Social Psychology and Personality - Key Concepts

Social Influence

  • Informational Influence: Conforming due to belief others have accurate information.
  • Normative Influence: Conforming to be liked and accepted.
  • Normative Social Influence: Conforming to gain approval, driven by the need for acceptance and the power of others.
  • Compliance: Involves public agreement but private disagreement.

The Art of Persuasion

  • Persuasive Individuals: Often possess authority, expertise, attractiveness, likeability, and trustworthiness.

Central vs Peripheral Route to Persuasion

  • Central Route: High-effort processing of persuasive messages, leading to lasting attitude change.
  • Peripheral Route: Low-effort processing influenced by cues outside the message, leading to temporary attitude change.
  • Correlation: A person's level of need for cognition correlates with central route processing.

Halo Effect

  • Definition: Cognitive bias where overall impression influences judgment of character.

Persuasion Techniques

  • Foot-in-the-Door: Small request followed by a larger one.
  • Low-Balling: Securing agreement then increasing the cost.
  • Door-in-the-Face: Large request refused, followed by a smaller one.

Conformity

  • Asch's Experiment: Demonstrated conformity, where individuals agreed with incorrect answers.
  • Factors Influencing Conformity:
    • Group size (3+)
    • Group Cohesiveness
    • Gender (women conform more)
    • Social Status (lower status conforms more)
    • Culture (collectivist cultures conform more)
    • Unanimity (conformity decreases if one person dissents)

Group Dynamics

  • Groupthink: Ignoring alternatives to maintain group cohesion.
  • Group Polarization: Strengthening of the group's predominant opinion after discussion.

Obedience

  • Milgram's Experiment: Demonstrated obedience to authority, even when it conflicts with personal judgment.
  • Ethical Concerns: Deception and potential harm to participants.

Social Behavior

  • Diffusion of Responsibility: Reduced likelihood of helping when more people are present.
  • Bystander Effect: Less help in emergencies when others are present.
  • Altruism: Selfless sacrifice for others.
  • Deindividuation: Reduced self-awareness and responsibility in a group.
  • Social Facilitation: Enhanced performance on simple tasks in the presence of others but impaired performance on difficult tasks.

Psychodynamic Theory

  • Emphasis: Unconscious, repressed memories, free association, dream analysis.
  • Less emphasis on sexual instincts than Freud.

Defense Mechanisms

  • Purpose: Protect the ego by distorting reality and reducing anxiety, especially cognitive dissonance.
  • Examples:
    • Repression: Unconsciously blocking disturbing thoughts.
    • Denial: Refusing to accept reality.
    • Projection: Attributing unacceptable feelings to others.
    • Displacement: Redirecting impulses to a substitute object.
    • Regression: Reverting to immature behavior.
    • Sublimation: Channeling impulses into socially acceptable behavior.
    • Rationalization: Justifying behaviors with acceptable reasons.
    • Reaction Formation: Adopting beliefs contrary to one's own.

Personality Assessment

  • Projective Tests: Use ambiguous stimuli to reveal inner dynamics (e.g., Rorschach, TAT).

Social Norms

  • Reciprocity Norm: Repaying actions of others.
  • Social Responsibility Norm: Helping those dependent on or in need, even without reward.

Social Issues

  • Social Loafing: Reduced effort in group tasks.
  • False Consensus Effect: Overestimating how common one's opinions are.
  • Superordinate Goals: Goals that unite opposing groups.
  • Social Traps: Short-term reward leads to long-term loss.

Workplace Psychology

  • Industrial/Organizational Psychology: Focuses on worker productivity and satisfaction.

Cognitive Biases

  • Assumed-Similarity Bias: Assuming others are similar to oneself.
  • Self-Serving Bias: Taking credit for successes and blaming failures on external factors.
  • Fundamental Attribution Error: Overemphasizing dispositional factors and underestimating situational factors in others' behavior.
  • Actor-Observer Bias: Attributing one's own behavior to situational factors while attributing others' behavior to dispositional factors.

Prejudice and Discrimination

  • Theories of Prejudice:
    • Observational Learning
    • Social Identity
  • Ways to Reduce Prejudice:
    • Increase contact
    • Expose to anti-prejudicial values
    • Educate about positive characteristics of those prejudiced against

Attraction

  • Mere Exposure Effect: Preference for familiar people and experiences.
  • Factors Leading to Attraction:
    • Positive evaluation
    • Shared opinions
    • Good physical appearance
    • Familiarity
    • Proximity

Beliefs

  • Just-World Phenomenon: Belief that the world is fair and people get what they deserve.

Personality

  • Definition: Organization of distinguishing characteristics, traits, or habits.
  • Includes unique ways of behaving, experiencing the environment, feeling, and thinking.

Personality Tests

  • Considerations:
    • Test creation
    • Applicability
    • Interpretation
    • Reliability and validity