Task 1- Social Cognition

Question 1

What is social cognition?

Answer 1

Cognitive processes and structures that influence and are influenced by social behaviour

-Mental processing-> largely automatic
& unconscious

Question 2

Configural model of Ash

Answer 2

Central traits play a disproportionate role in configuring the final impression
vs.
Peripheral traits having an insignificant influence on final impression

-> lecturer decribed as warm was linked to positive character trait

-> lecturer described as cold was linked to negative
characteristics

Question 3

Primacy effect

Answer 3

traits presented first disproportionately influence final impression

-> act as central cue/ pay more attention at the beginning

Question 4

Recency effect

Answer 4

later presented information can also have disproportionate influence

eg when you are distracted (overworked, bombarded with stimuli, tired)

Question 5

Implicit personality theories

Answer 5

personal ways of characterising other people and explaining their behaviour

• > general expectations we build after learning something about central traits
  (e. g. assumption that happy people are friendly)

Question 6

Schema

Answer 6

cognitive structure that represents knowledge about a concept or type of stimulus, including its attributes and the relations among those attributes
allows to quickly make sense of sth

-> e.g. person schema, role schema,content-free schema

Question 7

Scripts

Answer 7

about events, making it meaningful

-> having script about going out/partying/studying

Question 8

Ways to change schemas (3)

Answer 8

1) Bookkeeping
- > slow change caused by accumulating evidence

2) Conversion
- > sudden and massive change once a discomforting evidence appeared

3) Subtyping
- > formation of subcategory to accommodate inconsistent information

Question 9

Self-categorization theory

Answer 9

process of categorizing oneself as a group member produces social identity & group & intergroup behaviour

Question 10

Social identity theory

Answer 10

Group membership & intergroup relations based on self-categorization, social comparisons & construction of shared self-definition in terms of ingroup-defining properties

Question 11

Accentuation principle

Answer 11

Categorization accentuates/emphasizes perceived similarities within & differences between groups on dimension people believe are correlated with the categorization

-> categorization produces stereotyping

Question 12

Social encoding (4)

Answer 12

1) Pre-attentive analysis
scanning of the environment

2)Focal attention
Identification & categorization of stimuli

3) Comprehension
stimuli are given meaning

4) Elaborative readoning
lining stimuli knowledge

Question 13

Vividness

Answer 13

attract attention due to emotional interest

eg a violent crime

Question 14

Elaboration-likelihood model

Answer 14

central/peripheral rout of processing

Question 15

Heuristic-systematic model

Answer 15

carefully & systematic processing
vs.
automatically relying on cognitive heuristics

Question 16

Normative model
( known as behavioural decision theory)

Answer 16

Ideal processes-> making accurate social inference

Question 17

Regression effects

Answer 17

tendency to judge sth based on (1st) initial obersvations

-> restaurant you visited is very good
• telling your friends
-> next time restaurant isn’t that good, then only average

Question 18

Base-rate information

Answer 18

general information usually factual, ppl underuse often bc they fail to see relevance

Question 19

illusory correlation

Answer 19

cognitive exaggeration of the degree of co-occurence of two stimuli or events, or the perception of a co-occurence where none exist

-> tend to overestimate/ see a covariation even though none exist

Question 20

Associated meaning

Answer 20

illusory correlation in which items are seen as belonging together because they “ought” to on the basis of prior expectations

Question 21

Paired distinctiveness

Answer 21

illusory correlation in which items are seen as belonging together because they share some unusual feature

Question 22

Affect-infusion model

Answer 22

describes effects of mood on social cognition (social judgements reflect current mood)

Question 23

false consensus effect

Answer 23

only bc you in group like sth, you expect everyone to like it too
eg two friends like Justin Bieber -> everyone does

Question 24

Substantive processing

Answer 24

way of processing information

-> carefully construct judgement from variety of informational sources

Question 25

Improving social inference

Answer 25

formal education in scientific & rational thinking + techniques

Question 26

Heuristics

Answer 26

Cognitive short-cuts that provide adequately accurate inferences for most of us most of the time

-> help navigating overwhelming amount of social information in our environment

Question 27

Representative Heuristic

Answer 27

instances are assigned to categories on the basis of overall similarity
eg a singer SHOULD look good

Question 28

Availability heuristic

Answer 28

frequency of an event is based on how quickly instances or associations come to mind
eg media shows muslims, we think it is frequent to find violent muslims

Question 29

Anchoring & adjustment

Answer 29

inferences are tied to initial standards or schemas

(e. g. judge someone on basis of our self
- > self= anchor)

Question 30

Internal (dispositional) attribution

Answer 30

assigning cause of our own or others’ behaviour to internal or dispositional factors

Question 31

External ( situational) attribution

Answer 31

assigning the cause of our own or others’ behaviour to external or environmental factors

Question 32

Correspondent inference

Answer 32

causal attribution of behaviour to underlying dispositions

(-> if we see correspondence between motive and behaviour)

•people like to make correspondent inferences to make behaviour predictable and gives us sense of power

Question 33

Outcome bias

Answer 33

Belief that the outcomes of a behaviour were intended by the person who chose the behaviour

Question 34

Hedonic relevance

Answer 34

refers to behaviour that has important direct consequences for self

Question 35

Covariation model (3)

Answer 35

people assign the cause of behaviour to the factor that covaries most closely with the behaviour

-> consitsency information
(Does Tom always [high] laugh at the comedian or just sometimes [low]?)

-> distinctive information
( Does Tom laugh at everything [low] or just the comedian [high]?)

-> consensus information
(Does everyone laugh [high] or just Tom [low]?)

Question 36

Causal schemata

Answer 36

Experience-based beliefs about how certain types of causes interact to produce an effect

Question 37

Self-perception theory

Answer 37

Gain knowledge of ourselves only by making self-attributions:

for example, we infer our own attitudes from our own behaviour

Question 38

Locus (Achievement attribution)

Answer 38

is the performance caused by internal (actor)/ external (situation) factors?

Question 39

Correspondence bias

Answer 39

tendency to over-attribute behaviour to stable underlying personality dispositions

Question 40

Fundamental attribution error

Answer 40

Bias in attributing another’s behaviour more to internal than to situational causes
less fundamental than correspondence bias

Question 46

Outcome bias

Answer 46

people assume that a person behaves in particular ways intended all outcomes of that behaviour

Question 47

Essentialism

Answer 47

behaviour that considered to reflect immutable, innate properties of people/group they belong to

Question 48

Actor-observer effect

Answer 48

tendency to attribute our own behaviour externally (environmental factors) & other’s internally (dispositional factors)

• actor can’t see him-/herself behaving, observer can
-> informational differences of actor & observer
about each other

Question 49

False-consensus effect

Answer 49

Seeing our own behaviour as being more typical than it really is

-> assume others behave the same way in same situation

Question 50

Self-serving bias

Answer 50

Attributional distortions that protect or enhance self-esteem or the self-concept

• > self-enhancing bias
• > self-protecting bias
• > self-handicapping (reduce responsibility)
• > illusion of control
• > belief in a just world (good things go to good people)

Question 51

Intergroup attributions

Answer 51

assigning cause of one’s behaviour to group member ship

Question 52

Ethnocentrism

Answer 52

Evaluative preference for all aspects of our own group relative to other groups