Social Psychology Exam 1 Flashcards
Social Psychology
The scientific study of the feelings, thoughts, and behaviors of individuals in social situations.
Zimbardo Prison Experiment
Experiment where make-believe roles were assigned to men for prison guards and prisoners. Prison guards abused the prisoners.
Milgram Experiment
Electric shock experiment with white coat guy.
Dispositions
Internal Factors: Beliefs, values, personality traits, and abilities that guide behavior
Fundamental Attribution Error
Failure to recognize the importance of situational influences on behavior and instead solely attributing behavior to dispositional factors
Nudge Factors
Small, innocuous-seeming prompts that have big effects on behavior (a check box that says ‘Don’t enroll for autopay’ rather than a check box that says ‘Enroll for autopay’)
Gestalt Psychology
Objects are not perceived through passive means objectively and without bias, but rather through an active nonconscious interpretation of what the object represents
Naïve Realism
The belief that we see the world without cognitive biases or complex cognitive machinery and instead see it in a direct, objective sense
Construal of Situations and Behaviors
Refers to our interpretation of situations and behaviors and to the usually nonconscious inferences we make about them
Schemas
Generalized knowledge of the physical and social world, such as what behavior to expect when interacting with a store clerk.
Stereotypes
Schema that we have for people of various kinds
Automatic Processing
Nonconscious and influenced by emotion. Results in implicit attitudes that can’t be readily controlled by the conscious mind.
Controlled Processing
Deliberate and conscious thought, use of logic. Results in explicit attitudes and beliefs that we’re aware of.
Ideomotor Mimicry
Nonconsciously mimicking someone’s body positioning whenever you’re in a conversation with them
Nonconscious Processing
We are not aware of how much of our stimuli is nonconsciously processed. For example when recognizing someone’s face you are recognizing a bunch of their distinct facial features at the same time.
Natural Selection: Evolution and Human Behavior
A lot of human behavior is essentially encoded in our genes. This is evident in the fact that a lot of behaviors are universal, for example some facial expressions.
Parental Investment
Women tend to put more value to kids and need partners that can support them because of the limited amount of kids they can have. Men can theoretically have an unlimited amount of kids so that stuff doesn’t matter to them as much.
Naturalistic Fallacy
The way things are, are the way they should be
Neocortex
The size of this part of the human brain is what distinguishes humans from other mammals. Involved in reasoning, abstract thought, and memory.
Behavior and Adaptability
Because of adaptability and flexibility in culture and behavior, humans are able to adapt to any environment and essentially to any situation.
Independent/Individualistic Cultures
Essentially able to form bonds and relationships but if those relationships get too troublesome then they can cut those ties
interdependent/collectivistic cultures
Don’t have complete personal control over their lives but also don’t necessarily want it
Independence and Gray Matter
People who were more independent rather than interdependent as shown in a study were seen to have more gray matter (neuron clusters)
Familialism
Interdependent social value defined by interpersonal warmth, closeness, and support
Hindsight Bias
Tendency to believe you could have predicted the outcome of something you learned about. When you have to predict the results of what you’re studying and then learn what the results are, you avoid this.
Hypothesis and Theory
Hypothesis: Prediction of a particular study in a particular set of conditions.
Theory: Several propositions that support an idea, backed up by lots of facts.
Dissonance Theory
The theory that people like their thoughts to be consistent with each other and will do substantial cognitive work to make that so.
Participant Observation
Observing some phenomenon at a close range. A form of observational research. For example an anthropologist following a community closely and documenting their activities.
Archival Research
Use of archives of information to perform research, past data and statistics, reports. For example study that used FBI data to show that murders involving barrooms and bedrooms were more common in the South.
Surveys
Asking questions through questionnaires or interviews, kind of self explanatory.
Representative Sampling
Sample of questioned people must be representative of population as a whole. Done by randomly sampling people.
Convenience Sampling
Example, asking just people as they walk into the library. NOT random as it must be caused by some sort of bias.
Correlational Research vs Experimental Research
Correlational Research: Two or more variables are measured to see if there is a relationship between them.
Experimental Research: Enables investigators to determine why a relationship exists or how different situations affect people’s behaviors.
Correlation and Causation
Correlation does not necessarily mean causation. There may be other factors such as a third variable or a reverse causation.
Self selection
The investigator has no control over a participant’s score or level in a particular level. For example you have no control on what religion they follow or whatever. Prevents correlation from showing causal relationships.
Longitudinal Study
Taking measurements from different periods in time. For example, measuring teens playing violent video games then into adulthood measuring incarceration rates. Does not remove causation problem but does remove reverse directionality as a 30 year old’s decisions can’t effect what he did as a 15 year old.
Independent vs Dependent variable
IV: Experimenter manipulates
DV: Experimenter measures, caused by IV
Controlled Variable
Essentially the same conditions of the experiment except it lacks the one ingredient in the hypothesis predicted to affect the dependent variable
Random Assignment
Helps get rid of third variable problem
Natural Experiment
An event occurs and the investigator measures for a causal outcome out of that event, the investigator doesn’t cause the event themselves. Kind of removes the third variable problem.
External Validity
Whether the findings or conditions of an experiment can be applied to situations outside of the context of a lab setting. Whether they can have real world implications and applications. Can it occur in everyday life? Not always essential, however.
Field experiment
Takes place in the real world out in the field and measures stimuli that participants wouldn’t expect. Helps with external validity.
Internal validity
Likelihood that only the manipulated variable and no other external influences may have caused the results. Help get rid of it with random assignment.
Reliability
Do the conditions give consistent results on repeated occasions? Can two measuring instruments provide the same or close results?
Measurement Validity
Correlation between a measure and the outcome a measure is supposed to predict. For example higher IQ score should mean that students perform better in school, so correlation between school results and IQ test scores is measured.
Regression to the mean
Think about a bell curve, correlation in one variable may be stronger than correlation on another variable. Probabilistic, conditions may cause something that wouldn’t typically happen to happen.
Statistical Significance
Measure of the probability that a result of an experiment could have occurred by chance alone. Value should be 1 in 20 or less than .05. Two Factors help this, size of difference between groups/size of relationship of correlation and number of cases on which the finding is based.
Replication
The experiment is able to be reproduced and so are its results.
Open Science
Experimental results are open, anyone can come and look at the data and confirm it or do whatever the fuck with it.
Informed consent
Participant agreeing to be researched after being told all of the conditions of the experiment. Keeps shit ethical.
Deception research and debriefing
Situations where informed consent would mess up the study, so people who are measured in the study are debriefed afterwards about the experiment they were a part of.
Basic Science
Trying to measure and figure out why something happens in its own right. For example measuring obedience instead of trying to find out what makes people more or less obedient.
Applied Science
Example would be how to make preteens less susceptible to smoking
Causal Attribution
Process people use to explain their own and other people’s behavior
Explanatory Style
People’s habitual way of explaining events. Has three dimensions: Internal/External, Stable/Unstable, Global/Specific.
Internal/External: Due to something about the person or to the situation
Stable/Unstable: Cause will be present in the future or not
Global/Specific: Cause influences many aspects of someone’s life or just this one
Optimistic Explanatory Style
External, unstable, and specific
Caveat to external attributions
Something like seeking out fame and fortune may seem like an internal attribution, but many people seem to find fame and fortune attractive so it is considered external
Covariation Principle
Has three types:
Consensus: Refers to what most people would do in a given situation
Distinctiveness: How does an individual behave in different situations
Consistency: What an individual does in a given situation on different occasions
When do situational attributions occur
Consensus, Distinctiveness, and Consistency are all high
When do dispositional attributions occur
Consistency is high, consensus and distinctiveness are low
Discounting principle
Confidence that a particular cause produced a given outcome is lower if there are other causes that are possible to have caused that outcome
Augmentation principle
Confidence that particular cause produced a given outcome is higher if other causes would produce a different outcome. For example if someone advocates for a position despite being threatened with torture for doing so, we’re more likely to believe it
Counterfactual thinking
Thoughts counter to the fact. What could have, should have, might have happened. Process present sometimes in making causal assessments.
Emotional amplification
Emotion is intensified if a thing almost didn’t happen because of a cause. For example a loved one dies because you switched their seats in a bus last second. Example of counterfactual thinking.
Self-serving attributional bias
People attribute their failures and mishaps to external attributions, but their successes to dispositional factors
Fundamental Attribution Error
Attributing the behaviors of other people to dispositional factors rather than situational factors even when powerful situational factors are in place
Reasons people commit the fundamental attribution error
Dispositional inferences about ourselves can be comforting. For example you think if something bad happened to another person it must have not been situational, and if we do good then good will come to us.
Just world hypothesis
People get what they deserve in life
Perceptual Salience
A reason situational factors may not be noticeable to the observer. They are so focused on the person doing the behavior that they think it must be important.
Limited Experiences effect on fundamental attribution error
More of the FAE is likely to occur from limited experiences with someone because you are only seeing them in the context of that situation
Actor-Observer error
Attributing your own actions to be situational and the actions of others to be caused by dispositional factors
Activation of the frontoparietal area of the brain
Is activated more when people have to do some sort of thing that doesn’t come to them naturally. For example an American having to pay attention to the context
Causal Attribution for Independent and Interdependent People
Independent people, westerners, attribute things more often to disposition. Interdependent people, Asians, attribute things more often to situational factors
Priming Causal Attributions
If you show participants American stuff, they’ll attribute things to dispositional factors. If you show them Chinese stuff, they’ll attribute things to situational factors
Causal Attribution differences in social class
Wealthier people seemed to attribute things more to dispositional factors as opposed to lower class people. This is probably because lower class people interact with more people as opposed to wealthier people
Emotions vs Moods
Emotions are usually quick and subjective. Moods can also be subjective but they last longer, such as feeling irritable. Emotional disorders can last long. Emotional disorders and moods aren’t always clear what they’re caused by, emotions tend to be more clear.
Two reasons for having emotions
Help us interpret our surrounding circumstances and prompt us to act.
Universal vs Cultural views on emotion
Evolution supports that emotion is universal and caused by adapting and reacting to stimuli. Cultural views support that emotion is influenced by culture. Research shows that there is evidence of both.
Universality of Facial Expressions
Shown to be pretty consistent throughout different cultures
People like other people who show more emotion
As it says. If you blush more and seem more open about your emotions people will tend to view you in a more positive light
Focal Emotions
Emotions that are more common and intense in certain cultures. For example Chinese people may show more focus towards shame and embarrassment, Mexicans may be more prideful.
Affect valuation theory
Cultures will more commonly convey emotions that promote their ideals and values. More independent cultures seem to show more smiles and brightness
Display rules
Culturally specific rules that determine how, when, and to whom expressions of emotion should be conveyed. For example, you may mask your disgust at your mom’s cooking with a polite smile
Orbitofrontal Cortex
Losing function in this area of the brain makes you lose the function to rely on emotions to act in ways that fit the current situation
Commitment issue
Issue caused by lack of emotional reliability that causes one to be less committed to those he has a close relationship with. Emotions solves this issue
Oxytocin
Chemical that fosters commitment in long term relationships. Injecting this causes people to have higher empathy and be more generous
Touching people
Touching people also makes people more inclined to be open and invokes positive responses. Touch people. Touch them. Touch them.
Awe
Emotions of awe tend to invoke feelings of belonging.
Emotions influence perception
A certain emotion can influence perception in the sense that we perceive things going on around us in the light of that emotion. For example if we are angry we perceive people’s actions to be hostile and whatnot
Broaden-and-build Hypothesis
Says that negative emotions narrow our view of the world and kind of close us off. Positive emotions broaden our views and understanding and makes us develop better social relationships
Emotions affect moral judgement. Social intuitionist model of moral judgement
For example, the gut feeling that incest is wrong. We tend to have that gut feeling and then try to come up with reasonings after
Moral foundations theory
Much of our moral psychology rests on five foundations:
Care/Harm: concern for suffering of others
Fairness/cheating: focuses on justice of fairness
Loyalty/betrayal: commitment to groups and whatnot
Authority/subversion: finding one’s place in the social hierarchy
Purity/degradation: focuses on staying pure, away from sicknesses, and pure as in away from impure thoughts and stuff
Two distinct, measurable components of happiness
Life satisfaction, how well you think your life is going in general. Emotional well-being, quality of your moment-to-moment feelings.
Affective forecasting
Measured variable of emotional state in the future. Experiment of luckies and leftovers, luckies believed that two months after a breakup they would be super depressed, but leftovers actually didn’t seem to feel that way
Immune neglect
One of the factors that cause us to incorrectly predict our future happiness. We forget that our happiness has an immune system that finds the good in things
Focalism
Another factor that causes us to incorrectly predict future happiness. We focus on the central thing of a significant event, such as a breakup, but forget that other factors can also affect our happiness
Three factors that affect happiness
Peak moment. We remember the best bite of dessert. Ending. We recall the enjoyability of the last moments of a good event. The third factor that has very little influence is length, otherwise known as duration neglect
Self-schemas
People’s beliefs and feelings towards themselves, both in general and in particular situations. Built from past experience
Reflected Self Appraisals
We see ourselves in the eyes of others. Our beliefs about others’ reactions to us. Aren’t actually that accurate. We see ourselves as more shy than people actually perceive us to be.
Working self-concept
Only a subset of our vast pools of self-knowledge are utilized in a certain context. For example, notions of the self revolving around competition may be at the forefront of our minds during a sports match.
Culture and self
Westerners value independent self construals, they are themselves and separate in identity from other people. Easterners value interdependent self construals, they see themselves as someone who fulfills a role in society
Self in gender
Women tend to relate the self to social situations, for example when describing who they best are in a picture the picture tends to include other people. Men tend to point out more personal characteristics. Socialization is one of the things that causes this difference
Social Comparison Theory
Sometimes people seek out information about themselves through comparison with other people. We tend to favor downward social comparisons, in other words comparing ourselves with people slightly inferior to us, in order to boost our self esteem
Self-esteem
Overall positive or negative evaluation people have about themselves
Trait self esteem
Enduring level of self-regard over time, typically pretty stable
State self esteem
More changeable, more so about the self/self-esteem at that moment
Contingencies of self worth model
People’s self esteem gets affected by success and failures in the domains in which they have staked their self esteem. it goes up when you do well in areas that matter to you
Sociometer hypothesis
Self-esteem is an internal, subjective index of how well regarded we are by others and how likely we are to be included or excluded by them
Self esteem and culture
Asians value self esteem less than americans do. This is because of culture and day to day interactions
Self-enhancement
Desire to increase self-esteem
Better-than-average-effect
People think they are above average in the shit they do, or in popularity and stuff like that.
Self-affirmation theory
When people receive information or something happens that lowers their self-esteem, they will sometimes affirm themselves in a domain unrelated to the negative stimulus. For example if I learn that I have testicular cancer I’ll affirm myself by saying that I’m a funny guy
Self-enhancement
We see ourselves as better in a particular domain than we actually are. Is actually good for our self esteem and well being
Self-verification
We can also look for more subjective and accurate views on ourselves, which can help make ourselves more predictable and better in social situations. In other words, we strive to do shit that makes other people confirm our self-views. If we think we’re extroverted we’ll want other people to see that as well
Self regulation
act in which people initiate, alter, and regulate their behaviors in pursuit of their goals
Self discrepancy theory
Actual, ought, and ideal self theory. If there is a discrepancy between these then it can emotionally fuck you up.
Promotion focus
Ideal self, you wanna focus on attaining a positive outcome. Westerners focus on this more
Prevention focus
Ought self, you wanna focus on avoiding a negative outcome. East asians focus on this more
Implementation intentions
Specify how one will behave to achieve a goal in particular circumstances. If-then principle, if my roommate gives me a snarky comment I’ll ignore him
Goals and improvement
Bringing goals to mind can help resist temptations
Self presentations
Presenting others with the person we would like to believe we are
Self-monitoring
Monitoring our own behavior to fit the demands of the given situation
Self-handicapping
engaging in self-defeating behavior to protect the public self
Pluralistic inference
People are reluctant to give misgivings of a particular group norm, so their reluctance reinforces the false norm. Mistaken inferences are made from this
Negative information
More often reported than positive information, which leads people to believe that are at risk of more calamities than they actually are
Way info is presented, primacy effect and recency effect
primacy effect: The first thing presented is more influential because it affects interpretation of subsequent material.
Recency effect: Last thing is more influential because it is fresh in the memory
Framing effect
Examples are recency and primacy effect, other examples are just presenting info in a way to create a desired effect
Confirmation bias
People try to search for information that confirms the predicted hypothesis and are biased towards it and tend to find it more often
Schemas
Cognitive structure/organization of social norms. Top-down processing. You take shit you already know and apply it to shit you don’t know
Recency of schema
The more recently a schema has been activated the more likely it will be applied to new information
Availability heuristics
We make assessments based on what comes mostly available to mind. Makes us overestimate risks of hazards or overestimate our contributions to group projects
