Unit 4: Social Psychology and Personality

Attributions

Explanations we create for the causes of behavior (our own and others').

Dispositional (internal qualities)

Attributing behavior to someone's personality, traits, or abilities.

Situational (external circumstances)

Attributing behavior to environmental factors or the context.

Explanatory Styles

Individual differences in the way people typically explain the causes of events.

Optimistic

Explaining negative events as external, unstable, and specific.

Pessimistic

Explaining negative events as internal, stable, and global

Actor-observer bias

The tendency to attribute our own behavior to situational causes and others' behavior to dispositional causes.

Fundamental attribution error

The tendency to overestimate the role of dispositional factors and underestimate the role of situational factors in explaining others' behavior.

Self-serving bias

The tendency to attribute our successes to internal factors and our failures to external factors.

Internal locus of control

The belief that one controls their own outcomes and life events.

External locus of control

The belief that external forces (luck, fate, others) control one's outcomes.

Person perception

The processes by which we form impressions of and make judgments about other people.

Mere exposure effect

The phenomenon that repeated exposure to a stimulus (person, object, etc.) increases our liking for it.

Self-fulfilling prophecy

A belief or expectation that leads to its own fulfillment.

Social comparison (upward or downward)

Evaluating oneself by comparing to others who are perceived as better (upward) or worse (downward).

Relative deprivation

The feeling of discontent felt when one compares their situation to others who are perceived as better off.

Attitude

A relatively stable evaluation of a person, object, or idea.

Stereotype

A generalized belief about a group of people, often oversimplified and inaccurate.

Prejudice

A negative attitude or feeling toward a group and its members.

Discrimination

Unjustified negative behavior toward a group and its members.

Implicit attitudes

Unconscious, automatic evaluations that influence our feelings and behavior.

Just-world phenomenon

The belief that the world is fair and people get what they deserve.

Out-group homogeneity bias

The tendency to perceive members of out-groups as being more similar to each other than members of one's own in-group.

In-group bias

The tendency to favor one's own group over other groups.

Ethnocentrism

The belief that one's own culture or ethnic group is superior to others

Belief perseverance

The tendency to stick to one's initial beliefs even when presented with contradictory evidence.

Confirmation bias

The tendency to seek out information that confirms one's existing beliefs and ignore or distort contradictory evidence.

Cognitive dissonance

The discomfort experienced when holding conflicting beliefs, attitudes, or behaviors, which motivates a change to reduce the discomfort.

Social norms

Shared rules and expectations about how to behave in a particular social group or situation.

Descriptive

Perceptions about how people actually behave in a given situation.

Injunctive

Perceptions about what behaviors are approved or disapproved of by others.

Social influence theory

The ways in which people's thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are affected by other people.

Normative

Conformity based on a person's desire to be liked or accepted by others.

Informational

Conformity based on accepting evidence about reality provided by other people.

Persuasion

The process by which a message induces change in beliefs, attitudes, or behaviors.

Elaboration likelihood model

A theory of persuasion that proposes two routes to attitude change: central and peripheral.

Central route to persuasion

Attitude change based on thoughtful consideration of the arguments presented.

Peripheral route to persuasion

Attitude change based on superficial cues associated with the message (e.g., attractiveness of the speaker).

Halo effect

A cognitive bias where our overall impression of a person influences how we feel and think about their character.

Foot-in-the-door technique

A compliance tactic in which you first ask for a small request, and once it's granted, you ask for a larger, related request.

Door-in-the-face technique

A compliance tactic in which you first ask for a large request that is likely to be refused, and then you ask for a smaller, more reasonable request.

Conformity

Adjusting one's behavior or thinking to coincide with a group standard.

Obedience

Compliance with an order, request, or law or submission to another's authority.

Individualism

A social theory favoring freedom of action for individuals over collective control.

Collectivism

A social theory emphasizing interdependence, cooperation, and the priority of group goals over individual ones.

Multiculturalism

The presence of, or support for the presence of, several distinct cultural or ethnic groups within a society.

Group polarization

The tendency for group discussion to strengthen the initial leanings of the group members.

Groupthink

A mode of thinking that occurs when the desire for harmony in a decision-making group overrides a realistic appraisal of alternatives.

Diffusion of responsibility

The tendency for individuals to feel less responsible for taking action when other people are present.

Social loafing

The tendency for people in a group to exert less effort when pooling their efforts toward a common goal than when individually accountable.

Deindividuation

The loss of self-awareness and self-restraint occurring in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity.

Social facilitation

Improved performance on simple or well-learned tasks in the presence of others.

False consensus effect

The tendency to overestimate the extent to which others share our beliefs and behaviors.

Superordinate goals

Shared goals that necessitate cooperative effort; goals that override people's differences from one another.

Social traps

A situation in which conflicting parties, by each rationally pursuing their self-interest, become caught in mutually destructive behavior.

I/O Psychologists (Industrial/Organizational Psychologists)

Psychologists who apply psychological principles to the workplace to improve productivity and the quality of work life.

Altruism

Unselfish regard for the welfare of others.

Social reciprocity norm

The expectation that people will help those who have helped them

Bystander effect

The finding that a person is less likely to provide help when there are other bystanders.

Psychodynamic view of personality

A perspective emphasizing unconscious psychological processes and the influence of early childhood experiences on personality development.

Role of the unconscious

The part of the mind containing thoughts, feelings, memories, and urges that are outside of conscious awareness but still influence behavior.

Id

In psychoanalytic theory, the unconscious psychic entity present at birth that operates on the pleasure principle, demanding immediate gratification.

Superego

In psychoanalytic theory, the internalized ideals and standards of society, often representing the conscience.

Ego

In psychoanalytic theory, the largely conscious, "executive" part of personality that mediates among the demands of the id, superego, and reality.

Ego defense mechanisms

Unconscious psychological strategies used to protect oneself from anxiety arising from unacceptable thoughts or feelings.

Repression

Unconsciously pushing anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness.

Denial

Refusing to accept reality or facts.

Displacement

Redirecting unacceptable feelings from the original source to a safer, substitute target.

Projection

Attributing one's own unacceptable thoughts or feelings to others.

Rationalization

Creating self-justifying explanations in place of the real, more threatening, unconscious reasons for one's actions.

Reaction formation

Acting in a way that is the opposite of one's true, often unconscious, feelings.

Regression

Retreating to an earlier psychosexual stage, where some psychic energy remains fixated.

Sublimation

Transforming unacceptable urges or impulses into socially acceptable behaviors.

Projective tests to assess personality

Personality tests that provide ambiguous stimuli designed to trigger projection of one's inner dynamics. (Note: No projective tests are specifically named.)

Humanistic psychology

A perspective that emphasizes human potential for growth, self-actualization, and free will.

Unconditional (positive) regard (UPR)

According to Rogers, an attitude of total acceptance toward another person, regardless of their flaws.

Self-actualizing tendency

According to Rogers, the innate drive to develop our full potential and capabilities.

Social-Cognitive view of personality

A perspective emphasizing the interaction of traits, conscious thoughts, and social context in shaping personality.

Reciprocal determinism

The interacting influences of behavior, internal cognition, and environment.

Self-efficacy

One's sense of competence and effectiveness.

Self-concept

All our thoughts and feelings about ourselves, in answer to the question, "Who am I?".

Self-esteem

One's feelings of high or low self-worth.

Trait view on personality

A perspective that describes personality in terms of stable and enduring behavior patterns, or dispositions to feel and act.

Big Five Theory (OCEAN)

A model that proposes five basic personality dimensions

Openness

Imaginative, curious, artistic, insightful, original.

Conscientiousness

Organized, careful, disciplined, responsible.

Extraversion

Sociable, outgoing, assertive, energetic.

Agreeableness

Cooperative, kind, trusting, empathetic, warm.

Neuroticism (Emotional Stability)

Anxious, moody, irritable, worried, tense (low end: calm, secure, self-satisfied).

Personality inventories

Questionnaires (often with true-false or agree-disagree items) on which people respond to items designed to gauge a wide range of feelings and behaviors; used to assess selected personality traits.

Factor analysis

A statistical procedure that identifies clusters of related items (called factors) on a test; used to identify different dimensions of performance that underlie a person's total score

Motivation

A need or desire that energizes and directs behavior

Drive-reduction theory

The idea that a physiological need creates an aroused tension state (a drive) that motivates an organism to satisfy the need.

Homeostasis

The maintenance of a steady internal state

Arousal theory

The idea that people are motivated to maintain an optimal level of alertness and physical and mental activation.

Optimal arousal

The level of arousal at which performance is best.

Yerkes-Dodson Law

The principle that performance increases with arousal only up to a point, beyond which performance decreases.

Self-determination theory

A theory of motivation that emphasizes three innate psychological needs: autonomy, competence, and relatedness.

Intrinsic motivation

A desire to perform a behavior effectively for its own sake.

Extrinsic motivation

A desire to perform a behavior to receive promised rewards or avoid threatened punishment.