Quarter exam MUIDS G12 Psychology

Social Psychology

Study of how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by other people's presence and actors. Includes: Social cognition, social behavior and social influence

Social cognition

How people interpret social information and make sense of others in society.

Social behavior

The actions and interactions of individuals within a society / social groups

Social influence

How people are affected and affect eachother

How we recieve social information

Using social ques

Social ques

things that express other people's emotions, thoughts, and feelings

Example social ques

Body language, facial expression, vocal tone, attractiveness, personal space

Perception

How people make sense of sensory information

Person perception

How we interpret others based on observed physical characteristics

Stereotype

Generalizing from a characteristic or trait, done to understand others and their actions easier. A cognitive shortcut (heuristics)

Heuristic

Cognitive shortcuts we use to understand the world and analyze / make fast decisions / solve problems

Self-fufilling prophecy

When false expectations lead to actions or behaviors which eventually fulfill the belief (can influence social interactions)

How does perception lead to stereotype?

Perceptions can lead to making decisions about these people, which is a type of stereotype

Attribution theory

Explaining the causes of behavior using assumptions. Attributing things to internal or external reasons (situational / despositional)

Actor - observer bias

The way we attribute failures differs between our own failures and others' failures. For own failures, we attribute to external factors, and for others' failures we atribute to internal factors

Fundamental attribution error

When people overemphasize the effect of internal traits (and vice versa) on others' failures

Self

One's own identity which is distinct from others

Self Esteem

How you percieve your self worth

traits of high self esteeem

confidence, able to say no, accept and like yourself, stand up for yourself, accept compliments, set boundaries, forgive yourself

traits of low self esteem

Dislike themselves, passive, sensitive to criticism / defensive, self critical,dwell on mistakes, lack confidence, focus on own flaws, self-doubting

positive illusions

positive views of ourselves not rooted to reality- overly positive

Self-serving bias

When we take credit for our success, but blame outside factors for failure. We do it to maintain and enhance self esteem

Self - objectification

When we see ourself as objects to be judged by physical attributes, believing that self worth comes from physical appearance. Because of social media and unrealistic expectations, bullying, criticism, toxic relationships or a desire for validation.

Stereotype threat

When someone feels that they are at risk of doing something to reinforce a negative stereotype about their group. due to fear or being judged unfairly

Social comparison

When we compare ourselves against other people to get better asessment of ourselves, and motivate progress. But can make one feel inadequate

Attitude

Our feelings and opinions towards things (formed by upbringing). Can predict behaviors.

Things needed for attitude to predict behavior

strong attitude, strong awareness and practice of attitude, issue affects one personally

Cognitive dissonance theory

When behavior does not match attitude, one has to change. Either action / behavior or attitude changes

Self perception theory

When we look back at past behaviors to find our true attitude for something

Persuasion techniques

foot in the door, door in the face

4 elments of persuasion

Communicator, message, target audience, medium

Foot in the door

start small and work way up to large requests

door in the face

Start big. when rejected, ask for small thing instead

Elaboration of likelihood model

Two ways to persuade- central and peripheral routes

Centeral route of persuasion

directly engage with audience in argument

peripheral route of persuasion

indirect method of persuading using other factors, such as trustworthiness

Attitude innoculation

way to resist persuasion by exposing oneself to the weaker version of a counterargument first.

Social behavior

How individual's behavior influenced by the presence of others.

Prosocial behavior and its effects

The actions that help others by focusing on the outcomes not by motivation. The effects are mood booster, reduce stress, and build relationship with others.

Altruism

act of selflessness, helping other to benefit their interests not our.

Egoism

act of helping others to ensure reciprocity.

Reciprocity

when we do positive actions to receive kind action back.

Elements in prosocial behavior

1. Mood = doing something good can be a great mood booster.
2. Empathy = be able to understand other people's feeling.
3. Gender = Stereotype assumes that women will be more empathetic than men and men are likely to help when danger happen.
4. Social media = can promote aggressive behavior but can also bring out prosocial behavior.

Bystander effect

When we see but not help because they think that other people are going to help

Aggression

ability to engage kindness sits along with other capacities, and it can be in physical and verbal.

Factors influencing aggression

1. Biological factors = Testosterone can activates part of the brain that trigger aggression.
2. Neurobiological factors = Damage in frontal lobe can exhibit more aggressive behavior.
3. Environmental factors = About how you were raised.
4. Aversive circumstance = physical pain, physical environment such as weather can also trigger aggression.
5. Cultural variation = In some cultures, they promote masculine pride and family honor.
6. Media influence = Violence can portrayed on TV and movies.

Some impacts of aggression

1. ruin interpersonal relationship
2. depression and anxiety
3. social isolation
4. physical injury

Managing agression

1. Walk away from the situation
2. Practice mindfulness
3.Be aware for your emotion and signs of anger
4. Distract yourself with other activities

Social influence

When individual change their behavior, thoughts, attitude to fit in the social norms

Social norms

unwritten rules of behavior that are seen acceptable in society.

Conformity

When individual change their behavior to fit in the social group because they want to be accepted.

Autonomy

When individual take voluntary action that may or may not conform to the group.

Causes of conformity

1. Informational social influence = when we conform because we have the desire to be right.
2. Normative = When we change behavior to fit in the group and we want others to like us.

Obedience

when we obey for the order of people that have more power or higher status than us.

Compliance

when the individual gave into an expressed request from other people. We comply to avoid unpleasant experiences or to stay in our comfort zone.

Group influence

How individual choose to take certain action but would never do when they are alone and sometime it referred as " peer pressure ". The stronger influence the more of individual see themselves as the part of the group.

Deindividuation

reason why we act differently when we are in group than when we're alone can be explained

Social contagion

tendency for people to mimic the behavior of those who surrounded them.

Social facilitation

The improvement of an individual's performance when other people are presence.

Social loafing

When people in the group put less effort because of the reduced accountability on individual's effort.

Risky shift

when individual tend to do more risker and less conservative than when making decision alone.

Group popularization

when group move toward more extreme view compared to their initial thoughts before discussion due to hearing news.

Group think

process of impaired decision made to keep the group harmony rather than making the right decision

Majority and minority influence

The decision made by voting and minority could work through informational pressure.