Interpersonal Behavior and
Group Processes
PSY 750
Advanced Social Psychology
Outline
Interpersonal Circumplex
Prosocial Behavior
Groups
Interpersonal Circumplex
A model for
understanding social
behavior (Leary, 1957)
Consists of two
orthogonal axes
Agency (ranging from
Communion (ranging from
dominant to submissive)
nurturing to hostile)
Nearly all social behaviors can be
conceptualized as a combination of these
orthogonal dimensions
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Complementarity
The basic idea of complementarity is that there
is a tendency for individuals to have positive
interactions with each other to the extent that
their interpersonal styles “fit” together (Carson,
1969; Leary, 1957; Sullivan, 1953; Tracey, 2004)
One model defines complementarity as
corresponding (or similar) styles on the warmth
dimension but reciprocal (or opposite) styles on
the dominance dimension (Carson, 1969; Leary, 1957)
Other models suggest that complementarity is
defined by correspondence (or similarity) on
both the warmth and dominance dimensions
(e.g., Byrne, 1971)
Models of Complementarity
Prosocial Behavior
Oskar Schindler saved more than 1,200
Jews during the Holocaust at great
personal risk
9/11 - Ed Emery escorted 6 colleagues
out of the South tower and returned to
the 97th floor to get more
Feb. 22, 2008 - Stranger donates kidney
to 8-year-old girl
Why do humans behave in helpful and
cooperative ways even when it is not in their
own self-interest to do so?
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What is Prosocial Behavior?
Doing something good for someone or
society
Builds relationships
Allows society to function
Includes helping others
Obeying the rules
Conforming to socially acceptable behavior
Cooperating with others
Factors in Prosocial Behavior
Effective rule of law
People respect and follow rules
Correlates positively with happiness
Societies with no rule of law tend to be more
dangerous
Fairness and justice
Public circumstances
People behave better when rules are perceived as fair
Wanting to make a good impression
Satow (1975)
Participants donated more money (7 times more!) when
they believed they were being observed
Reciprocity
Obligation to return in kind what another
has done for us
Reciprocity norms found across cultures and
species
e.g., “You scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours”
Kunz and Woolcott (1976) received Christmas cards
in return when they sent them to strangers
e.g., Requests for charitable donations often include
small ‘free’ gifts like address labels
You are likely to feel obligated to return the favor
with a donation
Willingness to accept help from others may
depend partly on whether one feels like
they can pay it back
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Fairness
Norms
Standards established by society to tell its members
what types of behavior are typical or expected
Norms that promote fairness
Equity
Each person receives benefits in proportion to what he
or she contributes
e.g., the person who did the most work gets the highest
pay
Equality
Everyone gets the same amount
Notice that these fairness norms directly
contradict each other
In evolutionary terms, it is important to be accepted by
the group
Fairness
Ability to reproduce is affected by group inclusion and status
One who takes without giving back may experience
negative repercussions from the group
People desire a system based on fairness and social
exchange
Underbenefited: Getting less than you deserve
Overbenefited: Getting more than you deserve
Fairness requires recognition of both types of unfairness
and has only been found in humans
Relationship between inability to give back and depression
Produces anger
Produces guilt (only in humans)
Although monkeys protested when they were
underbenefited (received cucumber slice instead of grape),
they were unconcerned about being overbenefited (de Waal
& Davis, 2003)
Cooperation and Forgiveness
Cooperation
Forgiveness: Ceasing to feel anger toward or seek
retribution against someone who has wronged you
When is forgiveness more likely?
Each person does their part and works toward a common
goal
Important for groups
Communication improves cooperation
Must overcome automatic tendency towards competition
Minor offense
Offender apologizes
Who is more likely to forgive?
Religious people
People committed to a relationship
Not self-centered or narcissistic people
“Too proud to let go”
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Why Do People Help Others?
Evolutionary benefits
Kin selection
More
likely to help others who share our
genes
Inclusive Fitness
Our genes can survive in one’s own offspring
and in the offspring of one’s relatives
Life-and-death
helping is affected more
strongly by genetic relatedness
The closer genetically related the kin, the more
likely we are to help
Age is also a factor
Why Do People Help Others?
Egoistic helping
Wanting something in return for helping
John will help Mary with her math homework because she
will help him with his English paper
Negative state relief theory
Help to reduce your own distress
Providing a homeless man with some money to buy a meal
to relieve your distress at seeing him hungry
Altruistic helping
Expecting nothing in return for helping
Millie anonymously donates $500 to a local charity
Motivated by empathy
Reacting to another person’s emotional state by
experiencing the same emotional state
Studies of brain activation have shown similar activation when one
is receiving shocks and one’s loved one is receiving shocks
Who Helps Whom?
Helpful Personality
Research with gentiles who helped the Jews in Nazi Europe had
higher ethical values, stronger beliefs in equity, greater
empathy, and were more likely to see all people as equal
Similarity
Gender
We help people similar to us more than dissimilar others
because similarity promotes empathy
Males are more helpful in the broader public sphere, toward
strangers, and in emergencies
Females are more helpful in family sphere, toward close
relationship partners, and in repeated contacts
Women are more likely to receive help
Beautiful Victims
Beautiful people are more likely to receive help than less
attractive people
True for both men and women in emergencies and nonemergencies
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Belief in a Just World
The belief that life is essentially fair and that
people generally get what they deserve
Can lead to blaming the victim (e.g., blaming a rape
victim for dressing provocatively)
People who believe the world is just may only
help if they think people deserve help
…or these people may also help to be a good
person and therefore deserve good things
themselves
Students who believed in a just world were more likely to
volunteer their help to another student just before exams
Why? Possibly building up future rewards for
themselves
Bystander Helping in Emergencies
78-year-old Hartford man hit by car and no one helps
49-year-old woman collapses and dies on the floor of a
waiting room at a Brooklyn psychiatric hospital
Kitty Genovese
Employees ignored her for more than an hour
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lKUwBC IBzA
http://youtube.com/watch?v=JuxGh5axb2k
Died after a 35 minute attack where 38 of her neighbors watched but
did not call for help
Why didn’t any of the 38 witnesses to Kitty Genovese’s murder
help?
Latane & Darley (1970) suggested that the witnesses did not help
BECAUSE there were so many witnesses!!
Bystander effect: People less likely to help when they are in
the presence of others
Pluralistic ignorance: Looking to others for cues about how
to behave, while they are looking at you
Bystanders to an emergency, trying to look poised, give
misleading cues to others that no help is needed
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KE5YwN4NW5o&feature=related
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Too Busy to Help?
People in a hurry tend to help less
Darley and Batson (1973) had seminary
students in low, moderate, or high timepressure groups (late for giving a talk) pass a
man who needed help (confederate)
Those who were in a hurry were less likely to
help even if they were on their way to give a
talk about the parable of the good Samaritan as
they passed him
People were more likely to help if they had
time to do so…regardless of whether they were
going to talk about the good Samaritan
parable or not
How Can We Increase Helping?
Getting Help in a Public Setting
Pick out one person and make it clear that you
need help and what you want that person to
do
Educate Others
When people know about the steps to helping
they are more likely to offer help
Provide Helpful Models
Teach moral inclusion
Give children examples
“We” rather than “Us” and “Them”
Groups
Henry Ford
Initially, 2-3 men worked together to build each car (slow
and expensive process)
Broke the process into 84 specialized steps with workers
moving in a circuit to the various cars which were mounted
on saw horses (better but not completely efficient)
Led to increased standardization
Eventually introduced the assembly line which consists of
stationary workers and moving products (much more
efficient because of stockpile of parts)
Workers were unhappy with the repetitive tasks but Ford
paid them more than twice the average wage at other
similar jobs
Can groups outperform individuals working by
themselves?
What does the story of Ford’s success with the assembly
line exemplify about the social psychology of groups?
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What is a Group?
Groups are two or more people doing or being
something together
Examples:
Groups feel similar to one another
Presence of an outgroup
Students in this class
Members of the Britney Spears fan club
Faculty members in psychology
Members of my family
Just because people are near each other does
not necessarily mean they constitute a group
(ex. students in a computer lab working
individually)
How Do Groups Help Us?
In evolutionary terms…
Safety in numbers
Help us find food
Accomplish tasks that are too difficult for the
individual
In cultural terms…
Preserve information and pass it along to
future generations
Use information to organize themselves
Benefit from role differentiation and division
of labor
Individuals in the Context of Groups
Optimal distinctiveness theory
(Brewer, 1993)
Tension between the need to be similar to group
members and distinctive from them
Identifying people in groups and holding
them accountable produces better results
For example, identifying the contributions of
specific individuals decreases the tendency to
engage in social loafing
Videotaping individual football players during games
Tracking production at a factory based on individual
workers rather than collections of workers (e.g.,
shifts)
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Social Facilitation
Theory of social facilitation
(Zajonc, 1965)
Presence of others increases arousal
Arousal increases dominant response
Presence of others can improve people’s
performance,
especially on
easy or
well-learned
tasks
Social Facilitation
average and above average pool
players were observed by 4 individuals while
playing pool (Michaels et al., 1982)
Percentage of
Shots Made
Below
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Before Being
Observed
While Being
Observed
Below Average
Above Average
Skill of Player
Shared Resources and
the Commons Dilemma
Tragedy of the Commons
Depletion of resources that are collectively
owned
The Fisherman’s Problem (Gordon, 1954)
Enough fish must survive the season in order to
reproduce and replenish supply
Restraint must be shown but nobody is ultimately
responsible
If you don’t catch the fish, someone else will
Leads to depletion of resource
Impossible to maximize both private and
common interests
e.g., Lunchroom refrigerators
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Shared Resources and
the Commons Dilemma
Costs of private ownership
Cost of communal ownership
Lack of preserving care
Commons dilemma
Squandering of shared resources
Conflicts within commons dilemma
Inequality
Ambition, greed
Social conscience versus selfish impulse
Time (Now versus tomorrow)
Factors influencing commons dilemma
Communication
Behavior of others
How Do Groups Think?
Brainstorming
People often enjoy the process and evaluate
it favorably
…but the output is generally lower (and of
poorer quality) than individuals working alone
Collective wisdom of a group is often
better than individual experts
For this to emerge, individuals must act as
independent members of the group and share
their diverse information instead of falling
victim to groupthink
Groupthink
Tendency of group members to think alike
Factors that encourage groupthink
Group may cling to shared but flawed view rather than
being open to the truth (Janus, 1972, 1982)
Basis may be in the desire to get along
Fairly similar and cohesive group at the start
Strong, directive leader
Group is isolated in some sense from others
Group regards itself as superior
Signs of groupthink
Pressure toward conformity
Appearance of unanimous agreement
Self-censorship
Illusion of invulnerability
Sense of moral superiority
Tendency to underestimate opponents
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Group Polarization and Risky Shift
Are groups less cautious than individuals?
When making decisions, groups often give
riskier advice than single individuals
This was originally thought of as the “Risky
Shift”
It was later found that discussion typically
strengthens the average inclination of
group members toward either extreme
…whether it is risky or not!
This is referred to as the “group polarization
effect”
How Does Group Polarization Work?
Informational Influence
Group discussion leads to a pooling of ideas,
most of which favor the dominant viewpoint
Active participation increases attitude change
(just repeating someone else’s ideas may
lead you to adopt their stronger position)
Normative Influence
People want others to like them and may
express stronger opinions after discovering
others share their views
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