Social Studies: People of a Feather

Question 1

Power Structure

Answer 1

Systems that are used to exert power and control over a government, organization, or resource (e.g. authority, governance). The hierarchical interrelationships existing within a controlling group.

Question 2

Role

Answer 2

The position or purpose that someone or something has in a situation,organization, society, or relationship (e.g. manager, boss).

Question 3

Communication Structures

Answer 3

Communication structures are practical guidelines and frameworks that help individuals and groups hold productive discussions, manage conflict, and reach decisions (e.g. partners might use a specific process for having open dialogue about difficult topics).

Question 4

Similarity

Answer 4

The state or fact of being similar (having a resemblance in appearance, character, or quantity, without being identical).

Question 5

Interdependence

Answer 5

The dependence of two or more people or things on each other (e.g. children depend on their parents to give them food and money).

Question 6

Norm

Answer 6

Something that is considered as normal by society.

Question 7

Injunctive Norms

Answer 7

Behaviors which are perceived as being approved of by other people (e.g. lower your voice in a library).

Question 8

Proscriptive Norm

Answer 8

Something you’re expected not to do by society (e.g. never speak with food in your mouth).

Question 9

Cultural Identity Groups

Answer 9

The identity or feeling of belonging to a group. It is part of a person’s self-conception and self-perception and is related to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality or any kind of social group that has its own distinct culture (e.g. millennials, Christians).

Question 10

Crowds vs Mobs

Answer 10

A crowd is a group of people whose members consist of individual thoughts; a mob is a group of people with one common thought usually of criminal consequence. A mob is a disorderly or riotous crowd of people or a crowd bent on or engaged in lawless violence. A crowd is a large number of persons gathered closely together or any large number of persons.

Question 11

The Tuckman Model

Answer 11

The Tuckman Model is a 5 step process that Bruce Tuckman (psychologist in 1965), said that all teams go through them to develop. These five stages of development are forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning.

Question 12

Seceder Model

Answer 12

The seceder model is an extremely simple individual based model which shows how the local tendency to be different gives rise to the formation of hierarchically structured groups, called the seceder effect.

Question 13

Homans’ Theory

Answer 13

Homans’ theory of group formation is based on three elements, namely, activities, interaction and sentiments. According to Homan, these three elements are directly related to each other. The required activities are the assigned tasks to people to work.

Question 14

Social Exchange Theory

Answer 14

Social exchange theory proposes that social behavior is the result of an exchange process. The purpose of this exchange is to maximize benefits and minimize costs. According to this theory, developed by sociologist George Homans, people weigh the potential benefits and risks of social relationships. When the risks outweigh the rewards, people will terminate or abandon that relationship.

Question 15

Swarm Behavior

Answer 15

Swarm behaviour, or swarming, is a collective behaviour exhibited by entities, particularly animals, of similar size which aggregate together, perhaps milling about the same spot or perhaps moving en masse or migrating in some direction. From a more abstract point of view, swarm behaviour is the collective motion of a large number of self-propelled entities. From the perspective of the mathematical modeller, it is an emergent behaviour arising from simple rules that are followed by individuals and does not involve any central coordination.

Question 16

Herd Mentality

Answer 16

Herd mentality, mob mentality and pack mentality, also lesser known as gang mentality, describes how people can be influenced by their peers to adopt certain behaviors on a largely emotional, rather than rational, basis.

Question 17

Conformity

Answer 17

Social conformity is a type of social influence that results in a change of behavior or belief in order to fit in with a group. Normative conformity is conformity that occurs because of the desire to be liked and accepted (e.g. Peer Pressure). Informational conformity is conformity that occurs because of the desire to be correct. Referencial conformity is conformity that is based on a set of societal expectations of an individual based on his or her background, ethnicity, or statistics.

Question 18

Social Identity Theory

Answer 18

Henri Tajfel’s greatest contribution to psychology was social identity theory. Social identity is a person’s sense of who they are based on their group membership(s). Tajfel (1979) proposed that the groups (e.g. social class, family, football team etc.) which people belonged to were an important source of pride and self-esteem. Groups give us a sense of social identity: a sense of belonging to the social world. In order to increase our self-image we enhance the status of the group to which we belong. The central hypothesis of social identity theory is that group members of an in-group will seek to find negative aspects of an out-group, thus enhancing their self-image (e.g. stereotypes).

Question 19

Self categorization

Answer 19

As a conceptual extension of social identity theory, John Turner and his colleagues developed self-categorization theory. Self-categorization theory seeks to understand and explain the processes by which people form cognitive representations of themselves and others in relation to different social groups. The underlying premise behind this theory is that people place themselves and others into social categories on the basis of the underlying attributes that are particularly salient, and this process of social categorization shapes a range of attitudes, emotions, and behaviors.

Question 20

Dominant Culture

Answer 20

A dominant culture is a cultural practice that is dominant within a particular political, social or economic entity, in which multiple cultures are present. It may refer to a language, religion/ritual, social value and/or social custom. These features are often a norm for an entire society.

Question 21

Counterculture

Answer 21

A counterculture (also written counter-culture) is a subculture whose values and norms of behavior differ substantially from those of mainstream society, often in opposition to mainstream cultural mores.

Question 22

High-brow

Answer 22

Something/someone that is considered highly cultured and sophisticated (e.g. book by a professor).

Question 23

Low-brow

Answer 23

Something/someone that is considered vulgar and less sophisticated (e.g. book by a reality TV star).

Question 24

Asch Paradigm

Answer 24

This scenario is actually part of a famous experiment conducted by Solomon Asch in 1951. The purpose was to study social conformity, which is a type of social influence that results in a change of behavior or belief in order to fit in with a group. Asch wanted to see how often people conform and why. In his experiment, the person at the end of the row was actually the only participant; the other people in the room were actually confederates, or actors, and were purposefully giving the incorrect answer to some of the questions. Asch measured the number of times each participant conformed to the obviously incorrect answer. Approximately 25% of the participants conformed most of the time, and an additional 50% of the participants conformed at least once. That means that only 25% never conformed.

Question 25

Crutchfield Situation

Answer 25

A study led by Richard Crutchfield to see if conformity increase of decrease without face to face contact with other people. After being sat into their individual cubicles, participants would make judgement decisions about various stimuli that were projected onto the wall in front of them. For example, one slide showed various shapes (e.g., a star and a circle), and the participants were asked to judge which shape had the greater area. The major difference between the Crutchfield Situation and Asch Situation was in how participants gave their responses. Instead of stating their answers aloud, each participant stated their response by flipping an appropriate switch on an electric control panel installed inside each cubicle. Although participants did conform to the apparent group’s incorrect judgements, fewer people actually conformed in the Crutchfield situation relative to the Asch situation. Some commentators posit that this observation was due largely to the fact that participants’ responses were private (i.e., no one knew which participant gave which response).

Question 26

Ingroups

Answer 26

The groups with which individual identifies himself are his in group. one’s family, one’s college are example of his in group. Ingroup members use the term ‘we’ to express themselves.

Question 27

Outgroups

Answer 27

Refer to those groups with which individual do not identify himself. These are outside groups. Ingroups use the term ‘they’ for the members of out-group.

Question 28

Outgroup Homogeneity

Answer 28

The tendency for members of a group to see themselves as more diverse and heterogeneous than they are seen by an outgroup. The out-group homogeneity effect is one’s perception of out-group members as more similar to one another than are in-group members (e.g.”they are alike; we are diverse”).

Question 29

Trait Ascription

Answer 29

The tendency for people to view themselves as relatively variable in terms of personality, behavior and mood while viewing others as much more predictable in their personal traits across different situations. More specifically, it is a tendency to describe one’s own behaviour in terms of situational factors while preferring to describe another’s behaviour by ascribing fixed dispositions to their personality. This may occur because people’s’ own internal states are more readily observable and available to them than those of others.

Question 30

Intergroup Interactions

Answer 30

Social interaction among members of different groups. Intergroup interactions construct that represents relatively negative beliefs (e.g., stereotypes), feelings/evaluations (e.g., prejudice), and behaviors (e.g., discrimination) toward an outgroup. Although multifaceted, the term intergroup bias is used to represent general negativity toward outgroups. Intergroup interaction is typically found to exacerbate intergroup bias, producing heightened stress, anxiety, or outgroup avoidance.

Question 31

Social Comparison

Answer 31

Social comparison theory states that individuals determine their own social and personal worth based on how they stack up against others they perceive as somehow faring better or worse. People sometimes compare themselves to others as a way of fostering self-improvement, self-motivation, and a positive self-image. Social comparison bias is having feelings of dislike and competitiveness with someone that is seen physically, or mentally better than yourself.

Question 32

Social Invisibility

Answer 32

Social invisibility refers to individuals who have been marginalized and are systematically overlooked by the wider public and in effect made as if invisible. It can include homeless people, the elderly, minorities, migrant workers, or anyone who experiences a sense of exclusion from society as a whole.

Question 33

Amity-Enmity Complex

Answer 33

This is a theory that states that humans evolved as differing races, tribes, and cultures, exhibiting patriotism, morality, leadership, and nationalism. Those who belong are part of the in-group and are tolerated; all others are classed as out-group and are subject to hostility. “The code of enmity is a necessary part of the machinery of evolution. He who feels generous towards his enemy… has given up his place in the turmoil of evolutionary competition.” This theory has been created by Arthur Keith in his work, A New Theory of Human Evolution (1948).

Question 34

Internalized Oppression

Answer 34

When oppressed persons believe the lies that the oppressors tell them about their status as inferior. Oppression is hatred of one group toward another group which is upheld by public policy and private action. Internalized oppression is like believing a lie; taking dishonesty as the truth; having faith that persons or institutions that are not trustworthy should be trusted; being betrayed but thinking the betrayal is deserved; or swallowing poison as if it is nutritious food.

Question 35

Black Sheep Effect

Answer 35

A “black sheep” is a group member who is undesirable and stands out from the group in such a way as to attract disapproval from the rest of the group. In social psychology, the term black sheep effect, coined by José Marques, refers to a more specific phenomenon in which someone who is socially undesirable is liked less if he or she is a member of your group (an ingroup member) than if he or she is a member of a group to which you do not belong (an outgroup member). Conversely, someone who is socially desirable (likable) is liked more if he or she is a member of your ingroup rather than a member of an outgroup.

Question 36

Robber’s Cave

Answer 36

In the Robber’s Cave experiment, the twenty-two boys in the study were unknown to each other and all from white middle-class backgrounds. During this first phase, the groups (The Rattlers and The Eagles) did not know of the other group’s existence. Sherif now arranged the ‘competition stage’ where friction between the groups was to occur over the next 4-6 days. The simplest explanation for this conflict is competition. Assign strangers to groups, throw the groups into competition, stir the pot, and soon there is conflict. There is a lot of evidence that when people compete for scarce resources (e.g. jobs, land etc.) there is a rise in hostility between groups. For example, in times of high unemployment there may be high levels of racism among white people who believe that black people (or asylum seekers) have taken their jobs. The study was a field experiment which means it has high ecological validity.

Question 37

Stanford Prison Experiment

Answer 37

Zimbardo and his colleagues (1973) were interested in finding out whether the brutality reported among guards in American prisons was due to the sadistic personalities of the guards (i.e., dispositional) or had more to do with the prison environment (i.e., situational). Conclusion: People will readily conform to the social roles they are expected to play, especially if the roles are as strongly stereotyped as those of the prison guards.