Social Influence And Group Processes

Question 1

Autocratic leaders

Answer 1

Individual control over all decisions and little input from group members. make choices based on their ideas and judgments
rarely accept advice from followers

Question 2

Compliance

Answer 2

A situation where you’ve agreed with other people’s opinions and complied with requests publicly but have not changed your real internal opinions which may be different

Social influence arising as a response to a request

Question 3

Conformity

Answer 3

You’ve changed these innermost thoughts and feelings as a result of less direct pressure from others.
Behaviour in accordance with socially accepted conventions

Social influence arising from adherence to group norms

Question 4

Contact hypothesis

Answer 4

This view suggests that contact between members of different groups lessens intergroup hostility

Question 5

Conversion effect

Answer 5

disagreement within the group results in conflict, and that group members are motivated to reduce that conflict—either by changing their own opinions or attempting to get others to change.

Question 6

Democratic leaders

Answer 6

Prepared to consider others opinions and call for discussion and suggestion

Question 7

Drive theory

Answer 7

Zajoncs

Presence of others leads to a state of arousal
= increase in performing dominant responses

Correct dominant response - social facilitation

Incorrect dominant response - social inhibition

Question 8

Dual process dependency model

Answer 8

focuses on interpersonal dependency, while this emphasises the social groups that you belong to and group norms. Therefore you don’t conform to others you conform to what is expected from your group norm.

Majority influence = compliance
Minority influence = conversion

Question 9

Evaluation apprehension model

Answer 9

Cottrell

People are aroused in the presence of others because they learn that social approval / disapproval (perceived rewards and punishments) are dependent on how we are evaluated by others

Question 10

Free-riding

Answer 10

Idea that own efforts not as important to the group because of the effort of other group members

Leave decision to other group members and reap any rewards that result

Question 11

Genetic model

Answer 11

Moscovici

studied how consistent minorities create cognitive conflict and produce social innovation by disrupting established norms and making visible their alternative point of view

Question 12

Group

Answer 12

2 or more people

Group membership can lead to changes in our own beliefs and attitudes and behaviours

Question 13

Group norm

Answer 13

Informal rules that groups adopt to regulate and regularize group members’ behavior

Question 14

Group polarisation

Answer 14

Group polarization occurs when a group makes a more extreme decision than its individual members would have made if acting on their own.

Question 15

Groupthink

Answer 15

A type of thinking among very cohesive groups that is based on members wanting to reach a unanimous decision irrespective of a motivation to use logical and reasoned decision- making processes

Question 16

Identity-reference group

Answer 16

Belonging to the group has an effect on ones own social identity

Act as a reference frame for people knowing and understanding who they are

Identification within the opinions, goal and motives of the group

Question 17

Informational social influence

Answer 17

Social influence based on the belief that others are better informed than we are

Question 18

In-group

Answer 18

an exclusive, typically small, group of people with a shared interest or identity

Question 19

Intergroup behaviour

Answer 19

Intergroup behaviour is any perception, cognition, or behaviour that is influenced by people’s recognition that they and others are members of distinct social groups.

Question 20

Laissez - faire leaders

Answer 20

Leaders hardly intervene. Let the group do what they want

Question 21

Leadership

Answer 21

A role designated in a group for encouraging other members to realise the groups goals

Question 22

Majority influence

Answer 22

Bring about direct public compliance because of normative and informational influence, without much thinking going on

Question 23

Minority influence

Answer 23

Bring about indirect and private change because majorities actively think about the minority view - leads to cognitive conflict

Question 24

Membership group

Answer 24

Committed to the groups norms and values

Defined by being a member

Question 25

Minimal group paradigm

Answer 25

Social psychology research methodology

Method for investigating the minimal conditions required for discrimination to occur between groups

Question 26

Normative social influence

Answer 26

Type of social influence that leads to conformity

Conformity is caused by the desire to be liked and accepted and to avoid being disliked

Non-conformity may lead to negative evaluations of us

Question 27

Obedience

Answer 27

compliance with an order, request, or law or submission to another’s authority

Social influence arising in response to a direct order

Question 28

Out-group

Answer 28

a group that is distinct from one’s own and so usually an object of hostility or dislike

Question 29

Prejudice

Answer 29

an assumption or an opinion about someone simply based on that person’s membership to a particular group.

E.G. people can be prejudiced against someone else of a different ethnicity, gender or religion

Question 30

Incidental groups

Answer 30

Transient in nature. People have minimal commitment and involvement with each other

E.g assigned by a lecturer to a group to complete a task

Question 31

Social influence

Answer 31

The ways in which a persons thoughts, their feelings and the ways they behave are influenced by other people or groups

Question 32

Social reality hypothesis

Answer 32

The less you can rely on your own perception of the world, the more likely you are to be influenced by others

Question 33

Social facilitation and social inhibition

Answer 33

refer to the findings that people appear to get better at well-learned tasks and worse at difficult tasks when in the presence of others

Question 34

Social loafing

Answer 34

People work less hard on tasks when they think that others are also working on the task. They can ‘loaf’ about

Question 35

Social compensation

Answer 35

Work harder on tasks when they perceive other members cannot do the tasks or are not prepared to put in the effort

Question 36

Prototype

Answer 36

Describes best what the group has in common and what makes it different from an out-group

Person who is least different from other in-group members but most different from out-group members = the prototype

Question 37

Realistic conflict theory

Answer 37

Sherif

Argued that intergroup conflict is the outcome of a conflict of interests between in-group and an out-group

When groups both desire a goal but cannot attain it, conflict arises

Seen in a series of 3 studies involving 3 phases: forming the groups, creating intergroup competition, reducing conflict

Question 38

Reference group

Answer 38

A group to which an individual or another group is compared

Group that individuals use as a standard for evaluating themselves and their own behaviour

Question 39

Referent informational influence

Answer 39

Argues that we conform because we are group members and not to avoid social disapproval

Question 40

Ringelmann effect

Answer 40

The tendency for individual productivity to decrease as group size increases

Question 41

Self-categorisation process

Answer 41

Members seek out the group norm to minimise differences between members (in-group) and maximise differences with other groups (out-group)

Question 42

Social comparison

Answer 42

People need to evaluate their own opinions and behaviours by comparing themselves with other group members

People seek a positive image of themselves and need to get approval and avoid social disapproval

Question 43

Social identity

Answer 43

portion of an individual’s self-concept derived from perceived membership in a relevant social group

Question 44

Social impact theory

Answer 44

Social impact is the result of social forces including the strength of the source of impact, the immediacy of the event, and the number of sources exerting the impact.

Question 45

Superordinate goals

Answer 45

Goals that no one group could attain by themselves

Method for reducing conflict