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Social Psychology
The study of how we think
about, influence, and
relate to one another
Social Psychology includes:
Attitude
Attraction
Aggression
Group Behavior
Social Thinking
How do we think about one
another?
Attribution Theory
• The idea that we give a casual
explanation for someone's behavior
•We credit that
behavior either to
the situation or….
•To the person’s
disposition
Was my friend a
jerk because she
had a bad day or
because she is just
a bad person?
Fundamental Attribution Error
• The tendency for observers, when analyzing
another’s behavior, to underestimate the
impact of a situation and overestimate the
impact of personal disposition
How do you view your teacher’s behavior?
You probably attribute it to their
personality rather than their profession.
When you start a
romance, you assume
that they agree with
your world
views….honeymoon
period.
Attribution At Work
The Effects of Attribution
• Social Effects
• Political
Effects
• Workplace
Effects
Self-Serving Bias
• The tendency to attribute one’s success to
personal factors and one’s failure’s to
situational factors
• The tendency to take more credit for good
outcomes and less for bad ones.
If you win, it is because
you are awesome…if you
lose, it must have been
the coach or weather
or….
Attitudes
• A belief or
feeling that
predisposes one
to respond in a
particular way
to something
How might different attitudes
respond to this picture?
Do our attitudes guide our actions?
Only if….
• External pressure is minimal.
• We are aware of our attitudes.
• The attitude is relevant to the behavior.
Attitudes
More often, our actions
affect our attitudes!
Foot-in-the-door phenomenon
• The tendency for
people who have
first agreed to a
small request to
comply later with
a larger request.
If I give out an answer on a quiz, what
happens next?
Door-in-face Phenomenon
• The tendency
for people who
say no to a
huge request,
to comply with
a smaller one.
If you ask your parents
for the 1952 Topps
Mantle card ($15k) what
would they say? NO
But they may buy
you a new
playstation game.
Zimbardo Prison Study
Role playing affects attitudes. What do
you think happened when college
students were made to take on the roles
of prison guards and inmates.
What happens when we become
aware that our attitudes don’t
match or actions?
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
• We do not like when we have
either conflicting attitudes or
when our attitudes do not
match our actions.
• When this happens – we
experience tension called
cognitive dissonance.
• When our awareness of our
attitudes and of our actions
clash, we can reduce the
resulting dissonance by
changing our attitudes.
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
• How does
cognitive
dissonance
theory play a
part in pledging a
fraternity?
Social Influences
Group Influences & Group Dynamics
Conformity
• Adjusting one’s
behavior or thinking
to coincide with a
group standard
Solomon Asch’s Study
Asch’s Results
• About 1/3 of the
participants conformed.
• 70% conformed at least
once.
To strengthen conformity:
•
•
•
•
The group is unanimous
The group is at least three
people.
One admires the group’s status
One had made no prior
commitment
Reasons for Conforming
Normative Social
Influence
• Influence resulting
from a person’s
desire to gain
approval or avoid
disappointment
Informational Social
Influence
• Influence resulting
from one’s
willingness to accept
others’ opinions
about reality
Obedience
Milgram’s Experiments
Milgram’s Obedience Study
What did we learn from
Asch & Milgram?
*Ordinary people can do shocking things!
• Social influence in powerful!
• Ethical issues….
• Would not have received approval from
today’s IRB (Internal Review Board)
Conditions that Strengthen
Obedience
• The person giving the orders is close at
hand and perceived to be a legitimate
authority figure
• The authority figure is supported by a
prestigious institution
• The victim is depersonalized or at a
distance, even in another room
• There are no role models for defiance
Group Influence on Behavior
Let’s look at how groups effect our behavior.
Social Facilitation Theory
• If you are really good
at something….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
(social impairment).
Social Impairment
• When a task is very hard or one is not
skilled (like my bowling), one performs
worst in front of a group than if they were
alone.
Yerkes- Dodson Law
• There is an optimal
level of arousal for
the best performance
of any task:
• easy tasks-relatively high
• difficult tasks--low
arousal
• other tasks-moderate level
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.
Deindividuation
• The loss of self-awareness and selfrestraint occurring in group situations
that foster arousal and anonymity
Group Polarization
• The concept that a
group’s attitude is
one of extremes and
rarely moderate
As a group, both the Black
Panthers and the Ku Klux
Klan are more extreme
than the average
individual in the group.
Group Polarization
Groupthink
• The mode of
thinking that occurs
when the desire for
harmony in a
decision-making
group overrides
common sense
(realistic appraisal
of alternatives).
We also influence ourselves
The Power of the Individual
can be stronger than a group
Social Relations
Attraction
Conflict and Prejudice
Altruism and Peacemaking
Aggression
How do we relate to others?
Stereotypes, Prejudice and
Discrimination
overt
Stereotype:
• Overgeneralized idea
about a group of people.
Prejudice:
• Undeserved (usually
negative) attitude
towards a group of
people. Ethnocentrism
is an example of a
prejudice.
Discrimination:
• An action based on a
prejudice.
subtle
Prejudice Over Time
Which person would you want to have
a long term relationship with?
Social Inequalities
(A principle reason behind prejudice)
• Ingroup: “us”- people
with whom one
shares a common
identity
• Outgroup: “them”those perceived as
different than one’s
ingroup
• Ingroup bias: the
Scapegoat Theory: The
tendency to favor
theory that prejudice provides
one’s own group
an outlet for anger by
providing someone to blame
Why is there Prejudice?
• Categorization
• Vivid Cases
(Availability heuristic)
• The Just-World
Phenomenon
Combating Prejudice
Contact Theory
• Contact between hostile groups will reduce
animosity if they are made to work towards a
superordinate goal.
• Serif camp study
• Election of Obama?
Prejudices can often lead to a….
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy
• A prediction that
causes itself to be
true
• Rosenthal and
Jacobson’s “Pygmalion
in the Classroom”
experiment
Aggression
• Any physical or
verbal behavior
intended to hurt or
destroy
• In the U.S. we are
MUCH more likely to
be murdered
compared to most
other developed
nations
Two types of Aggression
• Instrumental Aggression – when the
aggressive act has a purpose
• Hostile Aggression – Aggression that has
no clear purpose
The Biology of Aggression
• Genetics
• Neural
Influences
• Biochemical
The Psychology of Aggression
Frustration-Aggressive Principle:
• The blocking of an attempt to
achieve some goal
• Creates anger which generates
aggression
Goals can be:
•Sports or work
•Relationship
•Body Condition etc…
Hot Weather and Aggression
Can we learn to be aggressive
or gentle?
They can be but….
Once learned they are difficult
to change
Aggression and TV
Watches
=
• By the time you are 18, you spend more time in front of TV than in school
•2/3 of all homes have 3 or more sets average 51 hours a week.
•By the time a child finishes elementary school they have witnessed 8000
murders and 100,000 other acts of violence on TV
•Over half of all deaths do NOT show the victim's pain
•As TV watching has grown exponentially, as does violent behavior- a strong
positive correlation.
•How do you think TV has effected sexual aggression?
Attraction
5 Factors of Attraction….
Proximity
• Geographic nearness
Mere exposure effect:
• Repeated exposure to something breeds liking.
• Taiwanese Letters
• Mirror image concept
Stalking – get it? Ha! Ha!
Reciprocal Liking
• You are more
likely to like
someone who likes
you.
• Why?
• Except in
elementary
school!!!!
Similarity
• Paula Abdul was
wrong- opposites do
NOT attract
• Birds of the same
feather do flock
together
• Similarity breeds
content
Liking through Association
• Classical Conditioning
can play a pert in
attraction.
Physical Attractiveness:
The Hotty Factor
• Physically
attractiveness predicts
dating frequency (they
date more)
• They are perceived as
healthier, happier,
more honest and
successful than less
attractive counterparts
What is beauty?
• Some people say beauty is facial symmetry.
Beauty and Culture
LOVE
• Passionate Love: an
aroused state of
INTENSE positive
absorption of another.
• Compassionate Love: the
deep affectionate attachment
we feel for those with whom
our lives are intertwined.
What makes compassionate
love work?
• Equity
Self-disclosure
Altruism
• Unselfish regard for
the welfare of
others
• Kitty Genovese case
• Bystander Effect
(bystanders less
willing to help if
there are other
bystanders around)
Social Exchange Theory
• The idea that our social behavior is an
exchange process, the aim of which is to
maximize benefits and minimize costs
Peacemaking
• Give people superordinate (shared) goals that
can only be achieved through cooperation
• Win Win situations through mediation
• GRIT (Graduated and Reciprocated
Initiatives in Tension Reduction)