social psych exam 1

history and principles

norman triplett (1861-1931)
floyd allport (1890-1978)
first social psychology book - 1924
world war II
became unified field in psychology
propaganda
prejudice
social influence
push jewish scholars to US
kurt lewin
father of social psych
B = f(P,E)
behavior is function of personality and environment
gestalt
research- leadership, attitudes, person perception, group processes
leon festinger
lewins student
3 important papers
theory of informal social communication
people speak when:
they want to achieve a goal
when they want to see if they are correct
theory of social comparison
theory of cognitive dissonance
pioneered use of experiments
1950s-1960s: two camps
behaviorism
psychoanalysis
cognitive revolution
1970s- behaviorism falling out of favor
cognitive psychology taking over
models of memory, language, structure of mind
popular topics now
morality
social neuroscience
implicit attitudes
terrorism, intergroup conflict
culture- 1980s-1990s
triandis and miller
why do we behave the way we do
nature
people born a certain way
genes, hormones, brain structure ,etc, dictate how they act
culture
what people learn from parents, society, experiences
colapinto (2000)
twin boys
one raised as girl after accident
nature/evolution vs nurture/culture
theory of evolution to help explain social behavior
natural selection
survival until reproduction
reproduction
boyd and richerson (1985)
lots of definitions of culture
shared ideas
culture as a system
culture as a praxis- shared ways of doing something

definition
an information based system that includes shared ideas and common ways of doing
things
human universals
group living
language
theory of mind
cultural differences
adaptability
independent vs interdependent
kim and Markus pen study (1999)
interdependent- choose identical pen
independent- choose different pen
evolution and gender roles
marriage
financial interests
taking care of children
parental investment
naturalistic fallacy
claim that the way things are is the way they should be
methods
cohen and nisbett (1997) study
applicant convicted of felony
employers in south were more cooperative
attitudes towards violence the same between northerners and southerners
differences in response to threats to home and family
research questions
what happened (descriptive)
why did it happen like that? (causal)
steps
decide what to study
hypothesis to test theory
hypotheses and theories
hypothesis - creative idea as to how a scientific event or entity came to be, ba
sed on a number of logical assumptions
no scientific basis for hypothesis
enough data supports hypothesis, becomes a theory
theory
idea that results when a hypothesis is supported by observation and scientific i
nquiry
how to study it
descriptive research
what is the state of X
collection of data
observational
survey data
random sample vs convenience sample
archival data
correlational research
are X and Y related
a measure of whether a change in X also means a change in Y
correlation coefficient
strength and direction
requires
representative sample
2 measurements or variables
benefits
cheap, easy, fast
shows relationship between groups

drawbacks
correlation is not causation
3rd variable problem
experimental research
does X cause Y
intentionally causing a change in some variable in order to test the effects on
an outcome
independent variable vs dependent variable
requires
representative sample
2 similar groups prior to manipulation
control over confounding variables
benefits
shows causal relationship
allows control of extraneous variables
drawbacks
hard, expensive
impossible in some cases
issues in psychological research
validity
is research actually meaningful
external- accurately predict real-world behavior?
field experiment
internal- measure what you think it measures
random assignment
set up realistic experiment
debriefing
social cognition
study of how people
think about social world
arrive at judgments
interpret the past
understand the present
predict the future
traditional model of cognitive schemata
computer
sensory input > translation > storage
but we arent objective stimulus processors
information available for social cognition
judgments are only as effective as the quality of the information on which they
are based
but information available isnt always accurate or complete
minimal info
willis and todorov (2006)- judgments based on snapshots
snap judgments predict consensus opinion
misleading firsthand info
info based on personal experience or observation
personal experiences may be unrepresentative
pluralistic ignorance
individual motivations not to deviate form group norms can create misperceptions
about those norms
misleading second hand info
info that comes from other sources- gossip, news, books, agazines, internet, etc
ideological distortions
desire to foster certain beliefs or behaviors into others
overemphasis on bad news
effects of bas news bias
differential attention to positive and negative information
how information is presented

how info presented can affect judgments

order effects
primacy effect
recency effect
Asch (1946)- first impressions are crucial
framing effects
spin framing
framing that varies in content
positive and negative framing
temporal framing
moving example
construal level theory
theory that outlines the relationship between psychological distance and concret
eness versus abstraction of though
psychological distant actions- abstract thought
psychological close actions- concrete thought
how we seek information
dont just passively take in information
seek it out
pervasive bias in information seeking strategies often distorts the conclusions
we reach
confirmation bias
top down processing- using schemas to understand new information
preexisting knowledge, expectations, mental habits can influence contrstrual of
new information and substantially influence judgment
bottom up processes
data driven
form conclusion based on stimuli encountering through experience
top down processes
theory driven
filters and interprets new information in light of preexisting knowledge and exp
ectations
how is information stored and accessed
in coherent configurations or schemas
influence of schemas
attention
schemas influence how we direct our attention
memory
remember stimuli that have most captured our attention
construal
how we interpret the info or construe that info
experiment
perception- given list of words
read ambiguous essay
evaluations of person from essay
behavior
elderly schema > walked slower
which schemas are activated and applied?
priming
frequent activation and chronic accessibility
not conscious about schemas
self fulfilling prophecies
IQ test experiment
reason, intuition, heuristics
intuition and reason underlie social cognition, complex interplay determines jud
gments we make
2 mental systems can agree or disagree
heuristics
intuitive mental operations that allows us to make decisions quickly and efficie
ntly

availability heuristic
used to judge frequency or probability of events
judgments made based on ease of bringing examples to mind
representativeness heuristic
judgments based on how similar something is to a prototypical example
base rate info
how many members of category in question are there relative to members of all ot
her categories
social cognition, sources of error in judgment about social world
judgments only as effective as quality of info on which theyre based
information available is not always accurate or complete
way information is presented can affect judgments we make
dont just passively take in information
preexisting knowledge, expectations, mental habits can influence construal of ne
w info, influence judgment
2 mental systems - intuition, reason
underlie social cognition
complex interplay determines judgments we make
social attribution
attribution theory
set of theoretical accounts of how people assign causes to events around them
effects that peoples causal assessments have
inferring causes of behavior
causal attribution
process people use to explain both their own and others behavior
linking event to a cause
importance of causal attributions
type of attribution made will influence how you respond to situation
explanatory style
persons habitual way of explaining events
explanatory dimensions
internal vs external
degree that cause is linked to the self or to the external situation
stable vs unstable
degree that the cause is seen as fixed or as something thats temporary
global vs specific
degree that cause is seen as affecting other domains in life or is restricted to
affecting one specific domain
how do we attribute cause
person x situation = our attribution dispositions x the circumstances
disposition
pessimistic attribution style
internal, stable, global attributions
pessimistic attribution styles predict lower grades, poorer physical health late
r in life
hong et al 1999
ability attributions vs effort attributions
situation
covariation principle
behavioral attributions are made by weighing information about potential causes
of behavior
processes of causal attribution
consensus
what would most people do in the given situation
distinctiveness
whether an individuals behavior is unique to a given situation or whether that pe
rson would behave the same way in a different situation
consistency
whether an individual acts the same way in similar situations

covariation principle application

external attribution
yes consensus
yes distinctiveness
yes consistency
internal attributions
no consensus
no distinctiveness
yes consistency
imagining alternative outcomes
counterfactual thoughts
thoughts of what might have happened if only something had been done differently
wells and gavanski 1989
emotional amplification
emotional reaction to an event that is proportional to how easy it is to imagine
the event not happening
medvec et al 1995