unit 4

Conformity

The process by which individuals adjust their thoughts, feelings, or behavior to align with those of a group due to real or imagined group pressure.

Normative Social Influence

The influence to conform to the positive expectations of others, driven by the desire to be liked or accepted by the group.

Social Norms

Unwritten rules that dictate acceptable behavior within a society or group, influencing how individuals act and interact.

Relative Deprivation

A feeling of dissatisfaction or injustice experienced when individuals compare themselves to others and perceive that they are worse off.

Upward Social Comparison

Comparing oneself to others who are perceived to be better off or more skilled, which can motivate self-improvement but may also decrease self-esteem.

Downward Social Comparison

Comparing oneself to others who are perceived to be worse off or less skilled, which can boost self-esteem but may also foster complacency.

Informational Social Influence

The influence to accept information from others as evidence about reality, often occurring in situations where the correct action or belief is uncertain.

Obedience

The act of following direct commands, usually from an authority figure, even if they contradict personal beliefs or morals.

Social Facilitation

The tendency for people to perform differently when in the presence of others, typically showing improved performance on simple or well-practiced tasks and worse performance on complex or new tasks.

Group Polarization

When people in a group talk about an idea, they often end up agreeing even more strongly with each other, making their group opinion more extreme.

Groupthink

The desire for harmony or conformity in a group leads to irrational or dysfunctional decision-making outcomes.

Bystander Effect

The phenomenon where individuals are less likely to offer help to a victim when other people are present.

Diffusion of Responsibility

The tendency for individuals to feel less responsible for taking action or helping in a situation when others are present, leading to a decrease in the likelihood of intervention.

Social Loafing

The tendency for individuals to exert less effort when working in a group than when working alone.

Deindividuation

A psychological state where individuals lose their self-awareness and sense of individuality in group settings, often leading to impulsive and deviant behavior.

Attribution Theory

Explains how people decide whether someone’s behavior is caused by their personality or their situation.

Dispositional Attributions

Assuming a person's actions are due to their personality, not their situation.

Situational Attributions

Assuming a person's actions are due to their circumstances, not their personality.

Explanatory Style

How a person usually explains the reasons behind events—whether they blame themselves or outside factors.

Optimistic Explanatory Style

The habit of explaining good things as likely to happen again and bad things as one-time events.

Pessimistic Explanatory Style

The habit of explaining bad things as likely to happen again and good things as one-time events.

Fundamental Attribution Error

The tendency to blame people’s actions more on their personality and less on their situation.

Actor-Observer Bias

The habit of blaming our own actions on the situation but blaming other people’s actions on their personality.

Self-Serving Bias

The tendency to attribute one’s successes to personal characteristics and failures to external factors, enhancing one's self-esteem.

Internal Locus of Control

The belief that one's own actions and decisions directly influence the outcomes and events in their life.

External Locus of Control

The belief that outcomes and events are determined by external forces or fate, rather than one's own actions.

Altruism

The selfless concern for the well-being of others, leading to behavior that benefits others at a personal cost.

Social Responsibility Norm

The societal expectation that people should help others who need assistance, without regard to future exchanges.

Stereotype

A generalized belief about a particular category of people, often oversimplified and not based on direct experience.

Confirmation Bias

A tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or hypotheses.

Belief Perseverance

The tendency to hold on to one's initial beliefs even after they have been shown to be false, often ignoring contradictory evidence presented.

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

When a belief about a situation or a person leads to actions that make the belief come true

Prejudice

An unjustifiable and usually negative attitude toward a group and its members.

Discrimination

Unjustifiable negative behavior toward a group or its members.

Implicit Attitudes

Unconscious beliefs or feelings that influence a person's behavior and perceptions without their awareness

Just-World Phenomenon

A belief that the world is fundamentally fair, leading people to rationalize injustice or misfortune as deserved.

Out-Group Homogeneity Bias

The tendency to see members of an outgroup as more similar to each other than they really are, often perceiving them as less varied than members of one's own group.

In-Group Bias

The tendency to favor and extend loyalty to members of one's own group over those in other groups, often leading to preferential treatment and judgment.

Mere Exposure Effect

The phenomenon where repeated exposure to a stimulus increases an individual's preference for that stimulus.

Ethnocentrism

The belief in the inherent superiority of one's own ethnic group or culture, often accompanied by a feeling of contempt for other groups.

Collectivism

A cultural value that emphasizes the importance of the group or community over individual goals and desires, prioritizing group cohesion and interdependence.

Multiculturalism

The view that promotes the acknowledgment and respect of diverse cultural backgrounds and traditions, encouraging the coexistence and value of various cultural identities within a society.

Superordinate Goals

Shared goals that require cooperation among individuals or groups, typically overriding smaller or individual conflicts and fostering collaborative efforts.

Social Traps

Situations in which individuals or groups pursue immediate rewards that later prove to have negative or even catastrophic consequences for the larger community.

Persuasion

The process of influencing others’ attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors through communication, often involving appeals to reason, emotions, or authority

Elaboration Likelihood Model

A theory that describes how people process persuasive messages in two ways: through deep, thoughtful analysis (central route) or based on quick cues like how appealing or trustworthy the speaker seems (peripheral route).

Central Route of Persuasion

A method of persuasion that involves deeply engaging with the content of a message, leading to careful analysis and thoughtful consideration, typically resulting in more durable attitude change.

Peripheral Route of Persuasion

A method of persuasion that relies on superficial cues such as attractiveness or credibility of the speaker, rather than the actual content of the message, leading to temporary attitude changes.

Halo Effect

The cognitive bias where a positive impression in one area (like attractiveness) leads to positive evaluations in other areas, influencing overall judgments about a person.

Foot-in-the-Door Technique

A persuasive strategy where agreement to a small, initial request increases the likelihood of compliance with a larger, subsequent request.

Door-in-the-Face Technique

A persuasion strategy where a large, initial request is made knowing it will be refused, followed by a smaller, more reasonable request that is more likely to be accepted.

False Consensus Effect

A cognitive bias where people overestimate how much others agree with their own beliefs, behaviors, and attitudes.

Cognitive dissonance

A psychological discomfort experienced when simultaneously holding conflicting beliefs, attitudes, or values, often leading to an alteration in one of the beliefs or behaviors to reduce the discomfort.

Industrial-Organizational (I/O) Psychologists

Psychologists who apply psychological principles and research methods to the workplace to improve productivity, select and promote employees, and enhance organizational culture and structure.

Instincts

Innate, fixed patterns of behavior in animals that are triggered by specific stimuli, driving them to act in predictable ways.

Drive-Reduction Theory

Behavior is motivated by the need to reduce internal drives caused by physiological deficits, such as hunger or thirst, aiming to restore homeostasis.

Homeostasis

The body’s effort to maintain stable internal conditions.

Ghrelin

A hormone produced in the stomach that stimulates appetite.

Leptin

Hormone produced by fat cells that helps regulate energy balance by inhibiting hunger.

Belongingness

The innate human desire to form and sustain close, meaningful relationships, which significantly drives behavior and affects emotional health.

Arousal Theory

Individuals are motivated to maintain an optimal level of alertness, seeking to increase alertness when it is too low and decrease it when it is too high, to enhance performance and well-being.

Arousal

The level of alertness, wakefulness, and activation causes by activity in the central nervous system

Yerkes-Dodson Law

Performance increases with physiological or mental arousal (alertness), but only up to a point; when levels of arousal become too high, performance decreases.

Sensation-Seeking Theory

One's motivation is driven by the need for varied, novel, and intense experiences.

Thrill Seeking/Adventure Seeking

Individuals are motivated by the desire for new and challenging experiences, often involving physical activities and exploration.

Disinhibition

The tendency to seek out social and experiential thrills by engaging in behaviors that are typically restrained by social norms and inhibitions.

Boredom Susceptibility

An individual's intolerance for repetitive or monotonous experiences, leading them to seek out new and stimulating activities to avoid boredom.

Incentive Theory

Behavior is motivated by the desire for external rewards or incentives, which can include money, praise, or other tangible benefits.

Self-Determination Theory

People are motivated by intrinsic (internal) motivations, such as personal growth and fulfillment, or extrinsic (external) motivations, such as rewards and recognition.

Intrinsic Motivation

Engaging in activities for their own sake, driven by internal rewards such as personal satisfaction, enjoyment, or a sense of achievement.

Extrinsic Motivation

Engaging in behavior due to external rewards or pressures, such as money, grades, or approval from others.

Lewin's Motivational Conflicts Theory

Describes the psychological struggles individuals face when making decisions

Approach-Approach Conflicts

An individual must choose between two desirable options, leading to a conflict of which positive outcome to pursue.

Avoidance-Avoidance Conflicts

An individual must choose between two undesirable options, leading to a conflict of which negative outcome to avoid.

Approach-Avoidance Conflicts

An individual is drawn to and repelled by the same option, leading to a conflict between the desire for a positive outcome and the fear of a negative consequence.

Emotion/Affect

A feeling that involves our thoughts, body reactions, and actions, and is influenced by what happens inside us and around us.

Facial-Feedback Hypothesis

Facial expressions can influence emotions, meaning that smiling can make you feel happier and frowning can make you feel sadder.

Schachter-Singer Two-Factor Theory

Emotion is the result of physiological arousal and a cognitive label; our interpretation of arousal determines the specific emotion we experience.

Elicitors

Stimuli or events that trigger an emotional response in an individual.

Broaden-and-Build Theory of Emotion

Positive emotions help us think more openly and try new things, making us stronger. Negative emotions do the opposite, making us think narrowly and act less.

Universal Emotions

Certain emotional expressions are recognized and experienced similarly across different cultures.

Display Rules

Cultural norms that dictate how, when, and where individuals should express emotions.

Psychodynamic Theory

Personality is shaped by unconscious forces, internal conflicts, and defense mechanisms, originally developed by Sigmund Freud, emphasizing the influence of childhood experiences and unconscious drives.

Preconscious Mind

Contains thoughts and feelings that are not currently in conscious awareness but can be easily accessed when needed.

Unconscious Mind

Consists of processes and memories that are beyond conscious awareness and significantly influence thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.

Defense Mechanisms

Unconscious strategies used by the ego to protect itself from anxiety and perceived threats.

Denial

Refusing to acknowledge reality or facts, thereby protecting themselves from uncomfortable truths.

Displacement

Emotional impulses are redirected from the original source to a safer or more acceptable substitute target.

Projection

Individuals attribute their own unacceptable feelings, thoughts, or motives to someone else, thus deflecting self-criticism.

Rationalization

Individuals justify and explain their behaviors or feelings in a seemingly rational or logical manner to avoid confronting the true underlying reasons.

Reaction Formation

Individuals suppress unacceptable impulses by unconsciously displaying the opposite behavior or emotion.

Regression

An individual reverts to earlier stages of development and childlike behaviors when faced with stress or emotional conflict.

Repression

Distressing thoughts and feelings are unconsciously blocked from entering conscious awareness.

Sublimation

Negative urges and impulses are channeled into socially acceptable or constructive activities.

Humanistic Psychology

Emphasizes the study of the whole person and the uniqueness of each individual, particularly focusing on self-growth and unconditional positive regard as essential for achieving personal potential.

Unconditional Regard

An individual is accepted and loved as they are, without any conditions or judgments, fostering personal growth and self-acceptance.

Self-Actualizing Tendency

The innate drive in every individual to grow, develop, and realize their fullest potential

Social-Cognitive Theory

Emphasizes the influence of cognitive processes, behaviors, and context in understanding personality and human actions.

Reciprocal Determinism

An individual's behavior, personal factors (like thoughts and emotions), and environment influence each other interactively.

Self-Concept

An individual's perception of themselves, encompassing self-awareness and the evaluation of their role in relation to others.