A BRIEF HISTORY OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

The Birth and Infancy of Social Psychology: 1880s-1920s

A. Norman Triplett  conducted a research on how bicyclists tended to race faster in
the presence of others.
B. Max Ringelmann  conducted a research that showed that individuals performed
worse in the presence of others. (Pulling a rope)
However they did not completely establish the birth of social psychology as a distinct field of study.
> William McDougall (1908), Edward Ross (1908), Floyd Allport (1924) are the creator
of the first three textbooks in social psychology.

A Call to Action: 1930s-1950s

World War II marked an explosion of interest in social psychology.
A. Adolf Hitler  Hitler’s rise to power caused people to become desperate for answers to
social psychology questions (violence, prejudice, genocide, conformity/obedience)
B. Gordon Allport  in 1936 he formed the Society for the Psychological Study of Social
Issues that consists of psychologists who are concerned with social issues. In 1954 he
published The Nature of Prejudice.
C. Muzafer Sherif  a Turkish young-man who had witnessed Greek soldiers brutal murders,
fled to the United States, and conducted a study about the powerful influences groups can
exert on their individual members.
D. Kurt Lewin  helped establish a fundamental principle about behavior as a function of the
interaction between the person and the environment. (Interactionist Perspective). He also
helped in advocating the theories to applied in practical issues, such as;
 How to persuade Americans to conserve material during war
 How to promote economical and nutritious eating habits
 What kinds of leaders elicit the best work from group members?
E. Solomon Asch  demonstrated how people are willing to conform to an obviously wrong
majority.
F. Leon Festinger  introduced two theories—one concerning how people try to learn about
themselves by comparing to others and one about how people’s behavior can be changed by
their own behavior.
 Confidence and Crisis: 1960s-Mid 1970s
A. Stanley Milgram  inspired by the destructive obedience demonstrated by Nazi officers and
ordinary citizens in WWII, also by the disobedience of the civil that begun to challenge
institutions. His research demonstrated individual’s vulnerability to the destructive
commands of authority became the most famous research in the history of social psychology.
Social psychology entered a period of expansion and enthusiasm.
 Studied how people thought and felt about themselves and others
 Studied interactions in groups and social problems, such as why people fail to help others in
distress
 Examined aggression, physical attractiveness, and stress.
Ironically it was also time of crisis and heated debate, social psychology got split into two.
 Critics of laboratory method: asserted that certain practices were unethical and are influenced
by the experimenter’s expectations.
 Those who favored laboratory method: contended that their procedures were ethical, valid,
and widely applicable.

An Era of Pluralism: Mid-1970s—1990s

1) A pluralistic approach emerged  wider range of research techniques and questions are
established.
2) Social psychologist became more interested in cognitive psychology  Social Cognition
(how we perceive, remember, and interpret information) subfield was born.
3) The development of international and multicultural perspectives  social psychological
phenomena may vary dramatically as a function of culture.