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INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY
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Copyright © McGraw-Hill, Inc. 2011
CHAPTER 13:
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
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Attitudes and Social
Cognition

What are attitudes, and how are they
formed, maintained, and changed?

How do people form impressions of what
others are like and of the causes of their
behavior?

What are the biases that influence the
ways in which people view others’
behavior?
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Social Psychology
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Scientific study of how people’s thoughts,
feelings, and actions are affected by
others
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Persuasion: Changing
Attitudes

Evaluations of a particular person,
behavior, belief, or concept

Factors:
Message source
 Characteristics of the message
 Characteristics of the target
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Persuasion: Changing
Attitudes
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Routes to Persuasion
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Central route processing
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Occurs when the recipient thoughtfully considers
the issues and arguments used to persuade
Peripheral route processing

Occurs when people are persuaded on the basis
of factors unrelated to the nature or quality of the
content of a persuasive message
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Persuasion: Changing
Attitudes
Two Routes to Persuasion
Figure 1 of Chapter 13
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Persuasion: Changing
Attitudes

The Link Between Attitudes and Behavior

Cognitive dissonance
Occurs when a person holds two contradictory
attitudes or thoughts
 Leon Festinger (1957) experiment
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Persuasion: Changing
Attitudes
Cognitive Dissonance and Smoking
Figure 2 of Chapter 13
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Social Cognition

Understanding What Others Are Like
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Social cognition
The way people understand and make sense of
others and themselves
 Schemas


Sets of cognitions about people and social experiences
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Social Cognition

Impression Formation
Process by which an individual organizes
information about another person to form an
overall impression of that person
 Central traits
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Social Cognition

Attribution Process
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Attribution Theory
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Seeks to explain how we decide, on the basis of
samples of an individual’s behavior, what the
specific causes of that person’s behavior are
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Attribution Theory
The Process We Use to Explain the Behavior of
Others
Figure 3 of Chapter 13
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Social Cognition

Attribution Process
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Situational causes
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
Those brought about by something in the
environment
Dispositional causes

Prompted by the person’s disposition
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Social Cognition

Attribution Biases: To Err Is Human
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Halo effect
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Phenomenon in which an initial understanding that
a person has positive traits is used to infer other
uniformly positive characteristics
Assumed-similarity bias

Thinking of people as being similar to oneself even
when meeting them for the first time
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Social Cognition

Attribution Biases: To Err Is Human
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Self-serving bias
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Tendency to attribute success to personal factors
and attribute failure to factors outside oneself
Fundamental attribution error

Tendency to exaggerate the importance of
personality characteristics in producing others’
behavior, minimizing the influence of the
environment
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Social Cognition

Attribution in a Cultural Context
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Collectivistic orientation
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People see themselves as parts of a larger,
interconnected social network and as responsible
to others
Individualistic orientation
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Emphasizes personal identity and the uniqueness
of the individual
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Social Influence and Groups
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What are the major sources and tactics of
social influence?
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Social Influence and Groups
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Social Influence
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Process by which the actions of an individual
or group affect the behavior of others
Groups

Consist of two or more people who:
Interact with one another
 Perceive themselves as part of a group
 Are interdependent
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Conformity: Following
What Others Do
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Change in behavior or attitudes brought
about by a desire to follow the beliefs or
standards of other people
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Conformity: Following
What Others Do
Solomon Asch (1951) Study
Figure 4 of Chapter 13
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Conformity: Following
What Others Do
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Conformity Conclusions
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Characteristics of the group

Status
Situation in which the individual is responding
 Kind of task
 Unanimity of the group


Social supporter
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Conformity: Following
What Others Do

Conformity to Social Roles
Behaviors that are associated with people in a
given position
 Philip Zimbardo's Prison Study (1973)
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Compliance: Submitting to
Direct Social Pressure

Type of behavior that occurs in response
to direct social pressure
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Techniques:
Foot-in-the-door technique
 Door-in-the-face technique
 That’s-not-all technique
 Not-so-free sample


Norm of reciprocity
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Obedience

Change in behavior in response to the
commands of others
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Stanley Milgram’s Obedience Study
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Prejudice and Discrimination
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How do stereotypes, prejudice, and
discrimination differ?

How can we reduce prejudice and
discrimination?
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Prejudice and Discrimination
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Stereotype
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Prejudice
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Set of generalized beliefs and expectations about a
specific group and its members
A negative (or positive) evaluation of a group and its
members
Discrimination

Behavior directed toward individuals on the basis of
their membership in a particular group
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The Foundations of Prejudice
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Observational Learning Approaches
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Mass Media
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Social Identity Theory
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Ethnocentric
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Viewing the world from their own perspective and
judging others in terms of their group membership
Ingroup vs. outgroup
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Measuring Prejudice and
Discrimination: The Implicit
Personality Test
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Implicit Association Test
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Ingenious measure of prejudice that permits
a more accurate assessment of people’s
discrimination between members of different
groups
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Reducing Prejudice
and Discrimination
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Strategies:
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Increase contact between the target of
stereotyping and holder of the stereotype

Make values and norms against prejudice
more conspicuous

Provide information about the targets of
stereotyping
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Positive and Negative
Social Behavior

Why are we attracted to certain people,
and what progression do social
relationships follow?

What factors underlie aggression and
prosocial behavior?
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Liking and Loving:
Interpersonal Attraction and the
Development of Relationships
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How Do I Like Thee? Let Me Count the
Ways
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Factors:
Proximity
 Mere exposure
 Similarity
 Physical attractiveness
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Liking and Loving:
Interpersonal Attraction and the
Development of Relationships
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How Do I Love Thee? Let Me Count the Ways
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Passionate love
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Represents a state of intense absorption in someone and
includes intense physiological arousal, psychological interest,
and caring for the needs of another
Companionate love

Strong affection we have for those with whom our lives are
deeply involved
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Liking and Loving:
Interpersonal Attraction and the
Development of Relationships
Sternberg’s Three Types of Love
Figure 5 of Chapter 13
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Aggression and Prosocial
Behavior
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Instinct Approaches
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Frustration-Aggression Approaches
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Catharsis
The reaction to the blocking of goals
Observational Learning Approaches
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Aggression and Prosocial
Behavior
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Helping Others
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Prosocial behavior
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Diffusion of responsibility
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Tendency for people to feel that responsibility for acting
is shared among those present
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Aggression and Prosocial
Behavior
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Four basic steps in the helping process:
Noticing a person or situation that may require
help
 Interpreting the event as one that requires
help
 Assuming responsibility for helping
 Deciding on and implementing the form of
helping

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Aggression and Prosocial
Behavior
The Helping Process
Figure 6 of Chapter 13
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Dealing Effectively with Anger
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Strategies:

Look again at the anger-provoking situation
from the perspective of others
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Minimize the importance of the situation
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Fantasize about getting even – but do not act
on it

Relax
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