Download Social Cognition

Hart 1
Chapter 15 Notes:
Social Cognition
Schemata: we classify and categorize people according to our schemata
It is about objects, people, and social roles
Schemata allow us to make inferences about other people
Sometimes schemata lures us into remembering things about people that we never
actually observed.
Primacy effect: Solomon Asch early impressions are the most powerful
One of the explanations for that is the idea that we are cognitive misers
Self-fulfilling prophecy—idea that you get the behavior you expect
Stereotype – special kind of schema that is based on any distinguishing feature – sex,
race, occupation, membership etc. Stereotypes can become the basis for self-fulfilling
prophecies. – Experiment of the attractive vs. unattractive women
Attribution Theory: addresses the question of how people explain behavior. We go about
this process of assessment in predictable ways.
One attribution is internal or external causes – but not both.
Lateness – laziness (internal) or traffic congestion (external)
We decide by information such as: distinctiveness, consistency and consensus.
Attribution biases: you are guessing about the causes and that can contribute to a number of
biases.
Fundamental attribution error: tendency to attribute the behavior of others to causes
within themselves.
Actor-observer effect - others internal causes self-external causes
(Actor in terms of the person doing the thing – like Holocaust helpers)
Defensive attribution – we are motivated to present ourselves well. Self-serving bias.
Personal failure external factors and personal success to internal
Just-world hypothesis: bad things happen to bad people and good things happened to
good people. Rape – “asked for it by their clothing” AIDS victims due to immoral
behavior. This type of thinking is comfortable to us helping us to believe it could never
happen to us.
Attribution across cultures: not always the same Japanese tend to attribute failure to a
lack of effort (internal) and success as due to others (external)
Interpersonal Attraction: what causes us to be attracted to others? Romantics talk of
metaphysical forces, etc. Psychologists have more concrete ideas
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Proximity – physical closeness creates frequency of interaction that leads to attraction.
We also feel secure and more comfortable with familiar people.
Physical attractiveness: we feel attractive people are more intelligent, interesting, happy
sensitive etc. Also believe beauty has a radiating effect. – Makes us look better.
Attractive people are happier, make more money, treated better by others, mothers show
more affection!!!! Give them the benefit of the doubt, a second chance.
Attractive people begin to think of themselves as good or lovable because they are
continually treated as if they are – unattractive people see self an unlovable because they
have been regarded that way as children.
Similarity – of attitudes, interests, values, backgrounds and beliefs. Higher the proportion
of attitudes the two people share the stronger the attraction between them. It is important
that we have our values validated. Opposites don’t attract but complements may.
Exchange – reward theory of attraction. We tend to like people who make us feel
rewarded and appreciated. Gain-loss theory says increases in rewarding behavior
influence attractiveness more than constant rewarding behavior. “Playing hard to get”.
Based on concept of exchange. Give and get. As long as the exchanges are more
rewarding than costly their exchanges continue. Relationships need to be equitable to
work. Relationship fades when the rewards are not equal.
Intimacy: the quality of genuine closeness and trust. Share deep feelings. Self disclose.
Based on trust. Pacing of disclosure is important. If too fast causes the other person to
retreat.
Attitudes: relatively stable organization of beliefs, feelings, and tendencies toward something or
someone. Three components: evaluative beliefs about the object, feelings about the object, and
behavior tendencies toward the object.
Relationship between attitudes and behavior is not always straightforward. La Piere
study with the Chinese couple.
Self-monitoring people are likely to override their attitudes to behave in accordance with
others’ expectations. High self-monitors observe situation for cues about how they
should react. Ex. A person who disagrees with you at a dinner party.
Development – acquire our attitudes from early, direct personal experience. Imitation of
role models -- not only parents, but teachers and peers too.
Prejudice and Discrimination
Difference between prejudice and discrimination: prejudice is attitude discrimination is
action. Can be prejudiced without discriminating and can discriminate without prejudice.
Prejudice has three components: beliefs, feeling and behavior tendencies.
Beliefs are always stereotypes; reliance on stereotypes can lead to erroneous thinking
about others.
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Ultimate attribution error: tendency for a person with stereotyped beliefs to make internal
attributions for their shortcomings and external attributions for their successes.
The other side is to make internal attributions for the failures of people who belong to
groups we dislike.
In addition to stereotyped beliefs, prejudicial attitudes are usually marked by strong
emotions – the emotions and feelings are likely to lead to individuals discriminating
against the group in question.
Sources of prejudice:
Frustration-aggression theory – people who feel exploited and oppressed tend to vent
their anger against others they decide are lower on the social scale than they. These
people become scapegoats. Ex. Violence against Jews and the economy. Lynching
and the price of cotton.
Authoritarian personality - this person tends to be rigid and conventional in his thinking.
Hostile to those who defy those norms. Have fear and suspicion toward all except their
own group.
Oversimplification – a cognitive source another example of cognitive misers. They
oversimplify every thing that leads to erroneous thinking.
Also may have roots in conformity. We tend to reflect the beliefs of whom we hang
around. Once we are in a peer group and want to be accepted by them, it is hard to resist
their beliefs.
Racism:
Modern racism is a subtle and less extreme form of prejudice. 70% of whites and only
30% of blacks feel that blacks have as good a chance as whites to get a good job.
Institutional racism – disadvantages based on the overall effect of institutions and policies
over the years. Educational levels, income levels, etc.
How to reduce prejudice and discrimination
Recategorize – expand our schema for a particular group. Catholics and
Protestants are both Christians. Jews, Catholics and Protestants are all faithbased communities.
Controlled processing – be more mindful of people different from us. Try to
identify with them. Primary difference between someone who is prejudiced and
someone who is not is their ability to suppress prejudiced beliefs.
Improving contact between groups. – But the contact has to be on an equal basis,
one on one, contact must involved cooperation rather than competition.
Social norms need to encourage contact. Can’t have a highly charged
atmosphere like the Little Rock 9.
Attitude change:
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How and why do attitudes change?
Process of persuasion – first step is to catch their attention. Lots of creativity here.
Humor often helps. Then hook the person by involving them.
Even if an ad is annoying it often works because we remember it!
Communication model has four parts:
The Source:
The credibility of the source is most important when we are not inclined
to pay attention to the message itself. If we are interested in the message the source has
less importance than the content of the message.
The message itself: We frequently tune out messages that contradict our point of view
The more arguments a message makes in support of a position, the more effective that
message is. Novel arguments are more persuasive than rehashes of old standbys. Fear
sometimes works well. But if the message generates too much fear, it will turn off the
audience.
Messages are most persuasive when they present both sides of the argument.
The medium of communication: writing is best for helping people understand complex
arguments, video presentations are more effective with an audience that already
understands the basic components of the argument. Face to face appeals or the lessons
of our own experience are most effective.
Characteristics of the audience: This is the most critical and most difficult to control of
the factors.
Attitudes are most resistant to change if:
The audience has a strong commitment to its present attitudes
Others share those attitudes
A pivotal group instilled the attitudes during early childhood.
When there is a great discrepancy the influence increases if the speaker is
considered an expert
People with low self-esteem are more easily influenced when the
message is complex and hard to understand. Highly intelligent people
tend to be more resistant because they can think of so many counter
arguments.
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
Leon Festinger: when you have two contradictory cognitions you have to
reconcile that and often it involves changing your attitude. Or you might increase
the number of consonant elements. Or reduce the importance of one of the
elements.
The larger the reward the less likely you are to change. P 595.
Social Influence:
Refers to the process by which others affect our perceptions, attitudes, and actions.
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Cultural influence:
Culture refers to all the shared beliefs and values, and goods (tangible and intangible) a society
produced
Culture dictates how your dress
What you eat
Personal space: really varies from culture to culture – ours is an arms length.
Cultural truism is beliefs that most members of a society accept as self-evidently true:
examples?
Norm: a shared idea or expectation about how to behave. Keep our lives from being chaotic.
Cultural norm: a behavioral rule shared by an entire society – certain hand gestures mean very
different things in various cultures.
Need to be more open-minded about others; norms and values. Especially when we travel.
Notice the difference, enjoy the difference, be interested in the difference, but don’t judge them as
wrong and us as right.
Conformity – yielding own preferences or beliefs to norms or expectations of a larger group.
Solomon Asch: under some circumstances people will conform to group pressures even if this
forces them to deny obvious physical evidence.
Two factors influence the likelihood that a person will conform:
Characteristics of the situation
Characteristics of the individual
Size of the group is one situation variable. Increased as the group grew up to four. After that the
number made no difference
Degree of unanimity: just having one “ally” eases the pressure to conform.
Nature of the task – when the task is difficult or poorly defined, conformity tends to be
higher. In an ambiguous situation individuals are less sure of their own opinion and more
willing to conform to the majority view.
Personal characteristics: the more an individual is attracted to the group, expects to interact with
its members in the future, holds a position of relatively low status in the group and does not feel
completely accepted, the more the person tends to conform.
Fear of rejection apparently motivates conformity.
See the insert on binge drinking: Taking 5 or more drinks in a row. Number one health hazard
for college students. Students need to be aware that most of their peers do not indulge in binge
drinking. If you think binge drinking is common more likely to try it. Estimates of as high as
70%, in reality more like 38%.
Collectivists culture value community and harmony above all. Levels of conformity are greater
in collectivist cultures. . Conformity greater in farming communities than urban.
Compliance:
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Compliance is a change of behavior in response to an explicitly request.
Techniques:
Foot in the door effect If you allow the sales pitch to begin, you have a great chance of
making a sale. Once people have granted a small request, they are more likely to comply
with a larger one.
Lowball procedure: first induce a person to agree to do something. Second raise the cost
of compliance. Agree to buy a car at a low price, then change some of the terms of the
sale – down payment, etc.
“Door in the face effect” if turning down the first request you feel guilty, then may accept
a smaller commitment.