Social Psy Exam 1

What is construal?

The way a person interprets or makes sense of a situation.

What is Gestalt psychology?

The idea that the whole is more than the sum of its parts; people naturally organize information into meaningful patterns.

What is operationalization?

Defining a variable in a measurable, observable way.

What are the three major research methods on the review sheet?

Case studies/observational research, correlational research, and experimental research.

What is observational/case study research?

Research that observes or closely examines behavior without manipulating variables.

What is a major strength of observational/case study research?

It can provide detailed information and can be useful for unusual or rare phenomena.

What is a major limitation of observational/case study research?

It cannot establish causation and may have problems with observer bias or generalizability.

What is correlational research?

Research that measures the relationship between two or more variables without manipulating them.

What is the key limitation of correlational research?

Correlation does not establish causation; directionality and third-variable problems can exist.

What is experimental research?

Research in which the researcher manipulates an independent variable and measures its effect on a dependent variable.

What is the major strength of experimental research?

It provides the strongest basis for determining causation because researchers manipulate variables and can use random assignment.

What are limitations of experimental research?

Experiments can be artificial, may have ethical limitations, and high control can reduce real-world applicability.

How do observational, correlational, and experimental methods differ?

Observational research observes behavior; correlational research measures relationships; experimental research manipulates a variable to test cause and effect.

What is an independent variable?

The variable that the researcher manipulates.

What is a dependent variable?

The variable that the researcher measures.

What is self-selection?

When participants choose which condition or group they enter, potentially creating pre-existing differences between groups.

What is random assignment?

Randomly placing participants into experimental conditions so groups are more likely to be similar before the manipulation.

What is a control group?

The comparison or baseline group that does not receive the experimental treatment/manipulation.

What is an experimental/treatment group?

The group that receives the experimental manipulation or treatment.

What is internal validity?

How confidently we can conclude that the independent variable caused the observed change in the dependent variable.

What is the tradeoff between control and impact in experiments?

More experimental control can improve causal conclusions but can make an experiment less realistic or generalizable.

What is experimenter bias?

Researchers' expectations unintentionally influence participants, data collection, or interpretation.

What is evaluation apprehension?

Participants worry about how they are being judged or evaluated and may change their behavior.

What are demand characteristics?

Cues that allow participants to infer what the experiment is about or what is expected, causing them to alter their behavior.

What is hindsight bias?

After learning an outcome, people believe they could have predicted it beforehand.

What is confirmation bias?

The tendency to seek, notice, or interpret information that supports existing beliefs.

What is biased assimilation?

The tendency to interpret new evidence in a way that supports existing beliefs, even when people are exposed to the same evidence.

What was the key idea of Darley and Gross's 1983 Hannah study?

Stereotype-consistent information can influence how ambiguous information is interpreted, including judgments related to Hannah's performance.

What are major modes of nonverbal communication?

Facial expressions, eye contact, interpersonal distance, body posture, and other body movements/behaviors.

What can eye contact communicate?

Attention, interest, dominance, intimacy, threat, and social engagement, depending on context.

What is interpersonal distance?

The physical distance between people, which can communicate information about relationships and situations.

What can body posture communicate?

Things such as confidence, dominance, interest, discomfort, and submission.

What did Ekman's work examine?

Facial expressions of emotion and the extent to which certain emotional expressions are recognizable across cultures.

What is encoding?

Producing or sending a nonverbal signal.

What is decoding?

Interpreting someone else's nonverbal signal.

What is schadenfreude?

Pleasure at another person's misfortune.

What is the facial feedback hypothesis?

The idea that facial expressions or facial muscle activity can influence emotional experience.

What was the basic point of Strack et al.'s pen-in-mouth study?

Different ways of holding a pen produced different facial configurations, and the study was used as evidence that facial muscle activity can influence emotional experience or judgment.

How controllable is nonverbal communication?

People generally have more control over deliberate verbal behavior than subtle nonverbal behavior, so attempts to hide emotions can sometimes leak through nonverbal cues.

Can people reliably detect deception?

People are generally not extremely accurate lie detectors; many stereotypical cues to lying are unreliable.

What is Norman Anderson's information integration theory?

The idea that people combine pieces of information to form an overall impression.

What is the averaging model?

An impression can be represented as a weighted average of the pieces of information used to form it.

What are subjective weights?

The different amounts of importance a perceiver gives to different pieces of information.

Where can subjective weights come from?

Personal experience, expectations, context, existing knowledge, and beliefs.

How do you calculate a weighted impression?

Multiply each information value by its subjective weight, add those products, then divide by the sum of the weights.

What is Asch's configural model of impression formation?

The idea that traits do not simply add together; the meaning of one trait can depend on the other traits present.

What are central traits?

Traits that have a particularly strong influence on the overall impression of a person.

What is the primacy effect?

Earlier information has greater influence on an overall impression.

Why can primacy occur?

Early information can establish an initial impression or framework that affects interpretation of later information.

What is the recency effect?

Later information has greater influence on an overall impression.

Does positive or negative information receive greater weight?

Negative information can often receive greater weight because it can be especially informative when evaluating someone.

What is priming?

Exposure to one stimulus or concept influences how a later stimulus is interpreted or how a person responds.

What was the key point of Higgins et al.'s Donald study?

Primed concepts influenced how participants interpreted Donald's ambiguous behavior.

Why is context important in impression formation?

The same behavior can be interpreted differently depending on the concepts, expectations, and context that are activated.

What is a schema?

An organized knowledge structure that helps people interpret the world.

What are examples of schemas?

Schemas about people, roles, events/scripts, and the self.

How do schemas direct attention?

They influence what information people notice.

How do schemas influence interpretation?

They influence the meaning people assign to incoming information.

How do schemas influence memory?

They influence what people remember and how memories are reconstructed.

What is assimilation?

Perceiving something as more similar to an activated concept or comparison standard.

What is contrast?

Perceiving something as more different from an activated concept or comparison standard.

What is the basic lesson of Bargh, Chen, and Burrows (1996)?

Priming a concept can influence subsequent behavior without people necessarily consciously intending to behave that way.

What was the basic point of Dijksterhuis et al.'s professor/Einstein vs. supermodel study?

Priming different concepts, such as professor/Einstein versus supermodel/Schiffer, can influence subsequent performance or behavior.

What is bottom-up processing?

Starting with sensory or actual data and building an interpretation from that information.

What is top-down processing?

Using existing knowledge, expectations, and schemas to interpret incoming information.

What is intuitive processing?

Fast, automatic, relatively effortless processing that often uses heuristics.

What is rational processing?

Slower, controlled, effortful, more analytical processing.

What are Todorov's two dimensions of impression formation from faces?

trustworthness and dominance.

What does dominance mean in facial impressions?

Softer features (fuller cheek, big eyes a.k.a “baby face”

V.S
Shaper features (angular face, smaller eyes, “rbf)

What was Heider's basic attribution distinction?

Behavior can be explained by internal causes within the person or external causes in the situation.

What is an internal attribution?

Explaining behavior as caused by something inside the person, such as personality or ability.

What is an external attribution?

Explaining behavior as caused by the situation or environment.

What is Jones and Davis' correspondent inference theory?

A theory about how people infer an underlying disposition or trait from someone's behavior.

When is correspondence high?

When behavior provides strong evidence about an underlying trait or disposition.

When is correspondence low?

When the situation provides an obvious explanation or the behavior is not very diagnostic of personality.

How does social desirability affect correspondence?

Socially desirable or expected behavior provides less information about a person's unique disposition; unusual or undesirable behavior can be more diagnostic.

How does choice affect correspondence?

Freely chosen behavior is more likely to be seen as reflecting the person's underlying disposition than behavior that was forced or coerced.

What is the general process in correspondent inference?

Observe behavior, consider whether the person freely chose it, consider social desirability, and determine whether the behavior corresponds to an underlying trait.

What is Kelley’s covariation model?

A model for determining causes of behavior by examining how behavior varies across people, situations, and circumstances.

What does covariation mean?

Using patterns of variation across situations and people to infer what causes behavior.

What is consistency in Kelley’s model?

Whether the same person behaves this way repeatedly in the same situation.

What is consensus in Kelley’s model?

Whether other people behave the same way in the same situation.

What is distinctiveness in Kelley’s model?

Whether the person behaves this way mainly in this particular situation.

What pattern suggests an internal/person attribution?

High consistency, low consensus, and low distinctiveness.

What pattern suggests an external/situational attribution?

High consistency, high consensus, and high distinctiveness.

What is the discounting principle?

When multiple plausible causes exist, the importance assigned to any one cause is reduced.

What is the augmentation principle?

When behavior occurs despite an obstacle or inhibiting factor, the person's disposition is given more weight.

What is the fundamental attribution error (FAE)?

The tendency to overestimate internal/dispositional causes and underestimate situational causes when explaining other people's behavior.

How does focus of attention contribute to the FAE?

Attention is often focused on the person rather than the surrounding situation, making dispositional explanations more salient.

What is the actor-observer difference?

Actors are more likely to explain their own behavior using situational causes, while observers are more likely to explain others' behavior using dispositional causes.

How can empathy affect the FAE?

Taking another person's perspective can increase attention to situational factors and reduce dispositional bias.

What is Gilbert's two-step process model?

People first make an automatic dispositional inference, then may use controlled processing to correct it by considering situational factors.

What is cognitive load/cognitive busyness?

A state in which cognitive resources are occupied, leaving fewer resources for controlled processing.

How does cognitive load affect the FAE?

It can reduce controlled correction, leading to stronger dispositional judgments and a stronger FAE.

What is the just-world hypothesis?

The belief that the world is fundamentally fair and people generally get what they deserve.

How can the just-world hypothesis affect judgments?

It can lead people to blame victims because believing that bad things can happen to innocent people conflicts with the assumption that the world is fair.

How can culture affect attribution?

Cultures differ in how strongly people emphasize individual/dispositional explanations versus situational and social-context explanations.

What is a judgmental heuristic?

A mental shortcut or rule of thumb used to make judgments quickly.

What is the framing effect?

The way information is presented can influence decisions even when the underlying information is equivalent.

What is the availability heuristic?

The tendency to judge likelihood or frequency based on how easily examples come to mind.