Preview p.36
1. Describe an attitude or tendency you would
like to change.
2. Using the attitudes-follow-behavior principle,
how might you go about changing that
attitude?
Social Psychology
Textbook pp.722-734
Notebook p.37
Social Psychology
• The study of how we
think about, influence,
and relate to one
another.
• (how do we explain
mass suicides, prisoner
abuse, brainwashing,
and other shocking
phenomena)
Attitudes influence actions…
Attribution Theory
(Fritz Heider) – people
usually attribute others’
behavior to either their
internal dispositions or
their external
situations.
Dispositional (internal) or
Situational (external)?
•
They won only because the best athletes on the Central
State’s teams were out with injuries – talk about good
fortune.
•
•
They won because they have some of the best talent in the
country.
•
•
Internal (dispositional)
Anybody could win this region; the competition is so far
below average in comparison to the rest of the country.
•
•
External (situational)
External (situational)
They won because they put in a great deal of effort and
practice.
•
Internal (dispositional)
• Fundamental Attribution Error –
underestimating situational
influences when evaluating the
behavior of someone else.
– He swerved into my lane
because he is a jerk.
• Actor-observer bias – attributing
others’ behaviors to disposition
but your own behaviors (even the
same behaviors) to situational
factors.
– Example: He swerved into my
lane because he is a jerk, but I
swerved into the next lane
because I was trying to avoid
an animal in the road.
• Self-serving bias – crediting your
own successes to disposition, but
attributing your own failures to
situation.
– Example: I won the game
because I’m talented.
I failed the test because
the questions were unfair.
Our attributions have
consequences.
Do our attitudes influence actions?
…or do our actions influence
attitudes?
• Cognitive dissonance is the discomfort caused
by holding two contradictory beliefs or
performing an action contradictory to our
beliefs.
Cognitive Dissonance Theory
Cognitive dissonance theory states that we are
motivated to reduce this uncomfortable
feeling by changing our beliefs to match our
actions.
The dissonance (uncomfortable feeling) is less if
we feel that we were forced to perform the
action. Thus, the larger the pressure used to
elicit the overt behavior, the smaller the
tendency to change opinion.
Examples of Actions influences
Attitudes:
• Foot-in-the-door phenomenon – the tendency
for people who agree to a small request to
comply later with a larger one (examples,
“Drive carefully”, Korean War,)
• Effort justification – the tendency to find
something more attractive if you have to work
hard to achieve it.
– This is cognitive dissonance. If I am willing to be spanked for a fraternity, then I
must be crazy. Therefore, this must be the coolest fraternity ever!
– Can you think of a personal example of this and share it with your partner?
Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison
Experiment (1971)
The Power of the Situation:
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RazP8DMfe8
• Role playing - subjects
who play a role often
begin to “become” the
role (Zimbardo’s prison
study)
• How can the subjects’
behavior in this study
be explained by
cognitive dissonance
theory?
Conformity
Social Pressures Can Create
Dissonance and Lead to Conformity
•
Seven factors that increase
conformity (Asch):
1. Subject feels insecure
2. The group has at least 3 people.
3. The group is unanimous.
4. Subject admires the group.
5. Subject has made no prior
commitment to any response
6. Others observe the subject’s
behavior.
7. The culture encourages respect for
social standards.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYIh
4MkcfJA
So what can I do to make sure my
attitudes guide my actions?
• outside influences are minimal (i.e., avoid
peer pressure)
• the attitude is specific to the behavior (i.e.,
instead of “I won’t cheat”, think “I won’t copy
someone’s homework”.)
• we are mindful of our attitudes (i.e., wear a
ring or bracelet with a reminder of your
beliefs; promise ring, WWJD, Live Strong
bracelets)
Process p.36
• How have you conformed to group pressure
without seriously considering alternatives? Be
specific.