Social psychology

1. Social psychology • Concerned with how others influence the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of the individual • Social thinking • When something unexpected occurs, we analyze why people act as they do • is she warm to all people she has just met, or is she interested in me?

2. Explaining other’s and our own behavior • Attribution theory • Heider (1958) people try to decide whether someone’s behavior is the result of internal or external causes

3. Internal Attributions • Explanations based on someone’s stable characteristics • Attitudes, personality traits, abilities • They are smart

4. External Attributions • Explanations based on the situation • The environment, events of the day, rewards or penalties for acting that way • They have a lot of people around them to help them make smart decisions

5. Errors people make • Fundamental Attribution Error • Tendency to infer internal attributions for other people’s behavior even when they see evidence for external influences

6. Actor-observer effect • We are more likely to assume internal attributions for other’s behavior than our own. • Actor = explain your own behavior. • I fell off my bike because the sidewalk was bumpy • external attribution • observer = explain someone else’s behavior • they fell off their bike because they are clumsy • internal attribution

7. Self-serving bias • We say our positive behaviors reflect internal attributes • Good test score = I’m smart • But our negative behaviors reflect external attributes • Bad test score = Bad test

8. Handicapping strategies • Intentionally putting yourself at a disadvantage to provide an excuse for an expected failure • partying until 3 am on the night before an exam you expect to do poorly on. • provides an external attribute for something the person feels he or she is poor at (internal attribute). • I was really hung over, how could I do well?

9. Stanford Prison experiment Zimbardo (1972) • College students volunteered to spend time in a simulated prison • randomly assigned • Guards - uniforms, billy clubs, whistles, and instructed to enforce certain rules • prisoners - locked in a barren cell, forced to wear humiliating outfits • First day or two the people self-consciously played their roles

10. then it got real - too real • guards had mean attitudes - and devised cruel and degrading routines • prisoners - broke down, rebelled, or became passively resigned. • Study called off after only 6 days • What we do we gradually become

11. Conformity • Asch • Originally 37% conformity • 75% conformed at least once • Yielding • Small percentage believed the majority was correct • Most did not have confidence in their own judgements • Some did not want the confederates to think there was something wrong with them • Independent • Knew majority was wrong and had confidence in their own judgements • Strong need to remain independent – nonconformists • Wanted to perform well on the task

12. Obedience to Authority • Would an ordinary person placed in an extraordinary situation obey an authority and inflict pain on an innocent victim.

13. Milgram’s study • Participate with another person • Confederate • Experiment is about the effects of punishment on learning • One person will be the teacher • The other will be the learner • The drawing was rigged • The subject was always the teacher • Deliver increasingly stronger shocks for incorrect answers • Please continue • The experiment requires that you continue

14. 65% of subjects went all the way to the end of the shock meter • Danger: Severe Shock --- XXX