Download Social Psychology - Solon City Schools

Social Psychology
Attitude
Attraction
Aggression
Group Behavior
Social Psychology - Studying the way
people think about, influence and relate to
others.
Thinking about ourselves and
others
• Attribution Theory - how we
explain others’ behavior - by
attributing it either to their
• Situational Attribution
– External
•
• Dispositional Attribution
– Internal
•
– Example:
• Student’s hostility
– Situational –
– Dispositional –
Fundamental Attribution Error
How do you view your
• Fundamental
teacher’s behavior?
attribution
error - tendency to
overestimate the role of
factors and
factors
– More common in
Individualistic cultures
– Avoid by observing people in
If you win it is because you are
awesome…if you lose, it must have
been the coach …We (Solon) won
they game …They (Solon) lost the
game
Can be attributed to:
– Self-serving bias –
Attitudes
• Attitudes - Feelings,
based on beliefs,
that guide our
behavior
• Advertising is ALL
based on attitude
formation.
1.
4 Ways Attitudes Affect
Actions
Central Route of Persuasion - opinion change from
thoughtful focus on
– Example:
2. Peripheral Route Persuasion –opinion change through
(Speakers attractiveness,
endorsement of famous person, emotion evoking
music or images)
•
Example:
3. Social Pressure
4. Vivid, Easily recalled information
1.
5 Ways Actions Affect
Attitudes
Foot-in-the-door phenomenon – persuasion
technique to get someone to agree first to a small
request to get them to comply later with a larger
request
– Example:
2. Door-in-the-face phenomenon – persuasion
technique to get someone to comply by first
making an extremely large request, then
requesting something smaller
– Example:
3. Norms of reciprocity – social expectation that
people will respond to each other in kind
– Example:
Role-Playing Affects
Attitudes
4. Role Playing
–Role– set of behaviors
for a specific social
position
–Zimbardo - Stanford
Prison Study
–Abu Ghraib
Cognitive Dissonance
5. Cognitive Dissonance Theory
(Festinger) - Discomfort we
feel when your thoughts and
behaviors or two thoughts are
inconsistent
You have a belief
that cheating on
tests is bad.
But you cheat on
a test!!!
The teacher was
really bad so in
that class it is OK.
– People want to have consistent
attitudes and behaviors….when
they are not they experience
dissonance (unpleasant tension).
– Usually they will change their
attitude sometimes their
behavior.
• Example:
Fetzinger’s study
Conformity and Obedience
• Chameleon effectunconsciously
mimicking others’
expressions, postures
and voice tones
– Example:
• Mood linkage – sharing
up and down moods of
others
– Example:
Conformity
• Conformity - Adjusting
one’s behavior or
thinking to coincide
with a group standard.
– Example:
Asch’s Study of Conformity
Asch’s Conformity Experiment
• Independent
Variable
• Dependent
Variable
• Operational
Definition
• Confounding
Variables
Asch’s Results
• About 1/3 of the participants conformed.
• 70% conformed at least once.
Conditions that Strengthen Conformity:
1. The group is
2. You are
made to feel incompetent
3. The group is at
4. You
5. You had made
6. Others in the group
7. Your culture
within the group or
Reasons for Conforming
Normative social influence - desire to
gain approval/avoid rejection
– Example:
Informational social influence -
Accepting other peoples opinions about
reality
– Example
Milgram’s Study Of Obedience
Independent Variable
Dependent Variable
Operational Definition
Ethics
Other tests: Prestige of the setting, Proximity of Authority, Presence of
rebellious peers
Results of the Milgram Study
What did we learn from Milgram?
• Ordinary people can do shocking
things – evils can grow out of
compliance to others’ evils
• Factors that increase obedience:
– Experimenter
– Learner
– Experiment associated with prestigious
location
• Lower Obedience – Learner observed
other participants
• Ethics
• David's history teacher asked him why so many
German people complied with Hitler's orders to
systematically slaughter millions of innocent Jews.
David suggested that the atrocities were committed
because the Germans had become unusually cruel,
sadistic people with abnormal and twisted
personalities. Use your knowledge of the
fundamental attribution error and Milgram's research
on obedience to highlight the weaknesses of David's
explanation.
Social Facilitation Theory
• Social Facilitation – stronger
performance in the presence
of others
• If you are really good at
something (well learned
tasks)….or it is an easy
task…you will perform
BETTER in front of a group.
•
- If it is a
difficult task or you are not
very good at it…you will
perform WORSE in front of a
group
• Example:
Social Loafing
• Social Loafing - the
tendency for people in a
group to exert less
effort when pooling
efforts toward a
common goal than if
they were individually
accountable.
– Example –
Deindividuation
• Deindividuation –
presence of others
arouses people and
diminishes their
responsibility.
– Feel anonymous and
aroused.
– Example -
• A crowd at a soccer game starts to boo, yell at
the home team, and throw cups and trash at the
players after the team loses a very close match.
Explain how social facilitation and
deindividuation contribute to the crowd's
behavior.
Group Polarization
• Group polarization - If a
group is like-minded,
discussion strengthens its
prevailing opinion.
– Groups tend to make more
extreme decisions than the
individual.
– Example:
Groupthink
• Groupthink - Group members
suppress reservations about
the ideas supported by the
group.
– Desire for
– Worse in
groups—(group polarization).
– Avoided when leader
– Example:
• If representatives from the Republican and
Democratic parties gathered to discuss a minimum
wage bill, how might the concepts of group
polarization and groupthink influence the discussion
and eventual vote?
Cultural Influence
• Culture – behaviors, attitudes,
ideas, values shared by a group
• Example:
– Culture within animals
– Culture in humans
• Preservation of innovation
• Division of labor
Variations Across Cultures
• Norm – rules for accepted and
expected behavior
– Example:
•
– the buffer
zone we like to maintain
around our bodies
– North Americans prefer more
than Latin Americans
• Pace of life
–
• Expressiveness
–
Variation Over Time
• Changes over the generations
The Power of Individuals
• Social control – regulation of
peoples behavior through social
norms
– Example
• Personal control – the power of the
individual to do the opposite of
what is socially accepted
– Example –
• Minority influence – the power of
one or two individuals to sway
majorities
–
–
Social Relations –
how we relate to one another:
prejudice, aggression,
attraction, altruism,
peacemaking
Stereotypes, Prejudice and
Discrimination
Stereotype - Overgeneralized
beliefs about a group of
people.
• Example:
Prejudice - unjustifiable and
usually negative attitude
toward a group and its
members
• 3 components:
• Example:
Discrimination - An action based
on a prejudice (behavior).
• Example:
Prejudice
How Prejudiced Are People?
Automatic Prejudice
Automatic Prejudice
• Implicit racial associations: harboring unconscious
racial associations
• Unconscious patronization: evaluate performance
based on racial stereotypes
– low expectations result in inflated praise and insufficient
criticism hindering minority student’s academic achievement
• Racial influenced perceptions - people more often
mistakenly shot targets who were black.
• Seeing black – the more a person’s facial features
are perceived as typical of their racial category, the
more likely they are to elicit race-based responding.
• Reflexive boldly responses – studies have detected
implicit prejudice in facial responses and activation of
amygdala– demonstrates implicit prejudice.
Is it just race?
NO
• Palestinians and Jews
• Homosexual and
Heterosexual
• Men and Women
But women have some things going for them
like……
Which person would you want to have
a long term relationship with?
Social Roots of Prejudice
• Social inequalities – justify stereotypes
– Blame the victim dynamic – victims of
mistreatment are held partially responsible
for their problems
Solon vs. Twinsburg
• Example:
• Social Identities – portion our selfconcept derived from perceived
membership in a social group
– In-Group – people with whom we share a
common identity
• Example:
– Out-group – People with whom we don’t
share a common identity
• Example:
– In Group Bias – tendency to favor our own
group
• Example:
Girls rule, boys drool
Emotional Roots of Prejudice
• Scapegoat Theory –
theory that
prejudice offers an
outlet for anger by
providing someone to
blame
– Example:
Cognitive Roots of Prejudice
• Categorization
– Out-group homogeneity – overestimating the similarity
within other groups
• Example:
– Other-race effect (aka own-race bias, or cross-race effect)
– the tendency to recall faces of ones own group more
accurately than faces of other races
• Example:
• Vivid cases – tend to remember vivid cases more
easily
• Just-world phenomenon – tendency to believe that
people get what they deserve
– Hindsight bias
• Example
• Jill, a female employee at ACME Industries,
recently complained that she had been
sexually harassed by one of her male
supervisors.
• Write a comment from a male worker that
would demonstrate in-group bias.
• Write a comment that would demonstrate
scapegoat theory.
• Write a comment that would demonstrate the
cognitive roots of prejudice.
• Upon hearing of the complaint from Jill , Kurt,
a fellow employee, commented, “If the
women around here would stop some of their
flirting, they'd be left alone.” Bryan, another
co-worker, quickly added, “If the women in
this country stopped trying to act like men,
they'd all be treated with more respect.”
Explain how these insensitive remarks
illustrate some of the social, emotional, and
cognitive roots of prejudice.
Psychology of Aggression
• Aggression – any physical or
verbal behavior intended to
hurt or destroy
– Always involves
– Varies from
• Not
Which of these are Aggression?
• Two men fight for a piece of bread
• The warden of the prison executes a
convicted criminal
• A boxer gives his opponent a bloody nose
• A hunter kills an animal and mounts it as a
trophy
• A man viciously kicks a cat
The Biology of Aggression
• Genetic Influences
• Neural Influences
• Biochemical
Influences
Aggression Theories
Aversive Events
– Frustration-aggression principle – blocking an attempt
to achieve a goal creates anger
• Fight or flight reaction to stress
– Adverse stimuli – physical pain, insults, high
temperatures etc. can create anger
• Example:
Social and cultural influences
– Reinforcement – experience has taught that aggression
pays
– Aggression higher when:
• Aggression-replacement program –
Aggression Theories
-Observing models of aggression
– Rape myth – s
-Social scripts – mental tapes for
how to act provided by our
culture i.e. media
-video games and violence
–
• Your psychology class is studying aggression.
Phyllis, an outspoken student, says, “I think
one big cause of aggression are those horrible
violent video games. Boys are the only ones
who like those games, and they are way more
violent than girls.” Evaluate Phyllis' statement
according to psychological findings about the
biological factors of aggression and the
psychological and social-cultural factors of
aggression.
Attraction
1. Proximity
2.Physical Attractiveness
3.Similarity
4.Reciprocal Liking
5.Reward theory of attraction
5 Factors of Attraction
Proximity
1. Proximity
Mere exposure
effect- Increased
attraction to novel
stimuli that become
more familiar
•
– The more we are
exposed to
something, the more
we like it
Example:
Attraction
• The power of
physical
attractiveness
The Hotty Factor
2. Physically
attractiveness
predicts
•
•
They are perceived
as
than less attractive
counterparts.
We are attracted
to
Similarity
3. Similarity
– Paula Abdul was
wrong-
• Birds of the same
feather do flock
together.
• Similarity breeds
content.
Reciprocal Liking
4. Reciprocal Liking You are more likely
to like someone who
likes you.
– Especially when
• Why?
• Except in
elementary school!!!!
Reward theory of Attraction
5. Reward Theory of
Attraction - We
continue relationships
that offer more
rewards than costs
– Associating with people
that are attractive is
– When someone works
with us,
Beauty and Cultural Standards
Obesity is so revered among Mauritania's
white Moor Arab population that the
young girls are sometimes force-fed to
obtain a weight the government has
described as "life-threatening".
Are these cultures really that different?
Beauty and Biological
“Universals”
1.
2.
3.
Beauty and Psychology
• Led to believe
someone has
appealing traits
(honest, humorous,)
rather than
unappealing (rude,
unfair, abuses) – we
perceive the person
to be more
attractive
• Love
Romantic Love
– Passionate Love – intense
positive absorption of another
• Which emotion theory?
– Companionate Love – deep
affectionate attachment
• Equity – both partners receive in
proportion to what they give
– Example:
• Self-disclosure – revealing of
intimate details
– Example
• Research indicates that we often form more
positive impressions of beautiful people than
of those who are physically unattractive.
Explain how advertisements and movies might
encourage this tendency. Use your knowledge
of the factors that facilitate interpersonal
attraction to suggest how people could be
influenced to feel more positively about those
who are physically unattractive.
Altruism
• Altruism - unselfish regard for the
welfare of others
Prosocial Behavior
Bystander Effect -
Tendency for
a bystander to be less likely to help if
other people are present
– Example:
Causes:
1.Diffusion of Responsibility – When
many people share the responsibility
we think someone else will help
2. Pluralistic Ignorance - People decide
what to do by looking to others – a
lack of reaction is interpreted as a
non-emergency situation
Altruism
Altruism
Norms for Helping
• Social exchange theory – we want
to maximize the benefits and minimize
the costs
• Social Norms that Influence Altruism
–Reciprocity norm –
–Social-responsibility norm –
• While walking through a busy city park, Mr.
Cruz experiences sharp chest pains that
indicate to him the onset of a heart attack.
Describe several things Mr. Cruz should do to
increase the chances that someone will come
to his aid and quickly provide him with
appropriate medical attention. Explain the
rationale for your advice in light of research
on altruism and the decision-making process
underlying bystander intervention.
Conflict and Peacemaking
• Conflict – a perceived incompatibility of
goals actions and ideas
• Destructive Social Processes
– Social trap we harm our collective well
being by following our personal interests
• Non-zero sum game
– Distorted Perception
– Example:
Enemy Perceptions
• Mirror-image perceptions –
mutual views seen by
conflicting people
– Example:
• Self-fulfilling prophecy –
perceptions that can lead to
their own fulfillment
– Example:
Conflict and Peacemaking
• Contact
• Cooperation
– Superordinate goals – shared
goals achieved through
cooperation
• Communication
• Conciliation
– GRIT – strategy designed to
decrease international
tension