SPID3: Psychology in Context Flashcards
Describe the two perspectives in defining power
- Capacity to influence others while resisting their attempts to influence others (Hogg and Vaughan)
- Relative control over another’s valued outcomes and these can be physical, financial etc (Fiske and Berdahl)
Describe harsh bases of power
- use economic and physical outcomes
- work with outcomes that are more tangible and explicit
- rely upon power differentials that are more obvious
- are more likely to exist when power is illegitimate
Describe soft bases of power
- use social outcomes
- work with outcomes are more subjective and intangible
- rely upon power differentials that may be less obvious
- are NOT weaker than harsh bases of power
- tend to produce influence that is self sustaining
Describe the approach/inhibition theory of power
High power (approach): attention to rewards, positive emotions, automatic cognition
Low power (inhibition): attention to threats, negative emotions situationally constrained behaviour
When feelings powerful, people tend to…
- be more willing to engage in action
- act in line with own preferences
- express opinions
- lower basal cortisol levels
Define dominance
The degree of deference, respect and attention one receives as a consequence of the perceived ability to coerce, intimidate and impose costs and benefits
Define prestige
The degree of deference, respect and attention an individual receives as consequence of the perceived attractiveness as a cultural model or coalition partner
Why does group based power persist?
- social identity, social dominance and system justification
Describe social identity theory
group provides us with social identity
- by categorisation, group identity or salience can increase - depersonalisation, self stereotyping
- we strive for positive distinctiveness - individual mobility, social creativity and social competition
Describe social dominance theory
- group based hierarchies exist across societies
- some have positive social value (access to power and wealth)
- some have negative social value
What did social dominance orientation correlate with?
Correlation positively with: sexism, racism, nationalism, support for the US invasion of Iraq
Correlation negatively with: tolerance, egalitarian, support for human rights, support for the military intervention in the Yugoslavian civil war
Describe the system justification theory
Processes by which existing social arrangements are legitimised even at the expense of personal and group interest
- there is general motive to justify social order and this is partially responsible for internalisation of inferiority among members of disadvantaged groups (outgroup favouritism)
What did Milgram find?
65% delivered shocks until the end of the experiment
When did disobedience in Milgram’s variations increase?
- experimenter provided no directions to increase shocks
- groups pressured participant
- teacher had proximal distance to learner
- experimenter not physically present
Define persuasion
a change in attitude, beliefs in response to direct messages - requires internalisation
What are the three components of attitude?
affect - behaviour - cognition (they work together)
Explain implicit and explicit attitudes
Measurement - is it obvious what’s being measured (indirect vs direct)
Processing - what level of processing produces the response (automatic vs deliberate)
Mental construct - does it require a distinct mental construct? (implicit vs explicit)
How do we process persuasive messages?
Heuristic processing (automatic)
Systematic processing (cognitive)
What factors affect persuasion?
Source -> expertise
Message -> one or two sided arguments
Audience -> intelligence, self esteem
Describe the Lemphur study
affect oriented message (feel positive emotion)
Results show some evidence of people processing information heuristically when not motivated BUT when people really care about the issue they process it systematically
What’s the difference between pro and counter attitudinal?
Pro attitudinal - when people agree with us, we trust experts and process their arguments heuristically. But we scrutinise non experts in order to identify weakness in “our side”
Counter attitudinal - when people disagree with us, we ignore non experts. But we scrutinise experts in order to better counter them
How do we relate to brands?
According to the brands as intentional agents framework: brands are social objects and, like humans, are perceived in terms of intention and ability (analogous to warmth and competence). The combination of these dimensions elicits different emotional responses
What defines a strong brand relationship?
- elicit loyalty
- reflect or contribute to the self concert
- lead to resistance to negative information about the brand
- feelings of betrayal when brand falls short of expectations
- anthropomorphism of the brand
Define anthropomorphism
- attribution of human characteristics to inanimate object
- used in branding to create a positive effect on product impression
What do entity theorists believe?
people behave the same all the time
- expect behaviour to be consistent over time
- characterise a person based on a single act
What do incremental theorists believe?
people behave differently in different situation
- believe that behaviour changes with context
- do not expect behaviour to be stable over time
Define conformity
aligning ones behaviour and beliefs with social norms or others behaviour - does not require internalisation
Why do we conform according to Sherif?
Norms help us solve uncertainty
- The autokinetic effect is an illusion in which a point of light in a dark room appears to be moving
- Participants estimated how much the light was moving
- When responding alone, individuals came up with their own distinct estimates
- When responding in groups, they converged on common estimates
Why do we conform according to Asch?
Normative influence
Task: say aloud which one of three lines on the right are the same length as the one on the left
When alone, participants correct 99% of time
In a group of confeds who provided wrong answers: average conformity rate: 33%, only 25% answered correctly consistently, 50% conformed on more critical trials
When participants recorded their responses privately, conformity dropped to 12.5%
What’s informational influence?
one accepts information from another as evidence about reality
Whats normative influence?
one conforms to gain social approval or to avoid social disapproval
Whats referent informational influence?
one conforms to the norm of a group when one’s membership in that group is important or salient
What’s pluralistic ignorance?
Conforming to what one mistakenly believes is the majority view, despite not personally endorsing
What’s moral outrage?
- Violations of moral norms elicit moral outrage
- Reports of moral norm violation spread quickly
- Social media has emerged as a powerful force in spreading moral outrage
- One study measured outrage in response to moral norm violations across different media
-> experience sampling ( 5x per day, 3 days)
-> analysed instances in which participants learned of moral/immoral acts
-> compares sources and amount of outrage (anger and disgust)
Define social dilemmas
A situation in which each decision has a course of action that may yield superior outcomes for the self but if all choose this strategy then all end up worse off than if all had cooperated
These could be
- social traps: ones actions benefit the self -> cost to collective
- social fences: ones actions cost the self -> benefit to the collective
Define rational self interest
Based on ration self interest model of human behaviour, humans should optimise outcomes for the self over the collective
Key mechanisms of cooperation
Reciprocity
Indirect reciprocity
Fairness
Punishment
