the others

Question 22

List the 5 step bystander decision process by Latane and Darley

Answer 22

1) Notice the event
2) Decide if the event is really an emergency
Social comparison: look to see how others are responding
3) Assuming responsibility to intervene
Diffusion of Responsibility: believing that someone else will help
4) Self-efficacy in dealing with the situation
5) Decision to help (based on cost-benefit analysis e.g.
danger)

Question 23

How can helping behaviour be increased?

Answer 23

Reduce restraints on helping:

• Reduce ambiguity and increase responsibility
• Enhance concern for self image

Socialise altruism:

• Teaching moral inclusion
• Modelling helping behaviour
• Attributing helpful behaviour to altruistic motives
• Education about barriers to helping

Question 24

What was the Francis report?

Answer 24

• Poor care in mid staffordshire foundation NHS trust between 2005 to 2009, contributing to avoidable deaths
• Non-compassionate behaviour
• Bystandar apathy and cognitive dissonance?

Question 25

Describe the Milgram experiment

Answer 25

• Obedience
• Learner (actor) and a teacher. Teacher was the participant, gave a electric shock when there was a false answer (learning and memory)
• Shocks grew more intense with each mistake (450V)
• Actor receiving shocks shouting and saying he wants to leave
• The person running the experiment (white coat and clipboard) would encourage the participant to carry on when they said they wanted to stop 3 times then let them stop

Question 26

List the factors influencing obedience

Answer 26

• Remoteness of the victim
• Closeness and legitimacy of the authority figure
• Diffusion of responsibility: obedience increases when someone else administers the shocks
• Not personal characteristics

Question 27

Define groupthink

Answer 27

The tendency of group members to suspend critical thinking because they are striving to seek agreement

Question 28

Define group polarisation

Answer 28

The tendency of people to make
decisions that are more extreme when they are in a group
as opposed to a decision made alone or independently

Question 29

When is groupthink most likely to occur?

Answer 29

• Is under high stress to reach a decision
• Is insulated from outside input
• Has a directive leader
• Has high cohesiveness

Question 30

List the different leadership styles

Answer 30

• Autocratic or authoritarian style (all decision making powers are centralised in the leader)
• Participative or democratic style (decision-making by the group, group cooperation)
• Laissez-faire or “free rein style” (leaves the group to itself, maximum freedom to subordinates who decide their own policies and methods)

Question 31

List the advantages and disadvantages of autocratic leadership

Answer 31

Advantages

• Quick decision making
• Clear hierarchy of responsibility

Disadvantages

• Can be demotivating
• Can lead to errors

Question 32

List the advantages and disadvantages of democratic leadership

Answer 32

Advantages
- Can win cooperation
and motivate team
- Can improve quality of decision making

Disadvantages
- Time consuming
- Can lead to
disagreements

Question 33

List the advantages and disadvantages of Laissez Faire

Answer 33

Advantages

• Allows autonomous working
• Allows expertise to be utilised

Disadvantages

• Can lead to lack of direction
• Lack of ultimate responsibility holder