Psychology Unit 2 Outcome 1

Social Cognition and influences on behaviour

Person Perception

The mental processes we use to form impressions and draw conclusions about the personal characteristics of other other people.

Person Perception is based on:

• physical appearance (halo effect)

• body language

• eye contact

• facial expression

Physical Appearance

Is an important characteristic of first impressions (attractiveness)

Eye contact

Non-verbal communication (different across cultures)

Facial expressions

Are facial movements or positioning that change depending on what a person is trying to express.

Body langauge

Are observable behaviours and are an important part of a person’s physical appearance.

Halo effect

Basing your general impressions of someone on only one aspect will reduce cognitive dissonance by removing any heuristic feelings or thoughts.

Social Cognition

Involves how we interpret analyse, remember, and use information to make judgements about others in different social situation and the social world.

Attitude

An evaluation a person makes about an object , person, group, event or issue.

The Tri-Component Model

Suggests there are three main components that contribute to beahviours, affective, behavioural and cognitive.

Affective Component

The emotional reactions or feelings an individual has towards an object, person, group, event or issue.

Behavioural Component

The way an attitude is expressed through observable actions.

Cognitive Component

The beliefs we have about the object, person, group, event or issue.

Limiation of the Tri-Component Model

There are often inconsistencies between a person’s attitude and their behaviour.

Stereotypes

A collection of beliefs that we have about the people who belong to a certain group, regardless of individual differences among members of that group.

Attribution

Is the process by which people explain the causes of their own and other people’s behaviour.

Internal Attributions

An explanation based on internal characteristics within a person.

External attribution

An explanation due to factors external to the person involved.

Actor-observor bias

The tendency to attribute our own actions to external factors and situational causes while attributing other people’s actions to internal factors.

Self-serving bias

The tendency to attribute positive success to out internal character and actions and attribute our failures to external factors or situational causes.

Fundemental attribution error

The tendency to over-estimate the influence of internal factors and underestimate the impact of external factors on other people’s behaviour.

Cognitive dissonance

The psychological tension that occurs when our thoughts, feelings, and/or behaviours do not align.

Cognitive Bias

Conscious, systematic tendencies to interpret information in a way that is neither rational nor based on objective reality. (can be a result of trying to avoid cogntive dissonance)

Examples of cognitive bias

• Confirmatory bias

• False-consesus bias

• Anchoring bias'

• Halo effect

Confirmatory bias

The tendency to search for and accept information that supports our prior beliefs or behaviours, and ignoring contradictory information.

False-consensus bias

The tendency to overestimate the degree to which other people share the same ideas and attitudes as we do to protect our self esteem. (assuming people share same beliefs as us)

Anchoring bias

Judgments are formed based on the first information received which influences future related judgements.

To reduce cognitive dissonance:

• Change thought

• Change behaviour

Heuristics

Is the information-processing strategies or ‘mental shortcuts’ that enables individuals to form judgments, make decisions and solve problems quickly and efficiently.

Availability Heuristic

Information-processing strategy where judgmentsm decisions or problem solving is based on information that is most easily accessible.

Benefits of heuristics

• save time when making decisions and solving problems

• sometimes result in accurate decision-making and efficient problem-solving

• can be adaptive and protect an individual from dangerous situations

Negatives of heuristics

• decisions are made quick = probe to error

• may be biased to due to perceptions and judgments

Pros of avaliablity heurestics

Recalling memories and recent events over facts can aid in survival.

Cons of avaliablity heurestics

Recalling memories and recent events over facts may lead to bias or extreme thoughts/belief.

Represenative heuristic

Making a judgement about an idea, event, or person, based on similiarity to other items in that category. (bias from stereotyping)

Pros of represenative heuristic

May be useful for finding help quickly.

Cons of represenative heuristic

Can be inaccurate due to stereotypes.

Affect heuristic

Using emotions to make a judgement or decision. (like an instinct or ‘gut’ feeling)

Pros of affective heuristic

Can protect you from dangerous situations or make you look more closely into something that makes you feel negative emotions.

Cons of affective heuristic

Can stop you from doing something that makes you go outside your boundaries which may hinder development/growth.

Prejudice

Holding a negative attitude towards the members of a group based solely on their membership of that group. (involves a majority group (ingroup) and a minority group (outgroup))

Discrimination

Refers to negative behavoiour that is directed towards a social group and its members.

Direct discrimination

Involves action or behaviours that express a prejudice and disadvanatage another individual.

Indirect discrimination

Happens when policies or rules that are the same for everyone disadvantage only a particular group.

Stigma

Negative label associated with disapproval or rejection by others who aren’t labelled in the same way.

Prejudice vs Stigma

Prejudice is your own negative attitude towards a group of people, while stigma is a society-driven mark of shame against a particular group.

Prejudice + Discrimination + Stigma

Prejudice can lead to discrimination, when people observe a group being discriminated against this can lead to stigma.

Influence of prejudice, discrimination and stigma on personal mental well-being

• Damage or worsen self-image or self-confidence

• Heightened experience of stress

• Increased likelihood of rumination (overthinking)

• Increased susceptibility to mental health problems or disorders such as anxiety

Influence of prejudice, discrimination and stigma on group mental well-being

• Higher prevalence of mental disorders in the group

• feeling socially isolated from other groups

• Increased levels of substance abuse

• Feeling anxiety when going out for fear of becoming victims of hate crime

• Barriers to accesing treatment as a result of stigma

Ways to reduce prejudice and discrimination

• Inter-group contact

• Cognitive intervention

Inter-group contact

Increasing direct contact between groups prejudiced against one another.

Inter-group contact involves:

• Close contact

• Ongoing

• Groups need to rely on each other

• Have equal status in the situation

Cognitive Interventations

Involves changing the way people think about prejudice.

Cognitive Interventations involves:

• Individual deciding prejudice is wrong

• Sticking to non-prejudiced beliefs

• Blocking prejudiced reactions and replace them with non-prejudiced responses.

Group, three criteria to classify as a group:

Any collection of:

• two or more people

• who interact and influence each other

• who share a common purpose (goal)

Social Norms

Accepted standards about how a person should behave in certain situations.

Social Loafing

The tendency of people to put in less effort when they’re part of a group and this can increase confomity.

Factors that promote social loafing

• if the task is too easy

• if the task isn’t viewed as meaningful

Factors that prevent social loafing

• clear indications of individual effort within the group

• more group interactions

 Individualistic cultures 

A culture that priorities the needs + goals of individuals and values independence (being more likely to act in the interest of personal success + make fundemental distribution error)

In-group

A group that an individual identifies with or belongs to.

Out-group

A group that an individual does not identify with or belong to.

Culture

The customs, behaviours and values of a particular group in society that priotises the needs and goals of that group.

Collective Cultures

A culture that priorities the needs + goals of the group, choosing jobs to better provide for families over personal needs. (more likely to have higher levels of conformity)

Individualstic culture (characteristics)

• Value independence and uniqueness

• Dependence on others is discouraged

• Greater emphasis on career development

• Tends to be greater competition between individuals

• Individual needs come before group needs

Collectivist culture (characteristics)

• Greater value placed on interdependence

• More importance placed on social roles and norms

• Social harmony and group needs are seen as more important than individual needs

• Individuals are more inclined to act in ways that benefit the group rather than the individual's success

• Individuals are viewed as smaller parts of a larger whole

Aggregrate

When fails to meet requirements of a group. (large mass of people lacks one of the three characteristics of a group)

Status

Refers to the importance of an individual’s position in the group, perceived by members of the group.

Power

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

Zimbardo’s Stanford prison experiment

Aim: To investigate how status and power influences obedience

IV: Assigned role

DV: Participant’s behaviour

Sampling Method: Convenience

Results: Those without power become distressed, obedient, those with became authoritative

Breached Ethics: Non-Maleficience, Deception, Informed consent, withdrawal rights

Obedience

Occurs when people follow the commands of someone with authority, or rules or laws of society.

Constructive obedience

Occurs when someone follows the orders of an authority figure and it results in a positive outcome.

Destructive obedience

Occurs when someone follows the orders of an authority figure, but it results in a negative outcome.

Milgram’s experiments on Obedience Aim

To investigate whether individuals would obey an authority figure who was instructing them to inflict pain on another person.

Milgram’s experiments on Obedience results

• All participants administered at least 300 volts 

• 65% of participants administered the highest shock (450 volts)

Milgram’s experiments on Obedience conclusions

Concluded that people are likely to perform actions contrary to their beliefs and wishes if they are instructed to do so by an authority figure.

Milgram’s experiments on Obedience breached:

• Non-maleficience

• Withdrawal rights

• Deception and debriefing

Factors affecting obedience 

• Proximity of the teacher and learner

• Whether the authority figure is perceived as legitimate and having power

• Group pressure to obey

Social proximity

Refers to the closeness (physical distance or relationship) between two or more people. (decreased obedience)

Legitimacy of authority figure

When the indvidual who genuinely has power in a given situation or according to the law. (more likely to be obedient)

Group Pressure

Direct or indirect social pressure exerted by a group on its individual members to influence their choices. (increases obedience/decreases obedience depending on the pressures direction)

Conformity

The tendency to adjust one’s thoughts, feelings or behaviour in ways that are in agreement with those of a particular individual or group, or with social norms.

Asch’s experiments on conformity (original aim)

To investigate the extent to which an individual within a group will conform with the majority opinion.

Asch’s experiments on conformity (secondary aim)

Whether participants will be influenced by group size, or whether or not the group is unanimous.

Asch’s experiments on conformity (findings)

• 75% conformed to the incorrect answers at least once.

• 33% conformed in half or more of the trials.

• 24% never conformed to the incorrect answers.

Asch’s experiments on conformity (ethical issues)

• Informed Consent

• Deception and Debriefing

Factors affecting Conformity

● Group size

● Unanimity

● Culture

● Social loafing

Unanimity

When there is complete agreement among other members of the group (increases conformity and it reduced by social support)

Group size

• Conformity increased as group size increased, up to 4 people.

• Groups larger than 4 did not significantly increase conformity.

• Groups of 8+ actually showed reduced conformity.

Culture impact on conformity

• Individualistic cultures: lowest conformity; resisting group pressure is seen as strong-minded.

• Collectivist cultures: highest conformity; uniformity and conformity are encouraged.

Factors affecting group behaviour

● Group think

● Group polarisation

● Deindividuation

GroupThink

A way of thinking by individual members of a group characterised by a strong tendency to seek agreement when decision-making or problem-solving.

Group Polarisation

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

Reduced self-awareness, inhibition, feelings of personal responsibility and inner restraint that can occur when in a group or crowd.

Media

 Is the forms in which information is communicated throughout society.

Print Media

Media that is displayed in full on a physical surface.

Digital Media

Media that is designed to be projected onto an electronic device.

 Social connections

The network of people available to someone for support or engagement.

Social Comparison

The proposal that we measure self-worth in relation to the people around us.

Social Connections Postives

Reduces loneliness, increased mental health support, enables forming communities.