Social & Developmental Psychology Flashcards
Social psychology
the study of the social behavior of groups and individuals in the groups
Main social psychology points
1) the illusion of autonomy
2) collectivist vs. individualist context
3) Fundamental attribution error
4) propensity to conform and comply
Fundamental attribution error
we tend to attribute someone’s behavior to their personality traits rather than the situation they are placed in
ex: homeless man is lazy, not poorly affected by the economy
social cognition
how do individuals interpret social events
social influence
how do others affect an individual’s action
Features of social congition
the interpersonal nature of beliefs
opinion by social comparison
maintenance of cognitive consonance w the group
emotional content of opinions and attitudes
stereotypes and attribution errors
Situational attributions
involve factors external to the person we are observing
use situational attributions when we try to explain why someone did something
Dispositional attributions
focus on factors internal to the person we are observing
use dispositional attributions when we try to explain why someone did something
person perception
we rely on implicit theories of personality when we think about or remember other individuals
leave us vulnerable to stereotyping
Effects of stereotypes
can influence people’s behavior implicitly
Self-fulfilling prophecies
stereotype threat
Self-fulfilling prophecies
beliefs about how a person will behave that actually make the expected behavior more likely
Attitudes
attitudes are a combination of:
1) beliefs
2) feelings about the object/event
3) predisposition to act in accordance to these beliefs and feelings
Are attitude innate or learned? Permanent or subject to change?
Attitudes are learned, but they can be changed
4 ways to change attitudes
1) central route
2) periphereal route
3) intergroup contact
4) cognitive dissonance
Central route
change attitude through evidence and ration
we care about the issue so we seek this information
Periphereal route
change attitude through persuasion
we dont care about the issue so let others persuade
Intergroup contact
works to change attitudes about prejudice
Cognitive dissonance
inconsistency in one’s attitudes, actions, and feelings
try to align attitudes with actions
Self-perception theory
we know our own attitudes and feelings only by observing our own behaviors and deciding what caused them, similar to when we try to understand others
Conformity
a change in behavior due to explicit or implicit social behavior
3 forms of social influence
conformity
obedience
compliance
Informational influence
a reason for conformity based on people’s desire to be correct
Normative influence
a reason for conformity based on people’s desire to be liked (not to appear foolish)
Social referencing
general process of validating our reactions by checking on how others are behaving
Features of social influence
crowd behavior
bystander apathy
diffusion of responsibility
obedience
Milgrim experiment
shows willingness to follow commands through a man shocking a subject for incorrect answer
shows the power of social influence
Stanford prison experiment
shows how people respond to a cruel environment
power of role and environment
Sherif and Asch studies
show the affects of informational and normative influence
people will change their answers to incorrect answers to agree with others
When is obedience more likely?
if individuals do not believe that they are ultimately responsible for their actions
increased by psychological distance between people’s actions and the results of their action (dehumanizes the victim)
Compliance
a change in behavior in response to a request
norm of reciprocity
the social standard that a favor must be repaid
leads to compliance
that’s-not-all technique
a sales method that starts with a modest offer, then improves upon it
this improvement seems to be a favor that needs to be reciprocated
Mere prescence effects
behavior is influenced by the presence of an audience
Social facilitation
the tendency to perform simple or well-practiced tasks better in the prescence of others
Social inhibition
the tendency to perform complex or difficult tasks more poorly in the prescence of others
Social loafing
a pattern in which people working together on a task generates less total effort than they would have if they had each worked alone
Deindividuation
a state in which an individual in a group experiences a weakened sense of personal identity and diminished self-awareness
can lead to harmful or good behavior, depending the situation
How is deindividuation produced?
by having anonymity or an assigned role
Group polarization
decisions made by groups are often more extreme than decisions made by individuals
What produces group polarization?
Confirmation bias
Each member trying to be the group’s “leading edge”
Groupthink
group members do all they can to promote group cohesion
they downplay disagreements and overestimate the likelihood of success
Bystander effect
one reason people fail to help strangers in distress
larger the group is, the less likely someone is to help
pluralistic ignorance
a type of misunderstanding that occurs when members of a group don’t realize that other members share their perception
each member wrongly interprets the other’s inaction, which leads to no action overall
pluralistic influence
an individual rejects a private norm and follows a “perceived norm”
Halo effect
we expect people that have one good trait have many more
Romantic versus compassionate love
Romantic is often tumultuous, involves psychological arousal interpreted as passion
Compassionate involves similarity of outlook, mutual caring, and trust
Prosocial behavior
social behavior that benefits other people or society as a whole
Darley and Latane study
when someone has a seize in the middle of talking on an intercom, more people helped the person in smaller groups, then larger groups
shows diffusion of responsibility
Altruism
helping behavior that does not benefit the helper
Reciprocal altruism
helping others with the expectation that you will get help at a later time
Direct reciprocity
help someone because they directly helped you before
Indirect reciprocity
reputation rather than prior experience creates beneficial behavior
Empathy
the ability to understand and share the feelings of another
Empathy-altruism theory
if an individual experiences empathy, they are more likely to perform altruistic acts
In what type of cultures do we see fundamental attribution error more?
individualist cultures
In what type of cultures do we see the influence of romantic love more?
individualist cultures- personal fulfillment
collectivist cultures emphasize more connection one’s group
Developmental psychology
documents the course of social, emotional, intellecutal and moral development across the lifespan
focus on the process underlying behavioral changes and the emergence of behavior as plastic and dynamic phenomena
When does human psychology begin?
in the 3rd trimester during prenatal development
Neural tube
the tubular structure formed early in the embryonic from which the central nervous system develops
What is the fetus capable of in the fetal stage?
sucking reflex if it’s lips are touched
evidence that baby remembers the stories read to it by it’s mother
Teratogens
environmental factors that can disrupt healthy neural development
these include alcohol, cigarette smoke, and lead
Why do humans have such long developmental period?
ideal to learn language and culture
culture passes down ways of coping with the world from one generation to the next
Sensory capacities of the newborn
discriminate between tone of pitch and loudness
discriminate between mother’s voice and other female voices
vision- color and brightness, track a moving stimulus
smell- fruity vs. putrid
taste- sweet vs. sour
3 reflexes present in infants
1) Grasping reflex
2) Sucking reflex
3) Rooting reflex
Grasping reflex
an infantile reflex in which an infant closes her hand into a fist when her palm is touched
Sucking reflex
an infantile reflex in which she sucks on whatever is placed in her mouth
Rooting reflex
the sucking that is elicited by stroking around or nearby the lips
What do infants perceive and understand of the world?
pay more attention to faces than other figures
Cognitive development
studies the growth of the child’s understanding of the world that surrounds them and themself
Does Piaget think that the child thinks the same as an adult?
No Piaget believes that infants have a different type of thinking
Adult thinking only emerges after the child undergoes a series of stages of intellectual growth
What are the 4 developmental cognitive stages that the child must go through?
1) Sensory motor
2) preoperational
3) concrete operational
4) formal operational
Sensorimotor period
Birth-2 years
the infants world consists only of things he can sense
the child has not yet achieved object permanence
Object permanence
the understanding that objects still exist even when they cannot be seen, heard, smelled, or sensed in any way
A-not-B effect
the tendency of infants to reach for a hidden object where it was previously placed (location A) rather than where it was hidden most recently (location B)
Assimilation
In Piaget’s theory, the developing child’s process of interpreting the environment in terms of the schemas he already has
expanding the schemas the child is born with
Accommodation
In Piaget’s theory, the developing child’s process of CHANGING the schemas he is born with
Example of assimilation versus accommodation
The child learns what a helicopter is through assimilation
The child sees an airplane and thinks it is a helicopter
The child changes his schema and understands it is an airplane not a helicopter through accomodation
When does the sensorimotor period end?
When the child achieves object permanence
Pre-operational period
2-5 years
a child can think representationally but cannot yet relate this representations to each other or take a point of view other than his own
Signifier of the pre-operational period
children fail to conserve quantity and numbers
Concrete operational period
7-12 years
the child is beginning to understand concrete ideas such as number and substance, but only as they apply to real, concrete events
What is a criticism of Piaget?
he underestimated the mental capacities of infants
shows now that infants are more than just sensory impressions and motor reactions
infants seem to have rudimentary understandings of objects and numbers
What do habituation procedures show?
habituation procedures show that infants have an understanding of occlusion
Habituation procedures
a method for studying infant perception
after some exposure to a stimulus, an infant becomes habituated and stops paying attention to the stimulus
if the infant shows renewed interest when a new stimulus is presented, this shows that the infant regards the new stimulus as different from the old one
How do modern psychologists explain Piaget’s A-not-B finding?
believe that infants do have some kind of object permanence
believe that infants do not know how to respond and act to changes when object is hidden in new spot
Young children and intentions
young children do have a remarkable ability to understand other’s intentions
theory of mind
the set of interrelated concepts we use to make sense of our own thoughts, feelings, and behaviors as well as those of others
limitations of a young child’s theory of mind
3-year-old does not understand that beliefs can be true or false and that people can have different beliefs
Earliest signs of socioemotional development in infants
preference for facial shapes
imitate other’s facial expressions
When does social learning greatly broaden?
when the child begins to crawl and for the first time a parent says “no”
child starts to social reference
What is the infant’s earliest social relationship?
with their mother
Attachment
the strong and emotional bond between a child and their caregiver is one that some psychologists say is the basis for relationships later in life
Harlow’s experiment
monkeys will go to a soft figure rather than a figure that gives food
preferred terry cloth figure even more when frightened
shows the power of comfort and attachment
secure base
according to John Bowlby, the relationship in which the child feels secure and protected
strange situation
an experimental procedure for assessing attachment
the child’s mother leaves a room and the child’s reaction when the mother returns is studied
Different patterns of attachment in strange situation
Secure: want to be picked up when mother returns
Anxious/resistant: cry and thrash when mother returns
Anxious/avoidant: ignore mother when she returns
Disorganized: show no one pattern of attachment
internal working model
Bowlby theorizes is created from having a secure base
a set of beliefs and expectations about how people behave in social relationships and also guidelines for interpreting other’s actions and habitual responses to social settings
aggressive-rejected
the social status of children who are not respected or liked by their peers and become aggressive as a result
withdrawn-rejected
the social status of children who are not respected or liked by their peers and become withdrawn as a result
formal operational period
In Piaget’s theory, the period from about age 12 on, in which a child can think abstractly and consider hypothetical possibilities
Erik Erikson
looked at socioemotional development in adolescence and beyond
key focus in adolescence is identity versus role confusion
Identity versus role confusion
according to Erikson, the major developmental task of adolescence is developing a stable ego, sense of identity, or sense of who one is
failure to do so results in a negative identity or role confusion
What two processes did Piaget believe are responsible for all cognitive development?
assimilation and accomodation
socioemotional-selectivity theory
older adults increasingly prioritize emotion regulation goals which make them more positive
What produces differences in attachment styles?
child’s temperament
caregiver’s response
