PSY220 Test 1

uoft 2024 skorska

What is Social Psychology?

study of how people think about, influence and relate to one another

What are Social Psychology Major Themes?

• Social Thinking, constructing reality + institutions are powerful 

• Social influence, shape our behavior

• Social Relation, biological & basic need 

Construals

ways we view the social world

• they come from two basic motives: self esteem + social cognition (the need to be accurate)

What’s the differences Between Social Psychology and Sociology?

Sociology —> focuses on society, social status/classes, and qualitative data

Social psychology —> focuses on individuals, immediate stimuli, and predicts behavior through experiments.

What’s the Difference Between Social Psychology and Personality Psychology?

Personality psychology focuses on individual differences, while social psychology generally does not. As well as there is a use of FAE.

What are the Definitions of Variables?

Conceptual (textbook definition) and Operational (definition of constructs)

Priori Predictions vs Post Hoc Predictions

Prior —> Predictions made before the outcome of a study is known.

Post —> based on predictions after the research has been completed

Hindsight Bias

Tendency to overestimate ability to predict outcomes after knowing them (aka post-hoc)

Observational/Field Research

Goal: describe behavior or people (real-life setting)

uses interjudge reliability —> different judges agree in their assessment decisions

• Strengths → spontaneous behaviors

• Weaknesses → no causal statements; purely descriptive

Correlational Research

Goal: determines two variables are related + relationship

uses random/representative samples and correlational coefficient [r]

• Strengths → predict one variable using level of another; use variables that are difficult to observe

• Weaknesses → accuracy of responses; no causal statements

Random Sample vs Representative Sample

Random Sample: to select sample of population

Representative Sample: randomly selected sample of subjects from a larger population of subjects

Random Assignment

each participant has an equal chance of being placed into any group in an experiment

Why doesn’t Correlation ≄ Causation

Third variable problem + spurious correlation (third variable impacting seemingly related variables relationship)

Causality

Established when A causes B; determined experimentally in a manipulated environment.

Experimental Studies

Goal: determine what x causes to y (IV and DV)

IV is always controlled

• Strengths → causal inference; internal validity 

• Weaknesses →  practical issues, ethical issues and external validity

Validity

external validity: extent to which we can generalize findings to real-world settings

internal validity: extent to which the study established a cause and effect relationship between variables

Probability Level in Studies (P-value)

The likelihood that the results of an experiment occurred by chance.

• this is to see the statistic of chace not based off the IV

• Scientists calculate the probability level (p-value) to determine if the results are statistically significant (usually less than 5 in 100 or 5%).

Ethical Issues

Principles to protect participants, including informed consent and minimizing harm.

The Ethics of Experimentation

Mundane Realism: degree to which an experiment is superficially similar to everyday salutations

Experimental Realism: degree to which an experiment absorbs and involves participants 

Demand Characteristics: cues that influence participants behaviors

Basic vs Applied Research

Basic Research: Research done by curiosity.

Applied Research: Research done to solve a social situation.

Naturalistic Fallacy

error of defining what is good in terms of what is observable

• Ex, what's typical is normal, what's normal is good

Independent vs Dependent Variable

IV —> manipulated in an experiment to see its impact on the dependent variable.

DV —> measured to see how it is affected by the independent variable.

The Rouge Test

Red dye was painted on animals' ears and left with a mirror

Can they wipe it off by looking at the mirror?- know that it is themselves in the mirror?

• Great apes = Yes

• Lesser apes = No

The Self

• Self-concept: Who am i?

• Self-knowledge: Awareness of one's feelings, motivations, and attributes.

• Self-esteem: my sense of self worth.

• Social self: roles you have in your life.

Self-Efficacy

Estimation of ability to execute behaviors necessary for specific performance.

• Ex. a sharpshoot in the military might feel high self-efficacy and low self esteem 

Self-schemas

beliefs about the self that organize and guide the processing of the self-relevant information

• Eg. attitudes, preferences, personality

• Integrated set of memories, beliefs and generalization about one’s own behavior in a given domain

Do we have biases in Self Schemas?

Yes!

STUDY EXAMPLE: Sanitioso, Kunda, & Fong (1990)

• Fake study stating participants read that extroverts doing better than introverts after 

  • Each party wrote about whether each side is true

  • RESULTS:

Self-concept Clarity

extent to which a individual’s self knowledge (values/beliefs/goals) is stable and consistent

STUDY EXAMPLE: Usborne and Taylor (2010)

• Positive correlation of self-concept clarity and self-esteem

• high → life satisfaction, well-being and self compassion 

• Low → lower self-esteem, depression neuroticism, self-handicapping, lower awareness of internal states 

Self-handicapping

creating excuses in advance, so if one does poorly it’s easier to blame it on that performance 

STUDY EXAMPLE: Schwinger et al. (2014)

• On average, it has a negative impact on performance

• ↑ self-handicap = ↓ academic achievement

Self-presentation

expressing yourself and behaving in ways to create a favorable impression to our ideals

• Is self handicapping as self-protection for our self-image and self-esteem

How do we learn about who we are?

• Introspection/self-analysis: The process of examining one's thoughts and feelings.

• Self-Perception Theory (observing our behavior.)

• Social interaction

• Social comparison theory (comparing with others)

Self-Awareness Theory

Evaluation of current behavior to internal standards when focusing on oneself.

• introspection

STUDY EXAMPLE: Nisbett & Wilson (1977) - introspection

• The participants are told to watch a film

• Conditions: 1. power saw distraction 2. unfocused projector 3. nothing

• The overall rating was consistent amongst the groups, but when they were asked if the distraction influenced the rating, group 1 (55%) and group 2 (27%) said it did

  • It only influenced their explanation!

STUDY EXAMPLE: Heine (2003) - self-awareness theory

• Participants take an intelligence test and get feedback

• Conditions: 1. Success feedback 2. No feedback 3. Failure feedback

• The concentration of time they spent watching TV and total spent time spent watching TV

  • Failure feedback was most likely to focus more watching TV to escape the self-awareness

Self-perception theory

we learn about ourselves by observing our behavior

2 parts:

• when we feel unsure

• evaluate whether behavior really reflects how we feel

Planning Fallacy

underestimating the length of time required to complete a task

STUDY EXAMPLE: Peetz & Buehler (2009)

• PF = budget fallacy?

• Students are asked to record their spending from the previous week then predict the spending on upcoming week two times

• They predict their spending to be less than the week prior, but spent about the same amount.

• Even after they saw this, they still predicted low spending of the week after

  • Not learning from past example

Looking Glass Self

a self-image based on how we think others see us

STUDY EXAMPLE: Baldwin, Carrell & Lopez (1990)

• Participants are asked to give some research topics

• Then asked for a reaction time task- and the photos are mixed in for milliseconds between the lights

Social Comparison Theory

evaluating one's abilities and opinions by comparing oneself with others

• Downward comparison: higher self esteem.

• Upward comparison: lower self esteem.

STUDY EXAMPLE: Lockwood & Kunda (2007)

• People hear about a 4th year superstar with amazing records/ achievements then write a self-evaluation of their time in school

• Conditions:

  • 1st year - Higher self-evaluation than control

  • 4th year - Lower self-evaluation than control

Self-Serving Bias

a readiness to perceive oneself favorably

• AKA better than average effect

STUDY EXAMPLE: Klein, N., & Epley, N. (2017)

• In study they explained that most people see themselves as more likely than others to donate blood, do charity or give up their seat to a pregnant women.

• RESULTS: Being less evil than you by being more righteous than the normal person.

Self-Serving Attributions

attributing positive outcomes to oneself and negative outcomes to something else

Example: If I do well on a test, I tell others or myself that I did well because I am intelligent or smart. If I don't do well on a test, I tell myself or others that it was because the prof made the test too difficult.

Explantory Style

person’s habitual way of explaining life events. A negative, pessimistic, and depressive explanatory style attributes failures to stable, global, and internal causes.

Defensive Pessimism

the adaptive value of anticipating problems and harnessing one's anxiety to motivate effective action

Learned helplessness

the hopelessness and resignation learned when a human or animal perceives no control over repeated bad events

False consensus and false uniqueness effects

FC —> the tendency to overestimate the extent to which others share our beliefs and behaviors

FU —> the tendency to underestimate the commonality of one's abilities and one's desirable or successful behaviors

Individualism vs Collectivism

Individualism —> being self-reliant and independent

Collectivism —> giving priority to the goals of one's group and defining one's identity accordingly

Social Coginition

How individual think about the world and themselves

TWO DIVISIONS: Automatic and Controlled Thinking

Automatic Thinking: thoughts that occur spontaneously and quickly, often without conscious effort, and can influence our judgments and decision-making processes.

• Can lead to biases and errors in judgment.

• Not completely deterministic, we have some control over them

Controlled Thinking: thought processes by consciously considering options and making deliberate decisions.

Schemas

Mental structures used to organize our knowledge about the social world

• helps us process info faster

• unconsciously happens

• influences us

• Ex. Event (Handshake), Person (personality), Self (about yourself)

What are the Functions of a Schema?

• Organize

• Make sense of

• Reduce amount of info

• Fill in gaps in knowledge

• Interpret new or ambiguous info

How are Schemas Activated?

• Accessibility is influenced by past experience and current goals

• Schemas can be primed to be more accessible

Priming

process where schemas become more accessible after exposure to a stimulus that elicits that schema

STUDY EXAMPLE: Higgins et al. (1977)

• People were assigned to either one or two conditions after identifying the background of the previous screen when identifying the background colour of words.

• Conditions: 1. Positive words + neutral words OR 2. Negative words + neutral words

• Participants than read a unrelated text and asked about their impression of Donald.

• RESULTS: Schemas are accessible. Their impression of Donald had to deal with what words were primed with.

  • Positive words = positive impression & Negative words = negative impression

What is the Limitations of Schemas?

Self-fulfilling prophecy: occurs when expectations influence behavior and cause others to behave accordingly

• Ex. Expecting someone to be nice leads to us being nice to them

STUDY EXAMPLE: Rosenthal & Jacobson (1968)

• Teachers were told some students would be bloomers and others would not

• Students were randomly assigned, but teachers treated bloomers differently

• Bloomers gained more IQ points than non-bloomers

• Teachers gave bloomers more attention, encouragement, support, and difficult material

• RESULTS: Teachers acted based on their expectations and allowed bloomers to excel

Heuristics

mental shortcuts / stratgeies

Availability Heuristics

judges the likelihood of events based on how easily they are remembered or recalled.

• ex. Judging the safety of car travel vs. airplane travel based on media coverage.

• Can serve us well or poorly

STUDY EXAMPLE: Tversky and Kahneman (1973)

• In this study ppl were presented a list of names of non-celebs (list had more of these) vs celebs.

• RESULTS: But participants recalled more famous people because it was easily to process in memory

Representative heuristics

judges the likelihood of something belonging to a category based on how well it matches that category.

• ex. Classifying an image as a chair because it has typical chair features.

What is a Base Rate and Base Rate Fallacy?

Tendency to ignore/ underuse base-rate information in favor of distinctive features of the case being judged

• Base Rate: data about the frequency of members or different categories in a population

• ex. we might suspect that our colleague is more likely to commit a crime based on their race or religion

Base Rates will most likely be used when ______

• When base rates convey causal information

• Base rates are made salient or when chance factors are highlighted

Conjunction Fallacy

making extreme predictions with the belief that the combination of two events is more likely than one event alone.

• Probability theory —> states that the probability of a conjunction cannot be greater than the probability of each outcome alone.

  • aka LINDA example (bank teller vs feminist)

Example of Conjunction fallacy

• Probability of a bank teller is 1 in 1,000.

• Probability of being a feminist is 1 in 4.

• Probability of a feminist bank teller is 1 in 4,000.

• The probability of being a bank teller alone is higher than the probability of being a feminist bank teller.

Illusory correlation

• Perception of a relationship where one doesn't exist or perceiving a stronger relationship than actually exists.

• Stereotypes can arise from this

  • Example: Minority group members and violent crime.

STUDY EXAMPLE: Hamilton & Gifford (1976)

• 33 Participants exposed to 39 statements about group A and group B.

• Desirable and undesirable behaviors assigned to each group. (ex. visiting a sick friend in the hospital = desirable)

• RESULTS: Illusory correlation observed when recalling undesirable behaviors for group B.

Counterfactual thinking

Mental process of imagining alternative outcomes or scenarios that differ from the actual events that occurred

• AKA saying "What if___?"

• Caused when: Experiencing negative event that is a "close call"

• Can be positive and used for improvement on future events

STUDY EXAMPLE: Macrae (1992)

• Two groups read different passages with different conditions

  • 1. New restaurant gives food poisoning AND 2. Regular (old) restaurant gives food poisoning

• RESULTS: Participants believe a person who got food poisoning from a new restaurant should receive more compensation than someone who ate at their usual restaurant.

What are the Challenges to our Thinking?

Overconfidence phenomenon —> awareness of errors a more confidence

Confirmation bias —> leads to seeking information that aligns w/ existing beliefs

Belief perseverance —> persistence of initial beliefs despite discrediting evidence

Non-Verbal Behaviour

The way in which people communicate, intentionally or unintentionally, without words

• cues, communication functions

First Impressions

Initial judgments formed about individuals.

• can be made quickly through nonverbal communication

STUDY EXAMPLE (FOR SPEED): Willis & Todorov (2006)

• Participants exposed to photographs of unfamiliar faces for different durations (100ms, 500ms, 1000ms)

• RESULTS: First impressions can be made in about 100ms and remain relatively consistent with more exposure time

STUDY EXAMPLE (FOR ACCURACY): Rule & Ambady (2008)

• Participants judged sexual orientation of men based on photographs

• RESULTS: After 50ms, the accuracy of first impression gets higher but does not improve much with longer time

Facial expressions of emotions

STUDY EXAMPLE: Ekman & Friesen (1971)

• Participants - members of a tribal group who has little to no exposure to North American faces. Heard a story/statement that describes an emotion and then pick the emotion associated with that story.

• RESULTS: Anger, happiness, disgust and sadness seems to have a universal understanding of it - Surprise and fear was often confused upon.

Implicit Personality Theory

traits we link together using schemas

• ex. geronous = kind, happy = nice, dominant = aggressive

STUDY EXAMPLE: Williams, Kimble, et al. (1992)

• ↑ like the partner = ↑ chance of risky sex

• ↑ superficial characters of partner = ↓ chance of risky sex

• RESULTS: Basically, when people liked their partner, they associated it with them having less chances of STI (literally no connection however)

Attribution Theory

How we explain causes of our own and others' behaviours

• fritz heider (coined it)

• there are two basic attributions

  • internal —> behaviour towards their emotions and attitudes

  • external —> behaviour towards the situational factors

STUDY EXAMPLE: Bradbury & Fincham (1990)

• Marriage quality linked to attributions

• In happy marriages, people tend to make external attributions for negative behaviors of their partners.

  • Example: He wasn't helpful because he was stressed at work.

  • This helps maintain a positive view of the partner.

• In distressed marriages, people tend to make internal attributions for negative behaviors of their partners.

  • Example: He wasn't helpful because he's a jerk.

  • This leads to negative impressions about the person.

Fundamental Attribution Error [FAE]

tendency to attribute others' behavior to internal characteristics rather than considering situational factors.

• AKA CORRESPONDENCE BIAS

STUDY EXAMPLE: Jones & Harris (1967)

• Participants reads an essay on Fidel and his role on Cuba

• Then they are asked to guess the essay's writer's stance on Castro (Pro or Not)

• Conditions: 1. Author had a choice & 2. Author did not have a choice to write the essay

• RESULTS: Participants attributed the essay topic to the author's attitudes rather than the situation

STUDY EXAMPLE: Crandall et al. (2001)

• People tend to blame victims for their circumstances instead of considering situational factors. This is seen in cases of sexual assault and rape, where victims are blamed for their clothing choices

Why do we make an FAE?

• When we try to decide about the person, our focus is on the person not the situation

• Don't know about their day or how they interpret the situation

• perceptual salience

Perceptual salience

STUDY EXAMPLE: Taylor & Fiske (1975)

• showed that participants facing Confederate A were more likely to attribute causal role to A in a conversation, and vice versa for Confederate B

• Our visual point of view impacts whether we focus on the person or the situation

Two Step Process of FAE

HOW TO FIX: think of other possibilities

Two-step process

• Automatically make an internal attribution

• With time, energy, and motivation, you consider possible alternative explanations

Actor/observer difference

attributing dispositioned factors to others and situational factors to themselves

Ultimate Attribution Error

Assuming positive attributions about ingroup and negative attributions about outgroup.

• coined by pettigrew

Attitudes

an evaluation of person and object or idea

Implicit association test (IAT)

a test used to detect subconscious associations between mental representations of concepts in memory. It uses reaction time to determine.

Ambivalent Sexism

Hostile and benevolent views towards the other gender.

STUDY EXAMPLE: Phelan et al. (2008)

• showed how sexism can impact women in hiring contexts.

• Masculine traits in women were rated lower than in men, affecting their perceived social skills and hireability.

• Results: those who do not fit into the traditional gender roles face discrimination and disadvantage in the hiring process

Tripartite model of attitude (ABCS)

consists of three components: affective, behavioral, and cognitive.

• Affectively-based attitudes —> People's values - religious, moral, etc. - Sensory or aesthetic reactions

• Behaviorally-based attitudes —> Observations of how one own behaves toward attitude object

• Cognitively-based attitudes —> Beliefs about properties of an attitude object - logical, rational, et

Tripartite model of attitude (ABCS)

Affective —> emotional reaction towards an attitude object

• INFLUENCE: values, religious beliefs, and emotions.

• Eg. when someone experiences disgust in response to an object

Behavioural —> observable behaviour, intended behaviour, etc.

• INFLUENCE: objective evaluation of the attitude object.

• Eg. discrimination against various individuals, etc.

Cognitive —> thoughts and beliefs about the attitude object

• INFLUENCE: Beliefs about properties of an attitude object - logical, rational

Explicit vs Implicit Attitudes

Explicit → deliberate, conscious, introspective, slow/cold

• Measured through self-report

• Eg. saying out loud “I like eating meat”

Implicit → automatic, non-conscious, involuntary, associative, fast/hot -

• Measured through response time

• Eg. facial expression when presented with a plate of meat, etc

When do Attitudes Predict Behaviour?

When social influences on what we say are minimal - Eg. no fear of being criticized, etc.

When attitudes are potent (being aware)

Attitudes predict behavior when specific to the behavior

STUDY EXAMPLE: LaPiere (1934)

• Went on a sight-seeing trip with an Asian couple; worried about discrimination

• Only 1 out of 200s hotels refused to serve them

• Lapierre sent follow-up letters asking if they would accept members of the Chinese race as guests. The majority of hotels and restaurants replied that they would not accept Asian individuals as guests, even though they had served them before.

• RESULTS: - attitudes are quite poor predictors of behaviours

Theory of planned behavior

explains individuals behaviour as resulting from intentions which are influenced by attitudes norms and perceived behavioural control

When does behaviour affect attitudes?

Role playing can shape attitudes.

• Taking on the role of a university student affects attitudes about being a university student.

STUDY EXAMPLE: Haney, Banks and Zimbardo (1973)

• Students randomly assigned to the roles of guards or prisoners in a mock prison

• Students took on the roles’s identity and engaged in behaviours that they previously perceived to be immoral (Prisoners - helpless, passive, etc | Guards - aggressive, hostile, etc)

• Even viewed the prisoners as deserving a punishment although they knew the roles were randomly assigned

• RESULTS: shut down in 6 days (planned for 2 weeks) due to distress. social roles can influence one’s identity and behaviours

Foot-in-the-door phenomenon

starting with a small request, then make a larger one

STUDY EXAMPLE: Freedman & Fraser (1966)

• asked residents to put a large sign first of safe driving, only 17% agreed

• then they residents to put a small sign to be a “safe driver”.

• 2 weeks later they asked if they could put the large sign, and 76% agreed

Low-ball technique

initially agreeing to something and then agreeing to something bigger or more costly.

• eg. Car dealership offering a low price initially, then increasing it after getting commitment

Door-in-the-face technique

start with a large request, then make a smaller one.

• theory of cognitive dissonance

STUDY EXAMPLE: Cialdini et al. (1975)

• Recruited volunteers to chaperone children at a Detention Centre on a trip to the zoo

• Group #1 - preceded by a larger request (volunteer, unpaid counsellor at the detention center)

  • 50% agreed to go to the zoo

• Group #2 - control

  • 16.7% agreed

Why does one’s behaviour affect their attitudes?

• Self-presentation → trying to create a favourable impression
• Self-perception → using one's own behaviors to infer attitude

Cognitive Dissonance Theory

discomfort felt when a person feels their behaviour does not align with their values or beliefs

STUDY EXAMPLE:Zanna & Cooper (1964)

• Participants completed a memory task and were given a placebo drug with different instructions about its side effects (relax, tense or no effect)

• Asked to complete an essay counter their own beliefs (inflammatory speakers should be banned on campus)

• attitudes were measured before and after the essay.

  • In the high choice condition, attitudes became more positive towards the ban. In the low choice condition, attitudes stayed low.

  • In the arousal condition, attitudes didn't vary between high and low choice conditions.

  • In the relaxation condition, enhanced dissonance was seen in the high choice condition.

Post-decision dissonance

occurs when we make a decision between two initially equally appealing alternatives

STUDY EXAMPLE: Brehm (1956)

• Women in a study rated appliances on attractiveness and desire

• They were then given a choice between two middle-rated alternatives and received the chosen appliance

• After the choice, the rating of the chosen appliance increased, while the rating of the unchosen appliance decreased

How to reduce cognitive dissonance?

Changing attitude, behavior or adding attitudes that are consistent with the situation

Justification of effort

Reducing dissonance - increasing how much they like something that they put in lots of efforts in order to obtain

• eg. getting into a club

STUDY EXAMPLE: Aronson & Mills (1959)

• found that providing individuals with a small external justification for lying increased their discomfort.

• This suggests that even a minor reason to justify dishonest behavior can intensify the inconsistency between actions and beliefs, emphasizing the influence of external justifications on cognitive dissonance.

Internal vs external justification

Internal → changing one’s own attitudes and behaviour for oneself

External → changing one’s attitudes and behaviour for something outside of yourself

• Eg. reward, avoid punishment, etc.

Insufficient justification

people will engage in behavior against their beliefs if offered a smaller rewards compared to a larger reward.

STUDY EXAMPLE: Festinger & Carlsmith (1959)

• participants were asked to lie about the excitement of a task for $1 or $20

  • Participants who received $20 had more external justification and reported enjoying the boring tasks less than those who received $1

Self-affirmation theory

Motivation to maintain a positive self-image and resist threats to self-confidence.

STUDY EXAMPLE: Aronson and Mettee (1968)

• Women were told that they were in a study between personality and extra-sensory perception via black-jack

• Before the Black Jack game - personality test and received false feedback

  • High self-esteem condition - positive feedback

  • Low self-esteem condition - negative feedback

  • Control - no feedback

• Participants thought no one would know tht they would cheat

• Participants with high self-esteem were less likely to cheat

• Participants with low self-esteem were more likely to cheat