PSYCH U2AOS1

social cognition

How we judge others in social situations by interpreting and analysing information

Person perception

mental process we use to form our impressions of others

2 ways person perception can be done?

Directly: provided from the person we are judging, for example through observing them or interacting with them.

Indirectly: through hearing about the person we are judging from another person or source, for example through a friend or reading about someone online.

Schema

pre-existing mental idea relating to a certain topic which helps us interpret/organise new information

Physical cues

The physical characteristics and behaviours of people that influence our impressions of them

Body language

Non-verbal communication in which physical behaviour and movement are used to express a message

Saliency

refers to any personal characteristic that is distinctive, prominent, conspicuous or noticeable in its context and therefore attracts attention

Social categorisation

A mental shortcut used in person perception to categorise people in groups based on their shared characteristics.

Attributions

Inferences we make about the causes of events and behaviours (of our own and of others).

internal attribution (personal attribution)

occurs when we judge behaviour as being caused by something personal within an individual

Internal attributions include:

judging behaviour as the result of someone's psychological state, age, gender, intellect, motivation, ability, desire and past behaviour.

Situational attribution

occurs when we determine the cause of a behaviour as resulting from situational factors occurring outside the individual.

Situational factors include:

• the environment a person is in when they produce a behaviour (e.g. at home or at a concert).

• events that the individual has experienced beyond their control (ranging from things like emergencies to the actions of another person).

just world theory

cognitive bias which people believe the world is fair and just, and that everyone gets what they deserve.

fundamental attribution error

refers to our tendency to overemphasise personal factors and ignore situational factors when judging someone else's behaviour.

Fundamental attribution bias affects:

How we percieve OTHERS' behaviour

Actor-observer bias

Blaming external factors for our bad behaviour and blaming a person’s internal factors for their bad behaviours.

Actor-observer bias affects:

How we percieve OTHERS' behavior compared to OUR OWN

Self-serving bias

Involves blaming external factors when negative events happen and internal factors when positive things happen.

Self-serving bias affects:

How we percieve OUR OWN behaviours

Attitudes

An evaluation that a person makes about other people, objects, issues or other things.

Tri-component model of attitudes

A model proposing that attitudes must have three related components - affective, behavioural and cognitive.

Affective component and eg

the emotional component of attitudes, involving how you feel about people, objects, places, events or ideas

Eg. I feel fit when I play basketball

Behavioral Component and eg

the action component of attitudes, involving what you do as an expression of your attitude

Eg. I play basketball every night

Cognitive component and eg

This is the mental component of attitudes, involving the beliefs or thoughts that you have about people, objects, places events, or ideas

eg. I think basketball is the best sport to play

Limitations of the tri-component

• Attitudes tend to be general, while behaviour is highly specific 

• Cognitive and affective components may imply that you’ll behave a certain way, they are not a guarantee that you will

• Situational factors may influence how different people behave in certain situations

Stereotypes

A collection of fixed ideas about members of a certain group in which individual differences are ignored. 

3 ways on how stereotypes can be harmful?

• They can be inaccurate.

• Most are formed on the basis of little or no research evidence.

• Can be offensive.

3 ways on how stereotypes can be helpful?

• simplify and make person perception more efficient.

• assist us in knowing how we should react to new people we meet

• reduces the amount of thinking, mental effort or information processing when we meet a new person.

Stigma

Negative attitudes about someone based on distinguishing characteristics

Ingroups

Any group that a person belongs or identifies with.

E.g. Friends, family, sporting team

Outgroups

Any group that a person does not belong or identify with.

E.g Sporting team’s opposition 

Cognitive dissonance:

The discomfort that people experience when they have conflicting beliefs or when their behaviours contradict their beliefs.

Reducing Cognitive Dissonance

In order to make ourselves feel better and reduce cognitive dissonance, we employ cognitive biases to alter the way we think about certain situations.

cognitive bias

systematic error in thinking generally due to oversimplification of information

Anchoring bias:

The tendency to rely too heavily on the first piece of information (anchor) that we learn when we make decisions.

Attentional bias:

Our tendency to pay attention to some things and ignore others, limiting our options. 

Confirmation bias:

The tendency to seek, favour or remember information that supports an existing belief and ignore contradicting information. 

False-consensus bias:

The tendency to overestimate how much others share our opinions or beliefs. 

Functional fixedness:

A cognitive bias involving the tendency to regard objects as only having one function or as working in a specific way. 

Misinformation effect:

A cognitive bias in which information that is received after an event interferes with a person’s original memory of the event. 

Optimism bias:

Our tendency to underestimate the chances of negative events happening and overestimate the chances of positive events happening. 

The Dunning Kruger effect:

A cognitive bias in which people with low skills or ability in a specific area overestimate their abilities and performance, while people with high skills underestimate their abilities and performance. 

Heuristics:

Mental shortcuts that allow us to make quick decisions on limited information. 

Availability heuristic:

A mental shortcut that uses the first thoughts that come to a person’s mind when they are evaluating an issue or deciding what to do. 

• Make a decision based on information already available to them - easily accessible

Limitations and advantage of availability heuristic:

Advantage: quick decision

Limitation: can lead to errors (a longer time deciding may lead to a better result)

Representative heuristic:

A mental shortcut that involves making a categorical judgement about an idea, event, or person, based on their similarity to other items in that category.

Flaw of representative heuristsics

• people overestimate the accuracy when fitting things into a category

• Can lead to many errors if relied on too much

Affective heuristsic

A mental shortcut based on a person’s current emotional state.

Positives of heuristics:

• Heuristics enable individuals to make quick decisions.

• Using heuristics, individuals can accurately solve problems.

• Heuristics can be adaptive and protect individuals in dangerous situations.

Negatives of heuristics:

• Heuristics are prone to error and biased judgements.

• Heuristics can lead to the base-rate fallacy (our tendency to give more weight to the event-specific information than we should, instead of  statistical likelihood).

Prejudice

involves having a negative attitude towards people based solely on their membership of a certain group.

Old-fashioned prejudice

involves open rejection and recognisable negative views towards minority groups, including beliefs in racial superiority and segregation.

Modern prejudice

more subtle and hidden, often supporting equal opportunities in theory but holding private reservations or stereotypes, and is more common in Western societies.

discrimination

which is the unjust treatment of people due to their membership within a certain social category.

Types of discrimination - Direct discrimination

when someone is treated unfairly because of their association with a particular group (age, gender, sexuality, race, etc).

Types of discrimination - indirect discrimination

happens when there is an unreasonable requirement, condition or practice that disadvantages a person, or a group of people, because of a personal characteristic.

Types of discrimination - intersectional discrimination

how different parts of a person’s identity combine to create unique, overlapping forms of prejudice or systemic inequality.

Effects of discrimination

major negative impacts on mental wellbeing, causing anxiety, depression, and lowered self-esteem

Example of prdjudice and discrimination

PREDJUDICE: I feel annoyed that my Asian friends may get better grades than me on the maths SAC

DISCRIMINATION: I don’t help my Asian friend with a maths question while we are studying because she is going to get a better grade than me anyway

Reducing stigma, prejudice and discrimination - intergroup contact

increasing direct contact between two groups who are prejudiced against each other.

Reducing stigma, prejudice and discrimination - Sustained Contact

Prolonged and cooperative interaction between two groups that are prejudiced against each other

Reducing stigma, prejudice and discrimination - Equality

Being on the same level as one another, with neither group having more or less status or power than the other.

Reducing stigma, prejudice and discrimination - Superordinate Goals

The top-level, ultimate goals that individuals or groups have. Having shared goals and cooperating to achieve them reduces conflict

Reducing prejudice- Mutual Interdependence

Groups must rely on each other to meet a goal.

Cooperative interaction on meaningful tasks reduces prejudice

Reducing prejudice- contact hypothesis

posits that social contact between groups can reduce inter-group prejudice by providing knowledge that changes negative prejudgements.

Reducing prejudice- extended-contact hypothesis.

idea that when members of an ingroup see that one of their own has a close relationship with an outgroup member, it can lead to more positive attitudes towards that outgroup.

Sherif's Robber's Cave experiment

• The Setup: Researchers divided 22 boys into two groups ("Rattlers" and "Eagles") at a summer camp.

• The Conflict: When the groups were forced to compete for prizes, they quickly developed intense hostility, prejudice, and name-calling.

• The Resolution: The researchers found that simply having the groups meet (contact) didn't help. Hostility only disappeared when they were given superordinate goals—tasks that required both groups to work together to succeed.

Social norms

unwritten rules of a society or group that tell us what is considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable behavior in specific situations.

social group (or simply a group)

any collection of two or more people who interact with and influence one another and who share a common purpose. 

Collective:

A collective is a gathering of people who are in the same place at the same time but have minimal interaction.

Status

refers to the importance of an individual’s position in the group, as perceived by members of the group.
Generally, a person can have high or low status. 

Power

refers to an individual’s (or group’s) ability to control or influence another person (or group), even when they try to resist this influence. 

Reward power

Power through control over rewards

Coercive power

Power through control over punishments or other force

Legitimate power

Power through a right to require and demand obedience

Referent power

power through respect

Expert power

power through superior abilities

Informational power

Power through access to and use of informational resources

Explain Zinbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment

• The Setup: He created a mock prison and recruited 24 male college students. They were randomly assigned to be either a "prisoner" or a "guard."

• The Findings: The study was meant to last two weeks but had to be aborted after only six days. The guards became increasingly abusive, authoritarian, and sadistic, while the prisoners became passive, depressed, and anxious.

• The Conclusion: Zimbardo concluded that situational factors—specifically the adoption of social roles and the power dynamics of the environment—can radically change people's behavior, often forcing them to act in ways they normally wouldn't.

2 Limitations of Zinbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment

• Withdrawal Rights: Prisoners found it very difficult to leave the study, as Zimbardo made it feel like a real prison, effectively denying their right to withdraw.

• Sample Bias: The sample consisted entirely of male college students. This makes it difficult to generalise the findings to women, other age groups.

Groupthink

involves a shift from focusing on making the best decision to focusing on reaching and maintaining agreement (aka. thinking and doing what the group as a whole thinks and does). 

8 Characteristics of the decision-making groups

1. illusion of invulnerability

2. moral correctness

3. collective rationalisation

4. outgroup stereotypes

5. self-censorship

6. direct pressure on dissenters

7. illusion of unanimity

8. self-appointed mindguards

Group shift

is the tendency of an individual group member, following group discussion, to shift their initially held views to a more extreme position (in the same general direction).

Deindividuation

is characterised by reduced self-consciousness, inhibition, feelings of personal responsibility and inner restraint that can occur when in a group or crowd.

• Helps explain extreme behaviour in groups, particularly when high levels of arousal or emotions are involved. 

Culture

generally refers to the way of life of a particular society or community that sets it apart from other societies and communities.

collectivist culture

the interests and aims of the group are prioritised over the wants and wishes of each individual.

Individualist culture

prioritise the needs of the individual over those of the group. 

Obedience

This is a change in behaviour due to someone with authority asking or telling us to do or not do something.

Milgram’s experiments

• The Goal: He wanted to find out whether individuals would obey an authority figure who was instructing them to inflict pain on another person.

• The Procedure: Participants ("teachers") were ordered by an experimenter to deliver electric shocks to a "learner" (actor) for every wrong answer.

• The Findings: 65% of participants delivered the maximum volt shock.

• The Conclusion: Obedience is driven more by situational factors—such as the perceived legitimacy of authority and the environment—rather than an individual's personality or moral compass

Factors affecting obedience- Social proximity

refers to the closeness between two or more people. This may include the physical distance between the people as well as the closeness of their relationship. 

Factors affecting obedience- Legitimacy of authority figures:

An individual is also more likely to be obedient when the authority figure is perceived as being legitimate and having power. When an ‘ordinary person’ (someone with no particular authority) instead of the experimenter gave the orders, full obedience dropped from 65% to 20%.

Factors affecting obedience- Group Pressure:

An individual is also more likely to be obedient where there is little or no group support for resisting the authority figure. When the ‘teachers’ were exposed to the actions of disobedient people who refused to obey the authority figure’s commands, full obedience dropped from 65% to about 10%.

3 Limitations of Milgram’s studies:

• did not actually obtain informed consent from his participants.

• Deception: The participants were lied to about the nature of the study and the shocks.

• Withdrawal Rights: Although participants could leave, the "prods" used by the experimenter made it feel nearly impossible to quit.

Asch’s conformity studies