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Chapter 18: Social Psychology
Part 1: 673-679
Part 2: 679-691
Part 3: 691-704
Part 4: 704-719
This chapter has A LOT of actual research studies in it. When I ask about a study, I expect you to know the
purpose of the study, the research design (describe how it was carried out), the results of the study, and (if
applicable) the broad implication of the study (what was the big lesson learned). See the Napolitan and Goethals
study below for an example.
Social Thinking (673-680)
Attributing Behavior to Persons or to Situations
1: How do we tend to explain others’ behavior and our own?
What theory did Fritz Heider propose? A child’s hostility reflects either a ___________ attribution or a
_________ attribution.
We tend to overestimate _________ traits and underestimate ____________factors. This is known as the
____________________.
Is the result of Napolitan and Goethals (1979) study surprising to you?
Purpose: description of the fundamental attribution error
Design: parps individually talk to a woman who is either acting aloof or warm and friendly; ½ students told
woman’s behavior will be spontaneous, ½ told she was instructed to act a certain way
Results: information about woman’s behavior was disregarded; if woman was friendly, inferred she truly was
friendly & if woman was unfriendly inferred she was truly was unfriendly…
Implication: we overestimate personal attributes even when told about situational factors…fundamental
attribution error is true.
Describe a personal example of when you fell victim to the fundamental attribution error.
How / why is it different when we describe our behavior?
The Effects of Attribution
Describe attributional differences in happily versus unhappily married people.
Describe a few attributional differences between political conservatives and liberals.
Attitudes and Actions
2: Does what we think affect what we do, or does what we do affect what we think?
What is an attitude?
Attitudes Affect Actions
Describe the difference between the central route and peripheral route to persuasion.
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Actions Affect Attitudes
Foot in the Door Phenomenon
Describe how the Chinese were able to use this to their advantage.
What was the effect of this compliance on the prisoners’ attitudes?
Describe the pledge teens can make and what effect this has on related behavior.
Freedman & Fraser, 1966
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
What did school desegregation and the Civil Rights Act do to white Americans’ expressed racial prejudice
over time?
Role Playing Affects Attitudes
Zimbardo’s (1972) Prison Study (very important):
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
Cognitive Dissonance: Relief from Tension
What is cognitive dissonance? What is Festinger’s cognitive dissonance theory? The more dissonance we
feel…Describe what changed about people’s attitudes concerning the War in Iraq (give the percentages).
Explain the study described on being paid to write an essay on something you don’t believe in (very important).
Purpose:
Design:
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Results:
Implication:
Think and Answer: How might this “attitudes-follow-behavior” (just do it) concept be useful to cognitive-behavioral
therapists?
Social Influence (680-691)
Conformity and Obedience
3: What do experiments on conformity and compliance reveal about the power of social influence?
Describe Chartrand and Bargh’s “chameleon effect.”
Chartrand and Bargh’s (1999) study (final paragraph of 680, going on to 681):
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
Be sure to note who is liked the most! How remarkable!!
What happened following the 1999 Columbine High School shootings?
What happened following Marilyn Monroe’s suicide in 1962?
Group Pressure and Conformity
Describe Asch’s (1955) Conformity study – THIS IS A HUGE ONE!! KNOW IT WELL!
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
Conditions That Strengthen Conformity
Provide 3 that are interesting to you. Be able to predict what condition will lead to most/least conformity
if given several scenarios.
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Reasons for Conformity
a) Describe normative social influence / why people do it.
b) Describe informational social influence / why people do it.
Baron’s (1996) Information Conformity Study – take your time with this one…it can be confusing if
you don’t think through it as you go…refer to Fig 16.3…this one is very important as well…be detailed in your
responses
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
When did participants conform the most (look at figure)? The least?
Implication:
What effect did the low vs. high importance have on conformity?
What effect did the easy vs. difficult judgments have on conformity?
Obedience
Stanley Milgram’s Obedience Study (1963, 1974) HUGE HUGE HUGE!
Purpose:
How far do you think you would have gone?
How far did the participants say they would go?
What did the psychologists predict about how far the parps would go?
Design:
Results:
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Implication:
Describe the 4 conditions where obedience varies and how:
Describe the implication of obedience for the Holocaust. Did any soldiers dissent to murdering innocent people?
What percent (at least in the story given in the book)?
Lessons From the Conformity and Obedience Studies
“With kindness and obedience on a collision course, _______________________.”
Paraphrase Milgram’s “fundamental lesson.”
Group Influence
Individual Behavior in the Presence of Others
4: How is our behavior affected by the presence of others or by being part of a group?
Social Facilitation – What did Triplett (1898) notice and hypothesize? Have you ever noticed what Towler
(1986) describes? Explain this.
Why do we actually perform less well on difficult tasks in the presence of others?
James Michaels’ (1982) Pool Players’ study
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
What did Aiello & others (1983) and Freedman & Perlick (1979) find about comedy clubs?
Have you ever watched Comedy Central comics perform and wonder why the people at the event are laughing when
clearly the comedian is pretty horrible in your opinion?
Social Loafing – What did Ingham (1974) discover about individual/team tug-of-war efforts?
Where is it seen more?
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Why does this occur? Describe a group you’ve been a part of where this occurred.
Deindividuation – Describe it and a few places where this might occur?
Effects of Group Interaction
5: What are group polarization and groupthink?
Group Polarization – What did Wilson & others (1975) discover about college students?
What did Maccoby (2002) discover about gender differences?
What did Bishop and Myers (the author) (1970) discover about low and high prejudice student groups?
Groupthink – Describe how the Bay of Pigs scenario described in the book on pg 689-690 is an example of
this. Describe another scenario of when this occurred.
The Power of Individuals
6: How much power do we have as individuals? Can a minority sway a majority?
Social Relations (691-719)
Prejudice
7: What is prejudice?
Prejudice is a mixture of ________-, ___________, and predispositions to __________.
How Prejudiced Are People?
How have people’s racist words changed over time? What question was asked to discover this (Fig 16.6)?
What’s the difference between blatant and subtle prejudice?
CLOSE-UP: Automatic Prejudice – Explain at least 2 of the studies/conclusions.
Answer the question! If you could only have 1 child, boy or girl?
How many people expressed a preference? Of those, how many chose a boy?
What’s the good news for women? What did Perrett (1998) discover?
Social Roots of Prejudice
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Social Inequalities – ______________ rationalize _______________.
Us and Them: Ingroup and Outgroup
What example is given throughout this section as an example of ingroup vs. outgroup?
Just think about how competitive you get when you get in the groups for quiz bowl style review.
There’s a reason I make you choose a team name…it helps to create an ingroup, making you feel as if
you belong to your group more. When you feel this way, you will work harder and be involved more
to help your ingroup be better than your outgroups.
What are some ingroups in our school? To which do you belong?
Emotional Roots of Prejudice
What example is given to illustrate scapegoat theory?
Cognitive Roots of Prejudice
9: What are the cognitive roots of prejudice?
Categorization – What is the “other race effect” and when does it emerge?
Vivid Cases – Rothbart et al. (1978) study:
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
Just-World Phenomenon – What did the unknowing German civilian say about the concentration camps and
the people within it?
Aggression – define using exact book def
The Biology of Aggression
10: What biological factors make us more prone to hurt one another?
Genetic Influences
Twins:
Neural Influences – explain evidence from the following that support a neural basis to aggressive behavior
a) Monkeys:
b) Amygdala Implants:
c) Death Row Inmates
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Biochemical Influences – Does testosterone heighten aggressiveness or vice versa?
The Psychology of Aggression
Aversive Events
Describe the frustration-aggression principle.
When are violent crime and spousal abuse rates the highest?
Social and Cultural Influences
Describe the effect of ostracism on aggression.
What 2 research conclusions did Triandis (1994) state (2 consecutive paragraphs)? Harper &
McLanahan (2004)?
Observing Models of Aggression
What is the “rape myth?” Who is more likely to accept it?
Zillmann & Bryant (1984) study:
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
What consensus was reached?
Acquiring Social Scripts
What is the source of many of our social scripts? Give 1 example.
Do Video Games Teach or Release Violence
What correlation did Anderson and Dill (2000) find?
The impact of playing violent video games is bigger than what according to Anderson (2007)? Why?
What hypothesis do these studies DISconfirm?
Close-Up: Parallels Between Smoking and Media Violence Effects
Note at least 2 parallels.
Attraction
The Psychology of Attraction
12: Why do we befriend or fall in love with some people but not with others?
Proximity – more than just simple availability, we are attracted to nonsense things such as…(list a few)
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This is known as the _____________________
Moreland and Beach’s (1992) attractiveness study
Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
Give an evolutionary explanation of /reason for this effect.
Physical Attractiveness
What do women say about the importance of physical attractiveness? Does a man’s attractiveness
influence women’s perceptions?
List 4 things we can predict about someone based on their attractiveness. List particularly
interesting or previously unknown items.
How does Hollywood portray attractive people?
Describe the correlation between one’s self-esteem & happiness?
Why might this be so, however?
What do attractive people do/think when they are praised for their work?
What aspects of attractiveness are universal?
What did Langlois and Roggman (1990) study and find?
Similarity
How can a reward theory account for all of these findings thus far?
Romantic Love
13: How does romantic love typically change as time passes?
Passionate Love –
Dutton and Aron’s (1974, 1989) studies:
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Purpose:
Design:
Results:
Implication:
Companionate Love – Describe it.
What is one key to predicting a happy and long-lasting relationship? What does this mean?
What is another key?
Altruism
14: When are we most—and least—likely to help?
What example is given for altruism? What is altruism? What happened (or didn’t happen) in NYC on March 13,
1964?
Bystander Intervention
What are 3 steps to helping in a situation?
Describe Darley and Latane (1968a)’s experiment and the three word term that explains why nobody
helped.
What is the bystander effect? You don’t have to write them all down right here, but KNOW ALL OF THE
CONDITIONS THAT MAKE IT MORE LIKELY THAT SOMEONE WILL HELP. What’s one of the
“consistent findings in all of psychology?”
The Norms for Helping
Describe social exchange theory.
Describe the reciprocity norm.
Describe the social-responsibility norm.
Conflict and Peacemaking
15: How do social traps and mirror-image perceptions fuel social conflict?
Social Traps
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Understand the social trap in Fig 16.7. Why exactly is it that both people end up choosing B? Why don’t
they both choose A? What is the risk involved of any individual person selecting A?
Enemy Perceptions
How are Bush and Hussein’s comments of each other representative of “mirror-image perceptions?”
How can the fundamental attribution error contribute to biased enemy perceptions?
Contact
16: How can we transform feelings of prejudice, aggression, and conflict into attitudes that promote peace?
When does contact help? Where could we see an example of contacting not helping in our school? See final
paragraph of this section?
Cooperation
Describe how Sherif (1966) was able to get the two competing groups to be cooperative.
Your book states that interracial cooperative groups can be very productive. Should teachers purposefully
place you in mixed race groups for group assignments and seating arrangements to further develop interrace cooperation? Why/why not?
Communication
What is the example with the orange?
Conciliation
When/how did Kennedy unknowingly use the concept we now call “GRIT.” For what does GRIT stand / how
does it work?
THAT’S IT!
NO MORE PSYHCOLOGY READING GUIDE HOMEWORK EVER!!!
ADMIT IT…YOU’RE A LITTLE SAD, RIGHT?
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