3 Social Psychology

Social Psychology Chapter 18 (695-741)

Mr. Holland

Social Psychologists  

Explore how we think about, influence, and relate to other people. Attributions – – –

Dispositional attribution – to attribute a behavior or action to someone’s personality Situational attribution – to attribute a behavior or actions to someone’s specific situation. Fundamental attribution error – to underestimate the situational and overestimate the personal disposition. To basically assume someone did something, like get angry, because they are “like that all the time.”

Attitudes Attitudes are beliefs and feelings that predispose us to certain behavior when we react to different things. Attitudes are most likely to guide our actions if:  Outside influences on what we say or do are minimal  The attitude is specifically relevant to the behavior  We are keenly aware of our attitudes

Actions  

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Actions can also guide attitudes Foot-in-the-door phenomenon – the idea that by agreeing to do a small thing, people will later be more susceptible to agreeing to do a big thing Role-Playing can affect attitudes Cognitive dissonance can possibly change attitudes. Your mind will resolve this dissonance by either changing your attitude or changing the facts that you observed.

Role Playing  Role

Playing can greatly affect attitudes  The Stanford Prison Experiment by Phil Zimbardo. Regular people were put into the roles of “guards” and “prisoners.”  http://www.prisonexp.org/slide-1.htm

Conformity 

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Solomon Asch, conformity and the line tests (295-300) - 75% choose the wrong answer to conform Milgram’s, obedience shock tests (308-316) -65% completed the entire test using “danger severe shock!”

Learn from this! Ask Questions!

Reasons for Conformity  To

avoid rejection or gain social approval - Normative Social Influence *How does Corliss enforce normative social influence?  We are receptive to other’s opinions about things especially if we are not sure ourselves or if our opinion is important. - Informative social influence

Conformity  Individualistic

cultures tend to have less conformity in them but still have a lot.  Obedience and conformity occur much less often when there are role models for defiance. (why no one can have headphones on!)

Group Influence  Social

Facilitation – When the group affects your performance. For simple or well rehearsed tasks group facilitation helps you do better. But for complex or new tasks it can make you do worse.  Social Loafing – tendency for people in a group to put in less effort towards a common goal than if they were working on their own.

The Danger of the Group  Deindividuation

– Loss of self-awareness and self-restraint occuring in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity. - examples: Concerts, Riots, War, Abu Ghraib Iraq

Group Polarization  Enhancing

the opinions of a group by talking about them in the group. Making the group more cohesive and less likely to agree with outsiders.

How can you avoid group polarization? What are the possible effects of the internet on Group Polarization?

Groupthink  Groups

often want “harmony.” They don’t like dissent.  Groupthink censors individuals, who do not speak up, because they want to conform. Famous Examples: Bay of Pigs invasion, Pearl Harbor, Escalation of Vietnam, Invasion of Iraq.

Social Relations Social Roots of Prejudice  Social Inequalities (wealth, status, power) -

Prejudice rationalizes inequalities Blame the victim / Self fulfilling prophesy

In Group Bias  People

have a need to belong. This means people will join groups. People tend to favor the groups they are in.  This predisposed prejudice against strangers  Group polarization can make things worse

Scapegoating  Scapegoat

theory – The theory that prejudice offers an outlet for anger by providing someone to blame.  Despised out groups can actually raise an ingroups self-esteem. People who have low self esteem often restore it by knocking down other people.  People with higher self esteem are usually more open

Cognitive Roots  Categorization -

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The human brain naturally categorizes things for you so you can understand the world you live in. Categorizing humans results in stereotyping, stereotyping often has some truth but overgeneralizes and can cause prejudice and discrimination.

Cognitive roots  Vivid

cases – often a vivid case can cause a stereotype  Just World Phenomenon – The belief that people get what they deserve. This contributes to prejudice because we think rich people deserve to be rich and poor people somehow deserve to be poor even if its not the case.

Aggression  Aggression

in psychology is any physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt or destroy.  Behavior emerges from an interaction of biology and experience. Why is it impossible for aggression to be a simple instinct?

Biology of Aggression Aggression is a complex behavior that occurs in particular contexts, many things influence it. Biology sets our thresholds for aggression but situations pull the trigger.

Biological factors 

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Biochemical - (serotonin), hormones, drugs such as alcohol influence neural systems that control aggression Genetic – Twin studies reveal genetics can influence aggressive dispositions. (don’t worry Moore Twins, fraternal twins much less likely to share aggressive dispositions). The most famous genetic indicator of increased aggression is simply the y chromosome

Biological factors  Neural

influences – The brain has a complex system for initiating and inhibiting aggression. No one part of the brain is responsible entirely but they do influence the likeliness of aggressive behavior in a given context.

Psychology of Aggression  Frustration-aggression

principle Being blocked from a goal can increase one’s readiness to be aggressive.  Frustration causes anger which causes aggression esp. if there is an aggressive cue around – like a gun.

Many factors increase aggressiveness  Averse

stimuli such as, physical pain, personal insults, foul odors, hot temperatures, cigarette smoke,  Learned Behavior – people are more likely to use aggression if they have learned aggression pays, either by direct reward or by observation

Cultural Values 

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High crime rates are reported in societies that have a great disparity between rich and poor. Cultural values such as “manly honor” as opposed to pacifism can affect aggression. Absence of a Father figure correlates to increased aggression. Not all individuals react the same to these social stresses.

Learned aggression and the Media 

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Sexual aggression in the modern world is on the rise. More women are complaining about sexual attacks, and harassment. Most TV/Movie/Internet sexual acts are casual and often start with aggressive behavior, the woman resisting and then finally “giving in.” This unrealistic portrayal of “romance” is the first and most often repeated kind of modeled sexual encounter most people experience in the media The over $15 Billion internet porn industry makes more than all major league sports combined.

Sexual Aggression and the Media  Experiments

reveal that watching pornography (even if non violent) makes one’s own partner seem less attractive, makes friendliness seem more like sexual advances, and makes sexual aggression to be taken less seriously.  However, no one explanation can be used to predict a violent act. Aggression is complex.

Violence and Video Games 

Experiments do show that violent video games do increase aggressive tendencies and behavior, but they themselves cannot predict an aggressive person or disposition.

Game Theory “Social Trap” 

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Conflict – A perceived incompatibility of actions, goals, or ideas Game Theory – when parties acting in their own interest choose what’s worst for both of them.

Enemy Perceptions 

People tend to demonize their enemies, often in mirror images of each other. For example both Osama Bin Laden and people of the US may call each other “terrorists” or “murderers” that follow their religion in a heretical way. It doesn’t make either side right or wrong its just a comment on how opposing sides think about each other.

Attraction  Proximity

and mere exposure effect – just physically being near someone for a great amount of time tends increase the chances of liking someone. Familiarity increases the chance you will like someone or something.  Appearance or physical attraction – Unfortunately appearance does matter a great deal in how people judge others.

Physical attraction  Physical

attractiveness accounts for people thinking that attractive people are more healthy, happier, more socially skilled, more sensitive, and more successful, though NOT more honest or compassionate.  However, attractiveness is basically unrelated to people’s personal self-esteem or happiness

Physical Attractiveness  “Beauty

is in the eye of the beholder” or in most cases the culture.  To be more “attractive” people in different cultures have pierced their noses, bound their feet to keep them tiny like a child’s, lengthened their necks, dyed or painted their skin or hair, become fatter, have surgery to become thinner, filled their breasts with silicone, etc etc

Attraction 

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Woman spend more on make-up than on education and social services combined. 8.5 million cosmetic surgeries occurred in 2001 Some things are attractive through-out time. Men think a more youthful appearance is usually attractive in woman, woman are attracted to men who seem healthy looking, mature, dominant, and affluent. Average is attractive, digital average composits have been rated as more attractive of the actual people that made them up.

Attraction 

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Feelings – how you feel about a person DOES matter as well. We like those who like us We like people who are more similar than more different. Opposites usually don’t attract as much. Passionate vs. Companionate love Equity Self-Disclosure

Passionate Love 

Passionate Love (romantic love) depends significantly on arousal. In an aroused state (arousal being caused by most any reason) people can seem more attractive. Because passionate love is based on constant arousal it usually fades at some point. Non-western cultures who rate love as not essential to a good marriage indeed have better divorce rates

Companionate Love 

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Companionate love is a deep affectionate attachment to someone. When someone becomes a part of your soul and a partner in everyday life. One key to an enduring relationship is equity The idea that both partners receive from a relationship in proportion to what they put into it. No one partner is giving or taking more. Mutually sharing self, possessions, support, and caring about each other’s welfare is the key to ANY intimate relationship.

Intimacy  Self-disclosure

– the psychological term for sharing intimate aspects of yourself with others. Increases in intimacy can also increase passion.

Altruism  The

ability to unselfishly care about the well being of others  Probably one of humanities greatest attributes.

Bystander Effect

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When witnessing a tragedy, a bystander is actually less likely to help if he or she is not alone and there are other bystanders around. Kitty Genovese, New York 1964 Rape and stabbing victim cried out for help and no one helped her. Rapist walked away when finished, then came BACK and stabbed her and raped her AGAIN in front of many witnesses.

Social Exchange Theory  Constant

goal to maximize rewards and minimize cost.  Cost benefit analysis or utilitarianism

Cooperation 

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Cooperation to achieve superordinate goals can reconcile differences and make people more tolerant of each other. As conflict intensifies stereotyping becomes more common, communication harder, extreme viewpoints more common.

Conciliation  GRIT

– Graduated and Reciprocated Initiatives in Tension Reduction  Using Foot in the Door Phenomenon sides can gradually reduce a crisis by taking small steps to reduce tensions.