Perception Prejudice Bias, Social Behavior, Social Interactions, Self Preservation and Interacting with Others

Attribution Theory – Basic Covariation

Explain the behavior of other people by breaking down our understanding/explanation of their behaviours to factors

about them, and factors related to their environment/surroundings.

 Internal (dispositional attribution) – about them

 External (situational attribution) – environment

 When we consider our own behaviours, we are more likely to blame our behaviour on external factors.

 This is called attribution theory – explaining behaviours around us.

Optimism bias is belief bad things happen to others, but not to us.

Covariation model – 3 cues of Kelley’s covariation model:

 Consistency (time)

 Distinctiveness (situation)

 Consensus (people)

 Ex. Take flaky friend, friend forever cancels. Consistent behavior over time. High level of consistent behavior

over time, we are more likely related to them as opposed to situation.

 When consistency is high = internal factors

 Ex. Very nice friend Jim, but one day he gets so mad at the pizza place. Out of character and distinctive. So much

more likely to be related to the environment. Distinctiveness = situational.

 Third factor in covariation model –

“group lateness” – if you arrive late at meeting but if 20 other people are late

too, high degree of consensus. When a lot of people demonstrate same behavior, we are more likely to attribute

behavior to situational cause.

Attribution Theory – Attribution Error and Culture

We look at behaviour as coming from person’s internal attributes, and as being fuelled by situation/external factors

 If in middle, we are a neutral judge and see a combination as both.

But often when we look at behaviour of others, we’re more likely to attribute their behaviour to internal factors

instead of considering complex external factors.

 We term this the fundamental attribution error.

 Problematic when looking at complex patients – we under-recognize the situational and social problems,

and healthcare barriers they can have, blaming them for their own problems.

Actor-Observer Bias: we are victims of circumstance, but others are wilful actors. *******

 Actor

 Observer

There’s also a cultural component: the fundamental attribution error occurs more in individualistic societies (NA and

Europe), collectivist (Africa and Asia)

 Cultures have different ways they explain success and failure

 In individualistic cultures (Western), success is attributed to internal and failure to external

 In collectivist cultures (Eastern), success is attributed to external and failure to external (favour situational

attributions when situational factors are emphasized)

Self-serving bias: preserving our self-esteem, more common in individualistic cultures. If we succeed it’s due to our

internal qualities, but if we fail no hit on self-esteem because likely to do with things outside of our control.

Stereotypes: Stereotype Threat and Self-fulfilling Prophecies

Stereotyping is attributing a certain thought/cognition to a group of individuals, and overgeneralizing (COGNITIVE

ACTION)

 Can involve race, gender, culture, religion, shoe size.

 Disadvantages: it’s inaccurate

 Advantages: allows us to rapidly assess large amounts of social data

Stereotype threat – self-fulfilling fear that one will be evaluated based on a negative stereotype.

 Ex. Blue and red students, both perform equally. Next time, implement negative stereotype about blue students,

blue students perform worse.

 What stereotype threat is – exposure to a negative stereotype surrounding a task can actually cause decrease in

the performance of an individual. It threatens performance.

Self-fulfilling prophecy – stereotypes can lead to behaviours that affirm the original stereotypes.

 “City dwellers are rude” (cognition, stereotyping) -> I don’t like them (affective component, prejudice) -> I will

avoid them (behavioural component, discrimination)

 They think I’m rude (cognition) -> They may not like me (affective)-> They avoid me (behavioural) -> City

dwellers are rude

 Continuous circle that feedbacks on itself.

Emotion and Cognition in Prejudice

All attitudes have 3 components: affect, behavioural, and cognition.

 At the core of prejudice is often fear of frustration.

 Scapegoats are group of people towards whom the aggression is directed, ex. Jews during World War II.

There are types of personality more subject to prejudice – the authoritarian personality.

 They’re obedient to superiors, but don’t have much sympathy for those they deem inferior to themselves –

oppressive. And rigid thinkers, inflexible with their viewpoints.

 They use prejudice to protect their ego and avoid confronting aspects of themselves because they’re always

focussed on others.

 Personality type is hard to change.

Frustration Aggression Hypothesis – not personality based, but more emotional.

 Ex. Someone getting frustrated can lead to prejudice. When someone’s frustrated, frustrations turn to

aggressive impulses, and direct that towards the employer. But you may lose your job, so you keep bottling up

the aggression – and rechannel it somewhere else. Often towards minorities.

 Display aggression towards other people – scapegoating. Often seen in times of economic hardship.

Hypothesis of Relative Deprivation –upsurge in prejudice when people are deprived of something they feel entitled

to.

 Leads to collective unrest, upsurge in prejudice and discrimination.

Prejudice and Discrimination Based on Race, Ethnicity, Power, Social Class, and Prestige

Prejudice and discrimination usually talked about in relation to racial and ethnic groups.

 Physical characteristics with social significance – some have more meanings than others. Ex. skin color, but not

eye color. Attached meaning to skin color.

 Ethnicity – ex. Puerto Rican, Irish, Japanese. Also include groups like Jews defined more by cultural practices

than country of origin.

Can also be based on power, social class, or prestige.

 Power – political power, economic (unfair hiring policies to minorities), personal (laws can limit where someone

lives/etc.)

 Social Class – status is relative, often sets stage for prejudice (people on top maintain differences between

themselves and lower class – the Just World Phenomenon contributes to prejudice).

 Prestige – often based on occupation.

Stigma – Social and Self

Extreme disapproval/discrediting of individual by society – 2 forms: social stigma and self-stigma

 Social stigma can be fuelled or associated with several other key concepts: stereotypes, prejudices,

discrimination. Relationship between stigma and these is unclear.

 Stigma against mental health is big problem – ex. stereotype is mentally ill are violent (cognition), I become

scared of mentally ill (affect, prejudice), so may not want to live with them or hire them (behavior,

discrimination)

 Self-stigma is individual can internalize all the negative stereotypes, prejudices, and discriminatory experiences

they’ve had, and may feel rejected by society.

 Ex. someone who has HIV/AIDS and feels the stigma may go into denial that they have the condition,

experiences hits from self-esteem and suffer from depression, and display behaviours that isolate

themselves from society.

Social Circles

 1st = self

 2nd = family

 3rd = society

 4th = media

 Bidirectional relationships between all these groups.

 Media is major source of stigma, because can depict conditions as being dangerous, etc. Social media is also

huge component.

 Society – interactions between self and society like education/employment/health care and stigmatizing views

can affect individual to get a job, healthcare, etc. Use of legislation and anti-discrimination laws.

 Family – family can be shunned by society, or shun individual themselves. Ex. isolate the individual and keep as

secret within family. May be detrimental to personal/intimate relationships, and interventions like

education/therapy are important.

 Self – Can lead to avoidance, denial of condition, suffering of mental health conditions, and no longer

participating in society. Useful interventions include educating, access to support groups/resources.

Social Perception – Primacy and Recency Bias

First impressions are

 1) long (lasts a long time)

 2) strong (tough to overcome) and

 3) built up (put extra emphasis on info that helps reinforce first impression, and not info that doesn’t).

 Called the primacy bias – assessor selection is made based on information presented earlier in the process

Your most recent actions are also very important, and people place a lot of emphasis on your recent

actions/performances, more than ones before – the recency bias.

 Information retention (memory) also has primacy and recency bias.

Social Perception – The Halo Effect

The halo effect is tendency people have inherently good/bad natures, rather than looking at individual

characteristics.

 The physical attractiveness stereotype – believe attractive people have more positive personality traits.

 Ex. Jim, overall impression is in the middle. His accounting bar is very high, sales negative, leadership is

moderately good.

 Now imagine, he has overall good impression, even though he has the same actual skillset. We would perceive

that the person is much better at other skills not demonstrated. We may perceive he’s actually pretty good at

sales, regardless of evidence. Same with leadership and accounting.

 Almost as if he has a halo on his head – the halo effect.

 Often happens with celebrities, and greater attractiveness.

Now imagine someone who we think is overall very poor. Even if baseline skills are same, we perceive them to all be

lower – the reverse halo effect. Can carry over into how we see other attributes about the person.

Social Perception – The Just World Hypothesis

“You got what you deserve”.

The “Just World Hypothesis” - Noble actions performed by an individual, while evil acts are always punished.

 Suggests there is some kind of special force, cosmic justice at play.

 Reason people think in this way because it helps individuals rationalize their good or misfortune. Ex. if I go to

school I will be rewarded in life

 However, world doesn’t always work this way, and using this hypothesis we may blame people in poverty for

being poor.

When the “just world hypothesis” is threatened, we can use these rational techniques

 1. Accept reality

 2. Prevent or correct injustice – with petition or changes to legal system

Irrational techniques can also be used

 1. Denial of the situation

 2. Reinterpreting the events - the outcome, the cause, and the character of the victim.

How do we explain the behavior of other people?

 Attribution Theory – explaining other people’s behavior based on internal vs. external causes

 JWH overemphasizes the internal factors rather than external (fundamental attribution error)

Ethnocentrism and Cultural Relativism - In Group and Outgroup

Judging someone else’s culture from the position of your own culture – ethnocentrism

 Viewing our own culture to be superior to that of others

 Can lead to cultural bias and prejudice

Or you can judge and understand their culture from within their culture – cultural relativism

 No absolute right or wrong, but we have different cultures who are themselves valid.

 Can falter if someone uses it to conduct activities that violate rights of humans no matter what culture they’re

from.

People within groups share psychological connection between peers, related to culture/spirituality.

 “In” group – the one we are connected with. Stronger interactions than with those in the out group, and more

influential as well.

 “Out” group – group we’re not associated with

 Group favouritism – we favour people in our own group, but those in outgroup are neutral – we don’t give them

favours we do to our in group.

 Out group derogation – we are super friendly to our in group, but not friendly to out group – we discriminate.

Happens if we feel that the out group is threatening to the in group’s success.

 Group polarization – Group makes decisions that are more extreme than any individual member in the group

would want. This can turbo charge the group’s viewpoints.

Proximity and the Mere Exposure Effect

Geographical proximity is most powerful predictor of friendships and relationships.

 Mating starts with meeting – we aren’t going to fall in love with someone we don’t meet. Even with social

media, still true.

Mere exposure effect = repeated exposure to novel people or objects increases our liking for them. More often we

see something, more often we like it. Applies to everything – music, numbers, objects, etc.

 There are exceptions, but in general true. Especially with attraction.

 Ex. study where males rated women’s attractiveness, took 2 women rated similarly and placed them in same

class as the male. After 15 classes males rated the woman in their class higher than the other one they initially

rated the same.

 Ex. study with individuals who had anterograde amnesia (retrograde amnesia is loss of memory before accident,

anterograde is loss of memory after). Showed them faces, and show them faces again at later date, some new

some old. Ask individual if they’ve seen before, say no. But if ask which one attractive, they pick the face they’ve

seen before.

 Shows us how subtle this effect is.

 Advertisers know this effect. They depend on the mere exposure effect to sell you different products. More

times we see a brand more likely we are to think positively.

Physical Attraction

What does physical attraction mean, and are there things attractive to all people?

 There are cultural differences, but some things are universal – skin clarity/smoothness, body symmetry. For

women, low waist-hip ratio and full breasts. For men, muscular chest and V-shaped torso.

Facial attraction is more important than body attraction. For women, high forehead/small chin and nose/full

lips/high cheekbone are attractive. For men, strong chin, jaw, cheekbones, and long lower face.

 Both men and women are attracted to high sexual dimorphism – the difference between male and female traits.

 Also averageness – turns out unique traits are not most attractive. Most respondents pick 32 face average as

most attractive, and 2 face average less.

 Even if you average 32 different faces, still looks the same as the average of 32 other faces. Suggests there’s

some prototype.

More subtle things also influence attractiveness – ex. red background more attractive than white background.

 Unrelated physiological arousal also influences attraction – individuals who just walked across narrow bridge

(sympathetic arousal) leads to increased rating of woman. Because during attraction sympathetic arousal occurs

as well, ex. fast heartbeat.

Similarity

How similar someone is to us is huge predictor of attraction.

 Close friends and couples are more likely to share common attitudes, beliefs, and values. We tend to partner up

with people who match our age, race, religion, and economic status/educational level.

 One study showed person is more likely to trust/cooperate with photo of someone whose facial features are

morphed with their own.

 Also more likely to think individual is attractive when their facial features are morphed with their own.

Similarity can help people stay together. Does it help them stay together? Research has shown yes.

 Couples can also stay together due to perceived similarity – because over time interests/beliefs are more

aligned. Become similar as time goes on.

 Could result in a similarity bias – implies we will not befriend people different from us.

 A projection bias is when we assume other share the same beliefs we do.

 False consensus is when we assume everyone else agrees with what we do, even if they do not.

Harlow Monkey Experiments

What causes attachment between mother and child? Scientists used to think it was food.

Scientists conducted the Harlow monkey experiments

 Separated monkeys from mothers at young age, then given choice between 2 substitute mothers (vaguely

monkey-shaped structures).

 First option was wire mother – vaguely face like shape on top of it, and chicken wire wrapped in cylinder.

And in middle was feeding tube.

 Second mother was the cloth mother – same shape/size, but instead of chicken wire had soft cloth blanket

around it, so it can provide comfort.

 Baby monkeys overwhelmingly preferred to cloth mother – spent a large majority of time clinging to her. If

had to eat, tried to eat while staying attached to cloth mother.

 Cloth mother acts as a secure base – eventually monkey is comfortable enough to explore world on its own,

because it knows cloth mother will still be there.

Secure and Insecure Attachment

Babies are passed around, but then around 8 months stranger anxiety sets in. Child ends up being wary of strangers

and even people they know. Some don’t have stranger anxiety though.

Mary Ainsworth’s Strange Situation – done to try to understand why some have stranger anxiety and some don’t.

 Mother and child in room with a stranger, then mom leaves and returns. Wanted to see how child reacts.

 Researchers found children in 2 groups – those with secure attachment and insecure attachment.

 60% were secure. Child was secure with parent and explored room, but when parent left, child was

upset/distressed, but happy when mother returned.

 Insecure children clinged to mother, and stayed with mother and did not explore. When mother left became

upset, but distress did not go away when she came back.

 Others were avoidant – ignored mother when she returned.

What causes this?

 Parenting style

 Those sensitive to child and responsive had secure attachment

 Those insensitive/unresponsive formed insecure attachments.

 Effects after childhood? Yes. Early attachment style forms basis of adult relationships later in life, especially with

intimacy/relationships.

 Parenting styles can be

 Authoritarian

 Permissive

 Authoritative (best).

Aggression

Aggression = any physical/verbal behavior intended to harm or destroy.

Aggression comes from combination of the 3:

 1) Biology:

 Genes (identical twins more aggressive than fraternal twins, and we can breed animals for aggression).

 Circuits in brain can inhibit/facilitate aggression. The amygdala facilitates our fear response, and when

stimulated triggers aggressive behavior. The frontal lobe is responsible for impulse control, criminals have

decreased frontal lobe activation.

 Testosterone is hormone released by testes in men and ovaries in women. High levels of high testosterone

can lead to aggression, muscle building, and wider faces. Can lead to irritability/impulsiveness, and low

tolerance for frustration. Drugs that reduce testosterone reduce aggressive tendencies.

 2) Psychological:

 Frustration-aggression principle, the idea that frustration creates anger which can spark aggression. Higher

temperatures can lead to frustration.

 Reinforcement-modeling can lead to aggression through positive reinforcement. Parents who give into

temper tantrums lead to more temper tantrums in future. Also if parents yell/hit each other, child will pick

up on behavior too.

 3) Socio-cultural

 People act more aggressively in groups (ex. riots) – deindividuation, such as on the internet.

 Social scripts – when people are in new situations they rely on social scripts, or instructions provided by

society on how to act.

 Ex. violent video games model aggressive behavior for them. Viewing media can give them example of

how they should act.

Seems to be a combination of all 3 factors that lead to aggressive factor, not only 1.

Altruism

Studies found connection between volunteerism and future health and well-being. Also higher life satisfaction and

decreased risk for depression/anxiety.

However, altruism can sometimes have ulterior motives.

 Kin selection - people act more altruistically to close kin than distant/non-kin.

 Same when people share last names, especially rare last names.

 Reciprocal altruism - People are also more cooperative if they will interact with that person again in the future.

 We feel more obliged to help those who have helped us.

 Cost signalling – signals to others that person who’s giving has resources. People have increased trust in those

they know have helped others in the past.

Empathy-Altruism Hypothesis – suggests some people are altruistic due to empathy. Those who score higher on

empathy are more altruistic.

 Early developmental trajectory – some newborns cry when other newborns cry. Helping behavior begins

around age 2, children share toys and play act helping. Age 4 actually begin helping.

Social Support

Emotional support – love, trust, caring. The type that involves listening and emphasizing.

 Provided by those closest to you.

Esteem support – expressions of confidence/encouragement.

 Can come from therapists, teachers, coaches.

Informational support – sharing information with us or giving us advice.

 Can come from family/friends or even articles online.

Tangible support – financial support, goods, or services.

 Can come from a bank, people who bring you dinner when you’re sick, or lend you money between jobs.

Companionship support – the type that gives someone sense of social belonging. Companionship while you engage

in an activity.

Social support is major determinant of health and well-being. Can help us deal with stress.

 People with low social support report more symptoms related to depression/anxiety, and alcohol and drug

problems. Also higher risk of deaths from cancer and heart disease.

 Why it’s important to provide support for people around you too.

Status

Status is a person’s social position in society. Each person has many statuses, ex. Son, student, friend, etc. They

affect the type of interactions we have – some equal, some not.

 Ex. Friends are equal, but if you are interacting with professor they are superior to you. Of if you’re

president of school organization you can be superior over members.

 Ascribed statuses – statuses you can’t change, given from birth.

 ex. Prince of royal family

 Achieved status – status you earn yourself after working for it,

 ex. Olympic athlete

Role Strain and Role Conflict

Role strain – when you can’t carry out all obligations of a status, tensions within one status.

 Causes individual to be pulled many directions by one status, ex. a student.

Role conflict – conflict between two different statuses, unlike role strain.

 Ex. someone who’s a parent, friend, husband, and worker.

Primary and Secondary Groups

Primary groups – closest members of the group to you, ex. in a wedding the bridesmaids/groomsmen. They provide

an anchorpoint. You are born into a primary group – your family. Often seen as a source of close human

feeling/emotion.

Secondary groups – formal and business-like relationships, based on a limited purpose/goal. Usually short-term, and

only see them sometimes. Only part of the group to accomplish a task or earn money.

Dramaturgical Approach

Erving Goffman studied nature of people’s interactions. He noticed people planned their conduct, want to guide and

control how they’re seen, and act differently alone than in public.

 Says people do all these things through process of dramaturgy

2 parts of dramaturgy:

 Front stage – when people are in a social setting. Ex. someone watches baseball with friends even if he doesn’t

like baseball. Manipulating how he’s seen to make friends.

 Back stage – more private area of our lives, when act is over. You can be yourself.

Some people are crossing over from back stage to front stage due to social media – putting on a front in their

backstage to make a good impression.

Impression management

Impression management – our attempt to control how others see us on the front stage. There are multiple front

stages, and you have to play a different role every time.

Backstage – where you work on impression management. Ex. put on makeup, look in mirror and try different outfits.

Discrimination – Individual vs. Institutional

Discrimination is differential treatment and harmful actions against minorities. Can be based on different factors

including race, age, religion, etc. Can occur at individual or organizational/institutional level.

 Individual discrimination – ex. a science professor who doesn’t let women into his class.

 Institutional discrimination – governments, banks, etc.

 Example: Brown vs. Board of Education in 1954. In this court case, overturned separate schools for whites

and African-Americans. Brown said these schools aren’t equal, and Africans were being mistreated.

Unintentional discrimination – how policies can discriminate unintentionally

 Side-effect discrimination – talks about how one institution/sector can influence another negatively.

 Ex. a small town where African American always get unfair verdict of guilty. Then while applying to a job

later, don’t get the job because of record. Criminal justice reached unfair verdict, and potential employers

are swayed too.

 Past-In-Present discrimination – how things done in the past, even if no longer allowed they can have

consequences for people in the present.

 Ex. After Brown vs. Board verdict, but girl in integrated school still doesn’t feel welcome in her classroom.

Prejudice vs. Discrimination

Prejudice = attitudes that prejudge a group, usually negative and not based on facts. Make same assumptions about

everyone in a group without considering their differences. (cognition)

 Ex. CEO doesn’t think women are capable of running a team.

Discrimination = differential treatment and harmful actions against minorities. (action)

 Ex. say there’s a woman who’s very good at the job, but doesn’t promote her just because she’s a women.

Organizations and Bureaucratization

Organizations and bureaucracies play a large role on our lives.

Organizations are institutions designed for a specific purpose, and try to achieve maximum efficiency.

 Ex. Postal Service, McDonalds, etc.

 Utilitarian Organizations – members are paid/rewarded for their efforts, ex. Businesses and government jobs,

and universities.

 Normative Organizations – members come together through shared goals, ex. religion groups or MADD.

Positive sense of unity and purpose.

 Coercive Organization – members don’t have choice about membership, ex. people in a prison, or the military.

Organizations achieve maximum efficiency through bureaucracy – the rules, structures, and rankings that guide

organizations.

 Bureaucratization - process by which organizations become increasingly governed by laws and policy.

 Ex. customer service, move through 12 menu options before reaching someone to help you.

 Iron rule of oligarchy – even most democratic of organizations become more bureaucratic over time until

they’re governed by select few.

 Why? Once person gains leadership role they might be hesitant to give it up. Also have skills that make

them valuable.

 McDonaldization – fast food organizations have come to dominate other organizations in society. Principles of

efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control – have dominated everything, from medicine to sporting

events to entertainment

 Ex. Movie theatres all look and work similarly, with same brands and movies.

Characteristics of an Ideal Bureaucracy

Max Weber (sociologist) studied structure of organizations,

5 main characteristics of an ideal bureaucracy, regardless of goal of organization:

 Division of labour – people are trained to do specific tasks.

 Pro – people are better at tasks, and increased efficiency.

 Con – increase alienation in workers, separating them from other works, and they don’t see work from

beginning to end. Also trained incapacity, where workers are so specialized lose touch with overall picture.

 Hierarchy of organization – each position is under supervision of higher authority.

 Pro – clarify who’s in command

 Con – deprive people of voice in decision making, and shirk responsibility, especially in unethical tasks. Also

allows them to hide mistakes.

 Written rules and regulations

 Pro – clear expectations, uniform performance, equal treatment of all employees, and sense of

unity/continuity to organization.

 Con – stiffens creativity, and if too much structure discourages employees from taking initiative. Goal

displacement (rules become more important than goals)

 Impersonality – how individuals and officials conduct activities in unbiased manner

 Pro - equal treatment

 Con – alienation, discourage loyalty to the group

 Employment based on technical qualifications –hiring in bureaucracy is based on qualifications on person has

and not favouritism

 Pro – decrease discrimination

 Con – decrease ambition (only secure job and do nothing more). Peter Principle, where every employee in

hierarchy keeps getting promoted until they reach level of incompetence.

Animal Communication

Humans communicate with each other through language, non-verbal cues (smile, frown, etc)., and visual cues (ex.

painting rooms pink vs. black)

 Other animals have ways of communicating as well, with many non-verbal cues and visual cues, and other cues

not used by humans.

Who are animals communicating with?

 Members of same species, or members of other species like humans.

 Autocommunication – can give information to themselves. Ex. bats and echolocation

What are they trying to communicate?

 Mating rituals, to attract opposite sex

 To establish/defend territory

 To convey information about food location

 Alarm calls, to warn others about predators

 Signal dominance and submission

Watch about for anthropomorphism – attributing human characteristics to non-human animals, ex. pet sleeping

with you at night.

Types of Animal Communication

 Sound – can convey a lot of information

 Ex. mating calls, warning sounds, etc. Useful because it’s fast, can reach many, but not very private and

exposes the animal’s location.

 Chemical signals – Gain info from the environment through smells. They can release scents called pheromones.

Can detect predators using smell, or presence of other animals. Tends to be a lot slower than sound, but a lot

longer lasting. But can be “noisy” – a lot of chemical signals in a given area.

 Somatosensory communication – Touch and movement.. Can also convey food location (bees), pair bonding

(birds cuddle/prune mates), body language. Also seismic communication (ex. movement of bug in spider’s web

signals to spider to find it), electro-communication (fish)

 Ex. mating dances

 Visual cues – to find a mate

 Ex. color on birds. Mimicry, camouflage.