TERMS AND DEFINITIONS
Norm - A shared idea ore expectation about how to behave
Cultural norm - A behavioral rule shared by an entire society
Conformity - Voluntarily yielding to social norms, even at the expense of one’s own preferences
The Asch conformity experiments were a series of studies published in the 1950s that demonstrated
the power of conformity in groups. These are also known as the Asch Paradigm.
Compliance - Change of behavior in response to an explicit request from another person or group
Obedience - Change of behavior in response to a command from another person, typically an authority
figure.
The Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures was a series of social psychology
experiments conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram, which measured the
willingness of study participants to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts that
conflicted with their personal conscience.
Meme is an idea, behavior or style, such as symbols or catch-phrases, that spreads from person to
person within a culture. While genes transmit biological information, memes are said to transmit ideas
and belief information.
Social exchange theory - The theory that our social behavior is an exchange process, the aim of which is
to maximize benefits and minimize costs.
Reciprocity norm - An expectation that people will help, not hurt, those who have helped them.
Social facilitation - Stronger responses on simple or well-learned tasks in the presence of others.
Social loafing - The tendency for people in a group to exert less effort when pooling their efforts toward
attaining a common goal than when individually accountable.
Self-fulfilling prophecy - process in which a person’s expectation about another elicits behavior from the
second person that confirms the expectation
Just-world hypothesis - attribution error based on the assumption that bad things happen to bad people
and good things happen to good people
Proximity - how close two people live to each other
Exchange - concept that relationships are based on trading rewards among partners
Equity - fairness of exchange achieved when each partner in the relationship receives the same
proportion of outcomes to investments
Intimacy - the quality of genuine closeness and trust achieved in communication with another person
Self-monitoring - tendency for an individual to observe the situation for cues about how to react
Frustration-aggression theory - theory that under certain circumstances people who are frustrated in
their goals turn their anger away from the proper, powerful target toward another, less powerful target
it is safer to attack
Authoritarian personality - a personality pattern characterized by rigid conventionality, exaggerated
respect for authority, and hostility toward those who defy society’s norms
Cognitive dissonance - perceived inconsistency between two cognitions
Social influence - process by which others individually or collectively affect one’s perceptions, attitudes,
and actions.
Culture - All the goods, both tangible and intangible, produced in a society
Cultural truism - Belief that most members of a society accept as self-evidently true
Deindividuation - Loss of personal sense of responsibility in a group
Altruistic behavior - Helping behavior that is not linked to personal gain
Bystander effect - Tendency for an individual’s helpfulness in an emergency to decrease as the number
of bystanders increases.
Groupthink - The mode of thinking that occurs when the desire for harmony in a decision-making group
overrides a realistic appraisal of alternatives.
Group Polarization - Shift in attitudes by members of a group toward more extreme positions than the
ones held before group’s discussion
Risky shift -Greater willingness to take risks in decision making in a group than as independent
individuals
Scapegoat theory - The theory that prejudice offers an outlet for anger by providing someone to blame.
Frustration-aggression principle - The principle that frustration-the blocking of an attempt to achieve
some goal- creates anger, which can generate aggression.
Social trap - A situation in which the conflicting parties, by each rationally pursuing their self-interest,
become caught in mutually destructive behavior.
Mere exposure effect - The phenomenon that repeated exposure to novel stimuli increases liking of
them.
Passionate love - An aroused state of intense positive absorption in another, usually present at the
beginning of a love relationship.
Companionate love - The deep affectionate attachment we feel for those with whom our lives are
intertwined.
Equity - A condition in which people receive from a relationship in proportion to what they give to it.
Self-disclosure Revealing intimate aspects of oneself to others.
Altruism - Unselfish regard for the welfare of others.
Bystander effect - The tendency for any given bystander to be less likely to give aid if other bystanders
are present.
Social-responsibility - An expectation that people will help those dependent upon them.
Superordinate goals - Shared goals that override differences among people and require their
cooperation.
Hawthorne effect - Principle that subjects will alter their behavior because of researcher’s attention and
not necessarily because of any specific experimentation