Mod10.1: Prosocial and antisocial behavior, Social perception and cognition

Social Psychology

Scientific study of how a person's behavior, thoughts, and feelings influence and are influenced by social groups

Altruistic behavior

helping others without a benefit to ourselves

Diffusion of responsibility

less likely to act if there are other people around who can also help

Pluralistic ignorance

people say nothing, and each person falsely assumes that others have better-informed opinions

Social loafing

tendency to not make much effort when working with groups

Aggression

any behavior directed toward another individual that is carried out with the proximate (immediate) intent to cause harm

Hostile

[Aggression] Unplanned, reaction to perceived provocation

Instrumental

[Aggression] aggression as a way to reach a goal

Universal Egoism

when the motivation for helping is to serve our self-interest

Antisocial behavior

• tendencies to respond with fight or flight to any unpleasant events

• increased levels of stress can encourage this behavior

Monoamine oxidase alpha

• low levels for people with antisocial behavior

• helps regulate serotonin levels

• more likely to engage in violent behaviors but only if they have suffered through maltreatment and abuse

Deindividuation

• loss of self in group

• lessening of sense of personal responsibility

Dehumanization

• seeing others as less than humans

• justification for cruelty

Empathy

• the ability to understand and share the feelings of another

• an other-oriented emotional response elicited by and congruent with the perceived welfare of someone else

Empathy-Altruism Hypothesis

the greater the empathy, the greater the motive for altruistic behavior

Theory of mind

• awareness that other people have different internal experiences

• ability to think about your own and other people's mental state

• prerequisite (but insufficient) in the development of empathy

Medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC)

part of the brain important in recognizing other people's minds

Affective empathy

• feeling what someone else is feeling

• hot empathy

Cognitive empathy

-knowing and understanding another's perspective
-cold empathy

Primacy effect

first information we obtain about the person will affect how we see him or her more than later information

Stereotype

a belief or expectation about a group of people

Prejudice

an unfavorable attitude toward a group of people

Discrimination

unfair or unequal treatment among different groups

Attribution

we make sense of our social world by providing explanations for our and other people's behaviors

Internal attributions

• cause of a person's behavior is due to their personalities, attitudes, and abilities

• more likely when behavior is unexpected

External attribution

causal explanations that consider the influence of the situation or environment

Consensus information

• how the person's behavior compares with other people's behavior

• behavior is similar to how others are expected to act in that situation, then you make an external attribution

Consistency information

• how the person's behavior varies from one time to the next

• person's behavior is consistent at different times, then you are likely to provide internal attribution

Distinctiveness

• how the person's behavior varies from one situation to another

• person's behavior changed because of a different situation, more likely to make an external attribution

Fundamental Attribution Error

making internal attribution to people's behavior even when we see evidence otherwise

Actor-observer effect

make internal attributions for other people's behavior, while we make external attributions for our own

Self-serving biases

try to take responsibility for our successes but do not apply the same principle to our failures

Self-handicapping strategies

we put ourselves at a disadvantage so that we have an explanation for our failure