Psychology: Stereotyping, Prejudice, Social Influence, and Motivation Concepts

Stereotypes

Beliefs that certain characteristics are regular of members of particular groups.

Prejudice

Attitudinal and affective response toward a group and its individual members.

Discrimination

Favourable or unfavorable actions directed towards members of a group.

Modern racism

Ongoing prejudice against nonwhites despite rejection of explicit racist belief.

Benevolent sexism

Chivalrous ideology marked by protectiveness and affection toward women who embrace conventional roles.

Hostile sexism

Dislike of nontraditional women and those seen as 'usurping' men's power.

Realistic conflict theory

Prejudice and discrimination among groups often arise from competition over limited resources.

The Robber's Cave Study

Explored ethnocentrism resulting from intergroup competition among 5th grade boys.

Minimal group paradigm

An experimental paradigm in which researchers create groups based on arbitrary criteria.

Social Identity Theory

The idea that a person's self-concept derives from the status of the groups they belong to.

Conformity

Changing one's beliefs or behaviour to align with those of others.

Informational social influence

Relying on others as a source of information about what is correct.

Normative conformity

The influence of others that comes from the desire to avoid disapproval.

Asch's conformity experiment

Demonstrated that many people conform to incorrect answers to avoid negative judgment.

Factors affecting conformity pressure

Includes group size, group unanimity, anonymity, expertise, status, and culture.

Minority influence

When consistent minority opinion influences public responses and private judgments.

Pluralistic ignorance

A phenomenon where people act contrary to their true beliefs due to perceived group norms.

Compliance

When a person responds favourably to an explicit request from another person.

Door in the face

A compliance approach that involves asking for a very large favour that will be refused, followed by a smaller favour.

Foot in the door

Involves making an initial, small request followed by a larger request to change self-image.

Prescriptive norms

The way a person is supposed to behave in a given context.

Descriptive norms

The behaviour exhibited by most people in a given context.

Norm of Reciprocity

Dictates that people should provide benefits to those who benefit them.

Obedience

Occurs when a more powerful person issues a demand to which a less powerful person submits.

Remote-feedback version

In Milgram's studies, the learner was in an adjoining room, leading to 66% of teachers delivering max shock.

Voice-feedback version

Teachers could hear the learner's pleas, resulting in 62.5% delivering max shock.

Proximity version

The teacher and learner sat in the same room.

Touch Proximity version

The teacher had to force the learner's hand onto the shock plate, resulting in the lowest % giving max shock.

Gradual increments

The step-by-step instruction made obedience more likely.

Baseline version

Experimenter stood next to participant.

Experimenter absent version

Experimenter left the room and communicated only by telephone.

Ordinary person version

Instructions were given by a confederate acting as another participant.

Contradictory experimenters version

One of the two experimenters announced that he found the proceedings objectionable.

Normative social influence

The desire to avoid the disapproval of the experimenter or anyone else associated with the study.

Self-discrepancy theory

Dictates that behaviour is motivated by standards reflecting ideal and ought selves.

Actual self

The self one believes they are.

Ideal self

The self that represents one's hopes and wishes.

Ought self

Represents one's duties and obligations.

High level construals

Seeing abstract, global, and core features that facilitate self-control.

Low level construals

Seeing salient, incidental, and concrete details.

Stereotyping

Cognition about a social group.

Ingroup

Any group to which you belong.

Outgroup

Any group to which you don't belong.

Generalization

Where info learned from one context is applied to other contexts.

Schemas

Cognitive structures that help organize knowledge and guide processing.

Ingroup bias

We tend to evaluate ingroup members more favourably, even when the groups are made based on arbitrary reasons.

Outgroup derogation

Negative evaluations of outgroup members, such as hating someone because they're different.

Illusory correlation

People seeing relationships between events/characteristics/categories that are not actually related.

Warmth

How much we like the group; comes from presence (low warmth) / absence (high warmth) of competition.

Competence

How much we respect the group; comes from group's social status.

High warmth, low competence

Groups that are pitied and constantly helped even if not needed.

Low warmth, high competence

Groups that are envied and not helped.

Low warmth, low competence

Groups that are hated and seen as a drain on resources.

High warmth, high competence

Groups that are admired and we go out of our way to help.

The Doll Study

Surveyed doll colour preferences of Black schoolchildren, revealing a preference for White dolls.

Shooter Bias

Participants were faster to make 'shoot' decisions for armed Black targets than for armed White targets.

Stereotype threat

Fear that actions/behaviour will confirm a stereotype that applies to us.

Robber's Cave Study

Study showing how dividing groups can create ingroup and outgroup bias through competition.

Realistic conflict

Intergroup conflict develops from competition for limited resources.

Symbolic conflict

Conflict that does not involve tangible resources but values, rituals, traditions, etc.

Superordinate goals

Goals that require cooperation between groups to achieve, reducing conflict.

Intergroup contact

Conflict decreases if certain conditions are met, such as equal social status and sustained close contact.

Social influence

Exercise of social power to change the attitudes and behaviours of others.

Informational conformity

Conforming to navigate ambiguous situations by mimicking what others do.

Social norms

An expected standard of behaviour and belief established and enforced by a group.

Library Study

Demonstrated the power of expectations regarding social norms.

Internal compliance

Acting according to beliefs and principles.

External compliance

Acting out of concern for how it would appear to refuse.

Factors encouraging compliance

1. Positive mood 2. Reciprocity 3. Giving reasons for need of help.

Positive mood

People are more likely to comply in a good mood.

Reciprocity

Do something nice for someone, they'll be more likely to do something for you.

Langer, Blank & Chanowitz (1978) - printing study

Examined compliance in requests to cut in line for a printing machine.

Factors affecting obedience

Distance between authority and the person receiving orders.

Motivation

Internal state that activates and directs thoughts and behaviour.

Goals

Actions done to satisfy a need.

Self-discrepancy

Psychological distance between possible selves.

Affiliation needs

The need to be social; we are social creatures by nature.

Achievement needs

The need to be successful.

Schachter (1959) study

Examined the relationship between anxiety and willingness to affiliate.

Extrinsic motivation

Motivated by rewards associated with the activity.

Intrinsic motivation

Motivated by the activity itself.

Mastery goals

To get better; associated with intrinsic motivation.

Performance goals

Interested in only reward; associated with extrinsic motivation.

Regulatory Focus Theory

Two general ways to approach any goal: promotion focus and prevention focus.

Promotion focus

Work toward ensuring success.

Prevention focus

Work toward avoiding failure.