SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
I hope you like the way I altered the presentation of the
outline a little - please enjoy & find useful my prompts for you to
consider examples from your own life that are related to these concepts. These will help you to think more critically
(and also engage in elaborative rehearsal!)
OUR THOUGHTS ABOUT OTHERS
Ø
Ben was yelling loudly at people in the bar. Why was Ben doing this? Take a minute to make your attribution. There are many different ways to make
attributions about Ben's behavior.
Which did you choose? Was he
yelling because he is a boisterous, loud person? Was it because he was
drunk? Or was it because there was a
loud band playing and you have to yell so others can hear?
v Mistaken Attributions
Ø the fundamental attribution error: make the wrong attribution. Are you
failing to take environmental factors into account? If Ben was yelling because it was loud in the bar, but you
attributed it to Ben's boisterous personality, then did you mistakenly blame
Ben for what was really an action as a result of the environment?
§
Saliency
bias – can contribution to the fundamental attribution error
Ø self-serving bias – When it comes to yourself,
you'll make attributions about your achievements/failures that will have you
coming out on top (help you to look your best).
Attitudes: Our Learned Predispositions Toward Others
v Attitudes
are learned - they have 3 components - cognitive, affective, &
behavioral. (Think, feel, do).
Ø Ex: As a personal example - what is your
attitude about recycling? Take some
time to identify the "think, feel, & do" components of your
attitude about recycling. Then take
some time to do the same for some other things that you may have an attitude
about. Drinking & Driving? Civic
duties such as voting? Breakfast cereals?
Take some time to dissect some of your attitudes.
v Attitudes
are a product of acquisition. We are
not born with them. We learn them
through direct & indirect experience.
Ask yourself: what attitudes do
you have that you acquired through direct experience? Indirect experience?
v How do
they change?
Ø Attitudes
can change via persuasion. TV, radio,
& print commercials try to persuade you.
Ø Cognitive
dissonance - when attitudes/attitudes or attitudes/behaviors conflict -
discomfort may result. Steps will be
taken to reduce this discomfort, thus alleviating or eliminating the cognitive
dissonance.
§
Ex: When has
cognitive dissonance contributed to your attitudinal change?
§
On page 564, your book discusses an experiment by Festinger
& Carlsmith. This provides a good
example of attitudinal change effected by cognitive dissonance.
OUR FEELINGS ABOUT OTHERS
Prejudice & Discrimination:
It's the Feeling that Counts
v Prejudice:
attitude toward members of a particular group.
Name some different types of prejudice.
How does it affect your ability to make judgments & process
information? It hinders those
abilities! What are the components of
prejudice?
Ø stereotype
- oversimplified characterization of people in a certain
group. Ex: all black men are criminals.
All bikers are insensitive. What
are some other examples you have encountered?
Ø affective
component - what you feel about this it
Ø behavioral component - discrimination:
unequal treatment of groups. Ex:
pre-Civil Rights movement America in which different races had different
privileges, facilities, etc.
Major Sources of Prejudice & Discrimination
1)
Learning - acquisition
of prejudices may occur classically, operantly, and observationally.
2)
Displaced aggression - scapegoating
- making a person or group bear the blame for others.
3)
you see a group as posing a threat to your resources - you
don't like minorities bc you are convinced that they got all the scholarship $.
4)
Prejudice as a way to simply things -
stereotypes may enable you to make quick judgments about ppl & your
behavior towards them. May lead to ingroup
favoritism - favoring ppl in your grp.
The ingroup is the "us" & Outgroup is
"them." Outgroup homogeneity effect -tendency to see members
of the outgroup as all being the same.
Individual differences no longer exist.
Reducing Prejudice & Discrimination
1)
Cooperation & the creation of superordinate
goals - working together in the face of very large goals can
decrease prejudice. Cooperation is a
big weapon against prejudice.
2)
Increased contact -
increasing the amount of contact between groups or people can decrease
prejudice. Ex: Remember the Titans.
3)
Cognitive Retraining- people
can learn to think differently. An old
dog can learn new tricks, or in this case, a new way of thinking about things.õ
4)
Cognitive Dissonance- Cog dis
plays a role in all of the above. But
seeing that there are discrepancies between your old prejudicial attitudes
& the new attitudes that you have learned or new behaviors that you have
acquired can lead to a decrease in prejudice.
Interpersonal Attraction: Liking & Loving Others
Interpersonal
attraction –liking someone else.
Three Key Factors in Attraction: Physical Attractiveness,
Proximity, & Similarity
v
Physical Attractiveness - plays an
important role in initial attraction.
Physical attractiveness can lead to other positive things being
attributed to that person. Ex: the good
beautiful princess vs. the mean, ugly witch.
v
Proximity - who is
near you, available to you? Proximity
increases exposure - how often you come into contact with a person.
v Similarity - similarity
encompasses both demographic similarities & interest similarities. Are you a Baptist teenage boy like me? Do you share a love of basketball?
Loving Others
v
Liking Vs. Loving - like - you
favorably evaluate one another. Love: 3
components - caring, attachment & intimacy (intimacy doesn't just mean sexual
intimacy - consider a broader model of it.)
v
Romantic Love - Romantic
love - attraction, excitement, and sexual attraction, passion. Its intensity can swiftly diminish. Sets stage for companionate love.
v Companionate Love - warmth, closeness, sharing, &
commitment. This is the for better or
for worse, over the long haul love here.
Consider a couple you know that has been married for decades.
OUR ACTION TOWARD OTHERS
Social Influence: Conformity & Obedience
Conformity - Going Along With Others
v Acting
like other people in a certain group due to real or imagined pressure.
v Consider
Asch's famous experiment into conformity using the "standard line."
(Figure 16.7 on page 577) How often did
people conform with the group versus when asked the question alone? Why do you think they conformed?
Ø Normative
Social Influence - we conform so we can be accepted by the
group.
§
Personal space norms are very important
to adhere to. How close can your
grandmother get to you versus the UPS delivery person? What relationship exists between personal
space & your relationship with the other person?
Ø Informational Social Influence
- You may conform because you don't have enough information available to
you. This may be one of the reasons
Asch's subjects conformed. "Are
these other guys seeing something that I don't see? What do they know that I don't know?"
Ø Reference
groups - You may conform to your reference group. Your whole family wants to eat at Sonic, but
you would rather have Burger King.
However, since your whole family wants to go to Sonic, you go along,
too.
Obedience - Going Along with a Command
v What
about obedience – this is following the demands made by an authority
figure.
v Milgram's
famous study.
Ø What
happened when Milgram varied his study?
Those results are presented on page 580 of your book in a very handy
graph.
v Aside
from Milgram's famous study, what other examples of obedience can you
think of?
v What
factors did Milgram identify as impacting the amount of obedience in his
experiment?
Ø How
important is the authority figure who is making the demand?
Ø Modeling
- what have you seen other people do in response to these demands? What role
did modeling play in Milgram's experiments?
Ø Situational
factors are very important in obedience.
Group
Processes: Membership & Decision Making
Group
Membership
v Roles In Groups - we all have roles within a group - certain
behavioral expectations are incorporated by these roles. Ex: What behaviors to you expect from your
mother? How are these different than the
behaviors that you expect from your doctor? Boss? Friend? Co-worker?
Ø
In his famous prison study, Zimbardo examined the power of roles. He found that people can adopt new roles,
and their respective behaviors, very quickly.
v Deindividuation - as a member of a group, you feel
less self-conscious, more anonymous, and less inhibited than if you were
alone. How does this explain the
behavior of people in a riot? Can you
think of any personal examples of when you felt deindividuated? At the big sports event? In a crowd at a bar?
Group
Decision Making
v
Group Polarization - tendency of opinion to gravitate toward
extremes as they are discussed in a group.
Through group polarization, the rift between two factions in a group may
grow wider & wider. Point for
consideration: What problems would this
concept pose for our judicial system?
v Groupthink - a highly unified group bands together & ignores, discredit
dissenting/contrary information. I
think of it as a big set of blinders.
Ex: Kennedy & Bay of Pigs
invasion. Can you think of an example
of groupthink from your place of business or school?
Aggression: Explaining & Controlling It
Aggression
- any act meant to harm another living thing.
Biological
Factors in Aggression
1)
Instinct - Ethologists say that
aggression is just a natural thing for all animals
2)
Genes - is there genetic
predisposition to aggression?
3)
The brain & the nervous system -
certain structures in your brain are associated with aggressive behavior.
4)
Substance abuse & mental disorders - This
is pretty self explanatory. But, as an
example, consider a bar full of drunk guys.
Alcohol + hormones (see below) = powder keg.
5)
Hormones & neurotransmitters - your
hormones & neurotransmitters, get out of whack, aggression may result.
Psychological
Factors in Aggression
1)
Aversive Stimuli- frustration-aggression
hypothesis - that frustration leads to aggression.
2)
Culture & learning - We may
learn aggressive behaviors by watching others.
3)
Media & video games - We may
learn aggressive behaviors through media & video games. Some of those video games are downright
scary in their realistic portrayals of VIOLENCE.
Controlling
or Eliminating Aggression
How can we combat aggression? There are some different ways.
1)
You could channel your aggression into more
"harmless" forms
2)
Tech behaviors incompatible w/ aggression.
3)
Increase social & communication skills
Altruism: Why We Help & Don't Help Others
Altruistic behavior - or helping others. If you saw someone in danger or trouble or a
sad situation, would you help?
Why Do We Help?
v
egoistic model - we help others because we can later gain. Helping others in turn may help you.
v empathy-altruism
hypothesis- you help bc you have an unselfish desire.
Why Don't We Help?
There are many factors playing into bystander
intervention? If something goes
awry during one of these stages, you may not help.
v You must
notice there is a problem. (If you
don't notice, will you help?)
v You must
consider this to be an emergency. (If
you don't consider it an emergency, will you help?)
v You must
take responsibility. You decide that
you will do something about it.
v You must
decide what you will do.
As always, remember that this material is supplemental in nature. It's not meant to take the place of your
notes, classroom attendance, or reading your text. I reserve the right to add, alter, or delete this material at any
time. But I hope that it is of
assistance to you in your studies!