Social Behaviour Flashcards
Social behaviour
How people interact with one another
Ultrasocial
Form societies and divide labour, cooperate for mutual benefit
Problem of survival?
Hurting or helping behaviour
What’s the purpose of sociality?
To survive and reproduce
Aggression
Behaviour with the purpose of harming another
Frustration-aggression hypothesis
Animals show aggression when their goals are frustrated (when they can’t achieve their goals)
Gender differences when it comes to aggression
Males aggress more, because aggression is strongly correlated with testosterone which is higher in males, young men, and violent criminals
How do you elicit aggression in males?
Challenge status or dominance, especially men with unrealistically high self-esteem; perceive others’ actions as a challenge to their inflated sense of worth
What about female aggression?
- Premeditated aggression rather than impulsive
- Focused on obtaining or protecting an actual resource
- Aggress by causing social harm (covert aggression)
Role of culture in aggression
- Important role
- American context
- Northern vs. Southern states; appealing to authority vs. reacting aggressively when status challenged
- But Southerners were more polite when not challenged
Cooperation
Behaviour of two or more individuals that leads to mutual benefit. But….requires we take a risk by benefiting those who have not yet benefited us and trusting them to do the same.
Prisoner’s dilemma
You’re busted for doing something illegal with a friend and they bring you into separate rooms and interrogate you to see if either of you will rat the other out. You can cooperate with your friend or you don’t; or your friend may or may not cooperate with you.
E.g. You and your friend Tucker arrested for hacking in to a bank’s system and transferring money to yourselves; police aren’t sure who did the hacking; interrogated in separate rooms and asked to sign that other person did it
How do we know who to trust?
Some concepts that help us make sense of this:
- Group
- Prejudice
- Discrimination
Group
Collection of people who have something in common that distinguishes them from others
Prejudice
Positive or negative evaluation of another person based on their group membership. We’re positively prejudiced towards fellow members (ingroup; ingroup favoritism) and negatively prejudiced towards others (outgroup; outgroup derogation)
Discrimination
Positive or negative behaviour toward another person based on their group membership
Stereotypes
Cold (no emotion attached)/cognitive
Set of cognitive generalizations (i.e. beliefs) about characteristics shared by members of groups (can be positive or negative) (e.g. females are bad drivers)
Social psychology definition of prejudice
Cognitive/affective (emotion attached) Negative attitude (i.e. feeling) towards others because of their group membership (e.g. I don't like female drivers)
Social psychology definition of discrimination
Behaviour/action
Negative behaviours towards others because of their group membership (personal or institutional) (e.g. I would not hire a female driver)
What’s the problem with decision making in groups?
Higher weight to opinions from people of high status rather than experts
Common knowledge effect
Tendency for group discussions to focus on information that all members share (often unimportant); important info is only known to few (so often ignored)
Group polarization
Tendency for groups to make decisions that are more extreme than any member would have made alone; exposure to many opinions
Groupthink
Tendency for groups to reach consensus in order to facilitate interpersonal harmony
Why do people in groups do bad things?
- Deindividuation
- Diffusion of responsibility
- Social loafing
- Bystander intervention
Deindividuation
Immersion in a group causes people to become less concerned with personal values
Diffusion of responsibility
Tendency for individuals to feel diminished responsibility for their actions when they are surrounded by others who are acting the same way
Social loafing
Tendency for people to expend less effort when in a group than when alone
Bystander intervention
Act of helping strangers in an emergency situation; less likely to help as size of group increases
Altruism
Intentional behaviour that benefits another at a cost to oneself. Includes kin selection and reciprocal altruism.
Kin selection
Process by which evolution selects for individuals who cooperate with their relatives.
Reciprocal altruism
Behaviour that benefits another with the expectation that those benefits will be returned in the future (aka cooperation over time)
Selectivity in mating
Women tend to be more selective than men
Attraction
Involves situational factors, physical factors and psychological factors
Situational factors in attraction
Best predictor of interpersonal relationships is proximity; involves mere exposure effect
Mere exposure effect
Tendency for liking to increase with the frequency of exposure
Physical factors in attraction
Attraction; role of physical appearances
Psychological factors in attraction
Attracted to similar type people who share similar views as us because: easier to interact, agree on a wide range of issues, benefit of validation (confirmation we have right understanding of world), we like to be liked.
Standards of beauty
Involves body shape, symmetry and age
Body shape
Men: Inverted triangle (broad shoulders, narrow waist/hips)
Women: Hourglass (broad shoulders and hips, narrow waist)
Symmetry
Bilateral symmetry - the more symmetrical, the better
Age
Men: More attractive with mature features
Women: More attractive with youthful, childlike features
Types of love
Passionate love and companionate love
Passionate love
Experience involving feelings of euphoria, intimacy, intense sexual attraction; brings people together, rapid onset, reaches its peak quickly, diminishes within few months
Companionate love
Experience involving affection, trust and concern for a partner’s well-being; keeps people together, grows slowly
Divorce
4 in 10 marriages in Canada end before couple celebrates 30th wedding anniversary Marital satisfaction (how satisfied you are) is weakly correlated with marital stability (how long they've been married)
Social exchange hypothesis
People remain in relationships only as long as they perceive a favourable ratio of costs to benefits
3 reasons people might stay in relationships longer than they should
- Comparison level
- Equity
- Resources
Comparison level
Cost-benefit ratio that people believe they could attain in a new relationship (is it worth the current relationship falling apart?)
Equity
Cost-benefit ratios of two partners need to be equal; upset when ratios are different (both favourably/unfavourably)
Resources
Once you’ve poured resources in, you’re likely to stick with it
