social psychology Flashcards
what is social psychology?
the study of how influence other’s thoughts, feelings, behaviour, beliefs, and attitudes
* It tries to understand behavior and mental processes within its social context
* humans are inclined to form intimate interpersonal networks
what is person-environment? who theorized about P-E?
P-E focuses on an individual’s needs
kurt lewin - behaviour is a product of the person and environment
B = f(P, E),
what is social context?
social context includes
* The real, imagined, or symbolic
presence of other people
* the activities and interactions that take place among people
* the setting and the norms of behaviour in that given setting
what is the need to belong theory?
humans have a biologically-based need for interpersonal connections
*isolation -> associated with a risk for anxiety, abnormal eating, reduced intelligence or test performance
what are social influences?
obediance, confomity, etc.
* are adaptive unless they are blind/unquestioning -> then are maladaptive
what is social comparison theory?
individuals seek to evalute their abilities and beleifs by comparing them with those of others
* upward (superiors) and downward (inferiors) comaprison
what are social norms?
Standards of behaviour and attitudes expected of members of group regarding attitudes and behaviors
in given situations
what are social roles?
socially defined patterns of behavior
that are expected of persons in a given setting or group.
* The roles people assume may be the result of a person’s interests, abilities and goals, or they may be imposed on a person by cultural, economic or biological conditions.
what does social pressure do?
can create powerful psychological effects such as prejudice,
discrimination, blind obedience, and violence
* cause us to adopt behaviour to the demands of the social situation and take cues from behaviour of others
what is confomity?
The tendency for people to change or
adapt their behaviors, attitudes, and
opinions to be consistent with norms,
expectations of others.
* Influence resulting from a person’s desire to gain approval or avoid disapproval
what is asch’s experiment and the asch effect?
**asch effcect: a form of conformity in which a group majority influences individual judgements **
experiment: asking to pick a line and seeing how the group influenced the individual’s choice
results: majority of subjects in line experiment conformed to incorrect answers of majority (5% all the time & 70% some of the time)
asch’s outcomes are questioned because tendency to conform has decreased over time
what factors make conformity increase?
- You feel incompetent or insecure.
- You are in a group of 3 or more.
- You are impressed by the status of the group.
- You have made no prior commitment to a response.
- You are being observed by the others in the group.
- Your culture strongly encourages respect for social standards.
what is part of first impressions and why do they matter?
primacy effect: overal impression of another -> is influenced most by initial information
expectations affect how we percieve behaviour
self-fulfilling prophecy -> first impression affects behaviour which confirms the inital impression
what are attributions? what are internal vs external attributions?
assigning causes to explain behaviour
internal/dispositional: attribute behaviour at internal cause (qualities or actions of the individual)
* e.g. intelligence, gender, ethnicity, etc.
external/situational: atibute behaviour to external cause (context in which person is situated)
* e.g. time, environment, experinces with others
what are the types of attributional biases?
actor-observer bias: our issues due to situtaional factors while others’ issyes due to internal factors
funamental attibution error: overemphasize internal, underemphasize external factors when explaining others.
self-serving bias: successes are from internal causes while failures are from situational causes
what is attraction?
Human have a need to affiliate with other people, through
belonging to groups and developing close interpersonal relationships
what factors influence attraction?
- proximity (geographic closeness)
- mere-exposure effect (more positive twoard stimuli with repreated exposure)
- reciprocal liking
- attractivness (symmetrical faces, bodies seen as more attractive, sexually appealing)
- halo effect (attribution of positive/negative traits to person due to observing one positive/negative trait)
- similarity
how do groups influence?
social facilitation: the effect on the performance due to presence of others
* Robert Zajonc explained that
1. the presence of others heightens our
arousal
2. heightened arousal leads to better
performance on tasks we are good at and worse performance on tasks that are difficult for us
audience effects: impact of passive spectators
co-action effects: impact on performance caused by presence of others in same task
what three features characterize a group?
roles
norms
cohesiveness
what is group polarization?
groups discussion causes shift to more extreme positions
what is social loafing?
the tendency to exert less efort working with others than working alone
* studying in a group could lead to social loafing through a diffusion-of-
responsibility effect
what is deindividualization?
the loss of self-awareness and self-restraint occurring in group situations that foster action and anonymity