Social Psychology

1. Social Psychology Social Psychology - Studying the way people think about, influence and relate to others. Attitude Attraction Group Behavior Aggression

2. Thinking about ourselves and others • Attribution Theory - how we explain others’ behavior - by attributing it either to their • Situational Attribution • External • Dispositional Attribution • Internal • Example: • Student’s hostility • Situational – • Dispositional –

4. Fundamental Attribution Error How do you view your teacher’s behavior? • Fundamental attribution error - tendency to overestimate the role of factors and factors • More common in Individualistic cultures • Avoid by observing people in Can be attributed to: • Self-serving bias – If you win it is because you are awesome…if you lose, it must have been the coach …We (Solon) won they game …They (Solon) lost the game

5. Attitudes • Attitudes - Feelings, based on beliefs, that guide our behavior • Advertising is ALL based on attitude formation.

6. 4 Ways Attitudes Affect Actions • Central Route of Persuasion - opinion change from thoughtful focus on • Example: • Peripheral Route Persuasion –opinion change through (Speakers attractiveness, endorsement of famous person, emotion evoking music or images) • Example: • Social Pressure • Vivid, Easily recalled information

7. 5 Ways Actions Affect Attitudes • Foot-in-the-door phenomenon – persuasion technique to get someone to agree first to a small request to get them to comply later with a larger request • Example: • Door-in-the-face phenomenon – persuasion technique to get someone to comply by first making an extremely large request, then requesting something smaller • Example: • Norms of reciprocity – social expectation that people will respond to each other in kind • Example:

8. Role-Playing Affects Attitudes 4. Role Playing • Role– set of behaviors for a specific social position • Zimbardo - Stanford Prison Study • Abu Ghraib

9. Cognitive Dissonance 5. Cognitive Dissonance Theory (Festinger) - Discomfort we feel when your thoughts and behaviors or two thoughts are inconsistent • People want to have consistent attitudes and behaviors….when they are not they experience dissonance (unpleasant tension). • Usually they will change their attitude sometimes their behavior. • Example: The teacher was really bad so in that class it is OK. You have a belief that cheating on tests is bad. But you cheat on a test!!!

10. Fetzinger’s study

12. Conformity and Obedience • Chameleon effect- unconsciously mimicking others’ expressions, postures and voice tones • Example: • Mood linkage – sharing up and down moods of others • Example:

13. Conformity • Conformity - Adjusting one’s behavior or thinking to coincide with a group standard. • Example:

14. Asch’s Study of Conformity

15. Asch’s Conformity Experiment • Independent Variable • Dependent Variable • Operational Definition • Confounding Variables

16. Asch’s Results • About 1/3 of the participants conformed. • 70% conformed at least once. Conditions that Strengthen Conformity: • The group is • You are within the group or made to feel incompetent • The group is at • You • You had made • Others in the group • Your culture

17. Reasons for Conforming Normative social influence - desire to gain approval/avoid rejection • Example: Informational social influence - Accepting other peoples opinions about reality • Example

18. Milgram’s Study Of Obedience Independent Variable Dependent Variable Operational Definition Ethics Other tests: Prestige of the setting, Proximity of Authority, Presence of rebellious peers

19. Results of the Milgram Study

20. What did we learn from Milgram? • Ordinary people can do shocking things – evils can grow out of compliance to others’ evils • Factors that increase obedience: • Experimenter • Learner • Experiment associated with prestigious location • Lower Obedience – Learner observed other participants • Ethics

21. David's history teacher asked him why so many German people complied with Hitler's orders to systematically slaughter millions of innocent Jews. David suggested that the atrocities were committed because the Germans had become unusually cruel, sadistic people with abnormal and twisted personalities. Use your knowledge of the fundamental attribution error and Milgram's research on obedience to highlight the weaknesses of David's explanation.

22. Social Facilitation Theory • Social Facilitation – stronger performance in the presence of others • If you are really good at something (well learned tasks)….or it is an easy task…you will perform BETTERin front of a group. • - If it is a difficult task or you are not very good at it…youwill perform WORSE in front of a group • Example:

23. Social Loafing • Social Loafing - the tendency for people in a group to exert less effort when pooling efforts toward a common goal than if they were individually accountable. • Example –

24. Deindividuation • Deindividuation – presence of others arouses people and diminishes their responsibility. • Feel anonymous and aroused. • Example -

25. A crowd at a soccer game starts to boo, yell at the home team, and throw cups and trash at the players after the team loses a very close match. Explain how social facilitation and deindividuation contribute to the crowd's behavior.

26. Group Polarization • Group polarization - If a group is like-minded, discussion strengthens its prevailing opinion. • Groups tend to make more extreme decisions than the individual. • Example:

28. Groupthink • Groupthink - Group members suppress reservations about the ideas supported by the group. • Desire for • Worse in groups—(group polarization). • Avoided when leader • Example:

29. If representatives from the Republican and Democratic parties gathered to discuss a minimum wage bill, how might the concepts of group polarization and groupthink influence the discussion and eventual vote?

30. Cultural Influence • Culture – behaviors, attitudes, ideas, values shared by a group • Example: • Culture within animals • Culture in humans • Preservation of innovation • Division of labor

31. Variations Across Cultures • Norm – rules for accepted and expected behavior • Example: • – the buffer zone we like to maintain around our bodies • North Americans prefer more than Latin Americans • Pace of life • Expressiveness

32. Variation Over Time • Changes over the generations

33. The Power of Individuals • Social control – regulation of peoples behavior through social norms • Example • Personal control – the power of the individual to do the opposite of what is socially accepted • Example – • Minority influence – the power of one or two individuals to sway majorities

34. Social Relations –how we relate to one another: prejudice, aggression, attraction, altruism, peacemaking

36. Stereotypes, Prejudice and Discrimination Stereotype - Overgeneralized beliefs about a group of people. • Example: Prejudice - unjustifiable and usually negative attitude toward a group and its members • 3 components: • Example: Discrimination - An action based on a prejudice (behavior). • Example:

37. PrejudiceHow Prejudiced Are People?

38. Automatic Prejudice

39. Automatic Prejudice • Implicit racial associations: harboring unconscious racial associations • Unconscious patronization: evaluate performance based on racial stereotypes • low expectations result in inflated praise and insufficient criticism hindering minority student’s academic achievement • Racial influenced perceptions - people more often mistakenly shot targets who were black. • Seeing black – the more a person’s facial features are perceived as typical of their racial category, the more likely they are to elicit race-based responding. • Reflexive boldly responses – studies have detected implicit prejudice in facial responses and activation of amygdala– demonstrates implicit prejudice.

40. Is it just race? NO • Palestinians and Jews • Homosexual and Heterosexual • Men and Women But women have some things going for them like……

41. Which person would you want to have a long term relationship with?

42. Social Roots of Prejudice Solon vs. Twinsburg • Social inequalities – justify stereotypes • Blame the victim dynamic – victims of mistreatment are held partially responsible for their problems • Example: • Social Identities – portion our self-concept derived from perceived membership in a social group • In-Group – people with whom we share a common identity • Example: • Out-group – People with whom we don’t share a common identity • Example: • In Group Bias – tendency to favor our own group • Example: Girls rule, boys drool

43. Emotional Roots of Prejudice • Scapegoat Theory – theory that prejudice offers an outlet for anger by providing someone to blame • Example:

44. Cognitive Roots of Prejudice • Categorization • Out-group homogeneity – overestimating the similarity within other groups • Example: • Other-race effect (aka own-race bias, or cross-race effect) – the tendency to recall faces of ones own group more accurately than faces of other races • Example: • Vivid cases – tend to remember vivid cases more easily • Just-world phenomenon – tendency to believe that people get what they deserve • Hindsight bias • Example

45. Jill, a female employee at ACME Industries, recently complained that she had been sexually harassed by one of her male supervisors. • Write a comment from a male worker that would demonstrate in-group bias. • Write a comment that would demonstrate scapegoat theory. • Write a comment that would demonstrate the cognitive roots of prejudice.

46. Upon hearing of the complaint from Jill , Kurt, a fellow employee, commented, “If the women around here would stop some of their flirting, they'd be left alone.” Bryan, another co-worker, quickly added, “If the women in this country stopped trying to act like men, they'd all be treated with more respect.” Explain how these insensitive remarks illustrate some of the social, emotional, and cognitive roots of prejudice.

47. Psychology of Aggression • Aggression – any physicalor verbal behavior intended to hurt or destroy • Always involves • Varies from • Not

48. Which of these are Aggression? • Two men fight for a piece of bread • The warden of the prison executes a convicted criminal • A boxer gives his opponent a bloody nose • A hunter kills an animal and mounts it as a trophy • A man viciously kicks a cat

49. The Biology of Aggression • Genetic Influences • Neural Influences • Biochemical Influences

50. Aggression Theories Aversive Events • Frustration-aggression principle – blocking an attempt to achieve a goal creates anger • Fight or flight reaction to stress • Adverse stimuli – physical pain, insults, high temperatures etc. can create anger • Example: Social and cultural influences • Reinforcement – experience has taught that aggression pays • Aggression higher when: • Aggression-replacement program –