Social Psychology (Ch. 15) Flashcards
social psychology
study of how social context and cultural environments impact people’s thoughts, feelings, and actions (ex. thoughts differ at school vs. a tennis court)
what are people’s behaviors generally influenced by?
individual predispositions and situational context
what is the difference between personality psychologist and social psychologist?
personality psychologst wants to understand why people act consistently across a situation
how do we perceive people?
- first notice someone’s face (fusiform face are FFA, part of the brain related to facial recognition).
- schemas/ mental representations (associated information, ex. funny joke –> “good sense of humor”)
what are the most noteworthy dimensions of someone we retain to store in our schemas?
1) how warm/ trustworthy someone is (categorize friends and foes)
2) how competent someone is (gauge status) *tendency to deny homeless people humanity because in neither group
how do we use heuristics to establish impressions of people?
transference - assume new person has some trait as a person we already know because they have some traits in common.
false consensus - use self as an anchor, this overestimates the extent people’s beliefs and attitudes are similar to ours (ex. shocked to find out some of friends have different political beliefs)
impression management
some impressions are inaccurate because with impression management strategy is to impact the impressions people form of us. (eventually walls come down when people get to know each other better)
how do we promote impression management?
self-promotion – to be seen as competent (mentioning an award won at a job interview)
ingratiation – to be seen as likable (congratulating friend on their award)
exemplification – to be seen as dedicated (volunteering for an extra shift at work)
intimidation – to be seen as dominant (sneering at opponent in basketball competition)
supplication – to be seen as needy (tearing up and holding knee after falling)
FAE in cultural context
especially relevant in Western cultures bc individualistic culture, while the default is more situational in collectivist cultures
when do we overcome FAE?
it requires cognitive work, so not often, but usually when someone’s actions are surprising or negative, we reconsider attributions (system 2)
self-serving attributions
perceive actions and outcomes in ways that benefit ourselves (~ self-serving bias) to explain losses, blame on something else (that test was rly hard), to explain our successes, put responsibility on ourselves (i am so smart)
what is the long-term impact of self-serving attributions?
change how we interpret past events and how we imagine our future
affective forecasting errors
over and under-estimate the impact of factors that help was estimate our future
(study on affective forecasting errors)
surveyed students about predicted happiness if got first vs. last choice dorm. Most all said happiness is lower if in their last choice dorm vs. first. However, surveyed a year after and all had an equal level of happiness regardless of which dorm they got.
why do we have affective forecasting errors?
we place too much emphasis on current choices (location) and not enough on actual sources of happiness (fam, friends, relationships) and forget how good we are at coping
when do our attitudes come into play?
to evaluate and guide behaviors and decisions, but mainly for situations we’ve directly experienced and when are are certain about our attitudes
implicit attitudes
automatic, activated association (b/c repeated exposure to person, place, thing, issue) (harder to change, require repeated exposure to create a new association)
explicit attitudes
explicitly report that we feel/ believe about a person, place, thing, issue (shaped by values, social norms, and other beliefs about a stimulus) (can change just by learning new things)
voter study on attitudes
decided voters: explicit attitudes –> voting behavior
undecided voters: implicit attitudes –> voting behavior
elaboration likelihood model (ELM)
2 routes to people’s attitudes and behavior (dual-processing theory of persuasion) central and peripheral route
central route
thoughtful, reflective processes (ex. shopping for a new computer and reading reviews and statistics to guide decisions).
attitudes change when given strong evidence and like to elaborate and think deeply about information (positive attitude with strong evidence and negative attitude with weak evidence). One drawback is that it is time-consuming and effortful
peripheral route
more impressionable, attitudes impacted by surface-level features and automatic associations (ex. buying a computer because of the brand of looks)
central vs. pheripheral route
central route behaviors last longer (may spontaneously buy pizza from new restaurant bc got ad, but unless its really good, you’re still a loyal customer to your normal pizza place). If you have a higher need for cognition, you are more likely to favor a central route
compliance strategies
change behavior directly without attitudes towards the product
door-in-the-face strategy
eliciting guilt after people decline large request, so feel inclined to a smaller one (ex. selling girl scout cookies and after they say no to original request or 2 boxes, asks to just buy 1 box instead)
foot-in-the-door strategy
people who complied with an initial low-cost request are more likely to agree to a second, higher-cost request (ex. first, ask people to sign a petition for girl scouts, they are then more likely to agree to subsequently buy cookies)
social proof
show other people are doing it to. (ex. point out a long list of girl scout community supports that you’ll join by buying cookies, more likely to buy bc others endorse)
scarcity principle
greater value on things in short supply
post-decision dissonance
when we have to forgo an option we had a positive attitude towards, we may focus on the negative aspects of the option not chosen to alleviate this
effort justification
(ex. after hazing, humiliating experience to get into exclusive frat, must believe that we are freely submitting ourselves to gain group loyalty)
cognitive dissonance across cultures
in individualist societies: more likely to feel cognitive dissonance when inner and outer beliefs inconsistent
in collectivist societies: more dissonance when actions are not consistent with how people may be wished to be viewed by others
social norms
patterns of behavior, tradition, beliefs and preferences accepted and reinforced by others which has an impact on our behavior. (increases variations between cultures and generations)
