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South Dakota State University
PSYC 441 - Social Psychology
Concepts addressed:
Social Psychology, Personality and Abnormal Psychology: Social determinants of behavior: attitude,
group dynamics, and conformity
Social Detriments of Behavior
ο Attitudes
Why study attitudes?
• Strongly influence our social thought
o Help to organize and evaluate stimuli (e.g., categorizing stimuli as positive or
negative)
• Often have a strong effect on behavior
o Help to predict people's behavior in wide range of contexts (e.g., voting,
interpersonal relations)
• Often they are ambivalent
o Evaluate object both positively and negatively
• To determine why they are so resistant to change
Attitude functions
• Utilitarian function
• Knowledge function
• Ego-defensive function
• Value-expressive function
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Types of Attitude
Function Served by Attitude
Psychological Perspective
Helps the person to achieve
rewards and gain approval from
Utilitarian
Behaviorist
others
Helps the person to structure
Cognitive
Knowledge
world so that it makes sense
Helps the person protect himself
or herself from acknowledging
Ego defense
Psychoanalytic
basic self-truths
Helps the person express
important aspects of the selfValue-expression
Humanistic
concept
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Attitude formation
• Social learning-acquire attitudes from others
• Classical conditioning-learning based on association
o Subliminal conditioning- without awareness
• Instrumental conditioning-learn to hold the "right" views
• Observational learning-learning by observing others
o Social comparison-compare ourselves to others
Development of this review sheet was made possible by funding from the US Department of Education
through South Dakota’s EveryTeacher Teacher Quality Enhancement grant.
• Attitudes are shaped by social information from others we like or respect
Genetic factors-inherited general dispositions
• Highly heritable attitudes and gut-level preferences (music, food) are especially
influenced
Attitude-behavior link
• Attitudes do not always predict behavior
o Lapiere (1934) found that virtually all businesses served Chinese couples
courteously, yet most owners held negative attitudes
o Sun-worshippers know the dangers of exposure to the sun, yet they tan
anyway
"Looking good" attitude takes precedence over attitudes toward personal
health
Moderators of A-B link
• Aspects of the situation
o Situational constraints (e.g., sparing one's feelings) may prevent us from
expressing our true attitudes
o Often we choose situations where we can engage in behaviors consistent with
our attitudes
• Aspects of attitudes
o Origins-how attitudes were formed
o Strength-importance, vested interest, accessibility
o Specificity-general vs. specific
o Note: strong attitudes formed by direct experience measured at same level of
specificity do predict behavior
How do attitudes influence behavior?
• Attitude- to behavior process model (impulsive)
o Attitudes spontaneously shape our perceptions of the situation
• Theory of planned behavior (rational)
o Behavioral intentions are a function of attitudes toward behavior, subjective
norms, and perceived behavioral control
Persuasion: early research
• Early research on persuasion focused on the:
o Communicator (expertise, attractiveness)
o Message (one-sided vs. two-sided)
o Audience (age, motivation, ability to process)
• Classic findings include:
o Experts are more persuasive than non-experts
o Attractive sources are more persuasive than unattractive
o Soft sell is often better than overt persuasion
o If audience is skeptical-use two-sided message
o Fear-eliciting messages (with advice) are effective
Persuasion: cognitive approach
• Central route-persuasion caused by thoughtful, systematic processing of the
content of message
o Audience highly motivated (via accuracy, defensive, or impression
motivation) or high ability to process info.
• Peripheral route-persuasion caused by superficial cues or mental shortcuts
(heuristics)
Development of this review sheet was made possible by funding from the US Department of Education
through South Dakota’s EveryTeacher Teacher Quality Enhancement grant.
o Audience not motivated or lack ability to process
Resistance To Persuasion
• Reactance-protect one's personal freedom
o Hard-sell attempts often lead to Negative attitude change
• Forewarning-prior knowledge of persuasion
o Increase arguments for and counterarguments against
• Selective avoidance-screen out contradictory information
o Channel surf, tune out certain information
• Generate counterarguments
• Inoculation-challenging one's views increases resistance
• Biased assimilation-perceive information that disconfirms our views as less
reliable
• Attitude polarization-interpret mixed evidence in ways that strengthen existing
views
Cognitive dissonance
• Ways to reduce dissonance (e.g., "A dieter binges")
o Change attitude to be consistent with behavior
"Diets don't really work anyway"
o Acquire supporting information
"Many overweight people live long healthy lives"
o Trivialize the behaviors in question
"Looking thin is not all that important"
o Restore positive self-evaluations
"I like the way I look, regardless of my weight"
Dissonance and attitude change
• Less-leads-to-more-effect-insufficient justification (little reward) increases
dissonance
o Subjects given $1 for telling next subject the dull tasks were interesting,
reported liking task more
o Most effective when subjects perceive choice, responsibility
• Hypocrisy
o People induced to feel hypocrisy were more likely to use condoms, conserve
water, and conserve energy
o Most effective when subjects publicly state position, think about past failures,
and have ways to reduce dissonance
ο Group dynamics
Individual performance and behavior in group settings
• Social facilitation: the effects of an audience
• Social loafing: goofing off when others can do the work
• De-individuation: immersion in a group
• Individual performance and group productivity
Decision making in groups
• Groupthink: bad decisions because of pressure to agree
• Group polarization: moving toward the majority view
• Minority influence: the power of the few
Leadership
• Definitions of leadership and leadership effectiveness
Development of this review sheet was made possible by funding from the US Department of Education
through South Dakota’s EveryTeacher Teacher Quality Enhancement grant.
• Great person theory: trait approaches to - leadership
Inter group conflict
• Development and escalation of inter group conflict
• Reduction of inter group conflict
ο Conformity: social influence: changing others' behavior
Definition
• Social influence is the ability to change a person's beliefs or behaviors
Social norms
• Types of social norms
o The norm of reciprocity: treating others as they treat you
o The norm of reciprocity for concessions
o The norm of social commitment: keeping your promises
o The norm of obedience: submitting to authority
• Functions of social norms--they provide us with a sense of
o Mastery
o Connectedness
• Types of effects
o Public acceptance/compliance
o Change in overt behavior without a change in actual belief
o Private acceptance
o Change in actual belief
• Types of social influence used by groups
o Informational social influence
o Social comparison
o Cognitive restructuring
o Normative social influence
o Fear of negative consequences
o Attraction to the group
Types of social influence used by individual
• Tactics
o Generalized tactics
o Ask
o Present information
o Mention personal benefits
o Mention relationship
o Bargain
o Invoke norm
o Make moral appeal
o Butter up
o Emotional appeal
o Criticize
o Deceive
o Threaten
o Force
o Specialized tactics
o Foot-in- the-door
o Self-perception: after first complying, sees self as "one" who does that
sort of thing
Development of this review sheet was made possible by funding from the US Department of Education
through South Dakota’s EveryTeacher Teacher Quality Enhancement grant.
o View of helping: after first complying, sees helping in a more positive
light
o Door-in- the-face
o Self-presentation: after first refusing, one looks bad by refusing again
o Reciprocal concession: after requester had "backed down," one feels
need to reciprocate
o Low-ball technique
o Commitment: after agreeing, one becomes committed to agreement
o Unfulfilled obligation: after agreeing one feels obligated to requester
• Compliance techniques: individual differences
o Personality (Big 5")--preferred influence tactic
Agreeable-rational, inspirational appeals
Conscientious-rational, inspirational appeals
Extroverted--any tactic
High self-monitor-any tactic
Desire for control-rational, pressure tactics
Social power
• Types of social power
o Reward social power
Control rewards people receive for performing a behavior
o Coercive social power
Control punishments people receive for not performing a behavior
o Referent social power
Ability of the influencing agent to exert control over people because
people like, respect, or admire the agent
o Expert social power
Due to the agent's expertise in the matter at hand
o Legitimate social power
People believe the agent has the right to exert control
Resisting obedience
Take responsibility for any harm produced
Realize total submission is inappropriate
Question authority's motives
Increase awareness of the power of the situation (i.e., learn
about results)
• Intense indoctrination
o Indoctrination- process of inducing recruits to accept a group's extreme
views (e.g., cults)
o Stages
Softening-up-isolate from friends
Compliance-actively play role of group member
Internalization-privately accept group's views
Consolidation-engage in costly acts designed to increase commitment
o Note: at each stage reduced attentional capacity occurs (from lack of sleep,
poor nutrition, emotional arousal)
Development of this review sheet was made possible by funding from the US Department of Education
through South Dakota’s EveryTeacher Teacher Quality Enhancement grant.