Social Psychology 1-5

LESSON 1: SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY - Group Influence
● The scientific study of how people

think about, influence, and relate to SOME BIG IDEAS IN SOCIAL
one another. The study how humans PSYCHOLOGY
behave and interact with each other, 1. SOCIAL THINKING
mainly in specific situations. - We construct our social reality
● It lies at psychology's boundary with - Our social intuitions are powerful,
sociology. Compared with sociology, sometimes perilous
social psychology focuses more on - Attitudes shape, and are shaped by
individuals and uses more Behavior
experimentation. Compared to 2. SOCIAL INFLUENCES
personality psychology, social - Social influence shape behavior
psychology focuses less on - Disposition shape behavior
individuals' differences and more on 3. SOCIAL RELATIONS
how individuals, in general, view and - Social behavior is also biological
affect one another behavior
● Social psychology is still a young - Feelings and actions toward people
science. And not until World War II are sometimes negative, sometimes
did it began. positive.
● Social psychology studies our 4. APPLYING SOCIAL
thinking, influence, and relationship PSYCHOLOGY
by asking questions that have - Social psychology's principles are
intrigued as all. applicable to everyday life
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY IS THE SOCIAL THINKING

SCIENTIFIC STUDY OF - WE CONSTRUCT OUR OWN
1. SOCIAL THINKING REALITY
- The self in a social world > you and I may react differently to similar
- Social beliefs and judgments situations because we think differently
- Behavior and attitude > Princeton-Dartmouth Football game
2. SOCIAL INFLUENCE (1951)
- Prejudice: Disliking others > there is an objective reality out there, but
- Aggression: Hurting others we always view it through the lens of our
- Attraction and Intimacy: Liking & beliefs and values
Loving others - OUR SOCIAL INSTUITIONS ARE
- Helping OFTEN POWERFUL BUT
- Conflict and peacemaking SOMETIMES PERILOUS
3. APPLYING SOCPSY > Intuition is automatic processing from the
- Social Psychology in the Clinic unconscious mind
- Social Psychology in Court > 9/11 incident
4. SOCIAL RELATIONS > our instant intuition shape our fears,
- Genes, culture, and gender impressions, and relationships
- Conformity and obedience > we intuitively trust our memories more
- Persuasion than we should
SOCIAL INFLUENCES APPLICATION OF SOCIAL PSYCH
- SOCIAL INFLUENCES SHAPE - SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY'S
OUR BEHAVIORS PRINCIPLE ARE APPLICABLE IN
> As social creatures, we respond to our EVERYDAY LIFE
immediate contexts. Sometimes, the power > For judicial procedures and juror decisions
of social situations leads us to act contrary in courtrooms
to our expressed attitudes > For influencing behaviors that will enable
> Our culture define our situations an environmentally sustainable human
- PERSONAL ATTITUDES AND future
DISPOSITIONS ALSO SHAPE > Social psychology is all about life - your
BEHAVIORS life: your beliefs, your attitudes, your
> Our inner attitudes affect our behavior. relationships
Our political attitudes influence our voting
behavior. Our smoking attitudes influence SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY AND HUMAN
our susceptibility to peer pressures to VALUES
smoke. Our attitudes toward the poor Do social psychologists are really objective?
influence our willingness to help them. Because they are human beings, don't their
> Personality dispositions also affect values - their personal convictions about
behavior what is desirable and how people ought to
behave - seep their work? If so, can social
SOCIAL RELATIONS psychology really be scientific?
- SOCIAL BEHAVIOR IS
BIOLOGICALLY ROOTED OBVIOUS WAYS VALUES ENTER
> As evolutionary psychologists reminded PSYCHOLOGY
us, our inherited human nature predisposes ● RESEARCH - TIME
us to behave in ways that helped our 1940s - study of prejudice because of
ancestors survive and reproduce (dating, fascism
mating, hating, hurting, caring, sharing, and 1950s - conformity because of fashion
responding) sense
> We can also examine the neurobiology 1960's - aggression because of riots and
that underlies social behavior. What brain crime
areas enable our experiences of love and 1970's - gender because of feminism
contempt, helping and aggression, 1980's - psychological aspects of arms race
perception and belief. 1990's to 21st century - diversity and
> SOCIAL NEUROSCIENCE - an inclusion
integration of biological and social ● CULTURES
perspectives that explores the neural and Europe - take pride in their nationalities
psychological bases of social and emotional Scots are self-conscious rather then English
behaviors Europe - social identity
America - individuality
Asian - Collective identity
● TYPES OF PEOPLE
Differences of people who are attracted to
specific studies, interest, or hobbies.
THE SUBJECTIVE ASPECT OF SCIENCE foreseen how something turned out.
● Scientific interpretation based on Also known as the
mental categories or preconceptions "I-knew-it-all-along phenomenon
● Your mind blocks something that is ● this hindsight bias often makes
there, if only you were predisposed people overconfident about the
you will perceive it validity of their judgment and
● People who often share common predictions
viewpoint or came from the same
culture, their assumptions may go CORRELATIONAL RESEARCH:
unchallenged DETECTING NATURAL ASSOCIATIONS
● PLACE: Laboratory (controlled
SOCIAL REPRESENTATIONS: situation) or in the Field (everyday
-- socially shared beliefs - widely held ideas situation)
and values, including our assumptions and ● METHOD:-- CORRELATIONAL
cultural ideologies. Our social RESEARCH - the study of the
representations help us make sense of the naturally occurring relationship
world among variables
PSYCHOLOGICAL CONCEPTS CONTAIN CORRELATION

HIDDEN VALUES SOCIAL STATUS -------------------- HEALTH
- Defining a good life
- Professional advice ● correlational research allows us to
- Forming concepts predict, but it cannot tell us whether
- Labeling changing one variable will cause
● This penetration of values into changes in another
science is not a reason to fault social
psychology or any other science. EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCH - studies
That human thinking is seldom that seek clues to cause-and-effect
dispassionate is precisely why we relationships by manipulating one or more
need systematic observation and factors (independent variables) while
experimentation if we are to check controlling others (holding them constant)
our cherished ideas against reality.
SURVEY RESEARCH
IS SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY SIMPLY - measuring variables through
COMMON SENSE? representatives of a population
● Social psychology is criticized for - subgrouping population will enable
being trivial because it documents us to be
things that seems obvious - 95% confident on describing
● Experiments, however, reveal that population with
outcomes are more " obvious" after - 3% error margin or less
the facts are known.
● Hindsight bias - the tendency to
exaggerate after learning an
outcome, one's ability to have
IMPORTANT TO KNOW: ● DECEPTION or an effect by which
1. Unrepresentative samples participants are misinformed or
2. Order questions misled about the study's methods
3. Response options and purposes.
4. Wording of questions ● DEMAND CHARACTERISTICS or
● Framing - the way a question or an cues in an experiment that tell the
issue is posed, it can influence participant what behavior is
people's decisions and expressed expected can be minimized by
opinions making a standardize instructions.
● INFORMED CONSENT - an ethical
EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCH: principle that research participants
SEARCHING FOR CAUSE AND EFFECT be told enough to enable them to
CONTROL: MANIPULATING VARIABLES choose whether they wish to
INDEPENDENT VARIABLES - the participate
experimental factor that a researcher ● DEBRIEFING - it is the post-
manipulates experimental explanation of a study
DEPENDENT VARIABLES - the variable to its participants. It usually
being measured, so called because it discloses any deception and often
depend on manipulations of the I.V. queries participants regarding their
Example: understandings and feelings
● Correlation: The more violent
television children watch the more
aggressive they then to be.
● Experimental: Exposing children to
violent and non-violent programs,
researchers can now observe how
the amount of violence affects behavior

● Independent variables: Exposure
and non-exposure to violent
programs
● Dependent variable: Aggressive
acts
THE ETHICS OF EXPERIMENTATION

● Aronson et. al. (1985) MUNDANE
REALISM - degree to which an
experiment is superficially similar to
everyday life
● EXPERIMENTAL REALISM -
degree to which an experiment is
superficially similar to everyday
situations about 1/3 of social
psychological studies have used
LESSON 2: The SELF in Social World The SELF
● Self-Concept: Who am I?
Spotlights and Illusions ● Self-schema - beliefs about self that
● The spotlight effect - organize and guide the processing
overestimating others' noticing our of relevant information (e.g. athletic,
behavior and appearance. The belief overweight, smart, or whatever)
that others are paying more attention ● Self-knowledge - How can I explain
to one's appearance and behavior and predict myself.
than they really are ● Possible self - images of what we
● Illusion of Transparency - the dream of or becoming in the future\
illusion that our concealed emotions ● Self-esteem - my sense of
leak out and can be easily read by self-worth
others ● Social-self - my roles as a student,
Examples: family member, and friend, my group
● Social surroundings affect our identity
self-awareness - when we are only ● Social comparisons - evaluating
member of our race, gender, and one's abilities and opinions by
nationality in a group, we notice how comparing oneself with others
we differ and how others are
reacting to our difference Self and Culture
● Self-interest colors our social ● Individualism - the concept of
judgement - when problems arise in giving priority to one's own goals
a close relationship, we usually over group goals and defining one's
attribute more responsibility to our identity in terms of personal
partners than to ourselves. attributes rather than group
● Self-concern motivates our social identifications (European and
behavior - in hopes of making a Western Countries)
positive impression, we agonize our ● Collectivism - giving priority to the
appearance goals of one's groups and defining
● Social relationships help define one's identity accordingly ( Asia,
our self - in our varying Africa, and Central and South
relationships, we have varying America)
selves ● Interdependent self - construing
one's identity in relation to others
Other info about ourselves
● In 2009 the word self appeared in
6,935 book and article summaries of
PsychINFO, more than 4x the
number that it appeared in 1970
● Our sense of self organizes our
thoughts, feelings, and actions. It
enables us to remember our past,
assess our present, and project our
future - and thus behave adaptively
Growing Individualism Self-Knowledge
● "The Me Generation" EXPLAINING OUR BEHAVIORS
● "Make a name for yourself" - Our self-explanations our often
● The interaction of society and self wrong. According to the study made
● Uniqueness and Popularity in names by Stone and others (1985), these
are the reason our moods are
Culture and Cognition affected: the day of the week,
● In the book Geography of Thought, weather, the amount we slept and
when Americans were asked what others. Thus, we may give plausible
goes together, Panda, Monkey, and answers why we behave there was
Banana? They will choose Monkey little relationship between on how we
and Banana because of individual perceived of how well a factor
preference while Asians will choose predicted their mood and how well it
Panda and Monkey because of the really did
collective recognition that they PREDICTING OUR BEHAVIORS
belong to the same kingdom: - People also err when predicting their
animals (Nisbett, 2003) behavior, there is a high chance that
● East Asians think more holistically - friends, peers, or roommates can
perceiving and thinking about predict your behavior than you do.
objects and people in relationship to - PLANNING FALLACY - the
one another and to their tendency to underestimate how long
environment (Masuda, et.al. 2003) it will take to complete a task
- So, how can you improve your
Culture and Self- Esteem self-predictions? The best way is to
● Self-esteem in collectivist cultures be realistic how long tasks took in
correlates closely with "what others the past
think of me and my group" PREDICTING OUR FEELINGS
Self-concept is malleable than stable ● Studies of "affective forecasting"
● For those individualistic cultures, reveal that people have greatest
self- esteem is more personal and difficulty predicting the intensity and
less relational. People in the duration of their future emotions.
individualistic countries persists ● Hungry shoppers are most likely to
more when succeeding because do impulsive buying than do
success elevates self-esteem shoppers who have just ate
● Collectivist Japanese and ● IMPACT BIAS - overestimating the
Individualistic US students were enduring impact of emotion-causing
asked what is happiness means, events. Faster than we expect, the
Japanese answered that it comes emotional traces of such good
with positive social engagement, tidings evaporate
while US students said that with ● IMMUNE NEGLECT - the human
feeling effective, superior and proud tendency to underestimate the
speed and the strength of the
"psychological immune system,"
which enables emotional recovery
and resilience after bad things NARCISSISM: SELF-ESTEEM'S
happen CONCEITED SISTER
THE WISDOM AND ILLUSIONS OF ● High self-esteem becomes
SELF-ANALYSIS especially problematic if it crosses
● the mental processes that control over into narcissism or having an
our social behavior are distinct from inflated sense of self. Most people
the mental processes through which with high self- esteem value both
we explain our behavior (Wilson, individual achievement and
2002) relationships with others. Narcissists
● DUAL ATTITUDES - differing implicit usually have high self-esteem, but
(automatic) and explicit (consciously they missing the piece about caring
controlled) attitudes toward the for others
same object. Verbalized explicit ● Bushman and Baumeister (1998) -
attitudes may change with education those who were high in both
and persuasion; implicit attitudes self-esteem and narcissism were the
change slowly. with practice and most likely to retaliate against a
forming of new habits classmate's criticism by giving him or
● This research on the limits of our her a bad grade
self-knowledge has two practical LOW VERSUS SECURE SELF-ESTEEM
implications: ● When feeling bad or threatened, low
1. Self-reports are often untrustworthy - self-esteem people often take a
errors in self-understanding limit the negative view of everything. They
scientific usefulness of subjective notice and remember others' worst
personal reports behaviors and think their partners
2. The sincerity in which people report don't love them (Murray, et. al.,
and interpret their experiences is no 1999)
guarantee of the validity of those ● Low self-esteem people are less
reports satisfied with their relationships, and
most likely to leave those
Self-Esteem relationships (Fincham & Bradburry,
SELF-ESTEEM - a person's overall 1993)
self-evaluation or sense of self-worth
● Crocker and Wolfe (2001) - when we Perceived Self-Control
feel good about our looks, smarts, or - Effortful self-control depletes our
whatever we have high self-esteem limited willpower reserves.
Brown and Dutton (1994) - those Self-control therefore operates
with high self-esteem are more likely similarly to muscular strength,
to value their looks, abilities, and so conclude by Baumeister and Exline
forth Self-esteem motivation in (2000)
siblings, partners, and friends - Example: People who tried to control
their emotional responses to an
upsetting situation exhibit decreased
physical stamina
● SELF- EFFICACY - a sense that Learned Helplessness
one is competent and effective, - the sense of hopelessness and
distinguished from self-esteem, resignation learned when a human
which one's sense of self-worth or animal perceives no control over
● many people confuse self-efficacy repeated bad events
with self-esteem. If you believe that Uncontrollable Bad events -> Perceived
you can do something, that is lack of control ->Learned Helplessness
self-efficacy. If you like yourself - Helpless dogs and depressed
overall, that is self-esteem people both suffer paralysis of will,
● If you believe you can do something, passive resignation, even motionless
will that make a difference? That apathy (Seligman, 1991)
depends if you have control with
your outcomes. you feel like you're a Self-Determination
competent student (high - Studies confirm that systems of
self-efficacy) but you are easily to governing or managing people that
procrastinate (low control) promote self-control will indeed
promote health and happiness (Deci
Locus of Control & Ryan, 1987):
● the extent to which people perceive ● Prisoners given some control over
outcomes as internally controllable their environments - by being able to
by their own efforts or as externally move chairs, control TV, and operate
controlled by chance or outside the lights - experience less stress,
forces exhibit fewer health problems, and
commit less vandalism (Ruback &
INTERNAL LOCUS OF CONTROL others, 1986)
● In the long run, people get the ● Workers given leeway in carrying out
respect they deserve in this world tasks and making decisions
● What happens to me is my own experience improved morale (Miller
doing & Monge, 1986)
● the average person can have an ● People perceive them as having free
influence in government decisions choice experience greater
satisfaction with their lives. And
EXTERNAL LOCUS OF CONTROL people in the countries where people
● Unfortunately, people's worth passes experience more freedom have
unrecognized no matter how hard more satisfied citizens
they try
● Sometimes, I feel that I don't have
enough control over the direction my
life is taking
● This world is run by few people in
power, and there is not much the
little guy can do about it
Self-Serving Bias ● Yet a dash of realism - can save us
- the tendency to perceive oneself from the perils of unrealistic
favorably optimism or what Norem (2000)
- we readily excuse our failures, called as DEFENSIVE PESSIMISM -
accept credit for our successes, and the adaptive value of anticipating
in many ways see ourselves as problems and harnessing one's
better than average anxiety to motivate effective action
EXPLAINING POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE
EVENTS FALSE CONSENSUS AND UNIQUENESS
● many experiments have found that ● False consensus effect - the
people accept credit when told they tendency to overestimate the
have succeeded. They attribute the commonality of one's opinions and
success to their ability and effort, but one's undesirable or unsuccessful
they attribute failure to external behaviors. Example: "I lie, but
factors such as bad luck or the doesn't everyone?"
inherent impossibility (sports, ● False uniqueness effect - the
politics, and even car accidents) tendency to underestimate the
● SELF-SERVING ATTRIBUTIONS - commonality of one's abilities and
a form of self-serving bias; the one's desirable or successful
tendency to attribute positive behaviors. Example: " Yes I lie and
outcomes to oneself and negative cheated but not everyone can admit
outcomes to other factors it."
● Self-serving bias also appears when ● Thus, we may see our failings as
people compare themselves to relatively normal and our virtues as
others. Compared with people in relatively exceptional
general, most people see
themselves as more ethical, more Self-serving Bias
competent at their job, friendlier, ● Attributing one's success to ability
more intelligent, better looking, less and effort, failure to luck and
prejudiced and healthier external things
Ex. I got the A in Psychology because I
UNREALISTIC OPTIMISM studied hard. I got D in Chemistry
● Illusory optimism increases our because the exams are unfair
vulnerability. Believing ourselves ● Comparing oneself favorably to
immune to misfortune, we do not others
take sensible precautions. Ex, I do more for my parents than my sister
● Example: sexually active does
undergraduate women who don't ● Unrealistic Optimism
consistently use contraceptives Ex. Even though 50% of marriages
perceives themselves, compared to fail, I know mine will be enduring joy
other women in their university, as ● False consensus and uniqueness
much less vulnerable to unwanted Ex. I lie and I cheat and so everybody
pregnancy does. While I am the only one who can
admit it.
Self-serving bias as adaptive external rather than lack of talent or
● Self-serving bias and its ability
accompanying excuses also help ● Self-handicapping examples:
people from depression. - reduce preparation for an important
Non-depressed people usually athletic event
exhibit self-serving bias, they excuse - give their opponent an advantage
their failures on task and perceive - perform poorly at the beginning in
themselves as being more in control order not to create unreachable
than they are expectations
● As research on depression and ● SELF-PRESENTATION - refers to
anxiety suggests, there is a practical our wanting to present a desired
wisdom in self- serving perceptions. image both to an external audience
It may be strategic to believe we are (other people) and internal audience
smarter, stronger, and more (ourselves)
successful than we are ● We work at managing impressions
Self-serving bias as maladaptive that we create. We excuse, justify, or
● Self-serving biases also inflate apologize as necessary to shore up
people's judgment of their groups, a our self-esteem
phenomenon called GROUP ● Social interaction is a careful
SERVING BIAS - explaining away balance of looking good while not
outgroup members positive looking too good
behaviors; also attributing negative ● People felt significantly better than
behaviors to their dispositions they thought they would be after
● Example: Most entrepreneurs doing their best to "put their best
overpredict their own firms face forward"
productivity and growth ● SELF-MONITORING - being attuned
to the way one presents oneself in
Self-Presentation social situations and adjusting one's
● SELF-HANDICAPPING - protecting performance to create the desired
one's self -image with behaviors that impression
create a handy excuse for later
failure
● Why would people handicap
themselves with self-defeating
behavior? Recall that we eagerly
protect our self-images by attributing
failure to external factors
● Fearing failure, people might
handicap themselves by partying
before major exam. Handicaps
protect both self-esteem and public
image by allowing us to attributes
failures to something temporary or
LESSON 3: SOCIAL BELIEFS AND attitudes, and values. That is one
JUDGMENTS reason our beliefs are important;
they shape our interpretation of
PERCEIVING OUR SOCIAL WORLDS everything else
- striking research reveals the extent
to which our assumptions and BELIEF PERSEVERANCE
prejudgments guide our perceptions, ● Ross and others (1982) planted a
interpretations, and recall falsehood in people's mind and tried
PRIMING to discredit it. Their research reveals
- is the awakening or activating of that it is surprisingly difficult to
certain associations. In an demolish a falsehood, once the
experiment conducted by Bargh and person conjures up a rationale for it.
his colleagues (1996), they asked ● Each experiment first implanted a
people to complete a sentence belief, either by proclaiming it to be
containing words such as "old," true or providing anecdotal data.
"wise,"and "retired". Shortly Then the participants were asked to
afterward, they observed that these explain why it is true. Finally
people walking more slowly to the researchers totally discredited the
elevator than did those not primed initial information by telling the
with aging-related words. participants the truth. The new belief
PRIMING experiments (Bargh, 2006) in survived 75% intact.
everyday life: ● this phenomenon is called BELIEF
- watching a scary movie alone at PERSEVERANCE - persistence of
home can activate emotions that, one's initial conceptions, as when
without our realizing it, cause us to the basis for one's belief is
interpret furnace noises as possible discredited but an explanation of
intruder why the belief might be true survives
PERCEIVING AND INTERPRETING CONSTRUCTING MEMORIES OF

EVENTS OURSELVES AND OUR WORLDS
● social perceptions are very much in ● our memories are not exact copies
the eye of the beholder, even a of our experiences that remain
simple stimulus may strike deposit in memory bank, rather, we
● two people quite differently. construct our memories at the time
Example: sports and politics of withdrawal. We reconstruct our
● Researchers manipulated people's distant past by using our current
preconceptions with astonishing feelings and expectations to
effects upon their interpretations and combine information fragments
recollections (interpretation of faces) ● experimenters can manipulate
● Construal processes also color people's presumption about their
other's perception to us. (What you past (Example: Cafe Minamdang
said is often you) Killer)
● we view our social worlds through ● MISINFORMATION EFFECT
the spectacles of our beliefs, (Loftus, 2003) - incorporating
misinformation into one's memory of implicitly, without consciously
the event, after witnessing an event knowing or declaring that we know
and receiving misleading information
about it OVERCONFIDENCE
● Overconfidence phenomenon is
RECONSTUCTING OUR PAST the tendency to be more confident
ATTITUDES AND PAST BEHAVIORS than correct - to overestimate the
● Memory construction enables us to accuracy of one's belief.
revise our own histories. Our ● Kahneman & Tversky (!979) gave
memories reconstruct another sorts people the following statement to fill
of past behavior as well. in: "I feel 98% that the distance
● It is not that we are totally unaware between New Dehli and China is
of how we used to feel, just that more than ___ miles but less than
what memories re hazy, current ___. Most individuals were
feelings guide our recall. overconfident. About 30% of the
● When widows and widowers try to time, the correct answer lay outside
recall their grief they felt on their the range they felt 98% confident
spouse's death five years earlier, about.
their current emotional state colors ● What produces overconfidence?
their memories. Why doesn't experience lead us to a
more realistic self-appraisal? For
JUDGING OUR SOCIAL WORLDS one thing, people tend to recall their
INTUITIVE JUDGMENTS - THE POWER mistaken judgments as times when
OF INTUITION they were almost right.
- Studies of our unconscious
information processing confirm our CONFIRMATION BIAS
limited access to what's going on our - a tendency to search for information
mind. Our thinking is partly: that confirms one's preconceptions.
● CONTROLLED PROCESSING - - It helps explain why our self-images
(reflective, deliberate, and are so remarkably stable
conscious) or explicit and partly; (Self-verification) we seek
● AUTOMATIC PROCESSING - companion that will bolster our
(impulsive, effortless, and without beliefs in our selves (Swann and
our awareness) or implicit schemas Read, 1981) Example: Girl at the
of word (sects or sex) emotional party going to those who will
reactions sufficient expertise, people acknowledge her
intuitively know the answer to a
problem (chess players) HEURISTICS: MENTAL SHORTCUTS
● Some things - facts, names, aand ● With our little time to process so
past experiences - we remember much information, our cognitive
explicitly (consciously). But other system is fast and frugal. It
things - skills and conditioned specializes in mental shortcuts. With
dispositions - we remember remarkable ease, we form of
impressions, make judgments, and
invent explanations. We do so by as confirming their beliefs (Crocket,
using HEURISTICS - simple, et.al., 1981). If we believe correlation
efficient thinking strategies. exists, we are more likely to notice
● Heuristics enable us to live and and recall confirming instances. If
make routine decisions with minimal we believe that premonition and
effort. event's later occurrence.
Representativeness Heuristics ● Illusion of Control

- the tendency to presume, - the tendency to perceive random
sometimes despite contrary odds, events as related feeds an illusion of
that someone or something belongs control - the idea that chance events
to a particular group if resembling are subject to our influence. This
(representing) a typical member keeps gamblers going and makes
the rest of us do all sorts of unlikely
Availability Heuristics things.
- a cognitive rule that judges the - Ellen Langer (1977) demonstrated
likelihood of things in terms of their the illusion of control with
availability in memory. If instances of experiments on gambling.
something come readily to mind, we Compared with those given an
presume it to be commonplace assigned lottery number, people who
chose their own number demanded
COUNTERFACTUAL THINKING 4x as much money when asked if
● in Olympic competition, athletes' they would sell their lottery ticket.
emotions after an event reflect - When playing a game of chance
mostly how did relative to against an awkward and nervous
expectations, but also their person, they bet significantly more
counterfactual thinking - their than when playing against dapper,
mentally stimulating what might have confident opponent.
been. - Being the person who throws the
● Bronze medalists (for whom an dice or spins the wheel increases
easily imagined alternative was people's confidence.
finishing without a medal) exhibited - In other ways, 50 experiments have
more joy than silver medalists (who consistently found people acting as if
could more easily imagine having they can predict or control chance
won gold) events (Presson, et. al., 1996)
ILLUSORY THINKING Regression toward the average

● Illusory Correlation - the statistical tendency for extreme
- perception of a relationship where scores or extreme behavior to return
none exists, or perception of a towards one's average
stronger relationship than actually
exists.
- Experiments confirm that people
easily misperceive random events
MOODS AND JUDGMENTS EXPLAINING OUR SOCIAL WORLDS
● Social judgment involves efficient, ATTRIBUTING CAUSALITY: TO THE
though fallible, information PERSON OR THE SITUATION
processing. It also involves our ● Antonia Abbey and her colleagues
feelings: Our moods infuse our (1998) have repeatedly found that
judgments. Moods pervade our men are more likely than women to
thinking. attribute a woman's friendliness to
● University of New South Wales mild sexual interest. That misreading
social psychologist Joseph Forgas of warmth as a sexual come-on is an
(1999) conducted an experiment that example of MISATTRIBUTION or
involves giving bad and good mood mistakenly attributing a behavior to
to its participant. the wrong source.
● Forgas and colleagues put ● ATTRIBUTION THEORY - how
participant in a good or bad mood, people explain others' behavior - for
and then have watch a videotape example attributing it either to
(made a day before) of yourself internal dispositions (enduring traits,
talking to someone. motives and attitudes) or external
● If made to feel happy, participant feel situations
pleased with what you see, and you
are able to detect many instances of Dispositional Attribution
your poise, interest and social skill. - attributing behavior to the person's
● If made to put in a bad mood, disposition and traits
viewing the same tape seems reveal Situational Attribution
a quite different you - one who is - attributing behavior to the
stiff, nervous, and inarticulate. environment or external causes
● Given how your mood colors your Example: A teacher may wonder whether a
judgments, you feel relieved how student's underachievement is due to lack
things brighten when the of motivation and ability (dispositional) or
experimenters swithes participants to physical and social circumstances
to a happy mood before leaving the (situational attribution)
experiment.
INFERRING TRAITS
Spontaneous Trait Inference
● an effortless, automatic inference of
a trait after exposure to someone's
behavior.
● Jones and Davis (1965) noted that
we often infer that other people
actions are indicative of their
intentions and dispositions. If I
observe Rick making a sarcastic
comment to Linda, I infer that Rick is
a hostile person,
COMMONSENSE ATTRIBUTIONS ● if Mary and others criticize Steve

● Consistency (with consensus), and if Mary isn't
- How consistent is the person's critical of others (high
behavior in this situation? distinctiveness), then we make an
● Distinctiveness external attribution that (it is
- How specific is the person's something about Steve) but If Mary
behavior to this particular situation? alone (low consensus) criticize
● Consensus Steve, and she criticize many other
- To what extent do others situation people (low distinctiveness) then we
behave similarly can infer an internal attribution that it
is something about Mary.
● Pioneering attribution theorist Harold
Kelley (1973) described how we THE FUNDAMENTAL ATTRIBUTION
explain behavior by using ERROR
information about consistency, ● the tendency for observers to
distinctiveness, and consensus. underestimate situational influences
Example: When explaining why Edgar is and overestimates dispositional
having trouble with his computer most influences upon others' behavior.
people use information concerning (Also called correspondence bias,
consistency (is Edgar usually unable to get because we so often see behavior
his computer to work?), distinctiveness, as corresponding to behavior) (Lee
(does Edgar have trouble with this other Ross, 1977)
computers or just this one?) and consensus, ● Ex. We may infer that people fall
(do other people have similar problems with because they are clumsy, rather
this computer?) than because they were tripped; that
people smile because they're happy
rather than faking friendliness; that
people speed past us on the
highway because they're aggressive
rather than late for an important
meeting.
● In short, we tend to presume that focus of the detective, they
others are the way they act. perceived it as more coerced. Aware
Observing Cinderella cowering in of this research, New Zealand has
her oppressive home, people made it national policy that police
(ignoring the situation) infer that she interrogations be filmed with equal
is meek; dancing with her at the ball, focus on the officer and on the
prince sees a suave and glamorous suspect.
person ● PERSPECTIVES CHANGE WITH
● If anything, intelligent and socially TIME
competent people are more likely to - For most of us, the"old you" is
make the attribution error. (Block & someone other than today's"real
Funder, 1986) In real life, those with you." We regard our distant past
social power usually initiate and selves (and our distant future selves)
control conversations, which often almost as if they were other people
leads to overestimate their occupying our body.
knowledge and intelligence. (Ex. ● SELF AWARENESS
Medical doctors seen as - A Self-conscious state in which
knowledgeable of all information attention focuses on oneself. It
even outside medicine) makes people more sensitive to their
own attitudes and dispositions.
WHY DO WE MAKE ATTRIBUTION
ERROR? Cultural Differences
Perspective and Situational Awareness ● Culture also influence attribution
● ACTOR VERSUS OBSERVER error. A Western world-view
PERSPECTIVES predisposes people to assume that
- Attribution theorist pointed out that people, not the situation, cause, and
we observe others from a different events.
perspective than we see ourselves ● The fundamental attribution error
(Jones, 1976). When we act, the occurs varied cultures. Yet people in
environment commands our Eastern Asian cultures are
attention. When we watch another somewhat more sensitive to the
person act, that person occupies the importance of situation. Thus, when
center of our attention and the aware to social context, they are
environment relatively become less inclined to assume that others'
invisible behavior corresponds to their traits.
● THE CAMERA PERSPECTIVE ● Those who attribute poverty and
BIAS unemployment to personal
- In some experiments, people have dispositions (they are just lazy and
viewed videotape of a suspect undeserving) tend to adopt political
confessing during police interview. If positions unsympathetic to such
they viewed the confession through people. This dispositional attribution
the camera focus on the suspect, ascribes behavior to the person's
they perceive the confession as disposition and traits. Those who
genuine. If they viewed it through the make situational attributions (if you
and I were to live with the same FULFILLING PROPHECY - beliefs
overcrowding, poor education, that lead their own fulfilment.
discrimination, would be any better
off?) tend to adopt political positions
that offer more direct support to the
poor.
WHY WE STUDY ATTRIBUTION ERROR

1. It explains some foibles and fallacies
in our social thinking if our capacity
for illusion and self-deception is
shocking, remember that our modes
of thought are generally adaptive.
Illusory thinking is often a by-product GETTING FROM WHAT WE EXPECT
of our mind's strategies for ● Studies show that self fulfilling
simplifying complex information. prophecies also operate in work
2. 2 For focusing on thinking biases settings (with managers with high or
such as the fundamental attribution low expectations), in courtrooms (as
error is humanitarian (Gilovich & judge instruct juries), and in
Eibach, 2001). "Great humanizing simulated police contexts (as
messages is that people should not interrogators with guilty and innocent
always be blamed for their problems expectations interrogate and
3. For focusing on biases is that we are pressure suspects)
mostly unaware of them and can ● There are times when negative
benefit from greater awareness. expectations of someone lead us to
● Social psychology aims to expose us be extra nice to that person, which
to fallacies in our thinking in the induces him or her to be nice in
hope that we will become more return - thus disconfirming our
rational, more in touch with reality. expectations. But a more common
The hope is not in vain, Psychology finding in studies of social interaction
students explain behavior less is that, yes, we do to some extent
simplistically than similarly intelligent get what we expect (Olson & others,
natural science students. 1996)
● Several experiments conducted by
EXPECTATIONS OF OUR SOCIAL Mark Snyder (1984) at the University
WORLDS of Minnesota show how, once
● Our social beliefs and judgments do formed, erroneous beliefs, a
matter. They influence how we feel phenomenon called BEHAVIORAL
and by so doing their own reality. CONFIRMATION.
When ideas lead us to act in way
that produce apparent confirmation,
they have become what sociologist
Robert Merton (1948) termed SELF
Behavioral Confirmation
● a type of self-fulfilling prophecy
whereby people's social expectation
lead them to behave in ways that
cause others to confirm their
expectations.
● It occurs as people interact with
partners holding mistaken beliefs.
People who are believed lonely
behave less sociably. Men who are
believed sexist behave less
favorably toward women. Job
interviewees who are believed to be
warm behave more warmer.
LESSON 4: BEHAVIOR AND ATTITUDES do are minimal. when the attitude is specific
Attitude to a behavior, and when attitude is patent
- A favorable or unfavorable evaluative - When SOCIAL INFLUENCES on what we
reaction toward something or someone say are minimal
(often rooted in one's beliefs, and exhibited - When other influences on behavior are
in one's feelings and intended behavior) minimal
- When attitudes specific to the behavior are
How well do our Attitudes product our examined
Behavior? - When attitudes are potent
Wicker (1969), People's expressed attitudes - Bringing attitudes to mind
hardly predicted their varying behaviors: - Forging strong attitudes through
• Student attitudes toward cheating bore experience
little relation to the likelihood of their actual
cheating 1. When SOCIAL INFLUENCES on what
• Attitudes toward the church were only we say are minimal
modestly linked with church attendance in • Social psychologists never get a direct
any given Sunday reading on attitudes. Rather, we measure
• Self-described racial attitudes provided expressed attitudes. Like other behaviors,
little clue to behaviors in actual situations. expression are subject to outside
Influences. Example: We sometimes say
Batson and his colleagues (1997) we think. others want to hear
Experimented about MORAL
HYPOCRISY (appearing moral while • Today's social psychologists have some
avoiding the casts of being so) clever means at their disposal for
• Warnings about the dangers of smoking minimizing Social influences on people's
affect only minimally these who already attitude reports. Same of these complement
smoke traditional self-report measures of
• Increasing public awareness of the EXPLICIT (conscious) attitudes with
desensitizing and brutalizing effects of measures of IMPLICIT (unconscious)
violent programming yet they still watch attitudes
media murder as much as ever
• All in all, the developing picture of what • IMPLICIT ASSOCIATION TEST (IAT) a
controls behavior emphasized external computer driven assessment of implicit
Social influences, such as others' behavior attitudes. The test uses reaction times to
and expectations, and played down internal measure people's automatic associations
factors, such as attitudes and personality. between attitude objects and evaluate
wards. Easier pairings (and faster
When Attitudes Predict Behavior responses) are taken to indicate stranger
• Our behavior and expressed attitudes unconscious associations.
differ is that both are subject to other
influences. Triandis (1982), said that our
attitudes do predict our behaviors when
these other influences on what we say and
• Despite much excitement over these • But religious attitudes predict quite well the
recent studies of implicit attitudes hiding in total quantity of religious behaviors over
the mind's basement, the implicit time. The findings define a PRINCIPLE OF
associations test is not reliable enough for AGGREGATION: The effects of an attitude
use in assessing and comparing Individuals. become more apparent when we look at
And it produces biases. person's aggregate or average behavior
than when we consider isolated acts.
• For attitudes farmed early in life, such as
racial and gender attitudes, implicit and 3. When attitudes specific to the
explicit attitudes frequently diverge, with behavior are examined
implicit attitudes often being better predictor • Other conditions further improve the
of behavior. For other attitudes, such these predictive accuracy of attitudes. As Ajzen
related to consumer behavior and support and Fishbein (1977) paint out, when we
for political candidates, explicit self- reports measured attitude. us a general one and the
are better predictor behavior is very specific we should not
expect a close correspondence between:
2. When other influences on behavior are words and action
minimal
• On any occasion, it's not only our inner • For predicting behavior says Ajzen and
attitudes that guide us but also the situation Fishbein's theory of planned behavior, is
we face. Social influences can be enormous knowing people's intended behaviors. and
enough to induce people to violate their their perceived self-efficacy and Control
deepest Convictions.
• Further studies - more than 700 studies
• Predicting behaviors is like predicting a with 260,000 participants confirmed that
baseball or cricket's player hitting. The specific, relevant attitudes do predict
outcome of any particular turn at bat is intended and actual behavior. For example,
nearly impossible to predict. because it is attitudes towards condoms strongly predict
affected not only by the batter but als by condom use. And attitudes towards
what the pitcher throws and by a hast of recycling (but not general attitudes toward
chance factors. environmental issues) predict participation
in recycling.
• To use research example, people's
general attitude toward religion pearly 4. When attitudes are potent
predicts whether they will go to worship • Much of our behavior is automatic we act
services during the coming week (because) out familiar scripts without reflecting on what
attendance is also influenced by the we're doing. We respond to people we meet
weather, the worship leader, how one is in the hall with an automatic "Hi." We
feeling, and so forth) answer the restaurant cashier's question
How was your meal by saying. Fine." even
we found it tasteless.
• Such mindlessness is adaptive. It frees our When does our Behavior affect our
minds to work on other things. For habitual Attitudes?
behaviors - seat belt use, coffee • Role Playing
consumption, class attendance - conscious • Saying becomes Believing
intentions are hardly activated • The Foot-in-the-Door Phenomenon
• Evil and Moral Acts
5. Bringing attitudes to mind\ • Interracial Behavior and Racial Attitudes
6. Forging strong attitudes through • Social Movements
experience
• If we were prompted to think about our When does our Behavior affect our
attitudes before acting, would we be truer to Attitudes?
ourselves? Self-conscious people usually • Social Psychology has taught us that we
are in touch with their attitudes. That are likely not only to think ourselves in a
suggests another way to Induce people to away of acting but also to act ourselves in a
focus on their inner convictions: Make them way of thinking. It's true that we sometimes
self aware, perhaps by having them act in stand up for what we believe. But it's also
front of a mirror. true that we come to believe in what we
stand for. As we engage the evidence that
• Diener & Wallbom (1976) experiment on behavior affects attitudes, speculate why
students of University of Minnessts actions affect attitudes. Consider the
regarding their attitudes toward cheating. following incident:
There. are 120 participants, half of them is
not regulated and another half can see, • Sarah is hypnotized and told to take off her
themselves through a mirror. Both are shoes when a book drops on the floor.
instructed to finish once the bell has rung. Fifteen minutes later a book drops, and
The first half tend to cheat way pass the bell Sarah quietly slips out of her loafers. "Sarah
ring. why did you take of your shoes?” ask the
hypnotist, "Well my feet are hot and tired,"
• The attitudes that best predict behavior are Sarah replies. "It has been a long day."
accessible (easily. brought to mind) as well
as stable. And when attitudes are forged by • The mental aftereffects of our behavior
experience, not jut by hearsay, they are also appear in many social psychological
more accessible, more enduring and more phenomena. The following examples
likely to guide actions. In one study, illustrate such self-persuasion.
university students all expressed negative
attitudes towards housing shortage. But Role Playing
given the opportunities to act- to sign a • Role - a set of norms that defines how
petition, solicit signatures, join a committee, people in a given social position ought to
or write a letter only these whose attitude behave
grew from direct experience acted. • Think of a time when you stepped on a
new role - being in college. The first week
on campus, for example, you may have
been supersensitive to your new social
situation and tried valiantly to act mature
and to suppress your high school behavior. they are saying - provided they weren't
At such times, you may have felt bribed or coerced in doing so.
self-conscious. You observed your new • When there is no compelling external
speech and actions because they weren't explanation, saying becomes believing.
natural to you. Then one day, something
amazing happened: You pseudo-intellectual • Higgins and colleagues (1978) illustrated
talk no longer felt-forced. The role began to how saying becomes believing. They had
fit as comfortably as your old new jeans and university students read a personality
tshirt. description of someone and then
summarize it for someone else, who was
• In one study, college men volunteered to believed whether to like or dislike that
spend time in a simulated prison person. The students wrote a more positive
constructed in Stanford's psychology description when the recipient liked the
department by Philip Zimbardo. Zimbardo person. Having said positive things, they
wanted to find out: Is prison brutality a also then liked the person more themselves.
product of evil prisoners and malicious • Asked to recall what they had read, they
guards? Or do the institutional roles of remembered the description as more
guard and prisoner embitter and harden positive as it was. In short, people tend to
even compassionate people? Do the people adjust their messages to their listeners, and
make the place violent? Or does the place having done so, to believe the altered
make the people violent? message..
• John Jonhson (2007), when placed in a The-Foot-in-the-Door Phenomenon

rotten barrel, some people become bad • Foot-in-the-door phenomenon the
apples and others do not. behavior is a tendency for people to have first agreed to a
product of both the individual person and small request to comply later with a larger
the situation., and the prison study appears request
to have attracted volunteers who were • Experiments suggest that if you want
prone to aggressiveness. The deeper people to do a big favor for you, an effective
lesson of the role-playing studies is not that strategy is to get them do small favor first.
we are powerless machines. Rather it • Researchers posing as drive-safely
concerns how what is unreal (an artificial volunteers asked Californians to permit the
role) can subtly evolve what is real. installation of huge, poorly lettered "Drive
Carefully signs in their front yards. Only
Saying becomes Believing 17% consented. Others were first
• People often adapt what they say to approached with a small request: Would
please their listeners. They are quicker to they display. three-inch "Be a safe driver
tell people good news than bad, and they window signs? Nearly all readily agreed.
adjust their message their listener's position. When approached two weeks later to allow
• When induced to give spoken or written the large ugly signs, 76% consented.
support to something they doubt, people will • When people commit themselves to public
often feel bad about their deceit. behaviors and perceive those acts to be
Nevertheless, they begin to believe what their own doing, they come to believe more
strongly in what they have done.
• Cialdini and his collaborators (1978) initial bugs in "practice trial increase
explored a variation of foot-in-the-door students' willingness to kill more bugs later?
phenomenon which is the LOW-BALL • To find out, they asked some students to
TECHNIQUE - a tactic for getting people to dump one bug into the coffee grinder and
agree to something. People who agree in then press the "on" button for 3 seconds
initial request will often still comply when the (No bugs were actually killed. An unseen
requester ups the ante. People who, receive stopper at the base of the insert tube
only the costly request are less likely to prevented the bug from actually entering the
comply with it. opaque killing machine, which had torn bits
• The foot-in-the-door phenomenon is a of paper to stimulate the sound of killing)
lesson worth remembering. Someone trying • Others, who initially killed five bugs, went
to seduce us financially, politically, sexually on "kill" significantly more bugs during an
will often use this technique to create a ensuing 20-second period."
momentum of compliance. The practical • Harmful acts shape the self, but so,
lesson: before agreeing to a small request, thankfully, de moral acts. Our character is
think about what may follow. reflected in what we do when we think no
one is looking. Ex. patience test with kids
Evil and Moral Acts
• After telling white lie and thinking well that Interracial behavior and Racial Attitudes
wasn't so bad, the person may go on to tell • If moral action feeds moral attitudes, will
bigger lie positive interracial behavior reduce racial
• Another way in which evil acts influence prejudice - much as mandatory seat belt
attitudes is the paradoxical fact that we tend use, has produced more favorable seat belt
not only to hurt those we dislike but also to attitudes?
dislike who we hurt. Attitudes also follow • US Supreme Court's 1954 decision to
behavior in peacetime. A group that holds desegregate schools, their argument is: If
another in slavery will likely come to we wait for the heart to change through
perceive the slaves as having traits that preaching and teaching we will wait a long
justify their oppression. time for racial justice. But if we legislate
• Prison staff who participate in executions moral action, we can, under the right
experience moral disengagement by coming conditions, indirectly affect heartfelt
to believe (more strongly than do other attitudes
prison staff) that their victims deserve their • The idea that runs counter to the
fate presumption. that "you can't legislate
• Action and attitudes feed each other, morality." attitude change has, as
sometimes to the point of moral numbness. psychologists predicted. Some Yet Social
The more one harms another and adjusts followed desegregation. Consider:
one's attitudes, the easier harm doing • Following the Supreme Court decision, the
becomes. Conscience is corroded: percentage of White Americans favoring
• To stimulate the "killing begets killing integrated schools jumped and includes
process, Martens and colleagues (2007) nearly everyone now
asked University of Arizans students to kill • In the 10 years after the Civil Rights Act
some bugs. They wondered: Would killing of 1964, the percentage of white Americans
who described their neighborhood as all
white declined by about 20% for each of COGNITIVE DISSONANCE THEORY
those measures. Interracial behavior was assumes that to reduce discomfort we
increasing. justify our actions to ourselves.
• More uniform national standards against SELF-PERCEPTION THEORY assumes
discrimination were followed by decreasing that our actions are self-revealing (when
differences in racial attitudes among people uncertain to feelings or beliefs, we look to
of differing religions, classes, and our own behavior, much as anyone else
geographic regions would)
Social Movements Self-Presentation: Impression

• We have now seen that society's laws and, Management
therefore, its behavior can have a strong • The first explanation for why actions affect
influence on its racial attitudes. A danger attitudes began as simple idea that you may
lies in the possibility of employing the same recall in Chapter 2. Who among us does not
idea for political socialization on a mass care what people think?
scale. • We spend countless money on clothes,
• For many Germans during the 1930's, diets, cosmetics, skin care, and now plastic
participation in Nazi rallies, displaying the surgery all because of our fretting over what
Nazi flag, and especially the public greeting others think. We see making good
"Heil Hitler" established a profound impression as a way to gain social and
inconsistency between behavior and belief. material rewards, to feel better about
Historian Richard Grunberger (1971) ourselves even to become more secure in
reports that for those who had their doubts ourselves and Social identity.
about Hitler. "the German greeting" was a • No one wants to look foolishly
powerful conditioning device. Having once inconsistent. To avoid seeming 50, we
decided to intone it as an outward token of express attitudes that match our actions. To
conformity many experienced discomfort at consistent we appear may pretend those
the contradiction between their words and attitudes. Even if that means displaying little
their feelings. Prevented from saying what a insincerity or hypocrisy, it can pay off in
they believed, they tried to establish their managing the impression we are making, or
psychic equilibrium by consciously making So self-presentation theory suggest.
themselves believe they said.
Self-Justification: Cognitive Dissonance
Why does our Behavior affect our • COGNITIVE DISSONANCE - tension that
Attitudes? arises when one is simultaneously aware of
• We have seen that several streams of two inconsistent cognitions. For example,
evidence merge to form a river: the effect of dissonance may occur when we realize that
actions on attitudes. Do these observation we have, with a little justification, acted
contain any clues to why action affect contrary to our attitudes or made a decision
attitudes? Social psychology's detective favoring our one alternative despite reasons
suspect three possible sources. SELF favoring others
PRESENTATION THEORY assumes that
for strategic reasons we express attitudes
that make us appear consistent.
• It assumes that we feel tension, or lack of ● Self-Perception (Self-observatio)
harmony (dissonance), when two - Here I am smoking again, I must like
simultaneously accessible thoughts smoking
(cognitions) or beliefs are psychologically
inconsistent. Festinger argued that to
reduce this unpleasant arousal, we often
adjust our thinking.
• Dissonance theory pertains mostly to
discrepancies between behavior and
attitudes. We are aware of both. Thus, if we
Sense Some inconsistency, perhaps Some
hypocrisy, we feel pressure for change. That
helps explain why British and US cigarette
smokers have been much less likely than
nonsmokers to believe that smoking is
dangerous.
Self-Perception Theory
• Self-Perception Theory (proposed by
Daryl Bem, 1972) assumes that we make
similar inferences when we observe our
own behavior. When attitudes are weak or
ambiguous, we are in the position of
observing us outside.
• Hearing our selves talk informs us of our
attitudes, Seeing our actions provide clues
to how strong beliefs are. This is specially
so when we can't easily attribute our
behavior to external constraints. The acts
we freely commit are self-revealing.
Why do actions affect Attitudes?

● Self-Presentation (Impression
Management)
- i feel like a cool smoker
● Self-Justification (Cognitive
Dissonance)
- I know smoking is bad for me, also
I've been waiting all day for this and
the statistics aren't as awful as they
say. Anyways, I am very healthy, I
won't get sick
LESSON 5: SOCIAL INFLUENCE • We share answers to social questions
QUESTIONS FACED BY NEW such as, Whom I should trust, and fear?
SCIENTISTS Whom I should I help? When, and with
• HOW DO WE HUMANS DIFFER? whom, should I mate? Who may dominate
• HOW ARE WE ALIKE? me, and whom may I control? Evolutionary
• HOW ARE WE INFLUENCED BY HUMAN psychologists contend that our emotional
NATURE AND CULTURAL DIVERSITY? and behavioral answers to those questions
are the same answers that worked for our
GENES. EVOLUTION. AND BEHAVIOR ancestors.
• What are your roots and where do you
came from? CULTURAL AND BEHAVIOR
- Charles Darwin (1859), proposed an • CULTURE - the enduring behaviors, ideas,
evolutionary process he called NATURAL attitudes, and traditions shared by a large
SELECTION that enables evolution to took group of people and transmitted from one
place. The idea is: generation to the next.
• Organisms have many and varied
offspring Those offspring compete for CULTURAL DIVERSITY
survival in their environment • The diversity of our languages, customs,
• Certain biological and behavioral and expressive behaviors confirms that
variations increase their chances of much of our behavior is socially
reproduction and survival in that programmed, not hardwired. Increasingly,
environment our cultural diversity surrounds us. Fashion
• Those offspring that do survive are more and Literature are also a product of cultural
likely to pass their genes to ensuing diversity. Everywhere you go, you can
generations observe cultural diversity in all forms.
• Thus, over time, population characteristics
may change NORMS: EXPECTED BEHAVIOR
• NORMS standards for accepted an
• NATURAL SELECTION - the evolutionary expected behavior. Norms prescribe
process by which heritable traits that best "proper" behavior. (In a different sense of
enable organisms to survive and reproduce the word, norms also describe what most
in particular environments are passed to others do - what is "normal")
ensuing generations
Cultures vary in their norms for the
• EVOLUTIONARY PSYCHOLOGY- the following domains:
study of the evolution of cognition and EXPRESSIVENESS
behavior using principles of natural • To someone from a relatively formal
selection northern European culture, a person whose
roots are in an expressive Mediterranean
culture may seem warm, charming,
Inefficient, and time-wasting."To the
Mediterranean person, the northem
European may seem, efficient, cold, and
overconcerned with time”
PUNCTUALITY there is also some universal norms:
• Latin American business executives who Respect the friend's privacy, make eye
arrive late for a dinner engagement may be contact while talking, and don't divulge
mystified by how obsessed their North things said in confidence.
American counterparts are with punctuality.
North American tourists in Japan may UNIVERSAL TRAIT DIMENSIONS
wonder about the lack of eye contact from • If a test specifies where you stand on the
passing pedestrians "Big Five' personality dimensions, it pretty
well Canadians describe themselves as
RULE-BREAKING distinctly agreeable.
• Dutch research team led by Keizer (2008)
found people more than doubly likely to UNIVERSAL STATUS NORMS
disobey social rules when it appeared that • Wherever people form status hierarchies,
others were doing so. For example, when they also talk to higher status people in the
useless flyers were put on the bike handles, respectful way they talk to strangers. And
1/3 of cyclists tossed the flyer on the ground they talk to low-status people in the more
as litter when there was no graffiti on the familiar, first-name way they speak to a
adjacent wall. But more than 2/3 did so friend. Patients call their physicians Doctor,
when the wall is covered with graffiti the physician may reply using the patients
first names.
PERSONAL SPACE
• the buffer zone we like to maintain around THE INCEST TABOO
our bodies. Its size depends on our • The best-known universal norm is the
familiarity whoever is near us. Individuals taboo against incest. Parents are not have
differ: Some people prefer more personal sexual relations with their children, nor
space than others. Group differ too: Adults siblings with one another. Although the
maintain more distance than children. Men taboo apparently is violated more often than
keep more distance from one another than psychologists once believe, the norm is still
do women. For reasons unknown, cultures universal. Every society disapproves incest.
near the equator prefer less space and
more touching and hugging. NORMS OF WAR
• Humans even have cross-cultural norms,
CULTURAL SIMILARITY for conducting war. In the midst of killing
• There is still is an “essential universality” one's enemy, there are agreed-upon rules
as member of one species, we find that the that have been honored for centuries. You
processes that underlie our differing are to wear Identifiable uniforms, surrender
behaviors are much the same everywhere. with a gesture of submission, and treat
prisoners humanely. These norms, though
UNIVERSAL FRIENSHIP NORMS cross-cultural are not universal. When traqi
• Britain, Italy, Hong Kong, and Japan noted forces violated them bu showing surrender
several cultural variations in the norms that flags then attacking, and by dressing
define the role of a friend. For example, In soldiers as liberated civilians to set up
Japan it's specially Important not to ambushes, a U.S. military spokesperson
embarrass a friend with public criticism. But complained that "bath of these actions are
among the most serious violations of the
laws of war" FRIENDSHIP
• Women in cultures describes themselves
HOW ARE GENDER SIMILARITIES AND in more relational terms, welcome more
DIFFERENCES EXPLAINED? help, experience more relationship-linked
• Females and males are therefore similar in emotions and are more attuned to others'. In
many physical and developmental traits, conversation, men more often focus on the
such as the age of sitting up, teething, and tasks and on connections with large groups,
walking. They also are alike in may women on personal relationships. When on
psychological traits, such as vocabulary. phone, women's conversation with friends
creativity, intelligence, self-esteem, and last longer. When on the computer, women
happiness. spend more time sending e-mails, in which
they express more emotion. When facing
Actually there are some differences such stress, men tend to respond with fight or
as the following. Compared with males, flight often their response to threat is
the average female: combat. Women on other hand, are more
• has 70% more fat, has 40% less muscle, often tend and befriend, they turn to family
is 5 inches shorter, and weighs 40 lbs less and friends for support.
• is more sensitive to smell and sounds
• is doubly vulnerable to anxiety disorders VOCATIONS
and depression • Men gravitate disproportionately to jobs
that enhance inequalities (prosecuting
Compared with females, the average attorney, corporate advertising); women
male is: gravitate to jobs that reduce Inequalities
• slower to enter puberty but quicker to die (public defender, advertising work for
• 3x more likely to be diagnosed with ADHD, charity). Studies of 640,000 people's job
4x more likely to commit suicide, and 5x preferences reveal that men more than
more likely to killed by lightning women value earnings, promotion,
• more capable of wiggling the ears challenge, and power. Women more than
men value good hours, personal
GENDER - In psychology, the relationships and opportunities to help
characteristics whether biological or socially others.
influenced, by which people define male
and female FAMILY RELATIONS
• Women's connections as mothers,
INDEPENDENCE VERSUS daughters, sisters, and grandmothers bind
CONNECTEDNESS PLAY families. Women spend more time caring for
• Compared with boys, girls talk more both preschoolers and aging parents.
intimately and play less aggressively, notes Compared with men, they buy 3x gifts and
Maccobby (2002). They also play in smaller greeting cards, write two or 4x as many
groups, often talking with one friend, while personal letters and make 10-20% more
boys more often do larger group activities. long-distance calls to friends and family. For
And as they each interact with their own women, especially, a sense of mutual
gender, their differences grow support is crucial to marital satisfaction.
SMILING • Men also take more risks (Bymes and
• Across more than 400 studies, women's others, 1999). One study of dara from
greater connectedness has been expressed 35,000 artock broker found that "men are
in their generally higher rate of smiling. For more confident than women" and therefore
example, when Marianne LaFance (1985) 45% more stock traders.
analyzed 9,000 college yearbook photos • in writing, women tend to use more
and when Amy Halberstadt and Martha communal prepositions (with), fewer
Saitta (1987) studied 1,100 magazine and quantitative words, and more present tense
newspaper photos and 1,300 people in • In conversation, men's style reflects their
shopping malls, parks, and streets, they concern for Independence, women's for
consistently found that females were more connectedness. Men are more likely to act
likely to smile. as powerful and people often do - talking
assertively, interrupting intrusively, touching
EMPATHY with the hand, staring more, and smiling
• Empathy is the vicarious experience of less
another's feeling; putting oneself in another
shoes AGGRESSION
• Given upsetting experiences in the • By aggression, psychologist mean
laboratory or real life, women more than behavior intended to hurt
men express empathy for others enduring • Throughout the world, hunting, fighting,
similar experiences. One explanation for and warring are primarily male activities
this male-female empathy difference is that (Wood & Eagly, 2007)
women then to outperform men at reading • In Surveys, men admit to more aggression
others' emotions and women are more than do women. In laboratory experiments,
skilled at expressing emotions nonverbally. men indeed exhibit more physical
aggression, for example, by administering
SOCIAL DOMINANCE what they believe are hurtful electric shocks
• Reported by Williams and Best (1990), (Knight & others, 1996)
countries from Asia, Africa, Europe, and • In Canada, the male-to-female arrest ratio
Australia, people rate men as more is 9 to 1 murder
dominant, driven, and aggressive. • In USA, where 92% of prisoners are male,
Moreover, studies nearly 80,000 people it is 9 to 1
across 70 countries show that men more • Almost all suicide terrorists have been
than women rate power and achievement young men. So also are nearly battlefield
as important. deaths and death row inmates
• Men's style of communicating under girds • But once again, gender difference
theui social power. In situations where roles fluctuates with the context. When there is a
aren't rigidly scripted, men tend to be more provocation, the gender gap shrinks
autocratic, women more democratic. • And within less assaultive forms of
• In leadership, men tend to excel as aggression - say, slapping a family member,
directive, task-focused leaders; women throwing something, or verbally attacking
excel more often in the transformational someone - women are no less aggressive
leadership that is favored by more than men
organizations
• Women may be slightly more likely to • Consider for example, the male's greater
commit indirect aggressive acts, such as sexual Initiative. The average man,
spreading malicious gossip produces many trillions of sperm in his
lifetime, making sperm cheap compared
SEXUALITY with eggs. Moreover, whereas female brings
Consider the following one fetus to term and then nurses it, a male
• 48% of men and 12% of women agreed on can spread his genes by fertilizing many
casual sex (Bailey & others, 2000) females
• 58% of men and 34% of women (first year • Evolutionary psychologists said that
college) agreed on: "If two people really like females invest their reproductive
each other, it's all right to have sex even if opportunities carefully, by looking for signs
they're known each other for a very short of resources and commitment. Males
time. compete with other males for chances to
• In a survey of 3,400 randomly selected 18 win the genetic sweepstakes by sending
to 59 year old Americans, 25% of men and their genes into the future
48% of women cited affection for the partner • Women seek to reproduce wisely, men
as a reason for intercourse widely
• How do they think about having coitus? • Moreover, evolution psychology suggests,
"Everyday" or "Several times a day' said the physically dominant males were the
19% of women and 54% of mon ones who excelled in gaining access to
• Compared with lesbians, gay men also females, which over generation enhanced
report more interest in uncommited sex, male aggression
more frequent sex, more responsiveness to • Evolutionary Psychology also predicts
visual stimuli, and more concern with that men will strive to offer what women will
partner attractiveness (Bailey et al., 1994) desire- external resources and physical
• Sexual fantasies, too, express the gender protection
difference (Ellis & Symons, 1990). In male- • Example: Male peacocks strut their
oriented erotica, women are unattached and feathers, male humans, their abs, Audis,
lust driven and asset
• In romance novels, whose primary • In one experiment, teen males rated
market is women, a tender male is "having lots of money" as more important
emotionally consumed by his devoted after they were put alone in a room with
passion for the heroine teen female (Roney, 2003)
• Reflecting on these findings, Buss (1999)
EVOLUTION AND GENDER: DOING reports feeling somewhat astonished "that
WHAT COMES NATURALLY? men and women across the world differ in
GENDER AND MATING PREFERENCE their mate, preferences in precisely the
• Evolutionary psychology predicts no sex ways predicted by evolutionists"
differences in all the domains of
aggressiveness, dominance, and sexuality
in which the sexes faced similar adaptive
challenges. But it cannot predict sex
difference in behaviors relevant to dating,
mating and reproduction
REFLECTION ON EVOLUTIONARY GENDER AND HORMONES
PSYCHOLOGY • If genes predispose gender-related traits,
• Critics see a problem with evolutionary they must do so by their effects on our
explanations. Evolutionary psychologists bodies. In male embryos, the genes direct
sometimes start with an effect and then the formation of testes, which begin to
work backwards to construct an explanation secrete testosterone, the male sex
for it hormones that influences masculine
• Today's evolutionary psychology is like appearance
yesterday's Freudian psychology, say • Studies indicate that girls who are
critics: either they can be retrofitted to exposed to excess testosterone during fetal
whatever happens development tend to exhibit more
• Evolutionary psychologists reply to tomboyish play behavior than other girls
criticisms of their theories as being (Hines, 2004)
hindsight based are wrong. They argue that • Other case studies have followed males
hindsight plays no less a role in cultural who, having been born without penises, are
explanations. Why do women and men reared as girls (Reiner & Gearhart, 2004)
differ? Because their culture socializes their • The gender gap in aggression also
behavior. When people's roles vary across seems influenced by testosterone. In
time and place, culture describes those various animals, administering testosterone
roles better that it explains them heightens aggressiveness.
• Evolutionary psychologists also said • In humans, violent male criminals have
that their field is an empirical science that higher than normal testosterone levels; so
tests evolutionary predictions with data from do National Football- League players and
animal behavior, cross- cultural boisterous fraternity members
observations, and hormonal and genetic • As people mature to middle age and
studies beyond, a curious thing happens. Women
• Evolutionary Psychology's critics become more assertive and self-confident,
acknowledge thot evolution helps explain men are more emphatic and less
both our commonalities and differences (a domineering (Kasen, 2006)
certain amount of diversity aids survival). • Hormones changes are one possible
But they contend that our common explanation for the shrinking gender
evolutionary heritage does not, by itself, differences. Role demands are another.
predict the enormous cultural variation in Some speculate that during courtship and
human marriage patterns, spousal early parenthood, social expectations lead
relationships, succession of spouses to both sexes to emphasize traits that enhance
multiple wives. their roles
• The most significant trait that nature has • While courting, providing, and protecting,
endowed us with, it seems, is the capacity men play up their macho sides and forgo
to adapt, to learn, and to change. Therein the needs for Interdependence and
lies what we can all agree is culture's nurturance (Gutmann. 1977)
shaping power • While courting and rearing children, young
women restrain their impulses to assert and
be independent.
• Men and women becomes GENDER ROLES VARY OVER TIME
ANDROGYNOUS from andro (man) gyn • In 1938, just 1 in 5 Americans approved
(woman) thus mixing both feminine and "of a married woman earning money in
masculine characteristics business or industry f she has a husband
capable of supporting her." By 1996, 4
CULTURE AND GENDER: DOING AS THE • In 1967, 57% of first-year American
CULTURE SAYS? collegian agreed that "the activities of in 5
GENDER ROLES VARY WITH CULTURE approved married women are best confined
• Analyses of who does what in 185 to the home and family." In 2005, only 20%
societies revealed that men hunt big game agreed
and harvest lumber, women do about 90% • Behavioral changes have accompanied
of the cooking and the laundry, and the this attitude shift,. In 1965 the Harvard
sexes equally likely to plan and harvest Business School had never granted a
crops and to milk cows. Such behavior degree to a woman. At the turn of the 21st
expectations for males and females define century, 30% of its graduates were women
GENDER ROLES • From 1960-2005, women rose from 6% to
• GENDER ROLES - a set of behavior 50% of U.S. medical students and from 3%
expectations (norms) for males and females to 50% of law students
• Despite gender role inequalities, the • The changing male-female roles cross
majority of the world's people would ideally many cultures, as illustrated by women's
like to see more parallel male and female gradually increasing representation in the
roles parliaments of nations from Morocco to
• A Pew Global Attitudes survey asked Sweden
38,000 people whether life was more • Such changes, across cultures and over a
satisfying when both spouses work and remarkably short period of time, signal that
share child care or women stay home and evolution and biology do not fix gender
care for the children while husband roles: Time also bends the genders
provides. A majority of respondents in 41 of
44 countries chose the first answer PEER TRANSMITTED CULTURE
• The World Economic Forum (2008) • Nature vs Nurture: Parental Nurture, the
reported than Norway, Finland, and Sweden way parents bring their children up, governs
have the greatest gender inequality, and who their children become. Then children
Saudi Arabia, Chad, and Yemen the least who group up in the same families should
• Even in industrialized societies, roles vary be
enormously. Women fill in 1 in 10 • The evidence from studies of twins and
managerial positions in Japan and biological and adoptive siblings indicates
Germany and nearly 1 in 2 in Australia and that noticeably alike shouldn't they? genetic
US influences explain roughly 50% of individual
• In North America most doctors and variations in personality traits. Including the
dentists are men, in Russia doctors are shared personality account for only 0-10%,
women, as are most dentists in Denmark So what accounts for 40-50%? It's largely
peer influence.
• Harris argues that children and teens of muscle mass, are bound to experience
care most about is not what their parents life differently from women. Or consider this:
think but what their peers think. Children A very strong cultural norm dictates that
and youth learn their culture in games, their males should be taller than their female
musical tastes, their accents, even their mates
dirty words that are mostly from peers • Although biology predisposes men to
Consider: strength tasks and women to infant care,
• Preschoolers will often refuse to try a Wood and Eagly (2002) conclude that the
certain food despite parents urgings - until behavior of women and men is sufficiently
they are put at a table with a group of malleable that individuals of both sexes are
children who like it fully capable of effectively carrying out
• Although children of smokers have an organizational roles at all levels
elevated smoking rate, the effect seems
largely peer mediated. Such children more THE POWER OF SITUATION AND THE
often have friends who model smoking, who PERSON
suggest it pleasures, and who offer • People act and react. We respond and
cigarettes we get responses. We can resist the social
• Young Immigrant children whose situation and sometimes even change it
families are transplanted into foreign • Social situations do profoundly
cultures usually grows up preferring the influence individuals. But individuals also
language and norms of their new peer influence social situations. The two interact.
culture Asking whether external situations or
predispositions (or culture or evolution)
WHAT CAN WE CONCLUDE ABOUT
(genes: culture and gender) The interaction occurs in at least three
BIOLOGY AND CULTURE ways:
• We need not think of evolution and culture • A given social situation often affects
as competitors. Cultural norms subtly yet different people differently. Because our
powerfully affect our attitudes and behavior. minds do not see reality identically or
But they don't do so independent of biology. objectively, we respond to situation as we
• Everything social and psychological is construe it. And some people are more
ultimately biological programming. sensitive and responsive to social situations
Moreover, what our biological heritage than others.
initiates, culture may accentuate • People often choose their situations.
• Biology and culture may also Given a choice, sociable people elect
INTERACT. Advance genetic science situations that evoke social interaction.
indicate how experience uses genes to When you choose your college, you were
change the brain. Environmental stimull can also choosing to expose yourself to a
activate genes that produces new brain cell specific set of social influences
branching receptors • People often create their situations. if
• Biology and experience interact when we expect someone to be extraverted,
biological traits influence how the hostile, intelligent, or sexy, our action toward
environment reacts. Men, being 8% taller the person may induce the very behavior we
and averaging almost double the proportion expect

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LESSON 1: SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY - Group Influence

● The scientific study of how people

SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY IS THE SOCIAL THINKING

PSYCHOLOGICAL CONCEPTS CONTAIN CORRELATION

the amount of violence affects behavior

THE ETHICS OF EXPERIMENTATION

PERCEIVING AND INTERPRETING CONSTRUCTING MEMORIES OF

Representativeness Heuristics ● Illusion of Control

ILLUSORY THINKING Regression toward the average

COMMONSENSE ATTRIBUTIONS ● if Mary and others criticize Steve

WHY WE STUDY ATTRIBUTION ERROR

• John Jonhson (2007), when placed in a The-Foot-in-the-Door Phenomenon

Social Movements Self-Presentation: Impression

Why do actions affect Attitudes?

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