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Chapter 14
Social Psychology
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007
Stanford Prison Experiment
• Turn to page 565
Prison Experiment
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007
Social Psychology
Social psychology –
The branch of psychology that studies the
effects of social variables and cognitions on
individual behavior and social interactions.
Social context – The combination of:
(a) People
(b) The activities and interactions among people
(c) The setting in which behavior occurs
(d) The expectations and social norms governing
behavior in that setting
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How Does the
Social Situation
Affect our Behavior?
We usually adapt our
behavior to the demands of
the social situation, and in
ambiguous situations we
take our cues from the
behavior of others in that
setting.
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Social Situations
Situationism –
The view that environmental conditions
influence people’s behavior as much or
more than their personal dispositions do.
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Social Standards of Behavior
Social role –
One of several socially defined patterns
of behavior that are expected of persons
in a given setting or group.
Script –
Knowledge about the sequence
of events and actions that is
expected in a particular setting.
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Social Standards of Behavior
Social norms –
A group’s expectations regarding what is
appropriate and acceptable for its
members’ attitudes and behavior
(unwritten rules).
Violating Social Norms in an Elevator
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Conformity
• The tendency for people to adopt the behaviors,
attitudes, and opinions of other members of a
group.
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Conformity:
The Asch Studies
Which line matches the line on the left?
A
Standard line
1
2
3
Comparison lines
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Conformity:
The Asch Studies
What would you say if you were in a
room full of people who all picked line
number three?
A
Standard line
1
2
3
Comparison lines
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Group Characteristics That Produce
Conformity
• Asch identifies three factors that
influence whether a person will yield to
pressure:
1. The size of the majority.
2. The presence of a partner who dissented
from the majority.
3. The size of the discrepancy between the
correct answer and the majority position.
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Groupthink
• In “groupthink,”
members of the
group attempt to
conform their
opinions to what
each believes to
be the consensus
of the group.
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Groupthink
Conditions likely to promote
groupthink include:
• High group cohesiveness
• Directive leadership
• Similarity of members’ social background
and ideology
• High stress from external threats with low
hope of a better solution than that of the
group leader
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Obedience to Authority
• Imagine if an experimenter studying “the
effects of punishment on memory”
asked you to deliver painful electric
shocks to a middle-aged man who had
been treated for a heart condition.
• Each time the man missed
an answer, you would be
instructed to deliver an
increasingly powerful shock.
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Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007
The Shocking Results
• Nearly 2/3 delivered the maximum 450 volts to
the learner!
• Most of those who refused to give the
maximum shock obeyed until reaching about
300 volts.
• No one who got within 5 switches of the end
refused to go all the way (by then their
resistance was broken).
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Obedience to Authority
• This controversial experiment
demonstrated the powerful effects of
obedience to authority.
• Situational factors, and not personality
variables, appeared to effect people’s
levels of obedience.
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The Bystander Problem
Diffusion of responsibility –
Dilution or weakening of each group
member’s obligation to act when
responsibility is perceived to be
shared with all
group members.
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The Bystander Problem
• In one experiment, a student was
led to believe that the he or she was taking part
in an experiment with between one and five
other students (over an intercom).
• The student then heard what sounded like
another student having a seizure and gasping
for help.
• The researchers timed how long it
would take the students to ask for
help.
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Bystander Intervention in an Emergency
100
2-person groups
Percentage helping
80
3-person groups
60
6-person groups
40
20
0
20
80
120
160
200
240
280
Seconds from beginning of emergency
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Constructing Social Reality:
What Influences Our
Judgments of Others?
The judgments we make
about others depend not only
on their behavior but also on
our interpretation of their
actions within a social
context.
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Constructing Social Reality:
What Influences Our
Judgments of Others?
Social reality –
An individual’s subjective
interpretation of other people
and of relationships with
them.
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Interpersonal Attraction
Reward theory of attraction –
A social learning view that says we
like best those who give us
maximum rewards at minimum
cost.
Proximity
Similarity
Self-Disclosure
Physical
Attractiveness
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Reward Theory of Attraction
Proximity
Similarity
People will make friends
with those who are
nearby.
People are attracted to
those who are more
similar to themselves.
Self-Disclosure
Physical
Attractiveness
Allows you to get to
know each other and
signifies a sense of trust
in the relationship.
People find it more
rewarding to associate
with people they find
physically attractive.
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Expectations and the
Influence of Self-Esteem
Matching hypothesis –
Prediction that most people will find
friends and mates that are about their
same level of attractiveness.
Expectancy-value theory –
Theory that people decide whether or not
to pursue a relationship by weighing the
potential value of the relationship
against their expectations of success
in establishing the relationship.
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Attraction and Self-Justification
Cognitive dissonance –
A highly motivating state in which people
have conflicting cognitions, especially
when their voluntary actions conflict with
their attitudes.
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Making Cognitive
Attributions
Fundamental attribution error –
Tendency to emphasize internal causes
and ignore external pressures.
Actor-observer effect –
Tendency to attribute internal causes more
often for other people's behavior and
external attributions more often for one’s
own behavior.
Self-serving bias –
Attributional pattern in which one takes credit
for success but denies responsibility for failure.
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Prejudice and Discrimination
Prejudice –
A negative attitude toward an
individual based solely on his or
her membership in a particular
group.
Discrimination –
A negative action taken against an
individual as a result of his or her
group membership.
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Prejudice and Discrimination
In-group –
The group with which an individual
identifies.
Out-group –
Those outside the group
with which an individual
identifies.
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Prejudice and Discrimination
Social distance –
The perceived difference or similarity
between oneself and another person.
Scapegoating –
Blaming an innocent
person or a group
for one’s own
troubles.
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Other Topics in Social Psychology
Social facilitation –
An increase in an individual’s
performance because of being
in a group.
Social loafing –
A decrease in performance because of
being in a group.
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Other Topics in Social Psychology
Deindividuation –
Occurs when group
members lose their sense
of personal identity and
responsibility and the group
“assumes” responsibility for
their behavior.
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Other Topics in Social Psychology
Group polarization –
When individuals in a group have similar,
though not identical views, their opinions
become more extreme.
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Loving Relationships
Romantic love –
A temporary and highly emotional
condition based on infatuation and sexual
desire.
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Sternberg’s Triangular Theory of Love
Commitment
Complete Love
Infatuation
Passion
Friendship
Intimacy
Romantic Love
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What Are the Roots of
Violence and Terrorism?
The power of the situation can
help us understand violence
and terrorism, but the broader
understanding requires
multiple perspectives that go
beyond the boundaries of
traditional psychology.
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Turn to page 597 and read
The Robbers’ Cave:
An Experiment in Conflict
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007
The Robbers’ Cave:
An Experiment in Conflict
• In the Robber’s Cave experiment,
conflict between groups arose from an
intensely competitive situation.
• Cooperation, however, replaced conflict
when the experimenters contrived
situations that fostered mutual
interdependence and common goals for
the groups.
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The Robbers’ Cave:
An Experiment in Conflict
Violence and aggression –
Terms that refer to behavior that is
intended to cause harm.
Cohesiveness –
Solidarity, loyalty, and a sense of group
membership.
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The Robbers’ Cave:
An Experiment in Conflict
Mutual interdependence –
Shared sense that individuals or groups
need each other in order to achieve
common goals.
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Terrorism
Terrorism –
The use of violent, unpredictable acts by
a small group against a larger group for
political, economic, or religious goals.
• Taking multiple perspectives can provide
important insights on the problems of
aggression, violence, and terrorism.
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End of Chapter 14
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007
Strategies of Persuasion
Foot-in-the-door technique:
•
A method of eliciting compliance by
first making a modest request and
then following it with a larger request.
Door-in-the-face technique:
•
A method of compliance by first making an
outrageous request and then replying to
the refusal with a more reasonable request.
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Strategies of Persuasion
Bait-and-switch technique:
•
The procedure of first offering an
extremely favorable deal and then
making additional demands after the
other person has committed to the deal.
That’s-not-all-technique:
•
A method of eliciting compliance
when a person makes an offer
and then improves the offer before
anyone has a chance to reply.
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007