lecture 2 section 3

Vocabulary flashcards covering causal attributions, attributional biases, and attitude formation from Social Psychology Lecture 2.

Attributions

Judgments about the source or cause of a person's behavior, which help individuals understand what people are like and how situations influence them.

Internal Causality

A type of causal attribution that attributes a person's behavior to their internal disposition or personality characteristics rather than the situation.

External Causality

A type of causal attribution that assigns the cause of a person's behavior to situational or environmental factors.

Consistency (Attribution Theory)

Information regarding whether a person regularly behaves the same way in similar situations.

Consensus (Attribution Theory)

Information assessing whether other individuals behave in the same way when faced with a similar situation.

Distinctiveness (Attribution Theory)

Information evaluating whether a specific behavior occurs across many other situations or is unique to one context.

Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE)

The bias to make internal, dispositional attributions when judging the behavior of others rather than oneself; it is apparent in adults in Western cultures but not in Eastern cultures such as India.

Knowledge Across Situations Effect

The explanation for why people do not commit the fundamental attribution error for themselves or close acquaintances, driven by increased awareness of how behavior varies across different contexts.

Self-Serving Bias

The attributional bias of making internal attributions for one's successes and external attributions for one's failures.

Depressive Bias

The attributional pattern of attributing failures to internal causes and attributing successes to external causes.

Just World Bias

The belief that people get what they deserve, attributing life outcomes primarily to internal causes.

Attitude

An evaluation of someone or something, structured around three core components: affect, behavior, and cognition.

Affect (Attitude Component)

The emotional component of an attitude consisting of a person's feelings toward an entity, object, or topic.

Behavior (Attitude Component)

The component of an attitude that predisposes an individual to act in a particular manner toward an object or person.

Cognitive Component (Attitude Component)

The belief or thought component of an attitude held about a specific subject, person, or event.

Automatic Processing (Attitudes)

Rapid attitude formation based on association with a source; sources are especially influential if they are credible, trustworthy, attractive, famous, or share the receiver's value system.

Controlled Processing (Attitudes)

Slow, deliberative attitude formation engaged when an issue holds high personal relevance, causing individuals to evaluate arguments and details carefully.

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High relevance = central route: People carefully evaluate the quality of the arguments. Strong arguments persuade more than weak arguments.

Low relevance = peripheral route: People rely more on shortcuts, such as whether the speaker is an expert, rather than carefully analyzing the argument.