Social Psychology Overview

Social Psychology

• Social psychology is the scientific study of how individuals' thoughts, feelings, and behaviours are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others.
• Social influence is the process through which the real or implied presence of others directly or indirectly impacts an individual's thoughts, feelings, and behaviours.

Conformity

• Conformity is changing one's own behaviour to match the behaviour of others.

Groupthink and Compliance

• Groupthink is a type of thinking where individuals prioritize maintaining group cohesiveness over critically evaluating the facts.
• Consumer psychology studies consumer habits, including compliance.
• Compliance is changing one's behaviour in response to direction or requests from others.

Four Ways to Gain Compliance

• Foot-in-the-door technique involves starting with a small request to gain compliance and then escalating to a larger request.
• Door-in-the-face technique involves making a large request, expecting it to be refused, and then making a smaller, more acceptable request.
• Norm of reciprocity suggests that if someone does something for you, you feel obligated to reciprocate.
• Lowball technique involves gaining a commitment from someone and then increasing the cost of that commitment.
• That's-not-all technique involves making an offer and adding extra incentives to make it more attractive before the other person can respond.

Obedience

• Obedience is changing one's behaviour at the command of an authority figure.

Social Loafing and Social Facilitation

• Group polarization is the tendency for group members to take more extreme positions and suggest riskier actions during group discussions compared to individuals who have not participated.
• Social facilitation is when the presence of others positively impacts performance on easy tasks.
• Social loafing is when individuals put in less effort when working with others in a group on a simple task.

Attitudes

• Attitude is a tendency to respond positively or negatively towards a person, object, idea, or situation.
• Attitudes have affective (emotional), behavioural, and cognitive components.

Formation of Attitudes

• Attitudes are formed through direct contact, direct instruction from others, interactions with others holding similar attitudes, and vicarious conditioning (observing).

Persuasion

• Persuasion is the process of influencing another person's beliefs, opinions, positions, or actions through argument, pleading, or explanation.
• Key elements in persuasion include the source of the message, the message itself, and the target audience.

Elaboration Likelihood Model

• Central-route processing involves focusing on the content of the message.
• Peripheral route processing involves considering factors external to the message content, such as the source's appearance or message length.

Cognitive Dissonance

• Cognitive dissonance is mental discomfort arising from holding conflicting beliefs, values, or attitudes.
• Discomfort motivates people to engage in behaviors that minimize this dissonance.

Social Cognition and Impressions

• Social cognition involves the mental processes used to understand the social world.
• Impression formation is the creation of initial knowledge about another person.
• Primacy effect is when initial impressions are resistant to later information.

Social Cognition and Social Categorization

• Social categorization is assigning individuals to categories based on shared characteristics with previously encountered people.
• Stereotypes are sets of characteristics believed to be shared by all members of a social category.

Attributions

• Attribution theory explains how people explain the actions of others.
• Situational cause attributes actions to external factors.
• Dispositional cause attributes actions to internal factors.

Prejudice and Discrimination

• Prejudice is a negative attitude held about members of a specific social group.
• Discrimination is treating people differently based on prejudice.
• Types of prejudice include ageism, sexism, racism, and prejudice against those who are deemed too fat or too thin.

Realistic Conflict Theory and Scapegoating

• Realistic conflict theory states that group conflicts lead to increased prejudice and discrimination.
• Scapegoating is directing prejudice and discrimination toward out-group members who have less social power.

Stopping Prejudice

• Social cognitive theory views prejudice as an acquired attitude through direct instruction, modelling, and social influences.
• Social identity theory explains how a person's identity within a social group shapes behaviour through social categorization and comparison.
• Stereotype vulnerability is when individuals' awareness of stereotypes influences their behaviour.
• Self-fulfilling prophecy is when one's expectations impact their behaviour, making the expectation more likely to come true.

Attraction

• Interpersonal attraction is the desire for a relationship with another person.
• Proximity is having spatial closeness to another person.
• Similarity and complementarity are important factors in attraction.
• Reciprocity of liking is when people who like or admire others are more likely to be liked in return.

Love

• Love is a strong affection for another person due to kinship, personal ties, sexual attraction, or common interests.
• Sternberg's triangular theory of love highlights intimacy, passion, and commitment as key components. Different types of love are combinations of these elements.

Aggression

• Aggression is intended behaviour designed to hurt or destroy another person.
• Biological factors influencing aggression include genes, amygdala activity, limbic system, testosterone levels, and serotonin.
• Social roles and influences, like violent media, can also influence aggression.

Altruism and Bystander Effect

• Prosocial behavior is socially desirable actions benefiting others.
• Altruism is prosocial behaviour without the expectation of reward.
• The bystander effect involves decreased likelihood of help when more people are present.
• Diffusion of responsibility is the reduced feeling of personal responsibility to act when others are present in a situation. Five steps to deciding to help others: notice, define emergency, take responsibility, plan course of action, take action.

Cults

• Cults often recruit people under stress, who are unhappy, unassertive, gullible, dependent, want to belong, and are idealistic.
• Young people are more likely to join cults than older people.
• Cults use strategies like love-bombing, isolation, rituals, and activities to prevent critical thinking and questioning.