Download Social Psychology

Social Psychology
Chapter 10
What Social Psychology Is
• The scientific study of how a person’s
thoughts, feelings, and behavior are
influenced by the real, imagined, or implied
presence of others
• Referred to by some as ‘the psychology of
everyday life’
What Social Psychology Is Not
• Sociology
–Concerned with looking at the machine as a
whole (i.e., how groups of people live, work,
and play)
• Social psychology focuses on the individual
cogs of the machine (i.e. how does the
member of the group act and how the
member is influenced by the group)
Social Influence
• The process through which the real or implied
presence of others can directly or indirectly
influence the thoughts feelings, and behavior
of an individual
• Forms of social influence
–Conformity
–Compliance
–Obedience
I’m Not a Conformist! Conforming
Is too Mainstream…
• Have you ever…
–Taken out your phone
when others have theirs
out
–Faced the same direction
as everyone else in an
elevator
–Watched a TV show or
movie a friend
recommended to you
–Ordered the same thing in
Conformity
• Changing your behavior to match the
behavior of others
• Extremely common, we all do it
• Not as bad as society tends to think
The Asch Series of Studies
• 1 participant, several actors pretending to be
participants (confederates)
–4 max for effect
• Asked to match a line to one of the lines in a
set
• Confederates would answer incorrectly
• The participant would answer correctly at first,
but eventually would go along with the answer
the rest of the group provided
The Asch Series of Studies
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRh5qy09n
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Groupthink
• Kind of thinking that
occurs when people
focus on preserving
group cohesion than truly
assessing the facts of the
problem at hand
Compliance
• Changing your behavior as a result of other
people asking for the change
• Person asking for the change usually doesn’t
have the power or authority to make you
change
• Commonly seen in marketing
• Several techniques are used to gain
compliance
Compliance Techniques
• Foot-in-the-door technique
–asking for a small commitment and ask
gradually for progressively larger commitments
after getting compliance
• Door-in-the-face technique
–start by asking for a large commitment which is
refused and then followed by a smaller
commitment
Compliance Techniques
• Lowball technique
–get a commitment from a
person that becomes more
involved
• That’s-not-all technique
• persuader makes an offer and
then adds something to it to
enhance the offer before a
decision can be made
–http://www.youtube.com/watc
h?v=JpqiyFPdHZ4
Obedience
• Changing your behavior at the command of
an authority figure
• Very powerful force
• Interest in research came from the atrocities
of the Nazis in WWII
Milgram’s Study
• Participant was instructed to teach another
participant a set of words
• The ‘teacher’ was also instructed to punish
the ‘learner’ through a shock for each wrong
answer
• The shock increased intensity by 15 volts
• As the teachers began to hesitate giving
higher voltages, the experimenter would tell
them to continue
Milgram’s Study
• It was expected that the
teachers would reach a point
and stop giving the shock
• 65% of the teachers went to
450 volts (maximum amount)
• Results were unexpected
• Raised serious ethical
concerns
Social Cognition
• The ways people think about others and how
those thoughts influence behavior towards
others
Attitudes, What are They?
• What is an attitude?
• What makes up an attitude?
Attitudes
• Tendency to respond either positively or
negatively towards a source of stimulation
–More general in nature
• Consists of three parts
–Specific parts define the whole
• Possible to be predisposed based on past
experience
ABC Model of Attitudes
• Affective component- emotion
• Behavior component- action
• Cognitive component- thought
Build an Attitude Workshop
•
•
•
•
General idea
Affect
Behavior
Cognition
Attitude Change
• Poor predictors of behavior
–Strong attitudes are better predictors
• Attitudes are subject to change
• Can be changed by
–Persuasion
–Cognitive dissonance
Persuasion
• Process by which a person tries to change
the belief, opinion, position, or course of
action of another through argument, pleading,
or explanation
• Combination of factors determines
effectiveness
–Source
–Message
–Target audience
Elaboration Likelihood Model
• People will either add
details or information to a
message or pay attention
to other surface
characteristics of the
message
• Poses two types of
processing
–Central route- people pay
attention to the message’s
content
Cognitive Dissonance
• Sense of discomfort or
distress that occurs when a
person’s behavior does not
match his or her attitude
• Need to address this
uneasiness
• Three solutions
–Change behavior to match
attitude
–Change attitude to match
behavior
Attribution
• Process of explaining your behavior and the
behavior of others
–Justification
• Fulfills need for an explanation
• Will create an answer if not obvious
• Cognitive dissonance can occur if an
explanation is not found
Attribution Theory
• Two kinds of explanations
–External cause
–Internal cause
• Situational cause- external
–i.e., actions of others, aspects of the situation
• Dispositional cause- internal
–i.e., personality, character
Fundamental Attribution Error
• Tendency to overestimate the
influence another person’s internal
characteristics have on his/her
behavior and to underestimate the
influence of the situation
Social Interaction
• Relationships between people
–Casual
–Intimate
• Prejudice
• Aggression
• Prosocial behavior
• Liking and loving
Prejudice, Discrimination, and
Stereotypes, Oh My!
• What is prejudice?
• What is discrimination?
• What is a stereotype?
• Are they the same or are they
different?
• How are they the same or different?
Prejudice
• Negative attitude held about people in
a particular social group
• Hard to control
• Prejudice is not discrimination
–Discrimination is acting upon
prejudice(s)
–Discrimination can be controlled
Prejudice
• Prejudice is not a stereotype
–Stereotypes are thoughts
–Stereotypes can be positive or
negative
• Stems from the idea of us vs them
–In-group- us; people we identify with
–Out-group them; people we don’t
identify with
Brown Eye, Blue Eye Study
• Second grade class taught by Jane
Elliot
• Divided students into 2 groups (brown
eyes, blue eyes)
• Blue eyed kids were favored over
brown eyed kids
• Brown eyed kids were criticized by
both Jane Elliot and later their blue
eyed peers
Brown Eye, Blue Eye Study
• http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontli
ne/shows/divided/etc/view.html
Harms of Prejudice
• Scapegoating- an out-group with little
power that becomes the target of
blame, frustration, and negative
emotions of the in-group
• Stereotype vulnerability- the effect of
stereotypes of your group on your
behavior
Harms of Prejudice
• Self-fulfilling prophecy- expectations
affect behavior in a way to make the
expectation more likely to happen
• Easy to learn
• Takes effort to remedy
Countering Prejudice
• Intergroup contactopposing groups
have direct contact
with each other to
see the other group
as people through
observation and
interaction
–Can backfire
• Equal status
contact- contact
between groups
Aggression
• Behavior intended to cause harm to
another person
–Can be physical
–Can be verbal
• Several causes
–Learned
–Biology
–Chemical
Social Roles
• Pattern of behavior expected of a
person as a result of their social
position
Role Time
• What are some social roles?
• What are the expectations of those
roles?
Stanford Prison Experiment
• Conducted by Philip Zimbardo at
Stanford
• Turned the basement into a prison
• 70 young men participated
• Randomly assigned to the role of
guard or prisoner
• Planned to last for 2 weeks
Stanford Prison Experiment
• Guards and prisoners given clothes
for their role
–Guards had sunglasses covering their
eyes
• Quickly began to assimilate to their
roles
• Guards began to harass and beat the
prisoners
• Study was called off after 5 days
Stanford Prison Experiment
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8
McGyYAwcU
Prosocial Behavior
• Socially desirable
behavior that benefits
others
• Altruism- beneficial
behavior done without
expectation of a
reward or gain
• Debated on whether
or not if people are
The Five Must’s of Helping
• Must notice that there is a problem
that needs addressing
• Must be able to interpret the cues as
an emergency; a need to help
• Must take responsibility to act
The Five Must’s of Helping
• Must decide how to help and what
skills/abilities will be useful
• Must act
Another Brief Interlude Survey
• You’re driving along
on a road and your
car dies, would you
rather be on a major
highway or a county
road?
• Why would you
want to be there?
Bystander Effect
• The effect that the presence of other
people has on the decision of whether
or not to help
• Studied by Latane and Darley
–Inspired by the tragedy of Kitty
Genovese in New York
• Help is less likely with more people
present
–Diffusion of responsibility
Bystander Effect
–http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=
KIvGIwLcIuw