The world of social psychology

1. Psych 120General PsychologyChristopher GadeOffice: 1030AOffice hours: MW 4:30-5:30Email: gadecj@gmail.comClass MW 1:30-4:30 Room 2240

2. The world of social psychology • Social psychologists examine the world from a number of angles. Their goal is to study the interaction of people with and within their environment. This can be done in a number of different ways. • This class will cover some of the major perspectives taken by social psychologists in today’s world. • Forming perceptions of others • Developing opinions and changing these opinions • The influence of others on us (conformity)

3. Forming perceptions of others • There are a number of critical questions that are raised when discussing the formation of perceptions. • When are these perceptions formed? • Do we form perceptions of groups in the same way that we form perceptions of individuals? • Can and how do we change these perceptions? • Are our perceptions of others formed in the same way as our perceptions of ourselves?

4. When are our perceptions ofothers formed? • Primacy effect – the first information learned about someone influences us more that later information • This means that first impressions are very important. • Why is this the case? • Self-fulfilling prophecies – expectations that change one’s own behavior in such a way as to increase the probability of the predicted event. • The beautiful people example • The Pygmalion effect • 11:50-13:50

5. Stereotypes and Prejudices • In the same way that we form perceptions of individuals, we also form perceptions of groups. • Stereotypes – a generalized belief or expectation about a group of people. • Stereotypes can be both bad and good. • Stereotypes are often beneficial and necessary. • Prejudice – an unfavorable attitude toward a group of people. • Prejudices can be based on almost anything imaginable and be learned in a very short period of time. • 5:47-11:48 • Discrimination – unequal treatment of different groups.

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7. So how do we form perceptions of others and ourselves? • Attributions - the set of thought processes we use to assign causes to behavior. • Internal attributions – explaining behaviors based on the internal characteristics of the person in question. • External attributions – explaining behaviors based on the situation and surrounding environment.

8. Attribution tendencies we have when describing the behavior of others? • Fundamental attribution error – our tendency to attribute behaviors to internal attributions when looking at the behaviors of others. • Pro/Anti-Castro essay example • Differences amongst cultures • 1:50-5:00

9. Is our attribution tendencies different for ourselves? • Actor-observer effect – the tendency to make internal attributions for others, while making external attributions for ourselves. • This actor effect can be found in the descriptions of familiar others as well. • Self/Family Member/Walter Cronkite example • Self-serving bias – the tendency to attribute personal failures to the situation, while attributing personal successes to the ourselves.

10. So what have we learned? • How and when perceptions of others are formed. • The shortcomings of and ways to reduce the pervasiveness of these perceptions. • Our attribution tendencies of ourselves and others.

11. In the next part of class… • Attitudes and persuasion.

13. What are we going to focus on now? • Attitude is a like or dislike that influences our behavior. • Persuasion: the changing or formation of an attitude through information. • Central route to persuasion – seriously evaluate the evidence • Making a decision based on the argument. • Peripheral route to persuasion – evaluate unimportant factors (i.e. appearance) • Making a decision based on the amount of clapping.

14. When are these routes of persuasion effective? • When the argument is… • Intelligent and of interest • Critical for central routes, not for peripheral • Not presented as an attempt at persuasion • Forewarning effect: the reduced effectiveness of a persuasive message due to the awareness and resistance of the purpose of the message. • The first argument • Inoculation effect: the reduced effectiveness of a good argument if it follows a weak one.

15. What increases the power of persuasion? • Fear • Similarity • Group Endorsement • Individual Testimonies • More effective through authority figures

16. Specific Strategies for Persuasion • Foot-in-door technique • Start with modest request • Door-in-the-face technique • Start with an outrageous request • Bait-and-switch technique • Start with a great deal and then make additional demands • That’s-not-all technique • Make an offer, then improve it before the response

17. What principle do most of these persuasion techniques operate on? • Most of us believe that our attitudes influence our behaviors, however, that’s not true all of the time. • Cognitive dissonance: A change in behavior alters a change in attitude. In other words, sometimes what we do influences what we think. • Festinger’s cog turning task • Participants performed a boring task for a long period of time • There then asked to promoting that boring task to the next participant • Their incentive was being paid $1 or $20 • Their perception of the task was changed as a result of this difference in pay.

19. Conformity • Why do we conform? • Forms of conformity • Conformity surrounding us • Conformity in ambiguous situations • Conformity in unambiguous situations • How do we increase conformity? • Do we conform in our lack of action?

20. Why do we conform? • Conformity – maintaining or changing one’s behavior to match the behavior or expectations of others • But why do we conform? • Uncertainty? – we don’t know what to do in most novel situations, so we mimic the behavior of others • Norms – a set of behaviors or rules that define the proper behavior in a situations. • classroom behavior • Learned responses – conformity can result from the continual presentation of appropriate responses to situations. • “Hi, how’s it going?” • Reflexes? – a lot of our conformity is uncontrollable and even unrecognized. • Clapping example • Smiling/laughing example

21. Other forms of conformity in our environment • Clothing • Notebooks/ computers • “Center of attention” • Material being presented

22. Conformity in ambiguous situations • A lot of our conformity is a result of the fact that there is no true appropriate behavior or responses in most situations. • When presented with ambiguous situations, people look to others in an attempt to perceive what is best to do… we’ll get back to this later. • This conformity in ambiguous situations has also been found to overlap into ambiguous stimuli as well. • Autokinetic effect example

23. But what about unambiguous situations? • We conform to ambiguous situations because we often don’t know what the right answer/response is. • We certainly don’t conform to the group in situations where there is an obvious correct answer/response… right? • Solomon Asch’s line study experiments

24. What influences the likelihood of conformity? • The number of people in the majority • The magic #3 • The presence of an “ally” • The social situation’s requirement to conform • Need for speed • Need for unanimity • The ambiguity of the situation (sometimes) • The “collectivist”, or “individualist” nature of the individual being tested

27. Do we conform in our lack of action? • Kitty Genovese example • Diffusion of responsibility – we tend to feel less responsibility to act when other people nearby are equally able to act. • Communication exercise example • Pluralistic ignorance – assumption that everyone else has a better idea of how to act in a situation. • Smoke example