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The Power of the Situation Social Psych – Day 2 What makes people go wrong? • Evil: intentionally behaving in ways that harm, abuse, demean, dehumanize, or destroy innocent others – or using one’s authority and systemic power to encourage or permit others to do so on your behalf. • In short, KNOWING BETTER BUT DOING WORSE. Beware: SELF SERVING BIAS • A readiness to perceive ourselves favorably. • Found more often in individualistic cultures. A powerful force in transforming human behavior, pushing people across the boundary of good and evil comes from the basic desire to be in the “in group” and not in the “out group”. - C.S. Lewis One focus of this unit is to look at the WHY. Why do people do evil things. We will be analyzing this from a social psych perspective. Nobel Savage? Are we born good and then corrupted by an evil society? • OR, are we born evil and redeemed by a good society? Maybe each of us has the capacity to be a saint or a sinner; maybe it is our social circumstances that determine which of our many mental templates we develop. This unit will try to emphasize social psych concepts by relating them to the POWER OF THE SITUATION. Is possible for angels to turn into devils? Genocide in Rwanda Mass suicide @ Jonestown My Lai massacre Nazi concentration camps Sexual abuses of Catholic priests Fraudulent behavior of Enron execs Actions of tyrants in our era: • Hitler • Stalin • Pol Pot – Cambodian leader who’s policies killed approx 26% of population • Idi Amin – Ugandan leader. The number of people killed as a result of his regime is unknown; estimates from human rights groups range from 100,000 to 500,000. • Saddam Hussein Drug dealers, rapists, sex trade traffickers, scammers, bullies . . . The Science of EVIL Why do good people do? Use the following terms to help describe how these forces shape our behavior. Assignment: create a power point presentation that highlights these terms and their relationship to “the power of the situation”. For each of the terms below, explain how each concept COULD change a good person to do a bad thing. Students will: For each term, come up with an example (real or made up) that uses the concept to explain why people engage in bad behavior. Include a visual that represents the concept you are using. Include a brief summary of any research in this area, including the researcher’s name (only if the research is included in our text). Resources: Your book (#1 resource); internet – if you use the internet make sure you site your sources. You will use GOOGLE DOCS to create your power point. Make sure to add myself. You are limited to two slides per concept. You will be graded on how well you apply each concept. Clearly make a connection to your example and the concept you are using. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. Foot in the door phenomenon Cognitive Dissonance Conformity Normative social influence Informational social influence Obedience Social facilitation Social Loafing Deindividuation 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. Group Polarization Group Think Prejudice Stereotypes Scapegoat Theory In-group Bias Just World Phenomenon By-stander Effect Example: COGNITIVE DISSONANCE & HAZING During the traditional “Hell Week,” pledges are run through a variety of activities designed to test their limits of physical exertion, psychological strain, and social embarrassment. Too often, of course, the results are tragic. One pledge was told to dig his “own grave.” After he complied with orders to lie flat in the finished hole, the sides collapsed and suffocated him before his prospective fraternity brothers could dig him out. Another pledge choked to death after repeatedly trying to swallow a large slab of raw liver soaked in oil. Example: Cognitive dissonance theory &HAZING Cognitive Dissonance: A state in which people have conflicting thoughts (cognitions), especially when their voluntary actions (hazing) conflict with their attitudes (I’m a good person). Theory states that when our thoughts don’t match up, we act to reduce the discomfort (dissonance) by changing our attitudes. • There is little discomfort (dissonance) if you have good reason to harm someone. The dissonance becomes greater as the justification for such behavior decreases. Assuming you like your pledge brothers, you don’t want to hurt them. The hazing process creates DISSONANCE (like someone / but you are causing them harm). • In order to reduce the dissonance, the individual may rationalize the hazing as a prank, thereby modifying the cognition by lowering the importance of the cognition, believing, for example, that hazing is not a very serious matter. Name associated with theory: Carl Festinger Small Request – Large Request In the Korean War, Chinese communists solicited cooperation from US army prisoners by asking them to carry out small errands. By complying to small errands they were likely to comply to larger ones. Foot-in-the-Door Phenomenon: The tendency for people who have first agreed to a small request to comply later with a larger request. Role Playing Affects Attitudes Zimbardo (1972) assigned the roles of guards and prisoners to random students and found that guards and prisoners developed roleappropriate attitudes. Originally published in the New Yorker Phillip G. Zimbardo, Inc. Stanford Prison Project Assignment: Go to the following website: http://www.prisonexp.org/ After reading the text and watching video answer the following questions: • If you were a guard, what type of guard would you have become? How sure are you? • If you were a prisoner, would you have been able to endure the experience? What would you have done differently than those subjects did? If you were imprisoned in a "real" prison for five years or more, could you take it? • How do the ethical dilemmas is this research compare with the ethical issues raised by Stanley Milgram's obedience experiments? Would it be better if these studies had never been done? Beware: Self serving Bias • Most of us construct self-enhancing, self-serving, egocentric biases that make us feel special – never ordinary and certainly “above average”. • 86% of Australians rote there job performance as “above average” • 90% of American business managers rate their performance as superior to that of their average peer. Cognitive dissonance theory Suppose you had volunteered to participate in a psych experiment. Upon arrival, you were seated at a table and asked to undertake a series of dull, meaningless tasks for about an hour. Afterward, the experimenter convinced you to extol the virtues of the tasks you had performed by describing them to other potential participants as highly worthwhile, interesting, and educational. You were paid either $1 or $20 to do this. Suppose you were then asked to privately rate your enjoyment of the tasks on a questionnaire. After which amount do you believe your actual enjoyment rating of the tasks would be higher -$1 or $20? Cognitive dissonance theory Festinger and Carlsmith found that those receiving $1 rated the tasks as more enjoyable than those paid $20. Why? • Cognitive Dissonance – those who received the $1 presumably had insufficient justification for their behavior, which led to dissonance, which in turn produced a change in attitude about the task. Social Influence The greatest contribution of social psychology is its study of attitudes, beliefs, decisions, and actions and the way they are molded by social influence. NON SEQUITER © 2000 Wiley. Dist. by Universal Press Syndicate Reprinted with Permission Conformity & Obedience Behavior is contagious, modeled by one followed by another. We follow behavior of others to conform. Other behaviors may be an expression of compliance (obedience) toward authority. Conformity Obedience The Chameleon Effect Conformity: Adjusting one’s behavior or thinking to coincide with a group standard (Chartrand & Bargh, 1999). Group Pressure & Conformity Suggestibility is a subtle type of conformity, adjusting our behavior or thinking toward some group standard. Group Pressure & Conformity An influence resulting from one’s willingness to accept others’ opinions about reality. William Vandivert/ Scientific American Conditions that Strengthen Conformity 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. One is made to feel incompetent or insecure. The group has at least three people. The group is unanimous. One admires the group’s status and attractiveness. One has no prior commitment or response. The group observes one’s behavior. One’s culture strongly encourages respect for a social standard. Reasons for Conformity Normative Social Influence: Influence resulting from a person’s desire to gain approval or avoid rejection. A person may respect normative behavior because there may be a severe price to pay if not respected. Informative Social Influence: The group may provide valuable information, but stubborn people will never listen to others. Informative Social Influence Baron and colleagues (1996) made students do an eyewitness identification task. If the task was easy (lineup exposure 5 sec.), conformity was low in comparison to a difficult (1/2 sec. exposure) task. Informative Social Influence Baron et al., (1996) Obedience Stanley Milgram designed a study that investigates the effects of authority on obedience. Courtesy of CUNY Graduate School and University Center People comply to social pressures. How would they respond to outright command? Stanley Milgram (1933-1984) Both Photos: © 1965 By Stanley Miligram, from the film Obedience, dist. by Penn State, Media Sales Milgram’s Study Milgram’s Study: Results Individual Resistance A third of the individuals in Milgram’s study resisted social coercion. AP/ Wide World Photos An unarmed individual single-handedly challenged a line of tanks at Tiananmen Square. Lessons from the Conformity and Obedience Studies In both Ash's and Milgram's studies, participants were pressured to follow their standards and be responsive to others. In Milgram’s study, participants were torn between hearing the victims pleas and the experimenter’s orders. Individual Behavior in the Presence of Others Michelle Agnis/ NYT Pictures Social facilitation: Refers to improved performance on tasks in the presence of others. Triplett (1898) noticed cyclists’ race times were faster when they competed against others than when they just raced against the clock. Social Loafing The tendency of an individual in a group to exert less effort toward attaining a common goal than when tested individually (Latané, 1981). Singing in a choir Voting At work Goal setting is extremely important to diffuse this. At school Deindividuation Deindividuation loss of self-awareness and self-restraint in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity • “To Kill a Mockingbird” – riot scene • Sporting events • School dances If you could do anything humanly possible with complete assurance that you would not be detected or held responsible, what would you do? Group Polarization In groups, people tend to be more extreme in their decisions. Imagine you are arguing your point with someone else: to make the point and separate what you have to say from other people, you may exaggerate your position somewhat. The problem then is that having taken a position you feel obliged to support it, even if you think it actually is a bit extreme. People who tend to take risky decisions will make riskier decisions in a group as the risk is shared (risky shift). People who are more conservative will tend to make very conservative decisions as they take on the persona of the group and try to protect them from the effects of any risky decisions. • Book Banners Groupthink Groupthink mode of thinking that occurs when the desire for harmony in a decision-making group overrides realistic appraisal of alternatives. Examples: President Kennedy’s cabinet in the Bay of Pigs Invasion Bush administration in rationale to invade Iraq in search or weapons of mass destruction. Group Influence How do groups affect our behavior? Social psychologists study various groups: 1. 2. 3. 4. One person affecting another Families Teams Committees Social Influence Group Polarization enhancement of a group’s prevailing attitudes through discussion within the group Social Influence If a group is likeminded, discussion strengthens its prevailing opinions Prejudice Simply called “prejudgment,” a prejudice is an unjustifiable (usually negative) attitude toward a group and its members. Prejudice is often directed towards different cultural, ethnic, or gender groups. Components of Prejudice 1. 2. 3. Beliefs (stereotypes) Emotions (hostility, envy, fear) Predisposition to act (to discriminate) Reign of Prejudice Prejudice works at the conscious and [more at] the unconscious level. Therefore, prejudice is more like a knee-jerk response than a conscious decision. How Prejudiced are People? Over the duration of time many prejudices against interracial marriage, gender, homosexuality, and minorities have decreased. Racial & Gender Prejudice Americans today express much less racial and gender prejudice, but prejudices still exist. Race Nine out of ten white respondents were slow when responding to words like “peace” or “paradise” when they saw a black individual’s photo compared to a white individual’s photo (Hugenberg & Bodenhausen, 2003). Gender Most women still live in more poverty than men. About 100,000,000 women are missing in the world. There is a preference for male children in China and India, even with sexselected abortion outlawed. Gender Although prejudice prevails against women, more people feel positively toward women than men. Women rated picture b [feminized] higher (665) for a matrimonial ad (Perrett, 1998). Professor Dave Perrett, St. Andrews University Social Roots of Prejudice Why does prejudice arise? 1. 2. 3. Social Inequalities Social Divisions Emotional Scapegoating Social Inequality Prejudice develops when people have money, power, and prestige, and others do not. Social inequality increases prejudice. In and Out Groups Ingroup: People with whom one shares a common identity. Outgroup: Those perceived as different from one’s ingroup. Ingroup Bias: The tendency to favor one’s own group. Mike Hewitt/ Getty Images Scotland’s famed “Tartan Army” fans. Emotional Roots of Prejudice Prejudice provides an outlet for anger [emotion] by providing someone to blame. After 9/11 many people lashed out against innocent Arab-Americans. Cognitive Roots of Prejudice One way we simplify our world is to categorize. We categorize people into groups by stereotyping them. Michael S. Yamashita/ Woodfin Camp Associates Foreign sunbathers may think Balinese look alike. Cognitive Roots of Prejudice In vivid cases such as the 9/11 attacks, terrorists can feed stereotypes or prejudices (terrorism). Most terrorists are non-Muslims. Cognitive Roots of Prejudice © The New Yorker Collection, 1981, Robert Mankoff from cartoonbank.com. All Rights Reserved. The tendency of people to believe the world is just, and people get what they deserve and deserve what they get (the just-world phenomenon). Hindsight Bias After learning an outcome, the tendency to believe that we could have predicted it beforehand may contribute to blaming the victim and forming a prejudice against them. A Game of Social Trap By pursuing our self-interest and not trusting others, we can end up losers. Enemy Perceptions People in conflict form diabolical images of one another. http://www.aftonbladet.se http://www.cnn.com Saddam Hussein “Wicked Pharaoh” George Bush “Evil” Altruism An unselfish regard for the welfare of others. Equity: A condition in which people receive from a relationship in proportion to what they give. Self-Disclosure: Revealing intimate aspects of oneself to others. Bystander Effect Tendency of any given bystander to be less likely to give aid if other bystanders are present. Bystander Intervention The decision-making process for bystander intervention. Akos Szilvasi/ Stock, Boston The Norms for Helping Social Exchange Theory: Our social behavior is an exchange process. The aim is to maximize benefits and minimize costs. Reciprocity Norm: The expectation that we should return help and not harm those who have helped us. Social–Responsibility Norm: Largely learned, it is a norm that tells us to help others when they need us even though they may not repay us. Peacemaking Superordinate Goals are shared goals that override differences among people and require their cooperation. Syracuse Newspapers/ The Image Works Communication and understanding developed through talking to one another. Sometimes it is mediated by a third party. Peacemaking Graduated & Reciprocated Initiatives in Tension-Reduction (GRIT): This is a strategy designed to decrease international tensions. One side recognizes mutual interests and initiates a small conciliatory act that opens the door for reciprocation by the other party.