Social Psychology Comprehensive Lecture Notes

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering key definitions, theories, research methods, self-processes, social cognition, persuasion, conformity, and intergroup relations from the lecture notes.

Social Psychology

The scientific study of affect (feeling), cognitions (thoughts), and behaviors of individuals in a social context.

Sociology

The scientific study of large group behavior and institutions in society, investigating phenomena at the social level rather than focusing on individuals.

Personality Psychology

The study of how individuals differ on stable traits across situations, in contrast to social psychology's focus on situational contexts.

Theory

A broad explanation and set of predictions concerning the phenomenon of interest.

Hypothesis

A prediction stated in a testable way.

Operationalization (Operational Definition)

The process of translating a hypothesis into specific, testable procedures that can be measured and observed.

Hindsight Bias

The tendency to believe an outcome was foreseeable after learning it; it is guarded against by formulating clear hypotheses and progresses through three levels: memory distortion, inevitability, and predictability.

Archival Research

A descriptive research method that utilizes existing data in order to test a hypothesis.

Naturalistic Observation

The observation and recording of naturally occurring behavior in its typical environment without researcher intervention.

Survey Research

A descriptive method where a sample of individuals is asked a series of questions regarding their behavior, thoughts, and attitudes to represent a larger population.

Case Study

An in-depth, intensive investigation of a single individual or a small group of people (such as Phineas Gage).

Correlational Research

Research examining the relationship between two sets of variables to determine whether they are associated, yielding coefficients ranging from $-1$ to $+1$; correlation does not imply causation.

Random Assignment

The assignment of participants to experimental conditions strictly on the basis of chance and chance alone.

Reliability

The consistency and stability of research results or a measurement instrument.

Validity

The degree to which a study or tool measures what it actually intends to measure.

Internal Validity

The degree of confidence that experimental results and changes in the dependent variable were directly caused by the manipulated independent variable.

Confounds

Any uncontrolled factors that differ between experimental conditions other than the independent variable, making it impossible to determine whether the IV caused the effect on the DV.

External Validity

The degree to which experimental results can generalize to other settings, contexts, and populations.

Construct Validity

How well researchers manipulate or measure the conceptual variables they intend to study.

Institutional Review Board (IRB)

A committee at universities and research institutions that reviews research protocols to ensure the ethical conduct of studies.

Informed Consent

The ethical requirement to provide participants with sufficient information about a study, particularly its risks and benefits, so they can decide whether to participate.

Debriefing

The process of informing participants about all aspects, purposes, and hypotheses of an investigation after the study has concluded.

Rouge Test

An assessment of self-awareness where makeup is placed on a baby's face to see if they recognize their reflection in a mirror.

Self-Awareness

The realization that one is a distinct individual separate from others.

Self-Concept

A person's beliefs about their own roles, traits, abilities, and experiences.

Working Self-Concept

The subset of self-knowledge and self-concept facets that are active and salient at any given moment.

Self-Concept Clarity

The state where a person's self-concept feels clearly defined, internally consistent, and stable across time.

Self-Verification

The tendency to seek out and favor feedback that is consistent with one's existing self-beliefs.

Self-Complexity

The degree to which a person's self-concept consists of multiple distinct facets, making it easier to cope with failures or threats in any single domain.

Reflected Appraisals

Our perception of how other people perceive and evaluate us, which is highly subjective, prone to error, and particularly influential during adolescence.

Facial Feedback Hypothesis

The hypothesis that facial expressions directly influence internal emotional states through self-perception processes.

Overjustification Effect

The phenomenon where external rewards for an intrinsically motivated behavior undermine a person's internal commitment and intrinsic enjoyment of that behavior.

Social Role Theory

The theory that gender differences in self-concepts arise from historical and cultural pressures rather than biological factors.

Self-Esteem

The global or overall evaluation that an individual has of themselves.

Contingencies of Self-Worth

The specific domains and sources upon which a person bases their self-esteem, which vary across individuals and over time.

Sociometer Theory

An evolutionary theory proposing that self-esteem serves as an internal psychological metric tracking how well an individual is accepted socially.

Self-Evaluation Maintenance Model

A model detailing how another person's success can either threaten or enhance our self-esteem depending on psychological closeness and domain relevance.

Basking in Reflected Glory (BIRGing)

Associating with a successful individual in a domain that is not personally central to one's self-concept, resulting in an overall positive boost to self-esteem.

Embarrassment

A self-conscious, awkward emotion that first emerges when self-awareness allows for the idea of 'me'; characterized as a less intense form of shame accompanied by nonverbal cues like blushing.

Guilt

A negative self-conscious emotion based on the cognition 'I did a bad thing' (focusing on behavior), which motivates approach, reparative actions, perspective taking, and empathy.

Shame

A negative self-conscious emotion based on the cognition 'I am a bad person' (focusing on the self), which leads to avoidance and fear of exposure.

Delay of Gratification

Forgoing an immediate desirable outcome in order to secure a more desirable outcome in the future.

Ego Depletion

The state wherein self-control resources become exhausted through prior use, operating like a fatigued muscle.

Implementation Intentions

Specific 'if-then' plans detailing how an individual will engage in a target behavior in response to a particular situational cue.

Action Identification Theory

The theory that actions and goals can be mentally represented at an abstract level (which is motivating) or a concrete level (which is manageable).

Multiple Audience Problem

A self-presentation dilemma that arises when a person's desired impression differs for two distinct audiences present at the same time.

Self-Handicapping

The behavior of creating obstacles or handy excuses for potential failure in advance to protect one's self-presentation and self-image.

Rational System

A deliberate, controlled cognitive processing style used for unfamiliar tasks, problems with clear right answers, and conscious goal pursuit.

Intuitive System

A quick, automatic cognitive processing style that relies on heuristics and mental shortcuts to handle complex decisions and creativity.

Primacy Effect

An order effect where information presented first exerts a disproportionately large impact on judgment and recall.

Recency Effect

An order effect where information presented last exerts a disproportionately large impact on judgment and recall.

Framing Effects

The cognitive phenomenon where the manner in which information is presented (e.g., positive benefits versus negative risks/costs) influences how it is processed and evaluated.

Construal Level Theory

A theory stating that events far in psychological distance (time) are perceived through high-level abstract construals focused on 'why', whereas close events are perceived through low-level concrete construals focused on 'how'.

Assimilation

The process of interpreting new information in terms of existing beliefs and expectations.

Confirmation Bias

The tendency to search for, notice, and interpret information in a way that confirms preexisting perceptions and beliefs.

Availability Heuristic

A cognitive heuristic where the perceived frequency or likelihood of an event is judged by the ease with which relevant examples come to mind.

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

A phenomenon where expectations about a person or situation lead one to act in ways that elicit behaviors confirming those original expectations.

Belief Perseverance

The persistence of one's initial conceptions and beliefs even in the face of compelling opposing evidence.

Misinformation Effect

The alteration or corruption of a person's memory of an event caused by post-event exposure to misleading information.

Upward Counterfactual

Imagining an alternative scenario in which an outcome turned out better ('If only…'), which occurs after negative events, makes one feel worse, and motivates future change.

Downward Counterfactual

Imagining an alternative scenario in which an outcome turned out worse ('At least…'), which occurs after events, elevates mood, and reinforces repeated behavior.

Mirror Neurons

Neurons that fire both when an individual performs a behavior and when they observe another person performing that same behavior.

Thin Slices

The ability to form remarkably accurate social and personality impressions of people based on brief behavioral observations (e.g., $30\text{ seconds}$).

False Consensus Effect

The tendency to overestimate the degree to which other people share our attitudes, opinions, and preferences.

Halo Effect

The cognitive bias where an overall broad impression of an individual is generalized to specific, unrelated personal qualities (e.g., assuming attractive people are smarter and nicer).

Representativeness Heuristic

A mental shortcut where the probability of a person belonging to a certain group is judged by how closely their features resemble the typical prototype of that group.

Entity Theorists

Individuals who perceive personal characteristics such as intelligence and personality as fixed, stable, and unchangeable.

Incremental Theorists

Individuals who perceive personal characteristics as malleable, unstable, and capable of improvement through effort.

Covariation Principle

A principle stating that people explain events by identifying factors that are consistently present when the event occurs and absent when it does not.

Fundamental Attribution Error (Correspondent Inference)

The widespread tendency to overestimate internal, dispositional factors and underestimate external, situational influences when explaining others' behaviors.

Mediator

A variable that accounts for the relationship between the independent variable and the dependent variable by explaining how or why the effect occurs (the mechanism).

Moderator

A variable that influences the strength or direction of the relationship between an independent variable and a dependent variable (identifying when or for whom the effect holds).

James-Lange Theory of Emotion

The theory asserting that physiological arousal directly precedes and triggers the subjective emotional experience.

Cannon-Bard Theory of Emotion

The theory proposing that physiological arousal and emotional experience occur simultaneously yet independently upon exposure to a stimulus.

Schachter-Singer Two-Factor Theory

The theory that emotion is determined by two factors: non-specific physiological arousal and a cognitive interpretation of that arousal within situational context.

Lazarus's Cognitive-Mediational Theory

The theory proposing that emotional responses are directly determined by an individual's cognitive appraisal of the environmental stimulus.

Emotion Regulation

Any effort to modify an emotional experience (positive or negative), occurring via situational selection, situational modification, attentional deployment, cognitive change/reappraisal, or response modulation.

Affect Valuation Theory

The theory stating that cultural values dictate which emotional states are prioritized, causing emotions that align with cultural ideals to be more highly valued.

Display Rules

Culturally prescribed norms that dictate how, when, and to whom it is socially appropriate to express specific emotions.

Implicit Association Test (IAT)

A computer-based reaction-time assessment that measures unconscious associations and implicit attitudes toward target groups or concepts.

Cognitive Dissonance

A state of psychological discomfort that arises when an individual simultaneously holds two contradictory cognitions or acts in a manner contrary to their beliefs.

Post-Decisional Dissonance

The psychological discomfort experienced immediately following a difficult choice between two or more appealing alternatives.

Spreading of Alternatives

A dissonance-reduction strategy where an individual emphasizes the positive attributes of a chosen alternative and magnifies the negative aspects of the rejected alternative.

Induced Compliance Paradigm

An experimental setup where participants are subtly nudged into performing a behavior that conflicts with their true attitudes, prompting them to change their attitude to align with the behavior.

Effort Justification

The tendency to reduce dissonance by convincing oneself that a goal or group was exceptionally worthwhile to justify the intense effort or suffering endured to reach it.

Central Route to Persuasion

A persuasion route taken when individuals are motivated and analytical, characterized by high-effort processing of arguments that results in lasting attitude change.

Peripheral Route to Persuasion

A persuasion route taken when individuals lack motivation or ability, characterized by low-effort processing driven by superficial cues outside the message (resulting in temporary attitude change).

Sleeper Effect

The delayed increase in the persuasive impact of a non-credible message, which occurs when people remember the content over time but forget the discounted source.

Identifiable Victim Effect

The tendency to be more moved and persuaded by a vivid, detailed story of a single concrete victim than by abstract statistics describing large groups.

Chameleon Effect

The non-conscious, automatic mimicry of the postures, mannerisms, and nonverbal cues of an interaction partner.

Informational Social Influence

Conformity that occurs when people look to others as a source of correct information, leading to private internalization of beliefs.

Normative Social Influence

Conformity driven by the desire to fit in, gain social approval, and avoid exclusion, resulting in public compliance without private acceptance.

Foot-in-the-Door Technique

A compliance strategy where a persuader secures agreement to a small initial request, followed by a significantly larger target request.

Door-in-the-Face Technique

A compliance strategy where a persuader begins with an unreasonably large request that is rejected, followed by a smaller, reasonable request that is more likely to be accepted.

Descriptive Norms

Social perceptions of what behaviors are actually and commonly performed by most people in a given setting.

Prescriptive Norms

Social perceptions of what behaviors people ought to perform or are socially approved of doing.

Psychological Reactance

An unpleasant motivational state that arises when an individual's sense of freedom is threatened, driving actions to restore that freedom.

Outgroup Homogeneity Effect

The tendency to view outgroup members as all being alike while perceiving ingroup members as heterogeneous and diverse.

Illusory Correlation

The false perception of a relationship or correlation between two distinct variables or groups when no such relationship exists.

Stereotype Threat

The disruptive concern or anxiety that one might confirm a negative stereotype about one's group, which can impair performance.