Social Identity Theory Flashcards
Social Identity Theory argues that a person has not just ______ “personal self”, but rather ________social selves that correspond to _______ membership. According to the theory, we need to understand ____ ___ _____ and know our value in ______ contexts. This is why we _______ ourselves in terms of ______ membership
one, several, group, who we are, social, categorize, group
3 mechanisms within SIT
Social categorization, social comparison, social identification
Social categorization
The process by which people categorize themselves and others into groups. This simplifies and helps us make sense of our social world.
Social identification
The process of conforming to the behaviors and values of your in-group. In this process, your self-esteem is linked to your in-group.
Social comparison
If our self-esteem is to be maintained our group needs to compare favorably with other groups. We look to other groups to justify our membership in our own group.
In-group bias
The tendency for people to give preferential treatment to others who belong to the same group that they do. This can happen even when people are randomly assigned to groups.
Out-group homogeneity bias
The tendency to assume that the members of other groups are very similar to each other, particularly in contrast to the assumed diversity of the membership of one’s own group.
Salience
This is when we are very much aware of one of our social identities. It is argued that if we make a social identity salient, it will play a key role in behavior.
Levine et al (2005)
Aim:
Examine the effect of in-group bias on helping
Sample:
45 males students who were self-identified Manchester United fans
Procedure:
When arriving for the experiment, they were told that the experiment had to moved to a larger room across campus. During the process of travelling to the new room, they saw a confederate run down a grassy hill, slip, and hold on to his ankle shouting in pain. The confederate was either wearing a Manchester United team shirt, a Liverpool FC team shirt, or a plain t-shirt.
Findings:
12 participants helped the fan in the Manchester United shirt condition, only 4 helped in the plain shirt condition, and only 3 helped in the Liverpool FC shirt condition.
Link to SIT:
Students were most likely to help another Manchester United fan because through SIT, they identified with the confederate as being part of their in-group, influencing their helping behaviour.
