Social Psychology: Key Concepts in Social Thinking, Influence, and Relations

Social Thinking

Social psychologists focus more on how individuals view and affect one another.

Situation

They're grumpy because they're having a bad day.

Disposition

They're just a grumpy person.

Fundamental Attribution Error

Recognizing the Fundamental Attribution Error helps us stay objective as psychologists while holding people accountable for their choices.

Factors Affecting Attributions

Culture, whose behavior it is matters, and we judge our own behavior more favorably than others.

Real Life Consequences of Attributions

Our attributions to a person's disposition or to the situation have real life consequences.

Attitudes

Feelings, often influenced by our beliefs, that predispose us to respond in a particular way to objects, people, and events.

Conditions Affecting Attitudes

Attitudes affect behaviors only in certain conditions—situational pressures can override personal beliefs.

Attitudes Guide Actions

Attitudes guide actions when external influences are minimal, the attitude is stable over time, the attitude is specific to the behavior, and the attitude is easily recalled in the moment.

Attitudes Follow Behavior

Not only will we stand up for what we believe, but we will also more strongly believe in what we have stood up for.

Role

When you adopt a new role, you strive to follow the social prescriptions.

Internalizing Attitudes

Acting a role consistently can lead to internalizing the attitudes, thoughts, and feelings associated with that role.

Cognitive Dissonance

When we become aware that our attitudes and actions don't coincide, we experience a feeling of discomfort.

Relieving Cognitive Dissonance

To relieve discomfort, we may change our behavior, change our attitudes, or justify or rationalize behavior.

Persuasion

Persuasion efforts generally take two forms: Celebrity Endorsements and Logical arguments + evidence.

Norms

Understood rules for accepted and expected behavior that prescribe what is 'proper' behavior.

Social Contagion

Behavior is influenced by social contagion (aka the chameleon effect), which helps create a sense of similarity, trust, and understanding between people.

Chameleon Effect

Not unique to overt behavior - can include subtle cues of emotion such as tone of voice.

Conformity

Illustrated by the Solomon Asch Line Study, where people conform more when they are in groups of 3+ people who all agree.

Reasons for Conformity

Frequently, we conform to avoid rejection or to gain social approval, or because we want to be accurate.

Conformity Purposes

Conformity can be used for both good and bad purposes.

Obedience

Following orders

Milgram's Obedience Experiment

A study to understand how far people would go in obeying an authority figure, even if it meant harming another person.

Participants' belief in shocks

Participants thought they were giving shocks to another participant when they gave wrong answers; more incorrect answers led to increased voltage of shocks.

Confederates

Actors involved in the experiment, including the 'learner' being shocked and the 'experimenter' telling the participant to administer shocks.

300 volts

All participants went at least to 300 volts, enough to cause severe pain.

65% obedience

65% of participants went up to 450 volts, enough to kill someone.

Factors increasing obedience

Authority figure was close and perceived as legitimate, participants were told they were backed by a prestigious institution, and the 'student' receiving shocks was depersonalized or distant.

Social pressure

Can make ordinary people act against their conscience.

Small acts of compliance

Evil often begins with small acts of compliance.

Resistance to conformity

Individuals can resist; even just one voice that speaks up or refuses can reduce pressure to conform or obey.

Group behavior

When people act as part of a group, they may feel less accountable, view individual contributions as dispensable, and overestimate their own contributions.

Free riding

When individuals benefit from the efforts of others without contributing themselves.

Arousal and anonymity

Group participation can make people both aroused and anonymous, thriving in many settings.

Shopping / Consumer Decisions

A group of friends discussing which phone or game console is 'best' may become more convinced of their choice after discussion.

Extreme cheering

A group of sports fans watching a game together may become more extreme in cheering or criticizing the opposing team.

Suppression of dissent

Members may suppress dissenting opinions, fail to critically evaluate alternatives, and prioritize consensus over the best outcome.

Workplace Teams

A project team may decide to launch a product despite clear flaws because no one wants to rock the boat or disagree.

Friend Groups

A group may decide to try an extreme activity, like a scary amusement park ride, even though some friends are nervous.

Prejudice

Attitudes are feelings, influenced by beliefs, that predispose us to act in certain ways.

Components of prejudice

The three key components of prejudice are negative emotions, stereotypes, and a predisposition to discriminate.

Negative Emotions

Feelings such as hostility or fear that contribute to prejudice.

Behavioral expression of prejudice

When bias turns into action, it is the behavioral expression of prejudice.

Ingroup Bias

An ingroup bias soon follows when we draw the circle defining 'us'.

Scapegoat Theory

Evidence for the scapegoat theory comes in two forms: social trends and experiments.

Social Trends

Economically frustrated people often express heightened prejudice, and during downturns, racial prejudice intensifies.

Experiments on Prejudice

Temporarily frustrating people intensifies their prejudice - students who experience failure or are made to feel insecure often restore their self-esteem by disparaging another.

Outgroup Homogeneity

We often overestimate how much the members of other groups are alike.

Heuristics

We simplify the world through heuristics - mental shortcuts that enable snap judgments.

Availability Heuristic

A mental shortcut that relies on immediate examples that come to mind.

Representative Heuristic

A mental shortcut used to judge the likelihood of things in terms of how well they seem to represent, or match, particular prototypes.

Anchoring Heuristic

A cognitive bias that describes the tendency to rely too heavily on the first piece of information encountered when making decisions.

Familiarity Heuristic

A mental shortcut that relies on the familiarity of a situation or object to make judgments.

Biological Factors of Aggression

Genes influence aggression - studies of identical vs fraternal twins have found that genetics seem to play a role in predisposition to violence.

Neural Influences on Aggression

Aggression is a complex behavior and is not contributed to one particular part of the brain.

Biochemical Influences on Aggression

Neurotransmitters - testosterone influences the neural systems that influence aggression.

Aversive Events

Aversive stimuli can evoke hostility; a prime example of this phenomenon is the frustration-aggression principle.

Frustration-Aggression Principle

Frustration leads to anger which can lead to aggression.

Media Models for Violence

Media violence teaches us social scripts - culturally provided mental files for how to act in certain situations.

Reinforcement and Modeling

Children whose aggression has successfully intimidated other children may become bullies.

Attraction Components

Three components of our liking for one another are proximity, physical attractiveness, and similarity.

Romantic Love

Three key things for a lasting romantic relationship are equity, self-disclosure and vulnerability, and positive support.

Passionate Love

An aroused state of intense positive absorption in another, usually present at the beginning of a romantic relationship.

Two-Factor Theory of Emotion

Emotions have two ingredients: physical arousal plus cognitive appraisal.

Altruism

Altruism is evidence that while humans have the capacity for great evil, we more importantly have the capacity for great good.

Norms for Helping

Others believe we help because we have been socialized to do so - through norms that prescribe how we ought to behave.