Introduction to Social Psychology

Social Psychology

• Social psychology is the scientific study of how people think, influence, and relate to one another.
• Social thinking involves evaluations of people, objects, and ideas that affect behavior.
• Beliefs are convictions about the truth of something.
• Social influence includes enduring behaviors, ideas, attitudes, traditions, and conformity to adjust to group standards.
• Prejudice is a preconceived negative judgment of a group and its members.
• Aggression is behavior intended to harm someone physically or emotionally.
• Our social reality is shaped by beliefs and experiences.
• Social intuitions can be powerful but sometimes perilous.
• Intuitive judgments and biases can guide or mislead us.
• Social influences shape behavior.
• Personal attitudes and dispositions shape behavior.
• Biological factors influence our social behavior.
• Social psychology principles apply in everyday life.
• Human values affect social research topics, representations, and researcher assumptions.
• The naturalistic fallacy is deriving what ought to be from what is.

Social Psychology's Methods

• Correlational research studies naturally occurring relationships among variables.
• Experimental research manipulates variables to determine cause and effect.
• Independent variable: The factor being manipulated.
• Dependent variable: The measured outcome.
• Random assignment: Assigning participants to conditions by chance.
• Hypotheses: Testable predictions derived from theory.
• Field research: Studies in natural settings.
• Laboratory research: Controlled experiments in artificial settings.

Ethics in Social Psychology

• Informed consent: Participants must agree with full knowledge of the study.
• Debriefing: Participants are informed about the study's purpose.
• Deception: Acceptable only when necessary and when no harm will occur.

Social Psychology's Applications

• Addresses issues in health, law, business, and environmental challenges.

Chapter 2: The Self in a Social World

• Self-concept: A person's answers to "Who am I?".
• Self-schema: Beliefs about oneself that organize and guide self-relevant information.
• Possible selves: Images of what we dream of or fear becoming.
• Spotlight effect: Overestimating the extent others notice us.
• Illusion of transparency: Belief others can read our emotions easily.
• Self-esteem: A person's overall sense of self-worth.
• Sources of self-esteem: Achievements, feedback, relationships, cultural standards.
• Self-serving bias: Tendency to perceive oneself favorably.
• Manifestations of self-serving bias: Attributing successes to oneself and failures to external factors, unrealistic optimism, false consensus, and false uniqueness effects.
• Locus of Control: Extent to which people perceive outcomes as internally or externally controlled.
• Internal Locus of Control: Belief that outcomes are the result of one's actions.
• External Locus of Control: Belief that outcomes are determined by external forces (fate, luck, etc.).
• Learned helplessness: Hopelessness from repeated failures.
• Self-presentation: Expressing oneself, behaving to create a positive impression.
• Impression management: Efforts to control how others perceive us.
• Self-handicapping: Creating obstacles to avoid blaming oneself for failures.
• Self-monitoring: Adjusting behavior to fit different social situations.

Chapter 3: Social Beliefs and Judgments

• Social thinking involves how we perceive, interpret, and judge social information.
• Key to the process is how we construct social reality.
• Biases and shortcuts are involved in judgment processes.
• Heuristics: Mental shortcuts for decision-making.
• Representative heuristic: Judging based on similarity to a prototype.
• Availability heuristic: Judging likelihood based on how easily examples come to mind.
• Belief perseverance: Persistence of initial beliefs, despite contradictory evidence.
• Overconfidence phenomenon: Overestimating the accuracy of one's beliefs.
• Confirmation bias: Tendency to search for information that supports one's beliefs.
• Counterfactual thinking: Imagining alternative outcomes that could have occurred but didn't.
• Illusory correlation: Perceiving a relationship where none exists.
• Illusory control: Believing we can control events we cannot.

Chapter 4: Behavior and Attitudes

• Attitudes: Favorable or unfavorable evaluative reaction toward something.
• Attitude components: Affective (emotional), Behavioral (actions), Cognitive (beliefs).
• Attitudes predict behavior when external influences are minimal.
• Attitude specificity: Attitudes are better predictors of specific behaviors.
• Foot-in-the-door phenomenon: Agreeing to small requests increases compliance.
• Role playing: Acting a role can shape attitudes and behaviors.
• Behavior affects attitudes.
• Self-presentation theory: Express attitudes that project consistency to others.
• Cognitive dissonance theory: Psychological discomfort arises from inconsistent attitudes and behaviors.

Chapter 5: Genes, Culture, and Gender

• Nature (genes) and nurture (culture) shape behavior.
• Human diversity and universality: Common genetic makeup yet diverse cultures.
• Evolution and behavior: The study of the evolution of behavior and the mind using principles of natural selection.
• Traits that enhance survival and reproduction become more common.
• Culture: Enduring behaviors, ideas, attitudes, and traditions shared by a group.
• Norms: Standards for accepted behavior.
• Gender: Biological characteristics and associated behaviors.
• Sex: Biological characteristics that define male and female.
• Gender roles: Expectations of behavior based on gender.

Chapter 6: Conformity and Obedience

• Social influence: Ways that people are affected by the presence of others.
• Conformity: Changing behavior to match a group.
• Compliance: Conforming to gain approval.
• Obedience: Following direct orders.
• Factors affecting conformity: Group cohesion, status, public response, prior commitments, group size, unanimity.
• Why people conform: Normative influence (seeking approval), informational influence (seeking accurate information).
• Resisting social pressure: Reactance (protecting freedom feelings), asserting uniqueness.
• Obedience to authority: Factors affecting obedience: proximity of authority, victim, legitimacy of authority, institutional authority, defiance, by others.

Chapter 7: Persuasion

• Persuasion: Process by which a message induces change in beliefs, attitudes, or behaviors.
• Routes to persuasion: Central route (logical arguments), peripheral route (superficial cues).
• Elements of persuasion: Communicator (who is delivering the message), Message (content), Audience (who receives the message).
• Credibility: Perceived expertise and trustworthiness.
• Attractiveness and liking: Physical appeal, similarity.
• Reason vs. emotion: Logical arguments or emotional appeals.
• Message discrepancy: Difference between audience views and the message.
• One-sided vs. two-sided appeals: One side presents arguments, two-sided address opposing arguments.
• Primacy, and recency, effects: First and last presented information is most influential.
• Active vs. passive reception: Engaging with the message versus just hearing it.
• Media effects: Print, radio, and TV media influence.
• Audience factors: Age, need for cognition (personality indicating preference to thinking).
• Resistance to persuasion: Reactance to threats to freedom.
• Attitude inoculation: Exposing people to weak arguments.
• Forewarning: Knowing someone will try to persuade us.
• Selective exposure: Seeking information supporting existing attitudes.

This quiz covers the foundational concepts of social psychology, including how individuals think and relate to one another through social influence, prejudice, aggression, and more. Explore how social thinking, beliefs, and personal attitudes shape our behavior in everyday life.