Social Psychology

Question 1

What is Psychology

Answer 1

The scientific study of individual behaviour and experience

Question 2

What is social

Answer 2

Characterised by the presence of others, whether actual, implied or imagined (Allport, 1924)

Question 3

What is Social Psychology

Answer 3

The scientific study of how individual behaviour and experience are affected by the actual, a imagined or implied presence of others (Allport, 1954)

Question 4

What does social psychology link closely to

Answer 4

Cognitive psychology (social cognition)
Sociology (how groups are organised, how they function and how they change)
Social anthropology (more exotic cultures eg tribes)
Individual psychology 

Differs as behaviour science at heart, focuses on human interaction at both individuals and global level on how our cognition impacts a culture, vice versa

Question 5

What is involved in social psychology

Answer 5

Social thinking (cognition)

• how we see our self and others
• our beliefs
• our judgements
• our attitudes

Social influence

• culture and biology - pressure to conform
• persuasion - how we work in groups

Social relations

• prejudice - aggression
• helping - attraction and intimacy

Question 6

Auguste Comte

Answer 6

(1798-1857)
French Philosopher
Society & Social issues should be studied in the same scientific manner as natural science

Question 7

Gustav Lebon

Answer 7

(1841-1931)
French writer
Theory of crowd behaviour (1895)
People behave badly in groups because they are controlled by the crowd mind

Question 8

First social psychological experiment

Answer 8

Norman Triplett (1897)
Factors in pace making and competition
Unpacked racers were consistently slower than paced racers (competition or timed
Children work faster when next to each other
Competition can improve performance
Coaction effect: competition can improve performance
-social facilitation, competition anxiety - individual differences

Question 9

Hospitality study

Answer 9

La Pierre (1934)
Contradictions between attitudes & behaviour
Travelled around USA with a Chinese couple seeing how many hotels and restaurants would refuse service - 1 in 250 refused service
6 months later sent letter to the same establishments
- 90% of 128 replies said they would refuse to serve Chinese people
- 1% said they would accept them

Question 10

Sherif Boys Camp studies (1954; 1958, 1961)

Answer 10

Second World War promoted an interest in reducing prejudice against ethnic minorities
Explored how intercropping attitudes & behaviours eg prejudice, discrimination) are affected by the nature of intervention relations
3 phases in his studies
- Ingroup formation
- Intergroup conflict
- Reduction of intergroup conflict
Conditions for intergroup contact to reduce prejudice
- cooperation
- common goals
Influenced research on social identify, common ingroup identify and leadership

Question 11

Line judgement studies

Answer 11

(Asch, 1956)
Studies on conformity and resistance
76% of participants confirmed at least once (out of 12 trails) to an incorrect answer given by the majority
Post experiment participants reported perceiving the lines different by either:
Doubting themselves (information influence)
Or going along with the group to not stand out (normative influence)
Argues to show people unable to resist peer pressure even when they know the majority is wrong
More recent replication studies shoe much lower conformity (LaLancette & Standing, 1990)

Question 12

Obedience to authority (Milgram, 1963)

Answer 12

People follow orders even when those orders involve causing harm to others
Greater proximity of learner lower obedience
65% participant went full 450V