PSYC2020 Fundamentals of Social Psychology
(First Semester, 2015-2016)
Teaching Team
C. Harry Hui
662 Jockey Club
Tower, 3917 2291,
huiharry@hku.hk
Office hours: Thu 8:30-9:30 am or by
appointment
Ka Wai Ng
(Coordinating
tutor)
618 Jockey Club
Tower, 3917 8228,
kawaing@hku.hk
Office hour: Thu 2:30-3:30 pm
Wendy Lau
613 Jockey Club
Office hour: Tue 3:30-4:30 pm
Tower, 3917 8226
wendylauhku@gmail.
com
Livia Yuliawati
680 Jockey Club
Tower, 3917 7386
liviapsy@hku.hk
Office hour: Tue 2:00-3:00 pm
Learning Objectives and Learning Outcomes
After taking this course, students will
 understand major theories and research findings on how individuals are affected by
and affecting their social environment
 be able to apply social psychological concepts in the interpretation of everyday
problems we encounter
 be able to articulate and present, both orally and in writing, their understanding and
application of social psychology
Coursework Assessment
You will be continuously assessed against the above learning objectives:

Tutorial participation and tutorial admission tickets (20 marks): You will be
required to have an “admission ticket” (which is a short written assignment; under
300 words) for most of the tutorials. You may write beyond that word limit, and
your tutor will still make comments on them. However, for the sake of fairness,
marks for the admission ticket will be based on the first 300 words only. (Please
put an asterisk at the 300th word for our easy reference.) You are required to
submit both hard copy and soft copy. Bring the hard copy to the tutorial; upload
the soft copy on Moodle by 11:59 pm on the night before your tutorial.

Quizzes (60 marks): Each quiz will consist of short-answer and/or multiple-choice
questions, and covers class materials and reading assignments including and up to
the week preceding it.
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Quiz
1
2
3
Duration
20 mins
50 mins
50 mins
Marks
10
25
25
Venue will be announced later.
Quizzes 2 and 3 will be cumulative in coverage, although the emphasis will be on
more recent materials.
You may suggest short-answer or multiple-choice items for use in these quizzes.
Email your item, together with the source (e.g., page number), at least a week
before the quiz, to huiharry@hku.hk. The teaching team will have the final
decision on whether and how to use the suggestions in the quizzes.

Group Project (20 marks): In small groups of 3-5 persons you will review the
literature on one of the following topics. Group members do not have to come
from the same tutorial, although it will be more convenient if they are. Provide
information about group membership and topic preference on a form (group
project proposal.doc) downloadable from Moodle. Submit the form to Ms Ka Wai
Ng (kawaing@hku.hk) by 11:59 pm, September 19. (There is a fixed quota for
each topic and arrangement will be on a first-come-first-served basis.) If you want
the teaching team to put you in a group, submit your own name (with your contact
information as well as your topic preference) on the form to Ms. Ka Wai Ng by
11:59 pm, September 18. Students who do neither of the above by the respective
deadlines may be required to do the project on their own. One (1) mark will be
taken from a project not done in groups of the prescribed size.
A. Does information and communication technology help us connect socially
to others, or does it isolate us from them? As Myers in Chapter 11 shows, the
answer to the question “Does the internet create intimacy or isolation?” is not
a straightforward one. Summarize what the empirical literature tells us, and
justify your group position.
B. There is a hot debate as to whether playing video games affects social
behavior. The claim that video games affect social outcomes is still advocated
by some and questioned by others. On one hand, researchers argue that
aggression and helping are affected by video game play. On the other hand,
some studies fail to find that violent video games increase aggression or that
prosocial video games increase helping. In this project, discuss (1) the
long-term and short-term effects of video games on both positive and
negative social outcomes; and (2) how psychosocial variables may affect the
relationship between exposure of video games and social behaviors.
C. Dating violence refers to physical aggression, psychological abuse, and
sexual coercion in a romantic relationship (Lipsky & Caetano, 2009). It is
also known as intimate partner violence and occurs in adolescents’ dating.
Despite common beliefs, both male and female can be victims, and some of
them continue to maintain this abusive dating relationship. Based on scientific
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findings, please discuss: (1) What are the gender differences in dating
violence victimization? and (2) What are possible explanations for some
individuals staying in this unhealthy relationship? What empirical evidence
can be used to support these explanations?
Your project will have to be submitted in two phases:
Phase 1: This will be an annotated bibliography of no less than five journal
articles and books that you propose to read for the project. At least three of them
must be published in or after 2005. Briefly describe how they may be related to
the topic. The citations and references in the document should be presented in
APA format. You will receive feedback from us, within 14 days, on the
appropriateness of the materials that you intend to use for your project. Due
11:59pm, October 9. (800 to 1,000 words; 5 marks)
Phase 2: This is a full paper of 2,000 to 2,500 words, produced in APA format.
Due 11:59pm, December 3. (15 marks)
Both papers can be submitted only once. Additional submission by the same or
another group member will incur a penalty of 3 marks.
After submitting your project, you will rate, in strict confidence, your group
members on the significance and amount of their contribution. This is done by
distributing 100 percentage points among group members other than yourself. If
you do not send us your peer rating within a week, we shall assume that you
intend an equal distribution. The project score that you will finally receive is the
product of the score the grader gives to your group project multiplied by the total
percentage points (adjusted to be within the range of 80% to 120%) you receive
from your group members.
The sum of your coursework marks will be reported in letter grades:
Marks
80+
75-79
70-74
67-69
63-66
60-62
57-59
53-56
50-52
46-49
40-45
<40
Grade
A+
A
AB+
B
BC+
C
CD+
D
F
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Reading Assignments
Stillwell, A.M., & Baumeister, R.F. (1997). The construction of victim and perpetrator
memories: Accuracy and distortion in role-based accounts. Personality and Social
Psychology Bulletin, 23, 1157-1172.
Myers, D.G. (2010/2013). Social Psychology (10th or 11th edition). NY: McGraw-Hill.
What is plagiarism? www.hku.hk/plagiarism. University of Hong Kong.
You are expected to read extensively beyond the assigned readings to prepare for tutorials
and to write your group project.
Website
Some but not all course materials are downloadable from the course website on Moodle.
You can access the materials using the following:
Address at http://hkuportal.hku.hk/moodle/guest
Login ID: psyc2020_1a_2015_guest
Password: Guest_2020
You can initiate and conduct web-based discussion there. This discussion board is
unmoderated, although from time to time we may check and remove inappropriate
postings. Neither the university nor the teaching team is responsible for contents posted
here. If you have specific questions for the teaching team, please use email instead of
posting on the discussion board.
Codes of Conduct
By taking this course you agree to abide by the following codes of conduct.
Submission of assignments. All your coursework assignments must be handed in through
Moodle. Late submissions (for whatever reasons) will be marked down by 0.1% for each
minute late. (That is, you will lose all the marks for the assignment if you are more than
1000 minutes late.) Unforeseen technical failure is not a legitimate reason for late
submission, unless the Moodle server has been affected. As the group project is to be
done by a group, any single member’s medical condition does not warrant an extension of
the deadline. Only one copy is needed per group.
Preparation (in the form of admission tickets) is essential for learning in tutorials.
Students who cannot submit the required material may still be allowed to sit in the
tutorial, but will not be allowed to speak, nor receive any mark for participation.
Absence. Students who are 10 or more minutes late to a tutorial will be recorded as
absent. A student absent from a tutorial receives no mark for the admission ticket (even if
submitted on time) or any participation. Seek approval from your tutor at least 48 hours
before your scheduled tutorial if you need to attend another one. (Strong justification
must be provided. Approval will unlikely be granted more than once in a semester.) The
deadline for the admission ticket will accordingly be adjusted upon approval. In fairness
to all students, dates for quizzes will not be changed. No make-up or extension will be
given for any tutorial, admission ticket, and/or quiz missed. You will automatically
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receive half the score that the worst-performing student in that activity gets. However, if
a medical certificate is produced for the absence, we shall estimate your mark from marks
you obtain in other parts of your coursework, using a formula derived empirically from
the marks of other students in the course.
Marks appeal. If you suspect that a multiple-choice item in your quiz has been wrongly
graded, inform the teaching team within one week for rectification. Any other dispute on
marks you receive on a written assignment or short-answer quiz item must also be made
within one week after receipt of the feedback. Another member of the teaching team will
re-grade the material. The average of the two marks will be final.
You will contribute $50 towards a “snack fund” to buy snacks for your classmates, if
your pager or mobile phone rings in class, or if you talk on any electronic device.
We cherish academic honesty. Although you are encouraged to share your views and
course-relevant resources with your classmates, NEVER show them any of your own
written work (drafts or completed assignments). Things other people wrote (whether
published or unpublished) may be used in your assignments only with proper
acknowledgement and referencing. Plagiarism will not be tolerated. Neither may you use
materials submitted for another course without proper acknowledgement. (This is called
self-plagiarism.) Follow the APA Publication Manual for formats of citation and
references. You take individual and collective responsibility for your group’s submission.
If you suspect that your group project contains plagiarized materials, consult in
confidence any one of us in the teaching team for advice, BEFORE THE
MISBEHAVIOR IS DISCOVERED by us. Silent group members who do not
whistle-blow will receive the same penalty as that imposed on the “primary” transgressor.
Your project will be electronically scanned for plagiarized materials against a database of
articles, books, webpages, and student assignments. The minimum penalty imposed on all
members of the project group that plagiarizes in any group work will be a zero for the
project, plus further mark deduction. (You can check for plagiarized materials by
uploading your work on Moodle, and overwriting your earlier work if necessary, before
the due date. However, please be reminded that it may take at least 24 hours for the
system to generate a report every time you upload or re-upload your work)
If a group is found to have plagiarized in Phase 1, its members will be given the
opportunity to expel from the group the person who bears the most responsibility. The
expelled member will have to do the project on his/her own. Mark deduction for not
working in a group of the right size would not apply if a group is re-formed under this
circumstance.
If a student is found to have plagiarized in any individual admission ticket we shall take
the following actions:
- deduction of 30 marks or more from the course
- either removal of the student from his/her project group or informing group members
of the incident or both
- reporting to the student’s faculty for consideration of further disciplinary action
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You must not use or access a computer or any communication device during a quiz, not
even to turn it off when it sounds. Students suspected of cheating in a quiz will be
referred to the Disciplinary Committee for further action.
In the event of discrepancy between this syllabus and what a member of the teaching
team tells you, the former takes precedence. On important administrative matters, request
a written confirmation from your tutor.
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Learning Plan
Date
Lecture
Reading
Tutorial
Sept 10
Social psychology – Science or commonsense?
Myers 1, 16
Sept 17
Knowing about ourselves and others (1)
Myers 2,
Getting to know each other + “Who wants to be a
What is
plagiarism?
millionaire?”
Sept 24
Knowing about ourselves and others (2)
Myers 3, 9
Oct 1
National Day
Oct 8
Quiz 1; Attitudes and behaviors
Oct 15
Reading Week
Oct 22
Influencing others and being influenced
Myers 6, 8
Oct 29
Persuasion
Myers 7, 15
Nov 5
Quiz 2; Aggression
Myers 10
Nov 12
Pro-social behavior
Myers 5, 12
Nov 19
Liking and loving someone
Myers 11
Nov 26
Conflicts and peacemaking
Myers 13,
Myers 4, 14
Stillwell &
Baumeister
Dec 3
Quiz 3
*An admission ticket is required
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A public act of kindness*
Group Influence*
“Would you register as an organ donor, please?”*
12 Angry Men*