Unit 1a Social Psychology Flashcards
Social Psychology
Study of the way thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of one individual are influenced by the real, imagined, or inferred behavior or characteristics of other people.
Personality Psychology
The study of how people are unique and how their personalities develop and vary.
Person Perception
Impression of ourselves and others, including attributions and behaviors.
Social Comparison
People come to know themselves by evaluating their own attitudes, abilities, and beliefs in comparison with others.
Upward vs. Downward Comparison
Upward: Looking at something better. Downward: Looking at something worse.
Attribution Theory
Tries to explain how people make judgments about the causes of other people’s behavior.
Dispositional Attribution
Personality trait causes tendencies to act a certain way.
Situational Attribution
Credit behaviors to situations/scenarios.
Fundamental Attribution Error
Tendency for people to over estimate dispositional causes for behavior. In reality, situational attribution is a more likely cause.
Actor-Observer Bias
Attribution of behavior will depend if you are the actor or observer. Actor- more likely to accredit situational attribution. Observer- more likely to accredit dispositional attribution.
Explanatory Style
A person’s way of interpreting and explaining events.
Prejudice
Unjustifiable, usually negative attitude toward a group and its members. Generally involves negative emotions, stereotyped beliefs, and a predisposition to discriminatory action.
Stereotype
Over-generalized beliefs about a group of people or things, by-products of how we cognitively try to simplify the world.
Discrimination
Unfair, prejudiced, negative behavior.
Implicit Bias
Unconscious bias, unaware that it exists.
Self-Serving Bias
Example of Actor-Observer Effect, tendency for people to attribute positive events in their life to dispositional traits and negative events to situational factors.
WEIRD Acronym
W- Western
E- Educated
I- Industrial
R- Rich
D- Democracies,
Describing cultures. 80% of research is done in WEIRD countries, making up 12% of global population. This means the entire population is not represented/can’t be generalized.
Just-World Phenomenon
Reflects the common idea that good is rewarded and evil is punished; those who succeed must be good and those who don’t must be bad.
False Consensus Effect
Attribution type of cognitive bias whereby people tend to overestimate the extent to which their opinions, beliefs, preferences, values, and habits are normal and typical of those of others. We over assume that others share our opinions.
Halo Effect
The tendency for people to take a positive dispositional trait and extend it to every aspect of their life.
Devil Effect
The tendency for people to take a negative dispositional trait and extend it to every aspect of their life.
Schema
Mental representation of a concept. A shortcut/pattern of behavior or thought.
Out-group homogeneity
Perceiving uniformity of out-group attitudes, personality, and appearance that we don’t identify with. We tend to think other groups are all alike.
In-group bias
A favoring of our own group after identifying “us” and “them.”
Ethnocentrism
Assuming the superiority of one’s ethnic group.
Scapegoating
Theory that prejudice offers an outlet for anger by providing someone to blame.
Attitudes
Feeling influenced by beliefs, predispose us to respond in a particular way.
Self-fulfilling prophecy
Belief that leads to its own fulfillment.
Central Route Persuasion
Using central, key details to influence decision/attitude. More logical appeal.
Peripheral Route Persuasion
Using things that aren’t really important to influence decision/attitude. More emotional appeal.
Foot-in-the-Door Phenomenon
Tendency for people to who have first agreed to a small request to comply later with a larger request.
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
Feeling of tension/discomfort when values and behaviors are inconsistent.
Conformity
A behavior that is engaged in in order to fit in with a group.
Norm
Understood rules for accepted and expected behavior.
Normative Social Influence
Pressure resulting from a person’s desire to gain approval or avoid disapproval.
Informational Social Influence
Influence resulting from one’s willingness to accept other’s opinions about reality.
Obedience
Whether or not to follow directives of assumed authority figure.
Group Polarization
Phenomenon where, in decisions and opinions, people in a group setting become more extreme than their actual, privately held beliefs.
Groupthink
Mode of thinking that occurs with desire for harmony. In decision making the group overrides a realistic appraisal of alternatives. Leads to worse decisions.
Social Facilitation
Improved performance on simple or well-learned tasks in the presence of others. (Opposite if social inhibition).
Social Loafing
Tendency for people to exert less effort when working in a group than when individually accountable.
Deindividuation
Process of losing self-awareness and self-restraint when in a crowd.
Altruism
Doing good without expecting anything in return.
Bystander Effect
Presence of others discourages an individual from intervening in situations.
Reciprocity Norm
A social norm where, if someone does something for you, you feel obligated to return the favor.
Social Exchange Theory
We enter relationships because we benefit from them.
Social Traps
People act to obtain short-term individual gains. Which in the long run leads to a loss for the group as a whole.
Superordinate Goals
Goals that require cooperation of two or more people or groups to achieve, which usually results in rewards to the groups.
Mere Exposure Effect
Tendency to like something/someone more because you are exposed to it often.
Social Contagion
The spread of behaviors, emotions, or attitudes through a group or network.
Antisocial
Long term pattern of disregarding social norms.
