Psych Module 18

Social Psychology

Studies how a person’s thoughts, feelings, and behavior are influenced by the real, imagined, or implied presence of others

Social Influence

Real or implied presence of others directly or indirectly influences thought, feeling, and behavior of an individual

Conformity

Changing one’s own behavior to match that of others

Consumer Psychology

Studies habits of consumers in the marketplace

Compliance

Changing one’s own behavior as a result of other people directing or asking for change

Foot-in-the-door Technique

Asking for a small commitment and after receiving compliance, asking for a bigger commitment

Norm of Recoprocity

Assumption that if someone does something for someone else, the other person should do something in return

Lowball Technique

Getting a commitment from a person and then raising the cost of the commitment

That’s-not-all Technique

A sales technique where an offer is made and then something is added on to look more enticing

Obedience

Changing one’s behavior at the command of an authority figure

Social Facilitation

Tendency for the presence of others to have a positive impact on the performance of an easy task

Social Impairment

Tendency for the presence of others to negatively impact performance of a difficult task

Social Loafing

Tendency for people to put in less effort on a small task when working with others

Groupthink

Kind of thinking that occurs when more importance is put on group cohesiveness than the facts of the problem at hand

Door-in-the-face Technique

Asking for a large commitment, being refused, and then asking for a small commitment

Relativism

The idea that there is no absolute truth and that something is only true when it is widely agreed upon

The Solomon Asch Conformity Experiment

Subjects were shown lines, fake subjects threw their answers, real subjects said the wrong answer even if they knew it was wrong

The Milgram Study

A “teacher” administered what they thought were real shocks to a “learner” and most went to the end (deadly shocks) because they were told to by someone in a lab coat