Social Psychology Flashcards
dialogues and debates in social psychology
Rousseau
- man is by nature good and only institutions make him bad
Hobbes
- man is by nature solitary, poore, nasty and brutish
- if not for the civilizing constraints of society, there would be “a war of all against all”
- people are naturally selfish and evil. Cannot be trusted
approaches to social theorizing
- cognitive
- how perception and what you interpret affects behaviour - learning
- emphasis on principles of reinforcement and imitation, responses based on prior learning - motivational
- emphasis on basic human biological and psychological needs - biological
- evolutionary past and genetic disposition - cultural
- how culture affects social behaviour
level of explanation in social psychology
4 levels of analysis
- intra personal level
- what goes on inside the person - inter personal level
- interactions between two people - inter group level
- based on group level behaviour - societal level
- cultural effects on behaviour
social psychology
social psychology is a discipline in which people attempt to understand explain and predict how the thoughts, feelings and actions of individuals are influenced by the perceived, imagined or implied thoughts, feelings and actions of others
core concepts in psychoanalysis
ID, EGO and SUPEREGO
ID - most primitive part of the psyche. contains most basic urges (eat, drink, rest etc)
- the need to gain sexual pleasure
- works on the pleasure principle
- demands satisfaction now not later, regardless of consequences
EGO- works on the reality principle
- tries to satisfy the id pragmatically in accordance with societal norms
SUPEREGO - moral policeman
- represents internalized rules of parents and society
- if rules are broken the superego metes out punishment, this leads to intense anxiety, guit and self reproach
defense mechanisms
displacement:
- impulses redirected into a safer course
reaction formation:
- original wish is supplanted with the opposite
projection:
- urges are projected onto others
isolation:
- awareness of memories but not emotions
psychosexual stages of development
as the child grows older pleasure is achieved through the stimulation of certain body zones
oral stage (0-2)
- little kids always put things in their mouths for sexual pleasure
anal stage (2-4)
- potty trained they would gain pleasure from going toilet
phallic stage (4-6)
- boys develop an oedipus complex where they want to sexually possess the mother, fear father will castrate him leading to castration anxiety. boys identifies with father in hope that he will enjoy an erotic partner like his mother in the future
latency stage (6-12)
- period of dominant sexuality when girls and boys dont like each other
genital stage (12+)
- from 12 and up children were ready for full sexual experiences
experimental evidence
- data more appropriately explained through other processes
- experiments supporting frueds claims are often flawed
- frued claimed that children whose parents treat them harshly would redirect aggressive instincts on to others who have less power: evidence suggests that authoritarian aggression is not caused by the redirection of repressed impulses but by observational learning (bobo doll study)
- frued claimed that threatening stimuli is repressed.
brunner and postman presented threatening (sex, fuck and penis)
and non threatening (six, brick, tennis)
they found that threatening words took longer to report
supports idea of repression
electra complex
girl realizes she does not have a penis and develops envy and feels although she has been castrated
turns to her father who has the desirable organ in the hope that he will give her a penis substitute in the form of a baby
she turns her sexual attetion to father - hates mother, develops anxiety over her desires
resolves this by indentifying with mother
techniques of attitude measurement
likert scales - most popular
- depend on honesty as some people give socially desirable answers
- very cheap and is very quick to get answers
the bogus pipeline
- participants hooked up told it measures changes in muscles/if participants believe it is assessing their true opinion more likely to answer honestly
electromyography (EMG) measures activity of facial measures
- muscles associated with happiness moved when the video supported attitudes
- muscles associated with anger moved when the video disagreed with attitudes
- very expensive form and takes along time to get answers
attitude behaviour relations
two things dont even coincide because we need to take context into account
source of controversy - lapiere 1934
- relation between racist attitudes and behavior
- chinese couple asking for hotel and resturant in person and over phone
- Attitude was no we are racist but when people turned up they were served
- Racist attitude was expressed in the response to letter
- People didn’t follow through with It when it camr to behvaior
- Attitudes do not predict bhevaior
attitude change and stability
on the whole attitudes are relatively stable
inconsistency between attitudes and behavior = cognitive dissonance
- behavior is irrevocable so we change our attitude
- bring beliefs into line with behaviour
attitudes can be changed if the source is credible, trustworthy, attractive and likeable
if the message is presented
quickly, long and without hesitation
if we are approached
on sunny days or when we are happy
attitude resilience
one way to avoid attitude change is via the rehersal of counter arguments
mcalister et al 1982 sought to prevent teenagers from smoking, taught arguments such as
- id be a real chicken is i smoked just to impress you
- teenagers trained in this way were less likely to smoke
theory of planned behaviour
You may have an attitude that predisposes you to behave in certain way but depending on context especially these 3 things to will tell if your attitude will follow or predict the behavior
- when we have a positive attitude towards the behavior
- when norms support our attitudes
- when the behavior is under our control
many studies fail to find relations between attitudes and behaviour because they do not take these factors into account
measurement of attributions
internal or external cause
- internal to a person or external to a person
likert scales
- if you thought the test was easy might say it was external factors