Social Psychology Exam One

Know what question a personality psychologist would want to investigate concerning divorce

Are some types of people more likely to divorce than others?

Know the definition of fundamental attribution error

The tendency to overestimate the extent to which people's behaviors is due to internal, dispositional factors and to underestimate the role of situational factors

Know what factor may be more important than the objective reality of someone's behavior when reaching a conclusion concerning that individual

Perception on ideas that there is naïve realism; each side assumes that other reasonable people see things the way they do.

Know the scenario(s) that the need for accurate information most conflict with the need for self - esteem

Getting a poor grade on a test or assignment that they worked hard on; need of accurate feedback conflict with the desire to maintain a positive self image

Know what best describes humans' abilities to accurately understand and predict their social worlds

Construal sets of cognitive and social skills

Know what outcome would most likely be a personal benefit of studying social psychology

Enhance self awareness; could identify and change your own self-defeating behaviors

Know the definition of archival analysis

The form of observational methods in which the researcher examines the accumulated documents, or archives, of a culture; diaries, novels, magazines, newspapers

Know what constitutes survey research

The collection of information from a sample of individuals through their responses to questons

Know the relationship between independent variables and dependent variables

Independent variables are what we expect will influence dependent variables

Dependent variables are what happens as a result of the independent variable

Know the definition of external validity

The extent to which the results of a study can be generalized to other situations and to other people

Know the definitions of basic research and applied research

Basic research: The study and research meant to increase our scientific knowledge of the field by investigating fundamental principles and theories of behavior/mental proccesses

Applied research: Focuses on using psychology principles and research findings to solve practical real world problems

Know the conclusions concerning the effects of deception experiments on participants

Full knowledge of the experiments purpose can alter participants behavior, interference of with informed consent, psychological harm, damage to self esteem, creation of suspicion and distrust, potential for coercion, methodological issues

Know what entails schema accessibility

The extent to which a schema is activated in memory and thus likely to typically be used in information processing; schemas we tend to typically use are often to those that we are most accessible to use

Know the principles of automatic goal pursuit.

The process where goals are activated and pursued without conscious awareness or intent, driven by external cues or past experiences

Know the conclusion regarding the effects of generating different numbers of examples of behavior

The number of examples does not affect how much the behavior seems to describe you; generating more examples of a behavior generally leads to stronger learning and higher likelihood of that behavior being repeated

Know the role of schemas in influencing what we notice and remember.

Shaping how informative pieces are encoded, stored and retrieved, what we pay attention to

Know the difference between automatic and controlled behavior.

Automatic behavior: Actions performed with conscious thought or effort, often habitual or ingrained

Controlled behavior: Deliberate, conscious thoughts and actions requiring effort and attention

Know what factor(s) appeared to influence how accurately and logically students reasoned through everyday problems

Training in statistics

Know the six (6) emotions that have a universal expression on the face

-Anger

-Happiness

-Surprise

-Fear

-Disgust

-Sadness

Know the results of the research of Sam Gosling concerning the traits of an extrovert

The minutiae of our private spaces hold the secrets of our true personality; some traits were easier to predict than others and some stereotypes were highly influenctial in skewing results

Know the definition of an external attribution

The interference that a person is behaving a certain way because of something about the situation they are in, with the assumption that most people would respond the same way in that situation

Concerning the covariation model of Hal Kelley, know what people do when they do not have the information they need to make attributions

Discounting and augmentation principles; essential step of attribution

Concerning being interrogated by a detective, according to G. Daniel Lassiter, know where you would not want a camera pointed

Directly at you

Know how culture influences the tendency to make internal versus external attributions.

Cultures vary in the extent to which interdependence and conformity are valued

Know the definition of karma.

the notion that good moral behavior is rewarded and bad actions will be punished, whether in this lifetime or others