Social Psychology
Unit 14
Social Psychology
• Social psychology - study of how we think about,
influence, and relate to others
Situational Behavior
• Fritz Heider - attribution theory
• people measure others’ behavior by either their
internal disposition or the external situation that
they’re in
• fundamental attribution error
• we tend to overestimate a person’s natural personality
and underestimate the position that they’re in
Attitudes and actions
• Attitudes
• feelings that drive us to respond to a situation, person,
or event in a certain way
Persuasion
• central route persuasion
• a change-of-attitude where people evaluate arguments
and respond with favorable thoughts
• peripheral route persuasion
• a change-of-attitude where people are influenced by
quick cues and make quick judgments
Persuasion
• foot-in-the-door phenomenon - if a person goes
along with a small requests, he or she will go
along with bigger requests
• Example - Korean War POWS
Role playing
• People tend to behave in a manner that they
think is appropriate for whatever role they are in
• “Zimbardo Prison Experiment” - Philip Zimbardo at
Stanford in 1972.
Attitudes matching Actions
• cognitive dissonance theory
• We try to bring our attitudes and our actions together
to relieve tension
• we rationalize/make excuses
• Or we change action or attitudes
Conformity and obedience
• “chameleon effect”
• “mood linkage”
• Conformity - changing behavior or thinking to the
group’s norm
Conformity and obedience
• Solomon Asch – Study
• Observations
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Insecurity.
Group must have 3+ people.
The group is unanimous.
Someone in the group is admired.
No commitment has been made yet.
Others watch one another.
Your culture values social standards.
Conformity and Obedience
• reasons we conform are…
• To avoid being ostracized, which can be a serious
punishment.
• normative social influence -adjust our behavior to
that of the group’s.
• informational social influence - go along with the
group lest we be “left out of the loop.”
• Culture – East more than West
Conformity and Obedience
• Obedience - obeying the directions of an
authority figure
• Milgram Experiment or the “Obedience to
Authority Experiment.”
• most people (63%) went all the way to 450 volts
Group influence
• Social facilitation - better performance while
someone is watching
• Physical Stimulus
• Social loafing - people put forth less effort while
in a group as compared to being on their own.
• Less accountable and rely on group
Group Influence
• Deindividuation - giving up normal restraints and
giving in to the crowd.
• “herd poisoning”
Group Influences
• Group polarization - differences between two
groups will widen as time passes.
• Ex. - Political views
• “Groupthink” - everyone in the group quietly
goes along with the others to keep harmony,
even though the idea may be unrealistic
Cultural influence
• Culture impacts behaviors, ideas, attitudes,
values, and traditions.
• Different cultures have their own variations.
• Personal space
• Punctuality
• Culture’s change over time
Prejudice
• Prejudice - “prejudge”—to draw a conclusion
prior to analyzing a situation.
• stereotypes
• Discriminate - to draw a distinction between
two things
Prejudice
• “blame-the-other-guy” mentality
• Ex. Rich v poor – Victims or poor decisions
• “ingroup” vs “outgroup”
• scapegoat theory
• Ex. Nazi Germany
• Simplified - “us-them” mentality
• Other race effect – Seeing differences in own
group but not another group
Prejudice
• just-world phenomenon - good behavior is
rewarded and bad behavior is punished
• Hindsight bias
Aggression
• Aggression - any physical or verbal behavior
intended to hurt or destroy
• Aggression biological factors
• Genetics - ex. Male more than women
• Neural influences - ex. amygdala
• Biochemical influences – ex. hormones, drugs, etc.
Aggression
• frustration-aggression principle - when things go
badly, we’re more inclined to get aggressive
• revenge
• More aggressive when cranky
Aggression
• Aggression being modeled
• Parents - yelling and beating their children
• TV and movies - aggressive and violent
Aggression
• Social scripts - “screenplays”, conveyed by the
media and our culture, that show us how to act
in situations.
• Example - video games
• “cartharsis hypothesis”- outlet to release emotions
• NOT supported by research
Attraction
• Factors for Attraction
• Proximity
• Mere exposure effect – longer we are exposed the more
we like it
• Physical appearance
• Similarity – people like us
• Reward Theory of attraction – we like those that give us
rewarding experience
Romantic Love
• Passionate love - usually brought on by arousal.
• fright, aerobic exercise, eroticism, funny or crude talk.
• Companionate love- steady, deep affection
Altruism
• Altruism put others ahead of ourselves
• 1964 rape and murder of Kitty Genovese
• if there are several people present during an emergency,
we’re less likely to take action
Altruism
• Helping others
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
The person seems to need help.
The person seems similar to us.
We’ve just observed someone else being helpful.
We’re not in a hurry.
We’re in a small town or rural area.
We’re feeling guilty.
We’re not preoccupied.
We’re in a good mood. This is one of the most consistent
findings. When people are happy, they’re more inclined to
help.
Altruism
• “Why do people help others anyway?’
• exchange theory - “cost-benefit analysis” or
“utilitarianism”
• intrinsic rewards
• reciprocity norm - should give help (not harm) to those
who’ve helped us
• social-responsibility norm - should help those who are
in need.
Conflict and peacemaking
• Conflict - perceived incompatibility of actions,
goals, or ideas
• Social traps - our self-interest leads us into loselose situations
• Jean Jacques Rousseau - Prisoners’ Dilemma
Conflict and peacemaking
• mirror-image perception concept - tend to view
others as evil and untrustworthy and they see us
the same way
• Self Fulfilling prophecy
Conflict and peacemaking
• Cooperation
• superordinate goals—shared goals that cancel
out differences
• Communication is critical
• mediators needed
Conflict and peacemaking
• Conciliation - overcoming disagreements and
giving in to, or appeasing, another person
• Charles Osgood
• “ GRIT” (Graduated and Reciprocated Initiatives in
Tension-Reduction)
Conflict and peacemaking
• Announce mutual interests and plans to lessen
tensions
• Make a small conciliatory act - opens the door to
reciprocity
• If the enemy responds with reconciliation, that gets
another conciliatory response. If the enemy responds
with aggression, appropriate action is taken.
• In laboratories - GRIT works
• In real-life – GRIT doesn’t
• Hitler – Chamberlain
• Hussein
• Iran