Podcast
Questions and Answers
What does the term 'Cognitive Miser' refer to?
What does the term 'Cognitive Miser' refer to?
Which heuristic is associated with judging the likelihood of an event based on how easily examples come to mind?
Which heuristic is associated with judging the likelihood of an event based on how easily examples come to mind?
What is a key concept of Cognitive Dissonance Theory?
What is a key concept of Cognitive Dissonance Theory?
In Social Influence, what does the term 'groupthink' refer to?
In Social Influence, what does the term 'groupthink' refer to?
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What is meant by 'social facilitation' in group processes?
What is meant by 'social facilitation' in group processes?
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What is the main focus of attribution as discussed in social psychology?
What is the main focus of attribution as discussed in social psychology?
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Which factor in attribution explains whether a cause is perceived as stable or unstable?
Which factor in attribution explains whether a cause is perceived as stable or unstable?
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What does the term 'availability heuristic' primarily relate to in social cognition?
What does the term 'availability heuristic' primarily relate to in social cognition?
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What is the outcome more likely when subjects are influenced by social norms?
What is the outcome more likely when subjects are influenced by social norms?
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How does cognitive dissonance theory explain a change in attitudes?
How does cognitive dissonance theory explain a change in attitudes?
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Study Notes
Attribution
- Naïve Scientist - People act like scientists casually trying to understand and explain behavior. People are motivated to understand the world around them.
- Locus of causality - Attributions about the source or cause of behavior; internal - dispositional, external - situational. Internal attributions: "That person is lazy." External attributions: "Traffic was terrible.”
- Stability and controllability - Stability: The extent to which the casual factor is stable or unstable. Controllability: The extent to which the casual factor is controllable or uncontrollable.
Attribution Biases
- Fundamental attribution error - tendency to overestimate the role of dispositional factors and underestimate the role of situational factors in explaining others behavior.
- Actor-observer bias - The tendency to make dispositional attributions for others’ behavior while making situational attributions for our own behavior.
- Self-serving bias - Tendency to attribute our successes to internal causes and our failures to external causes
Social Cognition
- Cognitive miser - A model of how people process information that assumes people are limited in their capacity to process information, and as a result, they often use mental shortcuts to make judgments.
- Heuristics - Mental shortcuts or rules of thumb that people use to simplify and speed up the process of making judgments.
- Representativeness Heuristic - People classify things according to how similar they are to a typical case.
- Availability Heuristic - The tendency to rely on information that is most readily available.
- False consensus Effect - the tendency to overestimate the extent to which others share our beliefs, values, and attitudes.
- Anchoring Heuristic - The tendency to rely too heavily on the first piece of information we receive.
- Motivated Tactician - A model of how people process information that assumes that people are flexible in their thinking and choose the most appropriate strategy depending on the situation.
Attitudes
- Mere Exposure - The tendency to develop a preference for things merely because we are exposed to them repeatedly.
- Richard LaPierre - Found a discrepancy between attitudes and behavior.
- Cognitive Dissonance Theory - An uncomfortable state that occurs when people hold two or more conflicting cognitions. People are motivated to reduce dissonance.
Social Influence
- Social Norms - Shared expectations about how people should behave in a given situation. Descriptive norms - How people typically behave. Injunctive norms - What people are expected to do.
- Conformity - The tendency to change one’s behavior or beliefs to match those of others.
- Groupthink - A phenomenon that occurs when group members strive for consensus and avoid any dissenting views, even if it means ignoring important information.
- Milgram's study of obedience - Subjects were led to believe they were administering electric shocks to a learner; The study revealed a disturbingly high level of obedience to authority, even when it meant harming others.
- Explaining obedience - People can be led to obey orders even when those orders are unethical.
- Conformity - Sometimes people conform to fit in, avoid social disapproval, and because they believe that the group is correct; it’s about getting along with the group.
Group Processes
- Social facilitation - The presence of others can enhance performance on simple or well-learned tasks. The presence of others can hinder performance on complex tasks.
- Social Loafing - Tendency for individuals to exert less effort when working in a group than when working alone.
Self and Identity
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Theories of self-comparison - We assess our own abilities and opinions by comparing ourselves to others
- Festinger (1954) - We compare ourselves to people who are similar to us.
- Social comparison theory - We compare ourselves to people who are better than us (upward comparison) and people who are worse than us (downward comparison).
- Self-esteem - Our overall evaluation of ourselves.
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Description
Explore the concepts of attribution and biases in psychology, including how we explain behavior and the factors influencing our perceptions of others and ourselves. This quiz covers key terms like the fundamental attribution error and self-serving bias, enhancing your understanding of social cognition.
