social psych part 1 and part 3 material Flashcards
conformity
the tendency to change one’s behaviour or beliefs in response to some real or imagined pressure from others
Asch’s conformity experiment
line experiment
results of Asch’s line experiment
76% went along, at least once, with the incorrect answer
37% went along ALL the time
factors that influence conformity in Asch’s experiment (3)
(1) group size (level out at 3-4 stooges), (2) unanimity and (3) writing down answers
other factors that influence conformity (4)
(1) attractiveness of group, (2) age, (3) gender and (4) culture
social norms
unspoken, but shared rules aobut common everyday behaviours
types of social norms (2)
(1) descriptive and (2) injunctive
descriptive norms
how most people typically behave in a given situation (what is typically done)
injunctive norms
what behaviour other people typically approve or disapprove of in a given situations (supposed to do)
sources of conformity (2)
(1) normative social influence and (2) informational social influence
normative social influence
going along to get along
normative social influence often results in ….
public conformity
public conformity
publically agreeing with others, without necessarily believing them
private acceptance (private conformity)
agreeing with others and genuinely believing them to be right
informational social influence
going along to be right (ie. viewing the behaviour of others as informative about what is correct)
minority influence
the process whereby a small number of people can come to influence the majority group
the key to minority influence is …
consistency
majorities often cause ___ conformity because of ___ social influence
public; normative
minorities often cause ____ ____ because of ____ social influence
private acceptance; informational
agression
any form of behaviour intended to harm another livign being who does not want to be harmed
types of aggression (4)
(1) direct and (2) indirect; (3) hostile and (4) instrumental
direct aggression
behaivours aimed at huring someone to his or her face
indirect aggression
attempts to hurt another perso without face-to-face conflict
hostile aggression (emotional/reactive aggression)
aggressive acts that are often impulsive or committed “in the heat of the moment” rather than planned or premeditated
instrumental aggression (proactive aggression)
hurting others as a means to some goal other than cuasing or inflicting pain
average physical aggression
male = 9.0 female = 6.9
average verbal aggression
male = 11.2
female 10.5
main causes of aggression (3)
(1) innate or unlearned, (2) response to situational or external causes and (3) learned behaviour
names associated with agression as innate (2)
(1) Freud and (2) Lorenz
Freud believed humans were born with a powerful __ instinct called ___, which was an energy that lead to aggressive and self-destructive behaviour toward the self
death; thanatos
according to Freud, we act aggressively to ___ the built up energy from thanatos
release
Lorenz believed people had evolved an ___ to be aggressive ( “____ ___”)
instinct; fighting instinct
is aggression an instinct? (based on contemporary understanding)
NO… ignores powerful role that learning plays in behaviour
link between testosterone (hormone) and aggression
positive correlation between aggression and testosterone
link between serotonin (neurotransmitter) and aggression
low levels of serotonin are assoicated with a lock of impulse control and aggressive tendencies
role of hypothalamus in aggression
controls emotional activity; when electrically stimulated in cats, aggressive behaviour can be induced
case study: Charles Whitman
university shooter who killed 14 people; post-mortem exam showed malignant brain tumor in the limbic system of his brain (including hypothalamus) which may have played a role in the shootings
role of frontal lobes in aggression
thosw who experience frontal lobe injuries tend to show more aggressive and violent tendencies
frustration-aggression hypothesis
frustration ALWAYS leads to aggression and ALL aggression is caused by frustration
frustration
feeling arrising when we are prevented from obtaining something we want
displaced aggression (“kicking the dog” effect)
people’s tendencyt o aggress against others when they cannot aggress against the source of the frustration
problem witht he frustration-aggression hypothesis
over-states link between frustration and aggression
what is the re-formulated frustration-aggression hypothesis called?
cognitive-neoassociation theory of aggression (aka negative affect theory)
cognitive-neoassociationist theory of aggression
negative affect automatically activates thoughts and feelings associated with aggression and these thoughts and feelings will be expressed as either aggression or flight, after an appraisal of the situation
aggressive cues
learned stimuli that are associated with aggressive responses
weapons effect
the mere presence of a weapon can increase the likelihood of aggression occurring in response to negative feelings
how is aggression learned? (2)
(1) direct reinforcement and (2) observational learning
Bandura’s learned aggression experiement
Bobo doll
link between media violence and aggression
positive correlation (in children)
ways in which we study media violence and aggression (2)
(1) before-and-after experiements and (2) correlational studies
criticism of before-and-after experiments (3)
(1) lack external validity, (2) demand characteristics and (3) lack of delay
criticism of correlational studies (3)
(1) not cause-and-effect, (2) directionality problem and (3) third variable problem
explanations for the rleationship between media violence and aggression (3)
(1) social leanring theory (Bandura), (2) normative view and (3) desensitization
personality factos associated with higher aggression (3)
(1) hostile attributional bias, (2) narcissism and (3) type A behaivour pattern
hostile attributional bias
tendency to interpret ambiguous behaviour in terms of hostility and aggression
narcissim
thinking you are better than everybody, seeking admiration, entitlement and an unrealistically high, but FRAGILE, self-esteem (when self-esteem is challenged they often react aggressively)
childhood gender differences in aggression
western countries, boys tend to fight physically more than girls and to fantasize more about aggressive themes
adult gender differences in aggression
males more likely to engage in physical aggression (violent crimes, murder) and females to engage in indirect aggression
culture of honour
a society in which people, especially males, are highly protective of their reputation and very sensitive and reactive to personal insults, humiliation and other threats to their honour
how to reduce aggression (6)
(1) physical punishment (2) skills training, (3) modeling non-aggressive behaviour, (4) incompatible response technique, (5) apology and (6) catharsis
link between physicla punishment in childhood and aggression
more physical punishment linked to highly aggressive children (modeling)
types of skills training (3)
(1) social skills training, (2) anger management training and (3) empathy (perspective) training
incompatible response technique
exposing people to stimuli that cause an emotional response that is incompatible with feelings of anger and aggression
does catharis of aggresion work?
study after study has shownt hat participating in or watchign aggressive activities tends to increase aggression… so…
group
a collection of people who perceive themselves to be bonded together in a coherent unit to some degree
common-bond groups (face-to-face)
individual group members are bonded/ attached to each other (typically involved regular fact-to-face interaction)
common-identiy groups (social categories
group members are linked together via a category as a whole rather than to other members
entitativity
the extent to which a group is perceived as being a distinct (or coherent) entity (or unit) rahter than simply a mere collection of individuals
groups high in entitativity tend to have the following characteristics (4)
(1) frequent interactions, (2) perceived as important to its members, (3) share common goals/ purpose and (4) members see themselves as similar to one antoher in important ways
___ groups show the lowest entitativity
transitory
key components present in groups (4)
(1) status, (2) roles, (3) norms and (4) cohesiveness
benefits of group membership (6)
(1) sense of belonging, (2) social rewards, (3) help us reach our goals, (4) help us accomplish social change, (5) meet our need for security and (6) social identity
costs of getting accepted into a group (3)
(1) restrictions of personal freedom, (2) demands on your time and resources and (3) groups can endorse a policy/ position you disagree with
Triplett experiment
kids winding fishing line onto a reel in pairs vs alone
results of the Triplett experiment
wound more when in pairs versus when alone, even though it wasn’t a competition
social facilitation
people perform better on a task in the presence of others (co-actors or a passive audience) than when they are performing the same task alone
social inhibition
people perform worse on a task in teh presence of others than when they are performing the same task alone
drive theory of social facilitation (mere presence explanation)
the mere presence of other people increases our physiological arousal; if we are performing a well-learned/ easy task, higher levels of arousal will lead to facilitation; high arousal inhibits performance on new or difficult tasks
evaluation apprehension theory
we are concerned about being evaluate by others which increases our physiological arousal; for well-learned/ easy tasks this improves performance and for difficult/new tasks it inhibits it
distraction-conflict theory
the presence of other people is distracting which lead to conflict that increases our physiological arousal; for well-learned/ easy tasks this improves performance and for difficult/new tasks it inhibits it
additive tasks
all group members perform the same task and group performance is the sum of the efforts of the individual members (eg. tug of war)
social loafing
reductions in effort when individuals work collectively in a group compared to when they work individually
free-rider effect
the tendency to contribute less to a collective task when one believes that other group members will make up for one’s lack of effort
sucker effect
tendency to contribute less to a collective task when one believes that other group members are not going to be contributing their fair share
reducing social loafing (5)
(1) make individual work identifiable and assessable, (2) make the task meaningful, (3) don’t work with strangers, (4) work with females and (5) work with some from a collectivistic culture
deindividuation
a reduced sense of individual identity accompanied by diminished self-regulation that comes over people when they are in a large group
factors that contirbute to deindividuation (4)
(1) energizing effect of others, (2) stimulus overload, (3) anonymity and (4) diffusion of responsibility
the opposite of deindividuation is ___-____
self-awareness
group polarization
tendency for group decisions to be more extreme than those made by individuals
causes of group polarization (2)
(1) persuasive arguments explanation and (2) social comparison explanation
group think
a decision-making style that is characterized by an excessive tendency among group members to maintain cohesion and seek unanimity or agreement, as opposed to making the best possible decision
antecedent/ precursors of groupthing (3)
(1) high cohesiveness, (2) isolation from outside influences and (3) strong directive leader
symptoms of groupthink (7)
(1) illusion of invulnerability, (2) illusion of morality, (3) stereotyped view of the enemy, (4) pressure on dissenters to conform, (5) self-censorship of misgivings, (6) illusion of unanimity and (7) mindguards
preventing group think (6)
(1) encourage voicing of objections, (2) seek input from outside experts, (3) appoint a devil’s advocate, (4) break into smaller subgroups, (5) have group leader initially remain impartial and (6) hold a second chance meeting a week or so later
social psychology
scientific study of how individual’s thoughts, feelings and behaviours are influenced by the real/ imagined presence of other people
drawbacks to common sense ideas (4)
(1) often contradictory, (2) fail to answer “why”, (3) not put to formal tests and (4) protected by hindsight bias
codes of ethical research conduct (4)
(1) minimize harm, (2) maintain confidentiality, (3) informed consent and (4) debriefing
social perception
how we form impressions of, and make inferences about, other people
non-verbal communication
intentional/ unintentional communication without words
micro-unit
smaller aspect of face (eg. eyebrow)
eyebrow flashing
quick up/down movement of eyebrows that humans and apes do when encountering a familiar person; innate recognition signal
fully raised eyebrows signify…
astonishment/ disbelief
half raised eyebrows signify…
mild surprise/ skepticism
half lowered eyebrows signify…
concern/ puzzlement
fully lowered eyebrows signify…
anger
basic emotions (6)
(1) happiness, (2) surprise, (3) fear, (4) sadness, (5) anger and (6) disgust
we recognize ___ (neg/pos) facial expressions faster
negative
display rules
cultural expectations about how, when and where emotions should be expressed
functions of eye contact in communication (4)
(1) regulate information flow in conversation, (2) gives feedback to speaker, (3) express emotions and (4) social control
emblems
gestures with a well-understood definition within a given culture
illustrators
gestures that accompany speech and demonstrate what is being said in a different form
categories of touch (7)
(1) positive affect, (2) playful, (3) control, (4) ritualistic and (5) task-related; + (6) negative affect and (7) aggressive
non-verbal leakage
true feelings leaking, even when they are trying to be concealed
paralanguage (paralinguistic cues)
how something is said
microexpression
a fleeting facial expression of concealed emotion, lasts less than 1/4 of a second
people __ more frequently when lying
blink
least relaible lie detector: ?
facial expression
people have __ OR __ amount of eye contact when lying
high; low
inter-channel discrepancy
inconsistency between non-verbal cues from differenct channels (eg. positive gaze but leaning away)
our deception detection is ___
poor
detection of deception (4)
(1) paralanguage, (2) microexpression, (3) eye contact and (4) inter-channel discrepancy
attribution
attempts to understand causes and perceived causes of other people’s behaviour
Heider’s categories of attribution (2)
(1) internal (dispositional) and (2) external (situational)
Kelley’s covariation theory
we focus on three sources of info to decide external versus internal attribution
(1) consensus info
(2) distinctiveness info
(3) consistency info
according to Kelley’s covariation theory, internal attributions are more likely to be made when…
consensus and distinctiveness are low and consistency is high
according to Kelley’s covariation theory, external attributions are more likely to be made when…
consensus, distinctiveness and consistnecy are ALL high
theory of correspondent inference
prefer internal attributions for others; especially if it is freely chosen, socially undesirable or produces non-common effect
attribution errors (4)
(1) fundamental attribution error (correspondence error), (2) actor-observer effect, (3) self-serving bias and (4) blame the victim
fundamental attribution error (correspondence error)
tnedency to overestimate role of internal factors in other people’s behavior
actor-observer effect
tendency to attribute their own behaviour to external causes but the behaivour of others mainly to internal causes
explanations for actor-observer effect (2)
(1) perceptual salience and (2) actors ahve more info about self than observers do
self-serving bias
tendency for people to take more responsibility for their successes than for their failures
explanations for self-serving bias (3)
(1) self-presentation strategy, (2) maintain/enhance self-esteem and (3) we expect to succeed
explanations for “blaming the victim” (2)
(1) just-world phenomenon and (2) defensive attribution
just-world phenomenon
belief that individuals get what they deserve and deserve what they get
impression formation
process of piecing information together about a person to form an overall impression
limitation of attributional theories
assumes that making causal inferences is part of everyday life
we are more likely to ask “why” questions when: (2)
(!) something unusual, negative or unexpected happens or (2) an event is personally very relevant
impression management
our efforts to produce a favorable first impression on other people
social cognition
how we select, interpret, analyze, remember and use ifnormation to make judgements and decisions about the world in which we live
naive scientists
attempt to rationally and lgoically process information about the social world
cognitive misers
lazy thinkers; look for mental short cuts when processing social information
motivated tactician model
people are flexible thinkers who caa choose among different cognitive strategies based on current goals, motivations and needs
schema
a hypothetical mental structure that contains our knowledge about some object, event, place or person; this info is stored in our memory
priming
occurs when a recent experiences makes a schema more active/accessible than it would be otherwise
types of schemas (3)
(1) person, (2) role and (3) event (aka scripts)
perseverance effect
tendency for shcemas to persist despite contradictory info
heuristic
mental shortcuts in social cognition that allow people to make judgements and decisions more quickly (with little thought)
representative heuristic
making judgements based on how similar someone/something is to the typical case
availability heuristic
tendency to judge the frequency of soemthing by how quickly relevant examples come to mind
counterfactual thinking
tendency to imagine alternative outcomes
false consensus effect
tendency to overestimate the extent to which other people share otu opinions, attitudes and behaviours
false uniqueness effect/ better than average effect
tendency to underestimate extent to which people share our socially desirable characteristics and abilities
planning fallacy
tendency for people to be overly optimistic about how long it will take to complete a project/ accomplish a task
magical thinking
based on assumptions that don’t hold up to logic/reason (rational scrutiny); belief that our thoughts/ behaviours can influence the physcial world in a manner not governed by the laws of physics
law of contagion (law of contact)
when two objects touch, they pass properties to one another
law of similarity
objects that resemble each toher share certain basic properties
mood dependent memory
more likely to remember information if your mood at the time of recall matches the time of memory storage/ information learning (encoding/ recall mood match)
attitude
an evaluation of someone or something
components of attitudes (3)
ABC’s: (1) affective, (2) behavioural and (3) cognitive
measuring attitudes (2)
(1) Likert scale (strongly agree->disagree) (2) semantic differential scale (bipolar adjective pairs)
developing attitudes (2)
(1) learning (classical, operant and social) and (2) genetics
functions of attitudes (4)
(1) instrumetnal fuciton (reward/punsihemnt), (2) knowledge function, (3) self-esteem function (ego defense) and (4) self-expression function )value expressive)
attitudes do not necessarily predict ___
behaviour
attitude-behaviour inconsistency explanations (5)
(1) person holds other relevant attitudes, (2) many attitudes are stereotypes that don’t match reality when it is faced, (3) presence of others may influence behaviour, (4) prevailing social norms may conflict with certain attitudes and (5) unforseen extraneous events can drastically chnage peoples behaviour regardless of attitudes
thoery of planned behaviour
attitudes influence our intentions to engage in a specific behaviour
what determines intentions to engage in a specific behaviour? (3)
(1) attitudes toward behaviour, (2) subjective norms and (3) perceived behavioural control
naturalistic observation
observation of people’s behaviour in natural settings without influencing the situation
requirements for experimental method (2)
(1) random assignment of participants and (2) control of confounding variables
mediating variables
ones that intervene between an independent variable and changes in social behaviour
moderators
factors that can alter the effect of an independent variable on the dependent varialbe
impression management (self-presentation)
efforts to make a good impression on others
impression management categories (2)
(1) self-enhancement and (2) other-enhancement
social comparison
tendency to compare ourselves with others in order to determine whether our view of soical reality is correct or not
attitude extremity
the extent to which an individual feel strongly about an issue
selective avoidance
tendency to direct out arrention away form information that challenges our existing attitudes
causes of obedience (4)
(1) people in authority relieve those who obey of the responsibility, (2) badges, (3) gradual escalation of orders and (4) fast pace of events limits time to consider options
resisting obedience (4)
(1) remembering you are responsible for your actions, (2) reminder that total submission is inappropriate, (3) question the experise and motives of authority figures and (4) understand the power of authority figures and its role in obedience
symbolic social influence
considering what others would think about your potentional actions; psychological presence of others inour thoughts
elaboration likelihood model
two routes to persuasion: central and peripheral
central route processing
thinking very carefully about all aspects of the persuasive message
peripheral route processing
more simplistic (heuristic) processing of information (superficial cues)
what determines if we take a central or peripheral route of processing? (2)
(1) motivation to think about the message and (2) ability to process it
cognitive dissonance
a state of psychological discomfort when you have inconsistencies between your behaviour and attitudes
changing cognitive dissonance (3)
(1) change behaviour, (2) change belief or (3) change action perception
less-leads-to-more effect
offering people small rewards for engaging in counter-attitudinal behaviour often produces more dissonance and so more attitude change than offering them larger rewards
factors affecting dissonance (3)
(1) justification, (2) freedom of choice and (3) investment
