Solomon Asch - conformity study 1955; will the participant conform to what the other participants “see” even though it’s wrong
Conformity is more likely if:
- we feel incompetent or insecure
- large group
- group is unanimous
- we admire an individual in group
- answer is visual
- from a culture that values social norms
Normative social influence - we want to gain approval (sensitive to social norms)
Informational social influence - we want to be seen as having the correct answer (sensitivity to being wrong)
- We do this to empathize and have a greater linkage with people
Stanley Milgram - shock experiment; promotes the question: Will people do unethical things to obey authority?
Conformity - complying with social pressures
- Chameleon effect - life’s natural tendencies to mimic another (similar to mood linkage but with behavior)
- social norms - understood rules for accepted and expected behavior
Philip Zimbardo - Stanford Prison Experiment 1971
Obedience - following orders
- Obedience is highest when:
- the person giving orders was close at hand and perceived to be an authority figure
- the authority figure was supported by a prestigious university
- the victim was personalized or at a distance
- there were no role models for defiance
Attribution & Persuasion
Attribution - when we try to figure out why someone is behaving the way they are
- Dispositional attribution - we assume that a person’s behavior results from who they are (stable personality traits)
- Situational attribution - a person’s behavior results from the situation they’re in
- Fundamental attribution error - we have a tendency to attribute people’s behavior to their disposition far too often and we underestimate the impact of the situation
Persuasion:
- Central route persuasion - attempting to convince someone of something using specific, detailed arguments about the thing itself (effective for big decisions)
- Peripheral route persuasion - attempting to convince someone of something using incidental cues sometimes not even related to the thing (small decisions)
- ex. Celebrity endorsement
- Foot-in-the-door phenomenon - if a person first agrees to a small request, they’re more likely to agree to a 2nd larger request
- Door-in-the-face phenomenon - starting with an unreasonable request (that is larger than what you’re looking for) then scaling it back to what you’re actually looking for
Leon Festinger - 1950s
- Cognitive Dissonance theory - when our thoughts/beliefs and behaviors are inconsistent with one another, we feel uncomfortable
Biases/Errors in Thinking
The Just World phenomenon - the belief that people get what they deserve
Self-fulfilling prophecies - when we are convinced that a situation will have a particular outcome, we (usually unconsciously) direct our behavior toward that outcome
The Spotlight effect - we assume that people are paying more attention to our behavior than they actually are
Hindsight bias - the tendency to think “I knew it all along” even if we didn’t actually predict the event that happened
Confirmation bias - once we have formed an opinion about a person or thing, we only look at evidence that supports that opinion
Belief perseverance - we stick to our beliefs, even when presented with evidence that they might be incorrect
Self-serving Bias - the tendency to interpret situations in a way that benefits ourselves
Group Behavior
Social facilitation - strengthened performance in others’ presence
- on tougher tasks, people perform worse when observed
Social loafing - the tendency for people in a group to exert less effort when pooling their efforts toward attaining a common goal than when individually accountable
- Causes:
- people acting as part of a group feel less accountable
- group members may view their individual contributions as dispensable
- when group members share equally in benefits regardless of how much they contribute
Deindividuation - the loss of self-awareness and self-restraint occurring in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity
Group Polarization - the enhancement of a group’s prevailing inclinations through discussion within the group
Groupthink - the mode of thinking that occurs when the desire for harmony in a decision-making group overrides a realistic appraisal of alternatives
The Power of Individuals:
- social control - the power of the situation
- personal control - the power of the individual
Cultural influences:
- culture - the enduring behaviors, ideas, attitudes, values, and traditions shared by a group of people and transmitted from one generation to the next
- norm - an understood rule for accepted and expected behavior
The Bystander effect - anyone given bystander is less likely to give help if other bystanders are present
- diffusion of responsibility
- In order for us to intervene in a situation we must:
- notice the incident
- interpret the situation as an emergency
- we have to take on personal responsibility and tell ourselves “I have to help”
- The best odds of someone giving help occur when:
- the person appears to be in need and deserves help
- they’re in some way similar to us
- they’re a woman
- we have observed someone else being helpful
- we’re not in a hurry
- we’re in a small town or rural area
- we’re feeling guilty
- we’re focused on others and not preoccupied
- we’re in a good mood
Aggression
Aggression - any physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt or destroy
The biology of aggression:
- genetic influences (nature)
- neural influences (nurture)
Psychological & Social-cultural factors:
- frustration-aggression principle - the principle that frustration (the blocking of an attempt to achieve some goal) creates anger, which generates aggression
- Social script - culturally modeled guide for how to act in various situations
Attraction & Love
Mere exposure effect - repeated exposure to a thing or person usually increases our liking of it
Physical attractiveness - usually the first thing we notice, impacts first impressions of their personality
- doesn’t seem to be related to our own self-esteem
Reward Theory of attraction - argues that we develop attraction/relationships with people we have positive fulfilling interactions with
- interactions like this activate the brain’s reward system
Romantic Love:
- Passionate love - strongest at the beginning f relationships; intense feelings of passion towards another person (obsessed); fades over time
- Companionate love - a sense of attachment and the feeling of connection with the other person
Prejudice/Stereotyping/Discrimination
Prejudice - an unjustifiable, usually negative, attitude about a group of people
- 3 parts:
- Beliefs (usually stereotypes)
- Emotions (hostility, fear)
- Predisposition to action (discrimination)
- Roots of Prejudice
- Just world phenomenon - in a “haves” vs “have not” situation, “haves” use it to justify what they have
- Us (ingroup) vs them (outgroup) mentality resulting from our human desire to belong and fit into groups
- Ingroup bias - favoring our own group, sometimes to a dangerous extent (ex nationalism)
- Scapegoat theory - when things go wrong we find someone to blame it on
- provides an outlet for frustration and anger
- We have a strong need to categorize (simplifies a complicated world)
- Other-race effect - tendency to recall faces of our own race better than faces of other races
- Outgroup homogeneity - we perceive members of other races as being more similar than they are
Prejudice - holding an erroneous (wrong) brief about a group
Stereotypes - a common type of erroneous belief ( all members of a group share some characteristics)
Discrimination - acting on an erroneous belief
Altruism, Conflict, & Peacemaking
Altruism - unselfish regard for the welfare of others
The Norms for Helping:
- Social exchange theory - the theory that our social behavior is an exchange process, the aim of which is to maximize benefits and minimize the costs
- Respricocity norms - an expectation that people will help, not hurt, those who have helped them
- Social-responsibility norm - an expectation that people will help those needing their help
Conflict and Peacemaking:
- conflict - a perceived incompatibility of actions, goals, or ideas
- social trap - a situation in which the conflicting g parties, by each rationally pursuing their self-interest rather than the good of the group, become caught in mutually destructive behavior
- Mirror image perceptions - mutual views often held by conflicting people
- Self-fulfilling prophecy - a belief that leads to its own fulfillment
- Superordinate goals - shared goals that override differences among people and require their cooperation
- GRIT - graduated and reciprocated initiatives in tension - reduction a strategy designed to decrease international tensions
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