Social Psychology

1. Social Psychology The borderland with sociology Social thinking Social influence Social relations

2. Social psychology • How do the ways we think, feel, and act change as we participate in groups? • Do we think differently about members of a group when we become part of the group? • Why do we act differently in different situations?

3. Social thinking • How do we think about each other? • Product of nurture? • Is social thinking learned? If so, how? • Is social thinking a kind of problem-solving thinking? • When does social thinking become abnormal? Was the social thinking of the 9/11 terrorists deranged?

4. Social thinking: Thinking about others • Heider (1958) and attribution theory • Attributions are explanations of the thoughts, feelings, or actions of others. • Attributions may be dispositional, relying on personality for explanations, or situational. • The fundamental attribution error is to emphasize dispositional attributions.

5. Do attributions matter? • They affect the way we judge others’ motives. • They relate to happiness in marriage. • Happily married people use situational attributions, while unhappily married people use dispositional attributions. • They relate to social and political attitudes. • Try to take the actor’s viewpoint.

6. Attitudes and actions • Attitudes and actions are in a dynamic interaction. • Attitudes often have little effect on action: we frequently act as hypocrites.

7. When do attitudes affect acts? • 1. When outside influences are weak • 2. When attitudes are specifically connected to specific behaviors • 3. When we focus on our attitudes • Reminders help: the phylactery effect • Frequent rehearsal of attitudes helps

8. When do actions affect attitudes? • When we start with small actions: the foot-in-the-door phenomenon • Agreement to small requests • Succumbing to small temptations • Defense mechanism: Rationalization • The principle works for good actions, too • Make small choices to do the right thing

9. More ways actions affect attitudes • Role playing • Being a college student • Being married • The Stanford prison study (Zimbardo, 1972) • Cognitive dissonance (Festinger) • Even writing essays changes attitudes • Act loving and you become loving: I John.

10. Social influence • Conformity • Group influence • Individualism

11. Conformity • We unconsciously imitate others • In behavior • In mood • Reciprocity of liking: Mimic effects • The chameleon effect (Chartrand & Bargh, 1999) • Group pressure (Asch, 1955)

12. When am I most likely to conform? • When I feel incompetent or insecure • When the group is at least three people, including me. • When I am without support • When I want to fit in and be accepted • When I am uncommitted • When I am being watched • When I am from a collectivist society

13. Reasons for conforming • Normative social influence • Informational social influence • Especially influential when the decision is important and difficult • Obedience to authority • Milgram’s studies: • Proximal authority figure • Support of a prstigious institution • Depersonalized victim • No role models for defiance

14. Milgram’s experiment