Social Psych Exam 3

Task-oriented leaders

leaders who are concerned more with getting the job done than with workers’ feelings and relationships.

Relationship-oriented leaders

leaders who are concerned more with workers’ feelings and relationships.

Altruistic Personality

the qualities that cause an individual to help others in a wide variety of situations

Cultures of honor

how even small disputes put a man’s reputation for toughness on the line, requiring him to respond aggressively to restore his status

Microaggressions

the small insults and put-downs that many members of minority groups experience

Implicit Prejudice

slight biases and rarely activated stereotypes as well as fuzzy attitudes of a group having more “goodness” or “badness.”

Implicit Association Test (IAT)

A test that measures the speed with which people can pair a target face (i.e., Black, white, old, young, etc.) with positive/negative words/stimuli reflecting unconscious prejudice.

Social Identity Threat

The threat elicited when people perceive that others are evaluating them as a member of their group instead of as an individual

Jigsaw classroom

A classroom setting designed to reduce prejudice and raise the self-esteem of children by placing them in small, multiethnic groups and making each child dependent on the other children in the group to learn the course material (Brown-eyed vs. Blue-eyed)

Group

Two or more people who interact and have shared needs and goals​

Social Roles​

Help organize the group and direct the behavior of the members​

Cohesion

• Binds members together and promotes liking

• Joint activities and goal achievement increases cohesion

• Too much = focus on harmony rather than task completion

Diversity/Similarity

• Members of a group tend to be similar, which adds to cohesion​

• But diversity can also be beneficial to groups​

Social Facilitation

• The tendency for people to perform simple or well-learned tasks better when in the presence of others, while complex or new tasks may be hindered

• cockroach maze experiment

• pool hall experiment

Social Loafing

• The tendency for people to do worse on simple tasks, but better on complex tasks, when in the presence of others and their individual performance is not evaluated. ​

• Slacking on a group project with one grade or outcome

• Cohesion, small group, and rewards DECREASE social loafing. ​

Deindividuation

loosening of normal constraints on our behavior when people cannot be identified​ (i.e., “if you were invisible, what would you do?”)

Social roles

shared expectations of the group about how a specific individual in the group should behave​; can be too immersive and blur with personality (i.e., Stanford prison study)

Process Loss

Any aspect of group behavior that inhibits good problem solving/decision-making​

Group Polarization

• The tendency for groups to make decisions that are more extreme than the initial inclinations of their members​

• Only works if group members all generally agree at first

Groupthink

• A kind of thinking in which maintaining group cohesiveness and solidarity is more important than considering the facts in a realistic matter. ​

• Happens when group is highly cohesive, isolated, under stress, and has a controlling leader.

• Protection from opposing viewpoints

• Group presumes they are invincible/well-off.

Social dilemma

a conflict where short-term self-interest clashes with long-term collective well-being, often leading to worse outcomes for all if individuals act selfishly

Tit-for-Tat strategy

A means of encouraging cooperation by at first acting cooperatively, but then always responding the way your opponent did (cooperatively or competitively) on the previous trial

Prosocial Behavior

Any action performed with the goal of benefiting another person. NOT ALWAYS SELFLESS​

Altruism

• The desire to help another person, even if it involves a cost to the helper​

• No rewards for helping​

• Always selfless

Evolutionary Psychology

a theoretical approach in psychology that examines cognition and behavior from a modern evolutionary perspective.​

Kin selection

The idea that behaviors that help a genetic relative are favored by natural selection​​ (saving a blood relative over a non-blood relative)

Tendency to help

• Most likely = children, parents

• Moderate = grandparents

• Least likely = first cousins

• None = acquaintances

• Women > Men (unless woman is older)

• Healthy > non-healthy in life-or-death situations

Norm of Reciprocity (or reciprocal altruism) ​

the expectation that helping others will increase the likelihood that they will help us in the future 

Social Learning Theory in children​

• children learn to help by being rewarded

• maturing = internalized value of helping and no need for rewards

Social Exchange Theory

social behavior is the result of an exchange process intended to maximize benefits (rewards) and minimize costs

Empathy-Altruism Hypothesis​

Batson (1991) - the idea that when we feel empathy for a person, we will attempt to help that person for purely altruistic reasons, regardless of what we have to gain.​​

Who will help? - Gender

• Women are more likely to provide social support to their friends + volunteer work that involves helping others.

• Men are more likely to risk their lives for a stranger, especially when there is:​

  • An audience​

  • Potential danger​

  • A woman in need of help​

Who will help? - Mood, Environment, and Lifestyle

• Religious people = SLIGHTLY more likely to help during emergencies

• Good moods can lead to helpful behavior

• Ambience - good smells, good weather, good luck, etc.

• Similarities (i.e., fan of the same sports team)

Who will help? - Urban overload hypothesis

•  if you put urban dwellers in a calmer, less stimulating environment, they would be as likely as anyone else to reach out to others

• Usually keep to themselves due to overstimulating environment​​

Negative-state relief hypothesis

proposes that individuals engage in prosocial behavior (helping others) not purely for altruistic reasons, but to reduce their own negative emotions, such as sadness, guilt, or distress

Non-helping - Bystander Effect

The greater the number of bystanders who witness an emergency, the less likely anyone of them is to help the victim (i.e., Kitty Genovese)​

5 Steps to Helping (or not)

How people decide when to help.

1. Noticing an Event: Yes/No​

2. Interpreting the Event as an Emergency Yes/No​

3. Assuming Responsibility Yes/No​

4. Knowing How to Help Yes/No​

5. Deciding to Implement the Help Yes/No​

Aggression

Any form of intentional behavior aimed at doing physical or psychological harm/pain to another person (who is motivated to avoid such treatment)​

Hostile aggression

• The goal is to injure/harm​

• Usually associated with feelings of anger​

• Example: punching someone in a fight​

Instrumental aggression

• Calculated, goal-oriented aggressive behavior used to obtain a specific reward, status, or object, rather than to express anger

• Example: muggings, football, war over territory​

Relational aggression

• Nonphysical aggression intended to damage a person’s social status, reputation, or relationships through manipulation, exclusion, gossip, and silent treatment.

• Example: excluding someone from a group; cyberbullying​

Aggression - Gender Differences

• Men = more likely to engage in physical violence/aggression

• Women = More exclusion, gossiping​

  • Online bullying is especially harmful​

  • Females are bullied more online, but also do more cyberbullying​

Social-Cognitive Learning Theory​

Albert Bandura posits that learning occurs in a social context through observation, imitation, and modeling, heavily influenced by cognitive processes (Bobo Doll study)

Frustration-Aggression Theory​

Developed by Dollard, Miller et al. in 1939, posits that aggression is often the direct result of blocking a person’s efforts to achieve a goal

Aversive Situations

Negative stimuli (pain, heat, etc.) can lead to more aggression

Aggressive cues/stimuli (priming)

environmental factors—such as weapons, violent media, or alcohol—that unconsciously activate aggression-related thoughts, feelings, and behavioral scripts

Catharsis Theory

• suggests that expressing or venting pent-up emotions—particularly anger, fear, or trauma—purges these feelings, leading to emotional relief and reduced psychological distress

• UNFOUNDED - provides temporary relief and reinforces aggression; can make someone MORE angry

Aggression and Media

• Violent TV watching predicts later aggression, but aggression does not predict later violent TV watching​

• Media normalizes and glamorizes violence

• Short-term AND long-term effects

Prejudice

• A hostile or negative attitude towards people in a distinguishable group based solely on their membership

• Cognitive, emotional, and behavioral components

• direct or subtle

• Can stem from evolution - preference for genetically similar individuals

Realistic conflict theory

• Intergroup conflict, prejudice, and discrimination arise from competition between groups for limited, valued resources

• Immigration debates (jobs, economic focus)

Relative deprivation

the perception that one is worse off compared to a reference standard—such as peers, past experiences, or expectations—leading to feelings of resentment or anger

Scapegoating

a psychological defense mechanism where individuals or groups redirect their frustration, anger, and blame onto a specific person or group who is not responsible for the problem

Institutionalized prejudice

unjust, systemic policies and practices within organizations—such as workplaces, schools, and government agencies—that create disadvantages for specific groups based on race, ethnicity, or other traits

Normative conformity

the tendency to align with group standards, behaviors, or beliefs to be liked, accepted, or avoid social rejection

Just-world theory/blaming the victim

tendency to believe that the world is just, so people get what they deserve and deserve what they get

Stereotypes

• a generalization about a group of people in which certain traits are assigned to virtually all members of the group, regardless of actual variation among the members

• cognitive component

• can be positive or negative

• can be accurate, partly accurate, or inaccurate

Social categorization

• tendency to mentally sort things/people into groups

• makes the world easier to think about (cognitive miser)

• automatic

Social Identity Theory

• We categorize ourselves and others into groups

• We sort the world into group that we belong to (ingroups) and groups we do not belong to (outgroups).

• Examples: country, school, race/ethnicity, political orientation

In-group bias

Positive feelings and special treatment for people we have defined as being part of our in-group

Out-group Homogeneity

“They are all alike. We are different.”

Ultimate Attribution Error - How do stereotypes persist?

• Make dispositional attributions about an entire group

  • Stereotype-consistent behavior: Dispositional

  • Stereotype-inconsistent behavior: Situational

Confirmation biases

People seek out information that confirms their original hypotheses. Thus, we tend to only find information that is consistent with our stereotypes.

Self-fulfilling prophecies

Our expectations about others can lead us to act in ways toward them that causes them to behave in ways consistent with our stereotypes.

Illusory correlation

tendency to see relationships (correlations) between events that are actually unrelated.

Discrimination

• An unjustified negative or harmful action toward the members of a group simply because of their membership in that group

• Many covert forms​

  • Nonverbal behavior​

  • Microaggressions​

  • Institutitionalized forms​

Impact of Discrimination​

• Internalizing Symptoms​ (e.g., depression and anxiety)​

• Externalizing Symptoms​ (e.g., anger and hostility; reduced self-control)​

• Physical Health Problems​ (e.g., increased blood pressure & adverse cardiovascular response)​

• Academic Problems​ (e.g., reduced academic motivation and achievement)​

Reducing prejudice - Contact Hypotheses

Groups need to interact OR have repeated contact​

• Problem: contact does NOT guarantee liking ​

6 conditions for contact to reduce prejudice

1. Mutual interdependence​

2. Share common goal​

3. Have equal status​

4. Friendly/informal setting​

5. Exposure to multiple members​

6. Social norms promote equality​

Superordinate goal

unite different groups and require cooperative effort​