Social Psychology
Attitude
Attraction
Aggression
Group Behavior
Social Psychology - Studying the way
people think about, influence and relate to
others.
Thinking about ourselves and
others
• Attribution Theory theory of how we explain
someone’s behavior by
crediting either the
situation or the person’s
disposition
• Situational Attribution
– External
• Dispositional Attribution
– Internal
– Example:
Fundamental Attribution Error
How do you view your
teacher’s behavior?
When you start a
romance, you assume
that they agree with
your world
views….honeymoon
period.
• Fundamental
attribution error tendency to
overestimate the role
of dispositional
factors and
underestimate
situational factors
If you win it is
because you are
awesome…if you
lose, it must have
been the coach or
weather or….
– More common in
Individualistic cultures
– Self-serving bias –
consider the situation
Attitudes
• Attitudes - Feelings,
based on beliefs,
that guide our
behavior
• Advertising is ALL
based on attitude
formation.
• Easier to change
actions than
attitudes
Attitude Change
• Central Route of Persuasion - opinion change
from thoughtful focus on scientific evidence and
the content of arguments
– Example:.
• Peripheral Route Persuasion –opinion change
through incidental cues (Speakers
attractiveness, endorsement of famous person,
emotion evoking music or images)
•
Example:
Compliance Strategies
• Foot-in-the-door phenomenon – persuasion
technique to get someone to agree first to a small
request to get them to comply later with a larger
request
– Example:
• Door-in-the-face phenomenon – persuasion
technique to get someone to comply by first making
an extremely large request, then requesting
something smaller
– Example:
• Norms of reciprocity – social expectation that
people will respond to each other in kind
– Example:”
Role-Playing Affects
Attitudes
–Role– set of behaviors
for a specific social
position
–Zimbardo - Stanford
Prison Study
–Abu Ghraib
Cognitive Dissonance
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
(Festinger) - Discomfort we
feel when your thoughts are
behaviors are inconsistent
You have a belief
that cheating on
tests is bad.
But you cheat on
a test!!!
The teacher was
really bad so in
that class it is OK.
– People want to have consistent
attitudes and behaviors….when
they are not they experience
dissonance (unpleasant
tension).
– Usually they will change their
attitude.
Conformity and Obedience
• Chameleon effectunconsciously
mimicking others’
expressions, postures
and voice tones
– Example:
• Mood linkage – sharing
up and down moods of
others
– Example
Conformity
• Conformity - Adjusting
one’s behavior or
thinking to coincide
with a group standard.
– Example:
Asch’s Study of Conformity
Asch’s Results
• About 1/3 of the
participants conformed.
• 70% conformed at least
once.
Conditions that Strengthen
Conformity:
•
•
•
•
•
The group is unanimous
One is insecure within the group or
made to feel incompetent
The group is at least three people.
One admires the group’s status
One had made no prior commitment
Reasons for Conforming
Normative social influence - desire to
gain approval/avoid rejection
– Example:
Informational social influence -
Accepting other peoples opinions about
reality
– Example -
Milgram’s Study
Of
Obedience
Results of the Milgram Study
What did we learn from
Milgram?
• Ordinary people can
do shocking things.
• Ethical issues….
• Would not have
received approval
from today’s IRB
(Internal Review
Board).
Social Facilitation Theory
• Social Facilitation – stronger
performance in the presence
of others
• If you are really good at something
(well learned tasks)….or it is an
easy task…you will perform BETTER
in front of a group.
• If it is a difficult task or you are
not very good at it…you will
perform WORSE in front of a group
(aka - social impairment).
• Comedians are funnier in a crowded
room than an uncrowded room
Social Loafing
• Social Loafing - the
tendency for people in a
group to exert less
effort when pooling
efforts toward a
common goal than if
they were individually
accountable.
– Example –
Deindividuation
• Deindividuation –
presence of others
arouses people and
diminishes their
responsibility.
– Feel anonymous and
aroused.
– Example
Group Polarization
• Group polarization - If a
group is like-minded,
discussion strengthens its
prevailing opinion.
– Groups tend to make more
extreme decisions than the
individual.
– Example:
Groupthink
• Groupthink - Group
members suppress
reservations about the
ideas supported by the
group.
– More concerned with
group harmony.
– Worse in highly
cohesive groups.
– Example:
Cultural Influence
• Culture – behaviors, attitudes,
ideas, values shared by a group
• Example:
– Culture within animals
– Culture in humans
Variations Across Cultures
• Norm – rules for accepted and
expected behavior
– Example:
• Personal space – the
buffer zone we like to
maintain around our bodies
–North Americans prefer
more than Latin Americans
• Pace of life
– More fast paced in U.S. than Mexico manana
Variation Over Time
• Changes over the generations
The Power of Individuals
• Social control – the
power of the situation
• personal control – the
power of the individual
– Example –
• Minority influence – the
power of one or two
individuals to sway
majorities
– Holding consistently to minority
opinion
Social Relations –
how we relate to one another:
prejudice, aggression,
attraction, altruism,
peacemaking
Stereotypes, Prejudice and
Discrimination
Stereotype:
• Overgeneralized beliefs about
a group of people.
• 3 components: beliefs,
emotions and predisposition to
action
•
Example: obese people are gluttonous
Prejudice:
• An unjustifiable and usually
negative attitude toward a
group and its members
•
Example: “I dislike fat people”
Discrimination:
• An action based on a prejudice
(behavior).
•
Example: to not hire an obese person
Prejudice
How Prejudiced Are People?
Automatic Prejudice
Automatic Prejudice
• Implicit racial associations: harboring unconscious
racial associations
• Unconscious patronization: evaluate performance
based on racial stereotypes
– low expectations result in inflated praise and insufficient
criticism hindering minority student’s academic achievement
• Racial influenced perceptions - people more often
mistakenly shot targets who were black.
• Seeing black – the more a person’s facial features
are perceived as typical of their racial category, the
more likely they are to elicit race-based responding.
• Reflexive boldly responses – studies have detected
implicit prejudice in facial responses and activation of
amygdala– demonstrates implicit prejudice.
Is it just race?
NO
• Palestinians and Jews
• Homosexual and
Heterosexual
• Men and Women
But women have some things going for them
like……
Which person would you want to have
a long term relationship with?
Social Roots of Prejudice
• In-Group – people with
whom we share a
common identity
Solon vs. Twinsburg
– Example:
• Out-group – People with
whom we don’t share a
common identity
– Example
• In Group Bias –
tendency to favor our
own group
– Example:
Girls rule, boys drool
Emotional Roots of Prejudice
• Scapegoat Theory –
theory that
prejudice offers an
outlet for anger by
providing someone to
blame
– Example:
Cognitive Roots of Prejudice
• Categorization
– Out-group homogeneity – overestimating the similarity
within other groups
– Other-race effect (aka own-race bias, or cross-race effect)
– the tendency to recall faces of ones own group more
accurately than faces of other races
• Example:
• Vivid cases – tend to remember vivid cases more
easily
• Just-world phenomenon – tendency to believe that
people get what they deserve
– Hindsight bias
Psychology of Aggression
Aggression – any physical
or verbal behavior
intended to hurt or
destroy
2 Types
1.Instrumental Aggression
2.Hostile Aggression
The Biology of Aggression
• Genetic Influences
• Neural Influences
• Biochemical
Influences
Aggression Theories
Aversive Events
– Frustration-aggression principle – blocking an
attempt to achieve a goal creates anger
• Fight or flight reaction to stress
– Adverse stimuli – physical pain, insults, high
temperatures etc. can create anger
Social and cultural influences
– Reinforcement – experience has taught that
aggression pays
– Aggression higher when: Ostracized, high
disparity between rich and poor, minimal father
care,
• Aggression-replacement program – communication skills,
anger control, moral reasoning
Aggression Theories
-Observing models of aggression
– Rape myth – some women enjoy or
invite rape
-Social scripts – mental tapes for
how to act provided by our cultural
i.e. media
-video games and violence
– Catharsis hypothesis
Attraction
1. Proximity
2.Physical Attractiveness
3.Similarity
4.Reciprocal Liking
5.Reward theory of attraction
5 Factors of Attraction
Proximity
Mere exposure effectIncreased attraction
to novel stimuli that
become more
familiar
– The more we are
exposed to
something, the more
we like it
Attraction
• The power of
physical
attractiveness
The Hotty Factor
• Physically
attractiveness
predicts dating
frequency (they
date more).
• They are perceived
as healthier,
happier, more honest
and successful than
less attractive
counterparts.
Similarity
• Paula Abdul was
wrong- opposites do
NOT attract.
• Birds of the same
feather do flock
together.
• Similarity breeds
content.
Reciprocal Liking
• You are more likely
to like someone who
likes you.
• Why?
• Except in
elementary school!!!!
Reward theory of Conditioning
• We continue
relationships that
offer more rewards
than costs
– Associating with people
that are attractive is
socially rewarding
– When someone works
with us, it costs less
time and effort to
develop a friendship and
enjoy the benefits
Beauty and Culture
Obesity is so revered among Mauritania's
white Moor Arab population that the
young girls are sometimes force-fed to
obtain a weight the government has
described as "life-threatening".
Are these cultures really that different?
• Love
Romantic Love
– Passionate Love – intense
positive absorption of another
• Two Factor Theory of Emotion
(Schachter/Singer)
– Companionate Love – deep
affectionate attachment
• Equity – both partners receive in
proportion to what they give
• Self-disclosure – revealing of
intimate details
Altruism
• Altruism - unselfish regard for the
welfare of others
Prosocial Behavior
Bystander Effect -
Tendency for
a bystander to be less likely to help if
other people are present
– Example:
Diffusion of Responsibility – When
many people share the responsibility
we think someone else will help
Pluralistic Ignorance - People decide
what to do by looking to others – a
lack of reaction is interpreted as a
non-emergency situation
Altruism
Altruism
Norms for Helping
• Social exchange theory – we want
to maximize the benefits and minimize
the costs
• Social Norms that Influence Altruism
–Reciprocity norm – we help
someone who has helped us
–Social-responsibility norm – we
help people who need our help
Conflict and Peacemaking
• Conflict – a perceived incompatibility of
goals actions and ideas
• Destructive Social Processes
– Social trap we harm our collective well
being by following our personal interests
• Non-zero sum game
– Distorted Perception
Enemy Perceptions
• Mirror-image perceptions –
mutual views seen by
conflicting people
– We are ethical and peaceful –
they are evil and aggressive
and visa-versa
• Self-fulfilling prophecy –
perceptions that can lead to
their own fulfillment
Conflict and Peacemaking
• Contact
• Cooperation
– Superordinate goals – shared
goals achieved through
cooperation
• Communication
• Conciliation
– GRIT – strategy designed to
decrease international
tension