Sociology: Social Thinking

Question 1

Social Behavior: Attraction + Affecting Factors (5)

Answer 1

Individuals liking each other.

Factors:

1. Similarity.
2. Self-disclosure.
3. Reciprocity.
4. Proximity.
5. Outward appearance.

Question 2

Social Behavior: Aggression

Answer 2

Intend to cause harm or increase social dominance.

Reasons for displays of aggression:

1. Evolutionary: protect against threats, gain access to resources.
2. Biological: brain regions.
3. Psychological/situational: negative emotions.
4. Exposure to aggression –> more likely to show aggression back.

Question 3

Social Behavior: Attachment (4 Types)

Answer 3

Emotional bond b/w caregiver and child (~6 mo to 2 yrs old).

1. Secure: consistent caregiver, trust and comfort.
2. Avoidant: caregiver has little to/no response to distressed child.
3. Ambivalent: inconsistent caregiver.
4. Disorganized: no clear pattern of behavior.

Question 4

Social Behavior: Social Support (5 Categories)

Answer 4

Perception or reality that one is cared for by a social network.

1. Emotional: listen, affirm, empathize w/ someone’s feelings.
2. Esteem: affirm qualities and skills of a person.
   3: Material: financial or material contribution to another person.
3. Informational: provide info that will help someone
4. Network: give a person a sense of belonging.

Question 5

Social Behavior: Evolutionary Fitness (Describe 3)

Answer 5

1. Foraging ~ biological, social, and cognitive.
2. Mate choice ~ phenotypic benefits, sensory bias, Fisherian / runaway selection, indicator traits, genetic compatibility.
3. Altruism: helping behavior in which person’s intent is to benefit someone else at some cost to self.

Empathy-altruism hypothesis: help someone else when you feel empathy for the other person, regardless of the cost.

Question 6

Social Perception: Impression Bias (4 Causes)

Answer 6

1. Primacy effect: 1st impressions&raquo_space; subsequent impressions.
2. Recency effect: most recent info we have about an individual is important in forming impressions.
3. Reliance on central traits to organize perception of others relative to perceiver.
4. Implicit personality theory: there are sets of assumptions people make about how different types of people, their traits, and their behaviors are related.

Question 7

Social Perception: Halo Effect

Answer 7

Cognitive bias in which judgments about a specific aspect of an individual can be affected by one’s overall impression of the individual.

Question 8

Social Perception: Just-World Hypothesis

Answer 8

Good things happen to good people. Bad things happen to bad people.

Question 9

Social Perception: Self-Serving Bias

Answer 9

Individuals view own success based on internal factors, failures based on external factors. To protect self-esteem.

Question 10

Dark Side: Prejudice (affective), Propaganda, Influences on Prejudice (name 3)

Answer 10

Irrational + or - attitude toward a person, group, or thing prior to an actual experience with that entity.

Propaganda: way by which large organizations and political groups attempt to create prejudices in others. Messages of fear, etc.

Influences:

1. Power: ability to control resources.
2. Prestige: level of respect shown to a person by others.
3. Class: SES.

Question 11

Dark Side: Ethnocentrism (vs. Cultural Relativism)

Answer 11

Ethnocentrism: judgments about other cultures based on values and beliefs of one’s own culture.

Cultural relativism: perception of another culture as different from one’s own, but with recognition that cultural values, mores, rules of a culture fit into that culture itself. Not superior, just different.

Question 12

Dark Side: Discrimination (behavioral) (2 Types)

Answer 12

When prejudicial attitudes cause individuals of a particular group to be treated differently from others.

1. Individual: conscious and obvious. Eliminated by removing person displaying behavior.
2. Institutional: built into structure of society. Perpetuated by maintaining status quo.