Topic 13: Introduction to Social Psychology

Question 1

Define social psychology

Answer 1

Study of the causes and consequences of interpersonal behaviour.

Question 2

Name some of the major research areas of social psychology

Answer 2

• Social cognition: how do humans perceive and make sense of others and the self?
• Evolution: how has evolution shaped social psychological processes?
• Culture: how does culture influence social behaviour?

Question 3

How do we perceive others?

Answer 3

Through schemas. They help with encoding of new information and anticipation of additional information.
They guide expectations, perceptions, interpretations and memory.

Question 4

How is social knowledge organised?

Answer 4

We use social schemas to organise information about people.
We also use social categories.

Question 5

What is rational thinking?

Answer 5

People are aware of their thought processes, there’s conscious deliberation.
Earlier theories assumed thinking was mostly rational.

Question 6

What is an example of a schema?

Answer 6

Dog schema = mammal, 4 legs, wags tail, barks

Question 7

What is an example of a social schema?

Answer 7

Friendship schema = shared interests, sharing resources, equal status
Warm vs Cold schema = shapes expectation and interpretation - same behaviour can be interpreted in different ways.
Stereotypes

Question 8

What is categorisation?

Answer 8

Allows us to organise large amounts of information and infer additional attributes in unfamiliar situations.

Question 9

What social categories do we tend to use?

Answer 9

Gender
Age
Race

Question 10

What determines a stereotype?

Answer 10

A category
E.g. Teenager (category) = rebellious (attribute/stereotype)

Question 11

How are we more likely to remember traits/schemas about others?

Answer 11

We are more likely to encode and remember traits that are consistent with stereotypes.
E.g. meet a librarian who is introverted, conscientious, lazy and confident
- more likely to remember the first two traits as they fit the librarian stereotype more than the others.
- challenge to this: librarian into metal music - more memorable as this is quite rare.

Question 12

What is a stereotype threat?

Answer 12

The fear of conforming to a negative stereotype.
E.g. African americans reminded of negative intellectual intelligence stereotype, women = poor maths performance.
can actually cause these people to perform badly - confirming the stereotype.

Question 13

What are the two systems of processing involved in thinking and decision making?

Answer 13

System 1: Intuitive thinking
System 2: Rational thinking

Question 14

What are the characteristics of intuitive thinking?

Answer 14

Heuristic thinking
Fast
Nonconscious
Automatic
Based on experiences

Question 15

What are the characteristics of rational thinking?

Answer 15

Slow
Conscious
Controlled
Based on consequences

Question 16

What are the ways in which we may be unaware of a mental process?

Answer 16

• Unaware of the stimulus e.g. subliminal perception
• Aware of stimulus but unaware of its effects (we may be aware of interacting with a member of a specific group but unaware of the stereotypes that come to mind)

Question 17

What does having intention mean?

Answer 17

Means being in control of the instigation of a mental process
e.g. we don’t intend to see colours, colour perception just happens
Similarly, we perceive certain social categories without intentending to and some stereotypes may spontaneously come to mind.

Question 18

How do we typically approach stereotypes?

Answer 18

By the amount of…
- Awareness
- Intention
- Efficiency
- Control

Question 19

What is efficiency with regard to mental processes?

Answer 19

The extent to which a mental process can operate with little attentional resources.
e.g. it can occur even when one’s attention is diverted such as perceiving colour
- solving a maths problem requires attentional resources so not efficient.

Question 20

What is stereotyping with regard to efficiency?

Answer 20

Stereotyping seems to occur even when attentional resources are depleted suggesting it is efficient.
However, some researchers disagree - may depend on what categories and stereotypes we are talking about.

Question 21

What is controlability?

Answer 21

The extent to which we can counteract the effect of a stimulus on thoughts and behaviours.
e.g. it is difficult (if not impossible) to control the eye blinking reflex.

Question 22

What is stereotyping with regards to control?

Answer 22

stereotypes may come to mind automatically but we may be able to control the effects of stereotypes on subsequent judgements and behaviour.
- derived from stereotype activation and application.

Question 23

Why is it important to understand the difference between intuitive and rational responses?

Answer 23

• Because much of social perception and cognition occurs intuitively/automatically.
• This underlies our perceptions of other people = affecting our judgements and behaviours.
• This can be a problem because if people are not always aware of their thought processes, then we cannot rely on self reports to find out what they’re thinking and their reasons behind their responses.

Question 24

How have researchers combated the problem behind gathering information that is not accurate as it is derived from intuitive thinking?

Answer 24

they have come up with methods that capture intuitive/automatic processes. e.g. computer tasks that measure implicit bias.
- problems to this as some of the measures seem unreliable - show different results when taken twice by same person.

Question 25

What are examples to show that social psychological processes can shift between the two systems?

Answer 25

• initially system 2 process can become more system 1: playing a musical instrument, driving a car
• system 1 can become more system 2: mindfulness practice - greater control over breathing, heart rate, social perception