Download Social Psychology

Social Psychology
Attitude
Attraction
Aggression
Group Behavior
Studying the way people relate to, think
about and influence others
Some questions in social
psychology
• Does being late for school signify something?
• How do our beliefs affect our interactions with
others?
• How does a catastrophe turn some people
into heroes and others into criminals?
• Is she nice to me or to everybody?
• Etc……….
• We are social animals!!
The Lunch Date
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epuTZigx
UY8&list=PL2920A92123EAF834&index=61&s
afety_mode=true&persist_safety_mode=1&sa
fe=active
Attribution Error
Fritz Heider
• People usually attribute others
behavior whether to internal
dispositions or external situations
• Are you just a cranky person or is
there some stress at home? Is my
AP Psychology teacher outgoing?
But you only know me from one
setting
• Is the person a bum or
unemployed? ( not me of course)
Attribution Theory- How do
we explain other’s behavior
• Tries to explain how people
determine the cause of the
behavior they observe.
It is either a….
• Situational Attribution- a
reaction to stress or abuse
• Dispositional Attributionan aggressive personality
And
• Stable Attribution- lasting
• Unstable Attribution temporary
Fundamental Attribution Error
How do you view your
teacher’s behavior?
You probably
attribute it to their
personality rather
than their profession.
But do you really
know?
• We tend to overestimate
the role of dispositional
factors (personality) and
underestimate the
importance of the
situation.
Self-Serving Bias:readiness
to perceive yourself more
favorably
If you win it is
because you are
awesome…if you
lose, it must have
been the coach or
weather or….
Effects of Attribution
• Every day we struggle to explain
others’ actions
• Guilty or innocent?
• Nice or mean?
• Genuinely friendly or self-serving
• Lazy or unemployed?
• Effects our thinking politically and
in other areas
• Conservatives tend to place
blame on personal attributions of
the poor and unemployed
• Point to remember:
• “Our attributions-to
individuals’ disposition
or to their situationsshould be made
carefully. They have
real
consequences.”(Myers)
Attitudes:
•
•
•
•
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Feelings influenced by beliefs
They determine our reactions to people
objects and events .
Central Route v. Peripheral Route of
Persuasion
Central means that you are involved in
the issue-use a solid argument to
convince somebody- analytical. Why
learning something would be good for
them? Get a good job. Use reasonable
arguments
Peripheral route – you respond to a
product endorsed by someone famous or
try to teach someone something by using
an attractive teacher.
Actions affect attitudes
• Foot-in-the-door
phenomenon- a tendency
for people who agree to a
small action to comply with
a larger one later on.
• The idea: To get people to
do something big- start
small
• Works also with good deeds
• Doing becomes believing
• During Korean War. Chinese
communists had prisoners run
errands etc. then slowly the
prisoners came to their way of
thinking (Brainwashed)
Attitude and Behavior
• Do attitudes tell us about
someone’s behavior?
• Leon Festinger:
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
• People want to have consistent
attitudes and behaviors….when
they are not they experience
dissonance (unpleasant tension).
• Usually they will change their
attitude.
When Civil Rights law passed racial
prejudice lessened
Moral actions strengthen moral
convictions
Role Playing Affects Attitudes: Role is a set of
expectations about a social position, that defines
behavior
Zimbardo Prison Experiment
• https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=1jdOoxnr7AI
• https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=sZwfNs1pqG0
• Toxic situations can make even
good people bad
• When adapting to new role (
whether playing or not) feels as
though you are playing a game.
As time wears on the role
becomes more real
•
•
•
•
•
Showed how we deindividuate
AND become the roles we are
given.
Cognitive Dissonance in action
Philip Zimbardo has students at
Stanford U play the roles of
prisoner and prison guards in the
basement of psychology building.
They were given uniforms and
numbers for each prisoner.
What do you think happened
Social Influence
• Social influence can be seen in conformity, our
compliance and group behavior.
• Conform in clothing, speech, suicides and
copy cat crimes, events in LeRoy, New York
• Social strings are strong no one wants to be
the loner. But how strong are they?
Conformity Studies
• Adjusting one’s
behavior or thinking
to coincide with a
group standard.
Asch’s Study of Conformity
Asch Experiment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAgbpt7Ts8
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
One is made to feel
incompetent
Chameleon Effect
•
•
•
•
People look toward the sky so do you
Someone laughs and you join in, yawn etc.
We are natural mimics
Someone is happy you become happy = mood
linkage
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxBH6f3crY
Candid Camera
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jP6b4RbI
PGQ
Reasons for Conforming
• Why do we clap when others
clap, see what they see
• Studies show students who live in
dorms begin to think like each
other.
• Generally we respect the norms
that govern our society
• Reason: Normative social
influence- price is too high not to
conform or to be different
• Informational social
influence- groups provide
valuable information only
stubborn people will never
listen to the group.
• Our view of social influence
as bad or good depends on
our values Is this
right/wrong
• Then came Millgram!
Milgram’s Study
Of
Obedience
Millgram Study
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOYLCy5
PVgM
Results of the Milgram Study
What did we learn from Milgram?
• Ordinary people can
do shocking things.
• Ethical issues….
• Would not have
received approval
from today’s IRB
(Internal Review
Board).
How groups affect 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).
• Home team advantge
• In book: when a light
turns green the
drivers drive 100yds
in 15% less time when
side by side
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.
Causes: In a group feel less
accountable, view individual
efforts as dispensable, may
not strongly identify with
the group
• More prevalent in
individualistic cultures
Deindividuation
• People get swept up in a
group and lose sense of
self.
• Feel anonymous and
aroused.
• Explains rioting
behaviors.
• Bullying on the internet
• Emails
Group Dynamics
Group Polarization
• Groups tend to make
more extreme decisions
than the individual.
• Zimbardo study: women
dressed in Klan outfits
administered more
electric shock
Groupthink
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•
•
•
•
•
Group members suppress their
reservations about the ideas
supported by the group.
They are more concerned with
group harmony.
Worse in highly cohesive groups.
Occurs when the desire for
group harmony in a decisionmaking process overrides a
realistic look at the situation.
Combination of overconfidence,
conformity, fear of unpopularity
EX: Bay of Pigs- JFK
Stereotypes, Prejudice and
Discrimination
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.
Racism
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoLPLsQb
dt0&playnext=1&list=PL8A4D336E121ECAFA&
feature=results_main&safety_mode=true&per
sist_safety_mode=1&safe=active
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1NY6Lxi
DFU&list=PL8A4D336E121ECAFA&safety_mod
e=true&persist_safety_mode=1&safe=active
Blue Eyes Brown Eyes
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hqp6GnY
qIjQ
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VeK759F
F84s
Is it just race?
NO
• Palestinians and Jews
• Yankees v Red Sox
• Men and Women
How does prejudice occur?
Social Roots:
Have v have nots- when the
haves have they develop
attitudes that justify
things as they are ex: slave
owners justified slavery,
blacks were too ______
Discrimination increases
stereotyping and prejudice
through the reactions it
provokes in its victims
Just world Phenomenon (reading)
Good is rewarded and evil is punished
Belief that people get what they deserve
Justifies the rich having money and the poor
is having none
Should have known better
Also know as:
Blame-the-victim
Us and Them: Ingroup and the
Outgroup
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Part of evolution
The social definition of who we are
also tells us who we are not
Make instant judgments about
people: language, accent,
The “us” the ingroup automatically
excludes “them” the outgroup
Creates an ingroup bias- favoring
ones own group
Social identity formed as we
associate ourselves with certain
groups and contrast ourselves to
other groups- predisposes us to
prejudice
Emotional Roots
• Scapegoat theoryfinding someone to
blame when things go
wrong
• Target for one’s anger
• High among
economically troubled
people
• Boosts our own self esteem
Cognitive Roots of Prejudice
• Simplify our world
through categorization
• Own-Race effect or own
race bias develops
around 3-9 months
• Own race effect the
ability to recognize the
face of one’s own race
more accurately than
the face of others
• Video from 60 minutes
• Morality and babies
• https://www.youtube.c
om/watch?v=FRvVFW8
5IcU&list=PL2920A9212
3EAF834&index=111
Combating Prejudice
Contact Theory
• Contact between hostile groups will reduce
animosity if they are made to work towards a
superordinate goal.
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.
High expectations
students perform, low
expectations students do
poorly
Psychology of Aggression
Read 671-678
Causes: genetic and
neural, biochemical
Theories of Aggression:
• Psychological- frustrationaggression modelfrustration creates anger,
anger begets aggression
• Sociocultural
• Observational
Prosocial Behavior/Altruism- the unselfish
regard for the welfare of others
• Kitty Genovese case in Kew
Gardens Queens, NY.
Bystander Effect:
• Conditions in which people
are more or less likely to
help one another. In
general…the more people
around…the less chance of
help….because of…
• Diffusion of Responsibility
Pluralistic Ignorance
• People decide what to do by
looking to others.
Help someone when…
• Person appears to need
help and deserves help
• Similar to us in some
way
• Observed helpfulness
• Not in a hurry
• Live in a small town or
rural area
• Feeling guilty
• Focused on othe
Bystander effect
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OdKow
7IAuw&list=PL2920A92123EAF834&index=62
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSsPfbu
p0ac
Norms for Helping
• Social exchange theory- weigh the costs of doing
good (time, etc.) against the benefits good feelings
ex: Blood donor costs time, anxiety, benefits- reduces
guilt, social approval, feels good. If rewards outweigh
costs, you help
• Reciprocity norm- return help to those who have
helped us
• Social – responsibility norm- help those who need
help. Children- reciprocity norm not in play
Conflict and Peacemaking
• Problem of Social traps:
when the conflicting
parties, by each
pursuing their own
interests, get caught in
mutually destructive
behavior
• Mirror-image
perceptions- as we see
them they see us ex:
they are evil, so they
see us as evil
• Self-fulfilling
prophecies- belief that
leads to its own
fulfillment
Attraction
5 Factors of Attraction
Proximity
• Geographic nearness
Mere exposure
effect:
• Repeated exposure
to something breeds
liking.
Which person would you want to
have a long term relationship
with?
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 part in attraction.
• I love Theo’s
Wings. If I see the
same waitress every
time I go there, I
may begin to
associate that
waitress with the
good feelings I get
from Theo's.
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?
Beauty and Culture
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?