Social Psychology Flashcards
What were the 3 types of self that Brewer and Gardner developed (1996) ?
Individual - personal traits that distinguish you from others e.g. friendly, kind
Relational - dynamic relation with others such as family e.g. mother, son
Collective - group membership and belonging e.g. academic, sporty
What is self-awareness ?
Psychological state
Traits, feelings and behaviours
Can be present in some more than others
Not born with self-awareness
Realisation of being individual
What is the mirror test (Gallup, 1970) ?
They put the child in front of a mirror
Then when away from the mirror they put a mark on the child’s face
They put the child back in front of the mirror
Observe whether or not the child touches their face or the mirror when noticing the mark
What is the difference between private and public identity ?
Private identity is your thoughts and feelings
Public identity is your social image and what you want others to see
What is the public self and what can it cause ?
The self that can be seen and evaluated by others
Can cause evaluation apprehension
People may enjoy the admiration
Makes you adhere to social standards of behaviour
What is chronic self-awareness ?
Constant aware of shortcomings
Result in avoidance behaviour such as drinking and drugs
What is reduced self-awareness ?
Deindividuation
Less likely to monitor your own behaviour and be aware of what you’re doing
What is mindfulness ?
Incorporates self-awareness and includes acceptance
What can heightened private self-consciousness cause ?
More intense emotion of looking inwards
Accurate self-perception
Adhere to personal beliefs
Less stress related illnesses
Depression and neuroticism
What can heightened public self consciousness cause ?
Nervousness
Loss of self-esteem
Adhering to group norms to avoid embarrassment
Concerned with physical appearance of yourself and others
What is self-knowledge ?
Accessing information about what we know about yourself and how we store the knowledge
What is a self-schema ?
A stereotype of yourself, act, think, behave, feel
What does self-schematic mean ?
Important part of self-concept
What does aschematic mean ?
Non important part e.g. criticising a footballer about their singing
What are the two theories for how a schema should be developed ?
Control theory/self-regulation
Self-discrepancy theory
What is the control theory/self-regulation ? (Carver & Scheier, 1981, 1998)
Setting standards set by yourself and aiming to reach these goals
If they aren’t the same then you operate change
Different for public and private standards
What is the self-discrepancy theory ? (Higgins, 1987)
Motivating change if the ideal (like to be) and actual (ought to be) are not the same
What are the two theories for how a schema develops in relation to other individuals ?
Social comparison theory
Self-evaluation maintenance
What is the social comparison theory ? (Festinger, 1954)
An objective benchmark in comparison to those around us
Downwards comparison - see people that aren’t as good as you to make you feel good
What is the self-evaluation maintenance ? (Tesser, 1988)
Upwards comparison - comparing to someone who is better than you
Exaggerate targets ability
Change target
Distance self from the target
Devaluate comparison
e.g. bronze medallists are happier than silver as silver is upwards comparing
What are the two theories for how a schema develops in relation to other groups of people ?
Social identity theory
Self-categorisation theory
What is the self identity theory ? (Tajfel & Turner, 1979)
Having a separate social identity that is defined by group membership and inter-group behaviours
Using this identity depending on the context
What is the self-categorisation theory ? (Turner, 1987)
Internalising the groups attributes and categorising yourself into groups
Meta-contrast principle - accentuate your similarities with in-groups and differences with out-groups
BIRGing - associate with people who do well e.g. when Andy Murray loses he is called Scottish but when he wins he is called British
What are the three stages of self-concept development ?
- self-assessment = desire for accurate info and seek the truth about yourself
- self-verification = confirm and reinforce what they know and seek consistency about yourself
- self-enhancement = maintain good image and seek favourable info about yourself
What is self-serving attribution bias ?
Taking credit for what causes success and remove credit for failure
What are individualist cultures ?
Independent
Autonomous individual - separate from context
Focus on internal traits
Stable across situations
Promote own goals and differences
What are collectivist cultures ?
Interdependent
Embedded in social context
Represented in terms of roles and relations
Fluid and changing in situations
Belonging and fitting in is important
What did Semin and Rubini find in 1990 in Italy ?
In northern Italy insults were personal whereas in southern Italy insults were about family and relationships with people
What is social cognition ?
How we process and store social information and how this affects our perceptions of behaviour
What is an attribution ?
Process of assigning a cause to our and other peoples behaviour
What are social schemas ?
Knowledge about schemas
Predict and fill in the gaps in our knowledge
Facilitate top-down processing
What is a category ?
Organising hierarchically
Fuzzy sets of features, where are boundaries ?
What are prototypes ?
Cognitive representation of typical defining features of a category
What is a causal attribution ?
An inference process through which perceivers attribute an affect to no one or more causes
e.g. why did I fail this test ?
What are the 4 theories of attribution ?
Naïve psychologist
Attribution theory
Correspondent inference theory
Covariation model
What is the naïve scientist theory ? (Heider 1958)
Three principles include:
Need to form a coherent view of the world - search for motives in others behaviours
Need to gain control over environment - search for enduring properties that cause behaviour
Need to identify internal vs external factors
What is the attributional theory ? (Weiner 1979)
Causality of success or failure
Multidimensional approach
Locus, Stability, Controllability
What is the correspondent inference theory ? (Jones & Davis 1965)
Focuses on internal cues:
Act was freely chosen
Act produced a non-common effect
Not socially desirable
Hedonic relevance
Personalism
Correspondence inference - act reflects a true characteristic of the person
What is the co-variation model ? (Kelley 1967)
Use observations to identify factors that co-vary with each other
Consistency - does it always co-occur
Distinctiveness - is it exclusively linked
Consensus - do other people react in the same way
What is attribution biases ?
Systematic errors indicative of shortcuts, gut feeling, intuition
What is the fundamental attribution error ?
The tendency to attribute behaviour to enduring propositions
Target more salient - internal attribution most accessible
More likely to forget situational causes
What is actor-observer bias ?
Assume a shop assistant is rude to you but you are simply stressed if you act the same
Perceptual focus and informational difference
Perspective taking can reverse the effect
What is a self-serving bias ?
Success - internal
Failure - external
To motivate and maintain self-esteem
What is a heuristic ?
A cognitive short cut
Make it quick and easy and avoid effort
What are the 3 types of heuristics ?
Availability heuristic - how easy is it to think of examples
Representative heuristic - similarity between instance and category members and allocate a set of attributes
Anchoring ad adjustment heuristic - start point for subsequent judgement
What is an attitude ?
An enduring organization of beliefs, feelings and behavioural tendencies towards attitude objects
What is Rosenberg and Hovland’s 1960 three component model ?
Affective - expression of feelings
Cognitive - expression of belief
Behavioural - Actions/statements
What is the difference between a simple and complex dimension ?
A simple belief has one opinion/feeling whereas complex has multiple
e.g. dogs are sociable or dogs look cute but they smell bad
What are the 4 functions of attitudes ?
- knowledge function - organise and predict social world, provides a sense of meaning and coherence
- utilitarian function - help people achieve and avoid negative outcomes
- ego-defensive - protecting self esteem
- value expressive - facilitate expression of ones core values
What is the mere exposure effect ? (Robert Zajonc 1968)
Repeated exposure of stimulus to enhance preference
Participants were more likely to say that familiar novel words meant something positive
Familiarity results in increase of likeness
What is classical conditioning ?
Repeated association of a previously neutral stimulus and generate a reaction of another stimulus
e.g. Pavlov’s dog
What is instrumental conditioning ?
Behaviour followed by a positive consequence is more likely to be repeated
Reinforcement
Insko 1965
What is self perception theory ? Bem 1972
Gain knowledge of our self
Infer attitudes from own behaviour
e.g. I read one novel a week so I like novels
What are the 3 methods of how attitudes are revealed ?
Self report and experimental paradigms - attitude scales and implicit association task
Physiological measure - skin resistance, heart rate, pupil dilation
Measures of overt behaviour - frequency of behaviour, non verbal behaviour
What impacts how well attitudes predict behaviour ?
How strong the attitude is
Whether it is formed through direct experience
How it is measured
What is the theory of planned behaviour ?
People make decisions as a result of rational thought processing
e.g. going to the gym - all factors are considered like what does the doctor say, do you have any fears etc
What is cognitive dissonance ?
Unpleasant state of tension generated when a person has two or more cognitions that are inconsistent or do not fit together
What is the elaboration likelihood model ? Petty & Cacioppo 1986)
Central route - following a message closely - analytical, high effort, enduring
Peripheral route - not well attended message - not analytical, low effort, temporary
What is the heuristic systematic model ? (Chaiken 1980)
Systematic processing - when messages are attended to (central route)
Heuristic processing - use cognitive heuristics (peripheral route)
According to Johnson and Johnson what is a group ?
A group is two or more individuals in a face to face interaction, each aware of his or hers membership in the group, each aware of the others who belong to the group, and each aware of their positive interdependence as they strive to achieve mutual goals
Example of strong interpersonal relationships
Families, small groups of close friends
Example of formed to fulfil tasks groups
Committees, work group
Example of groups based on large social categories
Women, Americans
Example of group based on weak social relationships
People who enjoy Taylor swift, people from the same local area
Example of transitory groups
People waiting at a bus stop, people in the queue for the bank
What are minimal groups (Tajfel et al 1971) ?
Split randomly into two groups
People allocated more money to their own group and this could not be explained by self-interest or existing friendship
Demonstrates how easily bias/ prejudice can develop
What was Triplett’s research into social facilitation ?
Observed track cyclists and found performance was faster when they were timed alone, and racing alongside others
Audience, particularly in competition, energised performance on motor tasks
What was Allport’s research into social facilitation ?
He suggests that the mere presence improved performance
Also been found in animals too
Study into social inhibition
Complex task - e.g. typing a name backwards is done slowly in the presence of others
Men take longer to urinate when someone is stood immediately beside them
What is Zajonc’s Drive Theory ?
The mere presence of others creates an increase in arousal and triggers the dominant response
The dominant response is what you would typically do in that situation
When people are anxious, they tend to do better on easy tasks and worse on difficult tasks
What are the two outcomes of the dominant response ?
If the dominant response is correct (easy) then performance will be facilitated
If the dominant response is wrong (difficult) then performance will be inhibited
What was Cottrell’s 1972 research into evaluation apprehension ?
We learn about social reward/ punishment contingencies based on other’s evaluation
Perception of evaluation audience creates arousal, not mere presence
3 different audience conditions
Facilitation was found when the audience was perceived o be attentive, wanting to perform well for their audience
What was Markus research into evaluation apprehension ?
Time taken to dress in familiar clothes vs unfamiliar clothes in 3 conditions
Presence makes us do worse
Both theories are right it just depends on the context
What is distraction conflict theory ?
People become distracted, focusing drive on what others are doing e.g. evaluating them
People performed worse when others were doing the same thing as them due to distraction
What is social loafing ?
Reduction in individual effort when working in a group rather than alone
Can be due to coordination loss or motivation loss
Why do people social loaf ?
Output equity - when people learn others are not pulling their weight they do the same
Evaluation apprehension - individuals only believe that they are being watched when they are on their own
How can social loafing be reduced ?
Identifiability - identify people when they make a contribution
Individual responsibility - people know that they can make a unique contribution they try harder contributions to a task
What is the collective model ?
People putting effort into a task when they believe their input will have an impact and the task is going to bring them something they value
What is group polarisation ?
People often discuss topics with those who are similar minded which strengthens their beliefs
What is group problem solving ?
When groups get together and critique each other ideas
More effective in smaller groups without the researcher present
What is groupthink ?
When there is a stressful situation without a clear answer and a cohesive group come together
They must have a leader
Consequences of groupthink
Group does not carry out adequate research
Alternative options are not considered
Risks are not adequately assessed
What is social influence ?
Process where attitudes and behaviour is influences by real or implied presence of other people
What are social norms ?
Rules and standards that are understood by a group that guide social behaviour without the force of laws
They emerge out of the interaction
Any sanctions come from social networks
They facilitate making choices
What was Sherif’s 1936 research into social norms ?
He showed ps a point of light in a dark room and asked if the point was moving (autokinetic effect)
Used the judgement of others to frame reference
Towards the end the group resulted with the same response due to using each other as guidance
What was Asch’s 1951 research into conformity ?
Ps were asked to make judgements about line length
If they were uncertain they looked to others
Confederates were used to call out the wrong or right answer
Average conformity was 33%
When judgement was anonymous conformity dropped to 12.5%
What is informational influence ?
Look to others in an uncertain moment
Influenced to accept information
True cognitive change
Sherif - used others estimates as information to resolve uncertainty
What is normative influence ?
Need for social approval and acceptance
Avoid disapproval
Surface compliance and attitudes don’t truly change
What is minority influence ?
A social influence process where minorities change the attitudes of the majority
Effective when consistent, not rigid, committed
What was Milgram’s 1963 research into obedience ?
Ps shocks confederate in mock learning study
People are told to respect authority
They went into agentic state where they give responsibility to the person giving the orders
What are the factors influencing obedience ?
Gradual change and commitment - the ps had committed to the research
The immediacy of the victim - as proximity increased, obedience decreased
The immediacy of authority figure - obedience decreased when experimenter was in the room
Legitimacy of authority - lab coat, at yale university
What are the ethical issues surrounding Milgram’s study ?
Is the research important ?
Right to withdraw
Informed consent
What is a category ?
Collections of instances that have a family resemblance organised around a prototype
What is a prototype ?
Cognitive representation of typical defining features of a category - standards against which family resemblance is assessed and category membership decided
What did Rosch, 1978 say about fuzzy categories ?
They can be identified if they are more or less typical of the category
Depends on the prototype - category
Categorisation of less typical members are more difficult
What are the three reasons as to why we categories ?
Save cognitive energy - simplify how we think
Clarifies and refines perception of the world - reduces uncertainty
Maintain positive self-esteem - motivational function of identity and makes you feel good
What is an illusory correlation ?
Negative stereotypes occur when people inaccurately pair minority groups with negative events because they are different to you
What did Hamilton and Sherman 1996 do to test illusory correlations ?
Asked white american ps to estimate the arrest rates
African americans were estimated higher arrest rate than they did
What are the three effects of stereotyping ?
Behavioural assimilation - stereotypes can also influence our own behaviour
Stereotyping threat - threat of negative evaluation can lead to poor performance such as sinking to that level
Prejudice and discrimination
What is Bargh 1996 scrambled sentence task ? (Behavioural assimilation)
They made ps make sentences out of words and the words were either related to elderly people or they were neutral
Confederate recorded time it took for PS to leave the room, they left more slowly when writing sentences with elderly words (primed)
What are examples of stereotype threats ?
We behave in line with the stereotypes
When women were reminded of stereotypes of women in maths they performed poorer
What is reluctance to help in regards to discrimination ? (Gaetner and Dovidio 1977)
Found PS were reluctant to help a minority member when faced with emergency, but only when others were present, if they were alone they would help
What is tokenism in response to discrimination ? (Monin and Miller 2001)
The process of favouring a member of a minority group in isolated episodes
They found that if someone had hired a minority group it would mean they were more willing to discriminate against other minorities in subsequent hiring as they ‘proved’ they weren’t prejudice
What is reverse discrimination ? (Dutton and Lake 1973)
Opening display minority behaviour but as a way to deflect accusations
What did Dovidio 1996 find about racism ?
That there has been a decline of racist attitudes within the last 60 years
However, Quillan and Lee 2022 found hiring discrimination among minority groups has no fallen
What is subtle prejudice ?
Modern racism - blame the victim, support policies that all happen to disadvantage racial minorities, more subtle
Ambivalent racism - pity the disadvantage, hostility to the deviant
What causes prejudice ?
Historical/ economical - linked to the notion of frustration aggression
Psychological - individual differences in personality, group processes
What is the frustration aggression hypothesis (Dollard 1939)
Psychic energy built up by frustration
find a scapegoat - minorities
linked to Freudian notion of displacement
when angry, misdirect anger
What was Hoyland and Sears 1940 evidence towards the frustration aggression hypothesis ?
As price of cotton increases, frustration increased, increased number of lynching
What is the authoritarian personality ?
People predisposed to be prejudice towards minority
Extreme reaction to authority
Obsession with rank
Displace anger
Related to upbringing
Adorno evidence for authoritarian personality
1950
Retrospective interviews about childhood
Correlation between harsh parenting and measures of prejudice
What are the problems with the authoritarian personaility ?
Correlational evidence - cant determine cause and effect
Poor methodology - relies on memory, self-report
Ignored social context - Take into account history and culture
What is Barrett and Shorts evidence 1992 into social learning ?
English children 4-5 years old see racial hatred and approval of racist behaviour
What is conformity?
Conforming to social norms
Minded 1952 investigated attitudes of white miners
60% would readily switch between racism
What are inter group differences ?
In group vs our group
Depolarisation
In group biases
Why is social identity important ?
Helps maintain self esteem
Social bonding
Implications for interaction with our-group members
Hypothesised cause of prejudice and stereotyping
What was Jane Elliot’s 1968 research ?
Acted as if blue eyed children were inferior and brown eyed children were quick to derogate those with blue eyes
Prejudice
What was Akrimi 2011 sexism research ?
Explored wether personality predicted sexism
Results showed sexism was a result of personality and social psychology constructs
What did Hobbes 1651 say about aggression ?
That extreme levels of aggression is natural for human beings
What is aggression ?
Intent to harm - even if you don’t cause harm, if the intention is there then it is aggressive
What are methods of measuring aggression ?
Bobo doll (Bandura 1963)
Observations from teacher or colleagues
Self-reports of aggressive behaviour
Selecting the spiciness of hot sauce (Lieberman 1999)
What was Chermack, Berman, Taylor 1997 research into aggression ?
Subjects competed against a game
After each trial the loser got a shock
Low provocation - shocks stayed at 2
High provocation - shock went to 9
What is the link between gaming and aggression ?
We use media as a model for our behaviour
Evidence between aggression and gaming from Anderson and Bushman 2001
Ferguson 2015 suggests no effect
No standardised use of aggression measure
Kennedy 2014 found people who play video games were less distracted by violent images
What are the two types of theories of aggression ?
Innate theories - aggression is unlearned and universal
Social theories - social context in which we exist explains it
What is the innate death instinct ? Thanatos
Psychodynamic approach
Anger is initially directed self-destruction but as we develop it becomes directed towards others
What is the dual factor theory ?
Ethological perspective
Innate urge to aggress (inevitable)
Aggressive behaviour elicited by environmental stimuli (releasers)
What is social learning theory ?
Observational learning - modelling and learning by vicarious experience
Bandits bobo doll w
What is the frustration-aggression hypothesis ?
The occurrence of aggressive behaviour always presupposes the existence of frustration
What is excitation transfer ?
Zilman 1979
Expression of aggression is a function of 3 factors
Learnt aggressive behaviour
Arousal or excitement from another source
The persons interpretation of the arousal state
What is type A personality as a factor influencing aggression, Baron 1989 ?
Striving to achieve, time urgency, competitiveness and hostility
More conflict with peers and subordinates
What is heat as a factor influencing aggression, Bushman 2005 ?
Assault goes up as temperature increases
Link between aggression and temperature
What is presence of a weapon as a factor influencing aggression, Klinesmith 2006 ?
Holding a gun increased aggressive behaviour
What is alcohol as a factor influencing aggression, Miller and Parrott 2010 ?
Intoxicated participants behave more aggressively
Low aggressors become more aggressive when intoxicated
What is narcissism as a factor influencing aggression, Bushman and Baumeister 1998 ?
Narcissistic people gave worse punishments of louder noises to one’s that critiqued them
What is the general aggression model ?
A comprehensive integrative framework for understanding human aggression, it considers social, cognitive, developmental and biological factors in aggression
What are in groups and out groups ?
In groups are where the individual feels a sense of belonging and membership
Out groups are where the individual doesn’t feel a sense of belonging and doesn’t identify with them
What is relative deprivation ?
Feeling like you have less than you are entitled to
Gap between expectations and entitlement
Subjective
What did Berkowitz 1962 say about inter group prejudice ?
It is a function of aversive events and aggressive associations
What is egoistic relative deprivation suggested by Runciman 1966 ?
Feeling of having less than we feel entitled to
Relative to our personal aspirations
What is fraternalistic relative deprivation suggested by Runciman 1966 ?
Sense that the group has less than it is entitled to
Relative to the collective aspirations of other groups
What is Sherif’s realistic conflict theory 1966 ?
Where groups compete over scarce recourses and ethnocentrism arises
What is ethnocentrism ?
View of things in which one’s own group is at the centre of everything
Own group is more superior
What are the four stages of Sherif’s summer camp studies ?
- Arrive at camp, friendships formed
- Camp divided into two groups, in groups formed and status differences
- Inter group competition
- Groups provided with superordinate goals and inter group cooperation
What is minimal group paradigm ?
Experimental methodology to investigate the effect of social categorisation alone on behaviour
Groups favoured their in group
What is social identity theory ?
Theory of group membership and inter group relations based on self categorisation, social comparison and the construction of shared properties
How can you improve inter group relations ?
Realistic conflict theory - existence of superordinate goals reduces hostility
Superordinate goals - if fail to achieve may worsen relations
Contact hypothesis - bring members of opposing social groups together
What is prosocial behaviour ?
Acts that are positively valued by society
Has a positive social consequence and well being for another person
What is the evolutionary perspective (contemporary neo-Darwinian models of evolution) ?
Evolutionary success - survival of one’s genes
Genetically based predispositions
Evolutionary success of people who display this
What is the evolutionary perspective (kin selection) ?
Benefit in terms of inclusive fitness to those who help relatives
More inclined to save relatives
What is the evolutionary perspective (reciprocal altruism) ?
Helping others increase the likelihood that they’ll help us
Increase status and reputation
How to people learn to be helpful ?
Observational learning
Using reinforcements so it is more likely to be repeated
What is the bystander effect ?
People are less likely to help in an emergency when there are others around
Bystander intervention is when an individual stops being a bystander and helps
What are the processes contributing to bystander apathy ?
Diffusion of responsibility
Audience inhibition
Social influence
What was Buirnstein 1994 research on kin selection ?
More willing to help closer kin
More likely to help those who are healthy in life or death and help those who are sick in everyday situations
What are the 5 factors for attraction ?
Evolution and attraction
Ideals
Similarity
Proximity
Familiarity
What is self-disclosure ?
Social penetration theory
Sharing of intimate information and feelings with another person
Disclosing personal info
Central processes in developing and maintaining relationships
What is love ?
Passionate and romantic love
Companionate love
What is passionate love ?
Intense emotional state
Feel more positive and increase self-esteem
What is compassionate love ?
Less intense than passionate
Feelings of friendly affection and deep attachment
What is the 3 factor theory of love ?
Cultural concept of love
Appropriate person to love
Emotional arousal, self-labelled love, felt when interaction
What was Dutton and Aron’s research ?
Male participants : wobbly bridge or sturdy bridge
Those who went on the arousal inducing bridge called the experimenter afterwards
What is Sternberg’s triangular theory of love ?
Intimacy - feel the closeness
Passion - drive that leads to romance
Commitment - maintain a relationship
What is the social exchange theory ?
Do the rewards exceed the cost
Satisfaction
What is equity theory ?
Ratio inputs to outcomes
