Social Psychology Overview

Social Psychology Summary

• Social psychology is the scientific study of feelings, thoughts, and behaviors of individuals in social situations.
• Social psychology emphasizes the influence of situations on behavior, sometimes overlooked in favor of personality traits.
• The fundamental attribution error is the tendency to overemphasize personality traits and underestimate situational influences.
• Construals, or subjective interpretations, play a key role in shaping social perceptions and behaviors.
• Schemas are cognitive frameworks used to organize and interpret social information.
• Stereotypes are schemas about groups of people.
• Automatic and controlled processes influence social judgments and behaviors.
• Automatic processes are nonconscious.
• Controlled processing are intentional, conscious thoughts and judgments.
• Evolutionary psychology provides insights into universal social behaviors.
• Humans are pre-wired with social behaviors (and cognitive traits) from evolution.
• Culture influences behavior and interpretations.
• Individualistic cultures prioritize independence.
• Collectivistic cultures prioritize interdependence.
• Social psychology research often combines participant observation with formal quantitative methods.
• Archival analysis utilizes existing records like census data, police reports, or historical documents.
• Surveys collect information from large samples of people, using random sampling for broader generalizations.
• Correlation studies examine relationships between variables, correlational studies can't determine causation.
• Experimental studies are used to manipulate variables to determine causality, random assignment is crucial.
• External validity refers to how well an experiment simulates real-life situations.
• Internal validity refers to whether the experiment measures what it intends to measure.
• Researchers balance both internal and external validity in their studies through methods like field experiments.
• Sound experiments require reliability and measurement validity.
• Ethical concerns play a crucial role regarding ethical treatment and informed consent of participants in research studies.
• Institutional review boards assess the ethics of research.
• Informed consent is obtained when participants are adequately informed of the study's purpose, procedures, and potential risks before participating.
• Self-perception theory argues attitudes are formed through observing behaviors.
• Cognitive dissonance theory explains the inconsistency between attitudes and behavior.
• Dissonance motivates individuals to change their attitudes to match their behaviors.
• Attitude change results when people need to justify their prior actions, especially if these are inconsistent with their beliefs.
• Attitudinal change, including implicit change via automatic processes also influences behavior.
• The Elaboration Likelihood Model of persuasion clarifies how people process information, arguing people either engage in the peripheral route (superficial) or central route (in-depth analysis).
• The central route occurs when motivated and able to engage in deep processing.
• The peripheral route occurs when less motivated or unable to process deeply.
• The media plays a powerful role in shaping attitudes and behaviors.

Social Influence Summary

• Social influence refers to the ways in which people are affected by the real or imagined presence of others.
• Conformity involves behaving in ways that are consistent with other people or societal norms.
• Informational social influence occurs when people rely on others for information and guidance on how to act.
• Normative social influence occurs when people conform to be accepted or avoid disapproval.
• Mimicry is a common unconscious form of conformity that helps us fit into social situations.
• Compliance involves responding favorably to a request.
• Reciprocity norm (or reciprocity principle) suggests that if someone does a favor for you, you're obligated to respond in kind, often resulting in greater compliance.
• The foot-in-the-door technique involves starting with a small request and gradually escalating to a larger one.
• The door-in-the-face technique involves starting with a large request, then making a concession to secure a smaller, acceptable request.
• Obedience involves following an order or instruction from a person in authority.
• Deindividuation is a psychological state where individuals feel anonymous and lose their sense of personal responsibility within a group, leading to atypical behaviors.
• Group decision making can be influenced by pressures towards consensus (groupthink), group polarization (enchanced opinions), and individual biases.
• Power dynamics in groups are inevitable.

Morality and Altruism Summary

• Morality is often driven by intuitive feelings and rationalizations.
• Moral judgment is influenced by situational factors and differing cultural viewpoints.
• Altruistic behavior involves concern/care for others, often stemming from emotional motivations like empathy.
• Bystander effect refers to the decreased likelihood of help in a group setting, attributable to the diffusion of responsibility to others.

Relationships Summary

• Relationships are an important part of human existence, driven by evolutionary pressures to belong and for survival and reproduction.
• Proximity and similarity often lead to attraction.
• Physical attractiveness has a strong impact on forming relationships, particularly for women.
• Evolutionary psychology suggests mating preferences are driven by reproductive fitness.
• Relationships frequently involve exchange and communal dimensions—exchange relationships are primarily focused on equity and reciprocity, while communal relationships are based on mutual care and support.
• Attachment theory describes how early childhood relationships influence later relationship styles.
• Attachment styles involve anxiety and avoidance concerning intimacy.
• Romantic relationships are characterized by different types of love (e.g., romantic, companionate).

Intergroup Relations Summary

• Stereotypes are cognitive shortcuts—generalizations about groups
• Group membership influences social perceptions and judgments
• Stereotypes lead to unconscious bias.
• Prejudice involves negative attitudes and feelings toward a group of people.
• Discrimination is biased behaviors and actions, based on a group membership.
• Economic perspectives, motivations and cognitive perspectives play vital roles in group biases.
• Realistic group conflict implies competition for resources and group conflict.
• Minimal group paradigm demonstrates that favoritism toward one's ingroup is common.
• Social identity theory elucidates the importance of group membership for the development of self-esteem.
• Stereotypes can be maintained through biases—cognitive distortion, biases and information processing.