Lernblätter Psychology of Decision Making PDF

LERNBLÄTTER | Psychology of Decision-Making CHAPTER 2: THE SELF IN A SOCIAL WORLD Spotlight and Illusions: What Do They Teach Us About Ourselves Examples of Interplay between our Sense of Self & our Social Worlds: Spotlight Effect = Belief that others are paying more attention to our appearance...

LERNBLÄTTER | Psychology of Decision-Making CHAPTER 2: THE SELF IN A SOCIAL WORLD Spotlight and Illusions: What Do They Teach Us About Ourselves Examples of Interplay between our Sense of Self & our Social Worlds: Spotlight Effect = Belief that others are paying more attention to our appearance & behavior than they really are - Seeing ourselves at center stage, thus intuitively overestimating the extent to which others’ attention is aimed at us - E.g.: self-conscious on bad hair day Illusion of Transparency = the illusion that our concealed emotions leak out & can be easily read by others - Fewer notice than we presume - We can be more non-transparent than we realize - Overestimate the visibility of social blunders (soziale Fehltritte) & public mental slips (öffentliche Ausrutscher) - Agonize over things, others may hardly notice and soon forget Social Surroundings affect our self-awareness - When only member of race/gender in group, notice how we differ & how others react to difference - When race comes up in discussion, minority feels uncomfortable amount of attention directed their way Self-Interest colors our social judgments - When problems arise in relationships, blame partners instead of ourselves - When things go well, see ourselves as more responsible Self-Concern motivates our social behavior - In hopes of making a good impression, we agonize about appearance - Monitor others’ behavior & expectations, adjust own behavior accordingly Social Relationships help define our sense of self - Have varying selves in varied relationships (different w/ parents, friends) - How we think of ourselves linked to person we’re with at the moment - When relationships change, self-concept can change as well ➔ Sense of ourselves affects how we respond ➔ Others help shape our sense of self Sense of Self - organizes thoughts, feelings, actions; enables us to remember past, assess present, project future -> behave adaptively - behavior sometimes automatic, unself-conscious - enables long-term planning, goal setting, restraint - imagines alternatives, compares w/ others, manages reputation and relationships Mark Leary (2004) The Curse of the Self - Self can be an impediment (Behinderung) to a satisfying life  That’s why: Religious/spiritual practices - seek to prune the self’s egocentric preoccupations by quieting the ego - reducing its attractions to material pleasures & redirecting it Self-Concept: Who Am I? At the Center of Our Worlds: Our Sense of Self Self-concept = what we know and believe about ourselves → Most people believe they have true, unchangeable self Neuroscientists explored brain activity that underlies constant sense of being oneself Most studies: right hemisphere, important - If put to sleep -> trouble recognizing own face - Patient w/ right hemisphere damage: failed to recognize that he owned & controlled right hand Medial Prefrontal Cortex: neuron path located in cleft between brain hemispheres (behind eyes), helps stitching together sense of self (more active when think about yourself) Self-Schemas = beliefs about self that organize and guide the processing of self-relevant information - affects how we perceive, remember and evaluate others & ourselves - Elements of your self-concept: specific beliefs by which you define yourself - Help us organize and retrieve our experiences Social Comparisons = Evaluating one’s opinions & abilities by comparing oneself w/ others - Others help define the standards by which we define ourselves as - Compare ourselves & consider how we differ ➔ Money does not lead to happiness, but having more than those around you ➔ Privately take pleasure in failure of others -> Schadenfreude - Compare upward: Experience of increase in affluence, status, achievement ➔ Raise standards by which we evaluate our attainments ➔ Compare w/ people doing even better (look up, not down) ➔ In Competition: protect shaky self-concept by perceiving competitor as advantaged Other People’s Judgments - When people think well of us => we think well of ourselves - Children labeled as gifted/ helpful -> incorporate idea into self-concepts & behavior -> becomes part of identity  - People labeled with negative aspects (stereotypes) -> disidentify ➔ Rather than fight, shift interests elsewhere - Looking-glass self (Cooley): how we think others to perceive us as a mirror for perceiving ourselves - Redefined by Mead: What mattes for self-concepts = NOT how others actually see us but way we imagine they do - Feel better to praise than criticize -> overestimate others’ appraisal (more attractive than we are) Self & Culture Individualism = priority to one’s own goals over group goals + defining one’s identity in terms of personal attributes rather than group identifications - Life enriched by believing in power of personal control (self-reliant individual) - Varies from person to person - Increasing globally → flourishes in capitalistic, globalized world - Rich, males, whites Independent Self = construing one’s identity as an autonomous self Identity is self-contained (abilities, traits, values, dreams) - Remains fairly constant Collectivism = giving priority to the goals of one’s group + defining one’s identity accordingly - Respecting & identifying with the group - More self-critical, focus less on positive self-views - Group identities (saying I less often) ➔ Cannot label entire culture as solely collectivist or individualist ➔ Varies across country’s political views & regions ➔ Depends on person Conservatives: - Economic Individualists -> don’t tax/ regulate - Moral collectivists -> legislate against Liberals: - Economic Collectivist -> pass universal health care - Moral Individualists -> keep laws off my body Culture and Cognition - In Individualist Cultures (Western cultures): expression through choices, products, uniqueness ➔ They evaluate choices more favorably ➔ Goal to Life: Enhance individual self & make independent choices - In Collectivist Cultures (Asian Cultures): more value on tradition, shared practices, holistic thinking ➔ greater sense of belonging ➔ Goal to Life: harmonize with & support community  Interdependent Self - not one but many selves - embedded in social memberships/others - conversation: less direct, more polite - focus more on gaining social approval Independent Self - solely acknowledges relationships with others Culture and Self-Esteem Collectivist cultures: - self-esteem tends to be malleable (context-specific) - many true selves - self-esteem less personal, more relational - persist more on tasks when failing - Make comparisons upward, in ways that facilitate self-improvement Individualistic cultures: - self-esteem tends to be stable (enduring across situations) - one true self - self-esteem more personal, less relational - persist more when succeeding (success elevates self-esteem) - Make comparisons with others that boost self-esteem - Study, when most likely to report positive emotions (happiness) ➔ Collectivist: Happiness comes w/ positive social engagement (feeling close, friendly, respectful) ➔ Individualist: Happiness comes w/ disengaged emotions (feeling effective, superior, proud) - Conflict ➔ Collectivist: takes place between groups ➔ Individualist: takes place between individuals (crime and divorce) Self-Knowledge Predicting Our Behavior 3 Examples how people’s self-predictions can err: 1. Movie watching: Netflix invited users to predict films they wanted to watch, many people predicted they would watch intellectual films; actually watched crowd-pleaser films. (think you want ≠ actually want) 2. Dating and Romance Future: couples optimistic about how long relationship, friends and family know better (roommates better predictors) → Planning Fallacy = the tendency to underestimate how long it will take to complete a task - One of most common errors in behavior prediction - Misremembering previous tasks as taking less time than actually Predicting Our Feelings Study: asked how women would feel if asked sexually harassing questions on job interview → Prediction: Feeling of anger; Actual experience: Fear → Affective Forecasting  = difficulty predicting intensity & duration of future emotions - People mispredict how they would feel in certain situations Impact Bias = overestimating the enduring impact of emotion-causing events - especially for negative events - General happiness after some time would be influenced by (1) the event, (2) everything else ➔ Discount the importance of everything else that contributes to happiness ➔ People neglect speed and power of coping mechanisms (rationalizing, discounting, forgiving, limiting emotional trauma) -> adapt more readily than expected ➔ Major negative events (activate psychological defenses) can be less distressing than minor irritations (don’t activate our defenses) The Wisdom and Illusions of Self-Analysis Self-Perceptions will be accurate when - the causes of behavior are conspicuous (auffällig) (e.g. vacation) - correct explanation fits our intuition → More aware of results of our thinking than of its process (cannot recall thought process but knowledge of results) Wilson: → Analyzing why we feel the way we do can make our judgments Dual Attitude System - Automatic, implicit, unconscious attitudes often differ from consciously controlled, explicit ones - “trusting their gut” -> implicit attitudes - Explicit attitudes may change easily, implicit attitudes change more slowly - With repeated practice, new habitual attitudes can replace old ones 2 Implications: - Self-Reports are often untrustworthy (errors in self-understanding limit scientific usefulness) - If people report & interpret experiences honestly, does not mean reports are true What is the Nature and Motivating Power of Self-Esteem? Self-Esteem = person’s overall self-evaluation or sense of self-worth - High self-esteem: when we feel good about domains important to our self-esteem - Self-Esteem is not as stable as we often believe - One person has self-esteem that is contingent on being attractive (will feel high self-esteem when made to feel good-looking) → Bottom-up view But causal arrow also goes the other way: - Those with high self-esteem that value themselves in a general way = more likely to value their looks, abilities… - Specific self-perceptions have some influence -> if you think good at math, you’ll do better Self-Esteem Motivation - Most people extremely motivated to maintain their self-esteem ➔ Boosting self-esteem through doing things one likes/ enjoys - When self-esteem threatened (by failure or unflattering comparison) ➔ Friend’s success can be more threatening than that of strangers Self-Esteem level makes a difference: - People w/ high self-esteem react to a self-esteem threat by compensating for it (blaming someone else, trying harder next time) ➔ Reactions help preserve positive feelings about themselves - People w/ low self-esteem react to self-esteem threat by blaming themselves or giving up What underlies motive to maintain or enhance self-esteem? - Self-esteem similar to fuel gauge → Relationships enable surviving & thriving, so: - Self-esteem gauge alerts us to threatened social rejection - Motivating to act with greater sensitivity to others’ expectations → Social Rejection lowers self-esteem and makes people more eager for approval → Sort of pain can motivate action such as self-improvement, search for acceptance and inclusion elsewhere - Self-esteem gauge of status with others → Growing higher when we are respected/liked Terror Management Theory = people exhibit self-protective emotional and cognitive responses when confronted with reminders of mortality - Humans must find ways to manage overwhelming fear of death - Reality of our own death motivates us to gain recognition from work & values - Not everyone can achieve recognition, that’s why self-esteem can’t be unconditional - Must pursue self-esteem by meeting standards of society Positive Consequences: - Become more self-protective - Self-improvement - More careful in processing information However, when we actively focus on boosting self-esteem: - become less open to criticism - less likely to emphasize w/ others - more pressured to succeed at activities The Trade-Off of Low vs High Self-Esteem Low Self-Esteem: - more vulnerable to anxiety, loneliness, depression, eating disorders, self-harm, drug abuse, - make less money - take a negative view of everything - notice & remember others’ worst behaviors (think partners don’t love them)  - sulk or complain to partners to get support -> quicker to think their partners are criticizing or rejecting them - more shy, modest High Self-Esteem: - fosters initiative, resilience, pleasant feelings - when good things happen, more likely to savor & sustain good feelings - self-serving perceptions -> believe in superiority motivates us to achieve, self-fulfilling prophecy, sustains hope - more likely to be obnoxious, interrupt, talk to people (rather than with them) - terrorists, gang leaders, men in prison -> tend to have higher than average self-esteem - Self-esteem = not key to success: doesn’t cause better academic achievements or superior work performance → Self-Control way more important than self-esteem Narcissism: Self-Esteem’s Conceited Sister Narcissism = an inflated sense of self - More than high self-esteem - High se: think they’re worthy | n: better and smarter than others - High se: value both individual achievement & relationships | n: do not care about others - Can be outgoing & charming at first, self-centeredness leads to relationship problems - more likely to become new leader of group (haven’t met them before) Self-Esteem & Insecure Narcissists? Overinflated ego as cover for deep-seated insecurities? No. ➔ Higher scores in IAT about themselves (match positive words) Deep-seated feeling of superiority may originate in childhood Narcissists often are aware that they are narcissists (agree with statement) ➔ Realize they see themselves more positively than others, arrogant, exaggerating abilities, make good first impressions but not liked in the long run Self-Efficacy = how competent we feel on a task - Believing in own competence & effectiveness pays off - Efficacy predicts how good they’ll do - Mediated by coping misfailure Strong feelings of self-efficacy: ➔ More persistent, less anxious,, less depressed, more academically successful ➔ Setting more challenging goals & persist Differences self-efficacy & self-esteem - Self-efficacy: believing you can do something - Self-esteem: liking yourself overall ➔ Self-efficacy feedback (you tried really hard) leads to better performance than self-esteem feedback (you’re really smart) What Is Self-Serving Bias? Self-Serving Bias = the tendency to perceive oneself favorably - Attribute success to own ability & effort (internalizing) - Attribute failure to external factors (bad luck, impossibility) (externalizing) - Situations that combine skill & chance especially prone to phenomenon (game, exam, job applications) ➔ Usually stronger for traits -> subjective or difficult to measure ➔ Subjective qualities give us leeway in constructing own definition of success Self-serving attributions = a form of self-serving bias; the tendency to attribute positive outcomes to oneself & negative outcomes to other factors - One of the most potent biases ➔ Reason: making self-serving attributions activate brain areas associated with reward & pleasure - When describing past vs present self -> past: nearly as many negative as positive statements, present: 3x more positive statements - Even biased against seeing own bias -> claim they avoid self-serving bias but others commit it - See ourself as objective, everyone else as biased ➔ Bias blind spot - Collectivist cultures: less likely to self-enhance by believing they are better than others Unrealistic Optimism - most humans more disposed to optimism than pessimism - Partly: relative pessimism about others’ fates - Self, far less likely to experience negative events (developing drinking problem) ➔ Illusionary Optimism - Increases our vulnerability -> believing immune to misfortune, not take sensible precautions Optimism beats pessimism in promoting self-efficacy, health, well-being Defensive Pessimism = adaptive value of anticipating problems & harnessing one’s anxiety to motivate effective action - Anticipates problems & motivates effective coping - Overconfident students tend to underprepare | equally able but less confident study harder -> better grades False Consensus and Uniqueness False Consensus Effect = the tendency to overestimate the commonality of one’s opinions & one’s undesirable or unsuccessful behaviors  - Opinions: find support for our positions by overestimating how much others agree - Overestimate the number of other people who do likewise ➔ Reason: Generalize from a limited sample, prominently includes ourselves ➔ Lacking other information, project ourselves ➔ Also more likely to spend time with people who share attitudes/behaviors False Uniqueness Effect = the tendency to underestimate the commonality of one’s abilities & one’s desirable or successful behaviors - Abilities: serve our self-image by seeing our talents & moral behaviors as unusual ➔ See failings as normal & virtues as exceptional ➔ Self-serving bias appears as self-serving attributions, self-congratulatory comparisons, illusory optimism, false consensus for failing Self-serving bias occurs ➔ Errors in how we process & remember information about ourselves - Comparing ourselves requires us to assess and recall their behavior and ours ➔ Creates multiple opportunities for flaws in information processing - Cognitive problems, do not look at things closely enough - Motivated to keep self-esteem, helps you keep your self-serving bias How Do People Manage Their Self-Presentation Self-Handicapping = protecting one’s self-image with behaviors that create a handy excuse for later failure - Sabotage their chances for success by creating impediments that make success less likely Fearing failure, people will: - Reduce preparation for important individual athletic events - Give opponent an advantage - Perform poorly at the beginning to not create unreachable expectations - Procrastinate ➔ Behavior have self-protective aim -> protects self-esteem & public image ➔ When self-image is tied up with performance, can be more self-deflating to try hard & fail than to procrastinate and have an excuse for bad performance ➔ If we fail -> blame it on the handicap (temporary/external) ➔ If we succeed -> boosts our self-image Impression Management Self-presentation = act of expressing oneself & behaving in ways designed to create a favorable impression or an impression that corresponds to one’s ideals - Wanting to present a desired image both to an external audience + to an internal audience - Work at managing the impressions we create - Excuse, justify, apologize as necessary to shore up our self-esteem & verify self-image  - Make sure not to brag too much -> risks disapproval of others One self-presentation strategy: humblebrag = attempt to disguise bragging behind complaints or false humility Careful balance (looking good, not too good) ➔ Particularly true in collectivist cultures - Modesty is default strategy to avoid offending others Familiar situations: ➔ Self-presentation happens without conscious effort Unfamiliar situations: ➔ Acutely self-conscious of impressions -> less modest than among friends Upside: Self-presentation can unexpectedly improve our mood (when told to put best face forward, make good impression on boyfriend) Concern for self-presentation -> self-handicap (to explain failure), take health risks (tanning), yielding to peer pressure, express more modesty when self-flattery is vulnerable For some: conscious self-presentation is a way of life - Continually monitor their behavior, note how others react -> adjust social performance to gain desired effect Self-Monitoring = being attuned to the way one presents oneself in social situations & adjusting one’s performance to create desired impression - People with high score on scale of self-monitoring: ➔ Social chameleons (use self-presentation to adjust behavior in response to external situations) ➔ Attuned behavior: more likely to express attitudes they don’t really hold ➔ Could result in dishonest behavior ➔ Less committed to their relationships, more likely to be dissatisfied in marriages - People with low score ➔ Care less about what others think, more internally guided -> act more like they feel & believe ➔ Can come across as insensitive ➔ False modesty phenomenon: often display lower self-esteem than we privately feel ➔ Humblebrag: when we have done well, insincerity of a disclaimer CHAPTER 3 SOCIAL BELIEFS AND JUDGMENTS How Do We Judge Our Social Worlds, Consciously and Unconsciously? Brain Systems System 1: fast, intuitive, automatic, unconscious (intuition, gut feeling) System 2: slow, deliberate, controlled, effortful, conscious (controlled processing) ➔ There is also automatic thinking that is rather slow  ➔ System 1 influences more of our action than we realize (e.g. through priming) Priming = activating particular associations in memory - Priming one thought, even without awareness, can influence another thought/action - Even when stimuli presented subliminally (unterschwellig) ➔ Invisible image/word primes a response to a later task - Unnoticed events can also prime ➔ Occurre without conscious awareness of its influence Embodied cognition = the mutual influence of bodily sensations on cognitive preferences & social judgments ➔ Physical sensations prime social judgments and vice versa o Social exclusion feels cold (eating alone, think lower temperature in the room) ➔ Social Cognition is embodied Intuitive Judgments Intuitive management -> should use system 1 when judging others, hiring, firing, investing The Powers of Intuition → Unconscious information processing confirms limited access to what’s going on in the mind → Thinking is partly automatic, partly controlled - Automatic thinking: implicit, effortless, habitual, without awareness, roughly corresponds to intuition -> System 1 - Controlled thinking: explicit, deliberate, reflective, conscious -> System 2 Examples of automatic thinking: - Schemas (mental concepts that intuitively guide our perceptions & interpretations) - Emotional reactions (instantaneous, happens before thinking, neural shortcut) - Expertise (intuitively knowing answer to a problem) - Snap judgments (if very small exposure to someone, snap judgment better than chance at guessing whether someone is straight or gay) Remember facts, names, past experiences explicitly (System 1) Remember skills, conditioned dispositions implicitly (System 2) → Many routine cognitive functions occur automatically, unintentionally, without awareness The Limits of Intuition - Although subliminal stimuli can trigger weak, fleeting response, there is no evidence that e.g. subliminal audio recordings can reprogram unconscious mind - Humans have capacity for illusions, misinterpretations and constructed beliefs - Illusory intuition appears in how we take in, store, retrieve social information -> illusionary thinking ➔ Demonstrations of how people create false beliefs do not prove that all believes are false Overconfidence = tendency to be more confident than correct, to overestimate the accuracy of one’s beliefs - Efficiency has a trade-off, System 1 intuitions are sometimes wrong, don’t realize our errors ➔ People frequently cut things too close (late, missing planes) ➔ In thinking we know how something will go, we often miss the window ➔ Incompetence feeds overconfidence Estimating chances for success on a task ➔ Confidence runs highest when it is in the future ➔ On the day, possibility of failure looms larger, confidence drops  - Stockbroker overconfidence (randomly selected stocks also work, stocks are confidence game, people who are overconfident invest more even when not going well) - Political overconfidence (political leaders/dictators) - Student overconfidence (more confident student do worse on tests, stopped studying) Why does overconfidence persist? ➔ We like those who are confident ➔ Group members rewarded highly confident individuals with higher status (even when incompetent) ➔ Overconfident people speak first, talk longer, use more factual tone Conformation Bias = tendency to search for information that confirms one’s preconceptions ➔ Tend to not seek information that might disprove what they believe, eager to verify our beliefs ➔ Even if people are exposed to information disconfirming their beliefs, stick with original belief ➔ Ideological echo chambers -> people choose news sources to align with beliefs -> Even if source is less reliable ➔ Confirmation bias appears to be System 1 snap judgment (default reaction is to look for information consistent with our presupposition) ➔ Stopping and thinking, activating System 2, makes us less likely to commit error Heuristics: Mental Shortcuts Heuristics = a thinking strategy that enables quick, efficient judgments (make routine decisions w/ minimal effort) ➔ Survival Representativeness Heuristic = the tendency to presume, sometimes despite contrary odds, that someone or something belongs to a particular group if resembling/representing a typical member ➔ Judge someone by intuitively comparing it to mental representation of a category ➔ Representativeness reflects reality ➔ Consequence: may lead to discounting other important information Availability Heuristic = cognitive rule that judges the likelihood of things in terms of their availability in memory -> if it comes readily to mind, we presume it to be commonplace - The easier we recall something, the more likely it seems ➔ Based on basic principle of social thinking: people are slow to understand specific examples from a general truth ➔ vivid, easy-to-imagine events (shark attack) may seem more likely to occur than harder-to- picture events ➔ Powerful anecdotes are more compelling than statistical information ➔ Probability Neglect: worry about remote possibilities while ignoring higher probabilities Counterfactual Thinking = imagining alternative scenarios and outcomes that could have happened, but didn’t - The higher a student’s score within grade category (B+), the worse they feel ➔ Happens when we can easily picture an alternative outcome - When barely escaped bad event, easily imagine a negative counterfactual -> feel good ➔ Bad luck refers to bad events that did happen but easily might not have ➔ The more significant and unlikely the event, the more intense the counterfactual thinking ➔ More people live with more regret over things they didn’t do Illusory Thinking Illusory Correlation = perception of relationship where none exists, or perception of stronger relationship than actually exists - Easy to see correlation where none exists - When expected to find significant relationships, easily associate random events  ➔ People easily misperceive random events as confirming their beliefs ➔ If we believe correlation exists, more likely to notice & recall confirming instances ➔ If we believe premonitions correlate with events, notice & remember joint occurrence ➔ We ignore or forget all the times unusual events do not coincide Gambling People acting as if they can predict/ control chance events - Gamblers attribute wins to skill and foresight, losses are near misses/flukes ➔ Illusion of control breeds overconfidence ➔ If people lack control, create a sense of predictability Regression toward the average = the statistical tendency for extreme scores or extreme behavior to return toward their average - Another illusion of control: fail to recognize regression toward the average ➔ When we hit low point, try anything, likely to be followed by improvement ➔ Recognize that events are not likely to continue at an unusually good/bad extreme ➔ Exceptional performance tends to regress toward normality Moods and Judgments - Social judgments involve efficient information processing - Moods infuse our judgments - Unhappy people more self-focused and brooding - Happy people more trusting, loving, responsive ➔ We don’t attribute changing perceptions to mood shifts (world seems different) ➔ When emotionally aroused, more likely to make System 1 snap judgments, stereotype-biased How Do We Perceive Our Social Worlds? We respond not to reality as it is but as we construct it Perceiving and Interpreting Events - First impressions are more often right than wrong Political Perceptions - people’s perception of bias can be used to assess their attitudes ➔ always perceive people as biased against own pov ➔ view social worlds through spectacles of beliefs, attitudes and values Belief Perseverance = persistence of one’s initial conceptions, such as when the basis for one’s belief is discredited but an explanation of why the belief might be true survives - surprisingly difficult to demolish a falsehood after the person conjures up a rationale for it  - when discredited, nevertheless held to self-generated explanations, continued to believe it ➔ the more we examine our theories and explain how they might be true, the more closed to information that challenges our beliefs ➔ beliefs and expectations powerfully affect how we mentally construct events (beware of thought patterns) Constructing Memories of Ourselves and Our Worlds - Construct memories at the time of withdrawal - Reconstruct our past by using current feelings & expectations to combine information fragments ➔ easily (unconsciously) revise memories to suit current knowledge - When experimenter manipulates people’s presumptions about past, many will construct false memories - Witness an event, receive misleading info about it, take memory test ➔ Misinformation effect = incorporating misinformation into one’s memory of the event after witnessing an event and receiving misleading information about it (social and physical events) Reconstructing our Past Attitudes - People whose beliefs/attitudes have changed often insist that they have always felt much as they now feel - Construction of positive memories brightens our recollections ➔ Rosy recollection (recall mildly pleasant events even more favorably than experienced) - People on trips (bike trip) reported enjoying trip as having it, later recalled experience even more fondly, minimizing unpleasant or boring aspect & remembering high points - Relationships change, revise recollections of other people ➔ Students still in love, tendency to overestimate first impressions (love at first sight) ➔ broken up underestimate their liking (recalling bad characteristics) Reconstructing our Past Behavior - “totalitarian egos” – revise the past to suit our present views - If present view is -> improved -> misrecall our past as more unlike the present ➔ Social judgments are mix of observation and expectation, reason, passion How Do We Explain Our Social Worlds? Attributing Causality: To the Person or the Situation Attribution Theory = how people explain others’ behavior – e.g. by attributing it either to internal causes (disposition, mental state,traits, motives, attitudes) or to external causes (situations) - How we explain people’s behavior and what we infer from it Dispositional Attribution = attributing behavior to the person’s disposition and traits - Child’s underachievement due to lack of motivation (internal) Situational Attribution = attributing behavior to the environment - Child’s underachievement due to physical/ social circumstances (external) Misattribution = mistakenly attributing a behavior to wrong source - E.g. Men are more likely to attribute woman’s friendliness to sexual interest Inferring Traits - Assume that people’s actions are indicative of their intentions - Behavior that’s normal for a situation tells us less about the person than unusual behavior Spontaneous Trait Inference = effortless, automatic inference (Schlussfolgerung) of a trait after exposure to someone’s behavior - The ease with which we infer traits Fundamental Attribution Error = tendency for observers to underestimate situational influences, overestimate dispositional influences upon others’ behavior (others are the way they act) - Explaining someone’s behavior, underestimate impact of situation, overestimate extent to which it reflects traits, attitudes and skills - People fall bc clumsy (not tripped), speed bc aggressive (late) ➔ Discounting of the situation - Even when people know they are causing the behavior of someone, still underestimate external influences -> if individuals dictate an opinion, someone else must express, tend to see person as actually holding the opinion Follow-up research: - Misinterpretations are not reflection of low social intelligence ➔ intelligent people more likely to make the attribution error ➔ people with social power usually initiate & control conversations ➔ leads to overestimation of knowledge & intelligence Why Do We Make the Attribution Error? PERSPECTIVE & SITUATIONAL AWARENESS - when we act, environment commands our attention - when others act, person occupies our center of attention (environment relatively invisible) - Analysis Malle (2006): actor-observer difference often minimal ➔ When action feels intentional and admirable, attribute it our own good reasons (not situation) ➔ When we behave badly, tend to display disposition, attribute behavior to situation ➔ We find causes where we look for them ➔ See ourselves as more variable than others do CULTURAL DIFFERENCES - Cultures influence attribution error - Individualistic/western: people, not situations, cause events (internal explanations more socially approved) -> get what you deserve ➔ Learn to explain others’ behavior in terms of personal characteristics - Collectivist/East Asian: more sensitive to importance of situation ➔ When aware of social context, less inclined to assume others’ behavior corresponds to traits ➔ Less likely to interpret behavior as reflecting an inner trait ➔ People’s attribution predict their attitudes toward sth ➔ Who attribute poverty & unemployment to personal dispositions -> tend to adopt political positions unsympathetic to such people ➔ Dispositional attributions ➔ Tend to adopt political positions that offer more direct support to the poor ➔ Situational attributions How do our social Belief Matter? Self-fulfilling Prophecies = a belief that leads to its own fulfillment - When ideas lead to us to act in ways that produce their apparent confirmation - Rosenthal experimenter bias: research participants live up to what they believe experimenters expect of them Teacher Expectations and Student Performance - Teachers’ evaluations correlate with student achievement: teachers think well of students who do well (mostly because accurate perceiving of abilities) - Expectations mostly reflect rather than cause social reality - Not only high performance followed by higher evaluations, also teachers’ judgments predicted students’ later performance beyond actual ability But high expectations boost low achievers Effect of students’ expectations on teacher - Expectations can affect both student & teacher - Students w/ high expectations (he was unaware) perceived him as more competent/interesting - Students learned more Results due to perception or self-fulfilling prophecy? ➔ Expectations of both, although usually reasonably accurate, occasionally self-fulfilling prophecy Getting from Others What We Expect Do self-fulfilling prophecies color our personal relationships? - Sometimes, negative expectations of someone lead us to be extra nice to that person, nice in return (disconfirming our expectations) - More common finding: get what we expect - If someone beliefs opponent will be noncooperative, opponent often responds by becoming noncooperative (vicious cycle) Behavioral Confirmation = type of self-fulfilling prophecy whereby people’s social expectations lead them to behave in ways that cause others to confirm their expectations - Mistaken beliefs about social world can induce others to confirm beliefs ➔ Social beliefs may be self-confirming CHAPTER 4 BEHAVIOR AND ATTITUDES How Well Do Our Attitudes Predict Our Behavior? Attitudes = feelings & beliefs, often influenced by our beliefs, that predispose us to respond favorably or unfavorably to objects, people and events - Attitudes size up the world - When responding quickly, way we feel can guide how we react - Person who believes particular group is lazy may feel dislike for such people, intend to act in discriminatory manner - ABCs of attitude: Affect (feelings), Behavior tendency, Cognition (thoughts) Moral hypocrisy = Disjuncture between attitude & action (appearing moral while avoiding costs of being so) ➔ Morality and greed on collision course, greed usually wins Sex education programs often influenced attitudes without affecting long-term abstinence and condom use behaviors ➔ Well-ingrained habits & practices override attitudes When Attitudes Predict Behavior - Both are subjective to other influences For attitude to lead to behavior: - Liking must become wanting - Goal must be set - Goal must be important enough to overwhelm other demands - Specific behavior must be chosen ➔ When other influences on what we say/do are minimal, attitude is specific to behavior, attitude is potent When Social Influences On What We Say Are Minimal - Measure expressed attitudes -> expressions subject to outside influences - To minimize social influences on attitude reports -> implicit attitudes ➔ IAT (implicit association test) - Uses reaction times to measure how quickly people associate concepts Do implicit biases predict behavior? ➔ Behavior is predicted best with combination of both explicit and implicit (self-report) measures ➔ Both together predict behavior better than either alone ➔ Implicit measures were the most consistent ➔ For attitudes formed early in life -> implicit attitudes can predict behavior ➔ Other attitudes (consumerism) -> explicit self-reports are better predictor When Other Influences on Behavior are Minimal - Situation matters too, influence can be enormous (not only personal attitudes) - Predicting behavior is nearly impossible -> but can compare averages ➔ Principle of aggregation: effort of an attitude become more apparent when we look at person’s average behavior When Attitudes are Specific to Behavior - If measured attitude is general, behavior is very specific -> no close correspondence - Attitudes don’t predict behavior in most studies ➔ Attitudes predicts behavior when measured attitude was specific to situation ➔ Specific, relevant attitudes predict intended and actual behavior (predict intention to recyle -> b)  ➔ To change habits through persuasion, must alter attitudes toward specific practice When Attitudes Are Potent - Much of behavior is automatic -> for habitual behaviors (seat belt), conscious intentions hardly activated - Mindlessness is adaptive -> frees mind to work on other tings Bringing Attitudes to Mind - Prompted to think about attitudes before acting, truer to ourselves ➔ Attitudes become potent if we think about them ➔ Make them self-aware (e.g. in front of mirror) -> promotes consistency between words & deeds Forging Strong Attitudes Through Experience - Attitudes that best predict behavior are accessible (easily brought to mind) & stable (always felt that way) - Attitudes forged (geformt) by experience (no hearsay), more accessible, enduring, likely to guide actions When Does Our Behavior Affect Our Attitudes? ➔ Attitudes follow behavior Role Playing Role = a set of norms that defines how people in a given social position ought to behave - Refers to actions expected of those who occupy certain social position - New role -> hypersensitive to social situation, feel self-conscious, observed new own actions, not natural, after a while behavior no longer felt forced Saying Becomes Believing - People adapt what they say to please listeners - Quicker to tell good news than bad & adjust messages to listener’s view - Begin to believe what they are saying (when not bribed/coerced) ➔ When there is no compelling external explanation for one’s words, saying becomes believing ➔ People adjust messages to listeners, when doing so, believing altered message Evil and Moral Acts - Attitudes-follow-behavior principle also occurs for immoral acts - Evil sometimes results from gradually escalating commitments -> litle evil act erodes moral sensitivity -> easier to perform worse act (after white lie, bigger lie) ➔ We tend not only to hurt those we dislike but dislike those we hurt - Harming innocent victim (comments/shocks) leads to disparage victims, justify behavior - Especially when coaxed rather than coerced (überredet statt gezwungen) -> feel responsible - Appears in wartime -> camp guards display good manners to captives first days of the job, soldiers ordered to kill get sick -> after time desensitized & dehumanized - Appears in peacetime -> group holding slaves perceive them having traits that justify oppression ➔ Actions and attitudes feed each other ➔ The more one harms another and adjusts one’s attitudes, the easier it becomes to harm ➔ Moral acts also shape the self  ➔ Character is reflected in what we do when we think no one is looking Why Does Our Behavior Affect Our Attitudes? Why does behavior affect attitude? Why do people sometimes internalize their self-presentations as genuine attitude changes? 1. Self-presentation theory (for strategic reasons, express attitudes that make us appear consistent) 2. Cognitive dissonance theory (to reduce discomfort, we justify our actions to ourselves) 3. Self-perception theory (actions are self-revealing, uncertain about feelings/beliefs, we look to behavior) Self-Presentation: Impression Management - Making good impression as a way to gain social & material rewards, to feel better about ourselves, to become more secure in social identities - No one wants to look inconsistent -> express attitudes that match actions - To appear consistent, automatically pretend hold attitudes consistent with behaviors - Little insincerity or hypocrisy can pay off Self-Justification: Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger) = tension that arises when one is simultaneously aware of two inconsistent cognitions = dissonance occurs when we realize that we have, with little justification, acted contrary to attitudes or made a decisions favoring one alternative despite reasons favoring another - Motivated to maintain consistency among our thoughts - Feel tension – dissonance – when two of beliefs are inconsistent - To reduce unpleasant arousal -> adjust our thinking Another way to minimize dissonance -> selective exposure to agreeable information = tendency to seek information & media that agree with one’s views + to avoid dissonant information - People w/ strong views on some topic, prone to “identity-protective cognition” ➔ To minimize dissonance: beliefs steer their reasoning & evaluation of data (same data about climate change, people read it differently) - People w/ practical, less values-relevant topics, “accuracy motives” drive them (home inspection before buying, second opinion before surgery) - Dissonance theory pertains mostly to discrepancies between behavior & attitude (aware of both) ➔ If we sense inconsistency, feel pressure for change ➔ Get someone to change their attitude by making a public statement, may change their behavior Insufficient Justification = reduction of dissonance by internally justifying one’s behavior when external justification is insufficient - Study Festinger & Carlsmith - Perform dull task, after finish, explained study concerns how expectations affect performance - Getting paid (1 or 20$), agree, convince other participant (confederate), fill out survey afterwards ➔ Paid 1$: hardly sufficient justification for a lie -> most likely to adjust attitudes to actions -> insufficient justification for actions, experience more dissonance, more motivated to believe in it  ➔ Paid 20$: sufficient justification, less dissonance In later experiments, attitude-follow-behavior effect was strongest - When people felt choice - When actions had foreseeable consequences Insufficient justification also works with punishments ➔ Attitudes follow behaviors for which we feel some responsibilities ➔ Dissonance theory: encouragement & inducement should be enough to elicit the desired action, use only enough incentive Dissonance After Decisions - Implies that decisions produce dissonance - Important decision -> torn between 2 equally attractive alternatives - After commitment -> aware of dissonant cognitions -> desirable features of rejected option & undesirable features of what chosen - After making decisions, reduce dissonance by upgrading chosen alternative, downgrading chosen option Self-Perception Theory = theory that when we are unsure of our attitudes, we infer them as much as would an observer, by looking at our behavior & the circumstances under which it occurs - We see person acting in particular situation, attribute behavior either to traits, attitudes or environmental forces - Make similar inferences when we observe own behavior ➔ When attitudes weak/ambiguous: similar to someone observing -> seeing actions provides clues how strong my beliefs are, hearing myself talk informs me of my attitudes ➔ E.g. if act like leader, we begin to think of ourselves as a leader ➔ Behavior also guides self-perceptions of emotions Expressions and Attitude - Facial Feedback Effect = tendency of facial expressions to trigger corresponding feelings - Also for body ➔ Motions trigger emotions - Naturally mimic others, helps us tune in what they’re feeling, emotional contagion ➔ Nonverbal behaviors also influence our attitudes Overjustification and Intrinsic Motivations - Overjustification = result of pressuring people to do what they already like doing, they may then see their actions as externally controlled rather than intrinsically appealing ➔ Rewarding people for doing what they already enjoy may lead them to attribute their action to the reward - Undermine self-perception that they do it bc they like it ➔ Extrinsic motivation of reward interferes with intrinsic motivation of true enjoyment ➔ Overjustification effort occurs when someone offers unnecessary reward beforehand in an obvious effort to control behavior - Many life tasks combine intrinsic and extrinsic rewards (nurse) - Not all tasks initially appealing, might need extrinsic incentives -> someone should use small extrinsic incentives to coax desired behavior -> if person complies -> give them intrinsic reason for continuing work Comparing the Theories Why actions might only seem to affect our attitudes: ➔ Self-presentation theory Why actions genuinely affect our attitudes:  ➔ Dissonance-theory (justify behavior to reduce internal discomfort) ➔ Self-perception-theory (observe behavior, make reasonable inferences about attitudes) Dissonance as Arousal Dissonance theory wins out on one count: ➔ Having attitudes & behavior disagree produces arousal - Especially if behavior has unwanted consequences for which person feels responsible ➔ Dissonance-related arousal -> increased sweat and heart rate Self-affirmation theory = People experience self-image threat after engaging in undesirable behavior & they can compensate by affirming another aspect of the self - Threaten self-concept in one domain, they will compensate by refocusing or by doing good deeds in another domain - Justifying actions is self-affirming: protects and supports our sense of integrity & self-worth - People whose self-concepts were restored felt less need to justify their acts - People with high & secure self-esteem also engage in less self-justification ➔ Tension aroused is necessary for attitudes-follow-behavior effect Self-Perceiving When Not Self-Contradicting - Dissonance is uncomfortably arousing, leads to self-persuasion after acting contrary to attitude - Dissonance theory can’t explain attitude changes that occur without dissonance - Also does not explain overjustification effect ➔ Dissonance Theory explains what happens when we act contrary to clearly defined attitudes -> feel tension, adjust our attitudes to reduce it -> explains attitude change → Situations, attitudes are not well formed, self-perception theory explains attitude formation CHAPTER 6 CONFORMITY AND OBEDIENCE What is Conformity - Western individualistic cultures (conformity has negative connotation) - Eastern collectivist cultures (not sign of weakness but tolerance, self-control, maturity) Conformity = change in behavior or belief as the result of real or imagined group pressure - Not just acting as other act, being affected by how they act - Acting or thinking differently as you would alone 2 varieties of conformity: 1. Acceptance = conformity that involves both acting and believing in accord with social pressure = genuinely believe in what the group has persuaded you to do (believe that actions are right)  2. Compliance = conformity that involves publicly acting in accord with an implied or explicit request while privately disagreeing - Conforming to an expectation or request without believing in what you are doing - To reap a reward or avoid a punishment ➔ Insincere, outward conformity - Obedience = a type of compliance involving acting in accord with a direct order or command - Compliance in response to command - Doing something you wouldn’t want to do otherwise bc someone else says you need to or because rules/laws require it - Most brain activity, leading to most cognitive arousal What Are The Classic Conformity and Obedience Studies? Sherif’s Studies of Norm Formation - Dark room, 15ft, point of light, first alone, then following days ➔ Group norm emerges (ambiguous reality) ➔ Optical illusion autokinetic phenomenon, apparent movement of stationary point of light in dark - Test people’s suggestibility - Retests a year later, continued to support group norms Other examples of suggestibility: - Contagious yawning - Comedy show laugh tracks (especially if audience made up of similar people to us) - Chameleon effect and natural mimicry (mimicking someone’s behavior) ➔ Mirroring helps people look more helpful, likeable Mimicry on large scale -> mass hysteria - Mass hysteria: suggestibility to problems that spread throughout a large group - Especially disturbing forms of mass hysteria: socially contagious conversion order, suicide, gun violence Milgram’s Obedience Studies - What happens when the demands of authority clash with demands of conscience - Cultural change towards individualism might have reduced obedience, not eliminated - All expressed concern -> experimenter prompted to continue ➔ Shows more than wide-ranging mere obedience (obeying direct order), challenges participants’ feeling of control ➔ Some stopped after argued that they have control, in new study reassert by reading  correct answer more loudly Psychological effects that increased obedience: - Slippery slope (small requests turn into large) - Framing of shock-giving as social norm for situation - Opportunity to deny responsibility - Limited time to reflect on decision What Breeds Obedience? - Varied social conditions 4 factors determined obedience: - Victim’s emotional distance - Authority’s closeness & legitimacy - Authority’s part of respected institution - Liberating effects of disobedient fellow participant The Victim’s Distance - Greatest obedience: learners/victims could not be seen (could not see teacher) -> remote - Less obedient when victim is visible - Close relationships mattered: only 15% would shock relative, friend, neighbor ➔ Easiest to abuse someone who’s distant or depersonalized (online, drones) Closeness & Legitimacy of the Authority - Physical presence of experimenter also affected obedience ➔ When person making command is physically close, compliance increases ➔ Authority must be perceived as legitimate Institutional Authority - International prestige of institution ➔ Authorities backed by institutions wield social power The Liberating Effects of Group Influence ➔ Conformity can also be constructive - Milgram liberating effect of conformity by placing teacher w/ 2 accomplices, help conduct procedure, 90% liberated themselves by conforming with accomplices - 9/11 firefighters brave but partly obeying their superiors, partly conforming to group loyalty Reflections on the Classic Studies - Common response: “I was only following orders” defenses 4 similarities with Asch & Milgram: 1. Show how compliance can take precedence over moral sense 2. Succeed in pressuring people to go against own consciences 3. Sensitize us to moral conflicts in own lifes 4. Affirm 2 familiar social psychological principles: link between behavior and attitudes & the power of the situation Behavior and Attitudes - When external influences override inner convictions, attitudes fail to determine behavior ➔ Different psychological state, slippery slope of obedience, difficult to stop ➔ External behavior and internal disposition can also feed each other (in an escalating spiral) -> harshly devalue victim as consequence of acting against him (stupid, deserves it) ➔ Blame-the-victim process ➔ Compliance breeds acceptance (small steps) ➔ Criticism produces contempt (Verachtung) -> licences cruelty -> when justified leads to brutality -> killing -> systematic killing ➔ Evolving attitudes both follow and justify actions ➔ Capacity for heroism (village, hide Jews, told to disobey) The Power of Social Norms - Even minor norms are strong, notice when try breaking with social constraints (golf in a suit) - Experiment Swim & Hyers (1999), difficult to violate social norm of being nice rather than confrontational (even when provoked) - Same with racial slur (thought they would be upset, in reality acted indifferent) ➔ Power of social norms, how hard it is to predict behavior, even our own ➔ Saying what we would do in hypothetical situation is easier than doing it in real life - Evil also results from social forces ➔ Drift toward evil usually comes in small increments, without conscious intent to do evil ➔ Under sway of evil forces, nice people sometimes corrupted as they construct moral rationalization for immoral behavior (soldiers shoot civilians) What Predicts Conformity? ➔ Conformity grows when judgments are difficult or if you feel incompetent (the more insecure, the more influenced) ➔ Conformity is highest when group has three or more people, unanimous, cohesive, high in status, response is public and made without prior commitment Group Size ➔ 3 to 5 more conformity than 1 or 2 ➔ Way group is packaged makes a difference Unanimity - Someone who punctures group’s unanimity deflates its social power ➔ People will voice opinion if just one other person differs from majority ➔ Observing dissent even if wrong can increase own independence Cohesion - Outgroup opinion sways us less than same minority opinion ingroup ➔ The more cohesive a group, the more power it gains over its members - Within same ethnic group -> own-group conformity pressure - Seeing someone cheating with uni shirt, more likely to cheat (another uni, less likely) ➔ Cohesion-fed conformity Status - Higher-status people have more impact - Junior group members conform more than senior ones - Milgram: people of lower status, accept commands more readily ➔ Prestige begets influence Public Response - Conform more when must respond in front of others than writing answers privately - Adolescents compared to children, more group pressure to conform Prior Commitment - Does public commitment make a difference? ➔ After making public commitment, they stick to it, at most, change judgments in a later situation ➔ When people apologize and admit they’re wrong, feel less in control ➔ Prior commitment restrains persuasion too  Why Conform? Two possibilities why people conform: 1. Normative Influence = based on desire to fulfill others’ expectations, to gain acceptance, liked 2. Informational influence = when people accept evidence about reality provided by others, right Normative - Going along with the crowd, avoid rejection, stay in good graces, gain approval - Leads to compliance (especially having seen others ridiculed or seeking to climb status ladder) - Often unaware of being influenced (Asch) - Brain area associated with social rejection active ➔ Concern for social image Informational - How beliefs spread - Leads people to privately accept others influence as source of information - When reality is ambiguous (Sherif) - Brain area associated with judgment ➔ Desire to be correct Groups often reject consistent nonconformers - Myers playing game, played by rules, not conform to customs - Firestorms & cancel culture -> harsh consequences for perceived nonconformity Social rejection is painful - When deviate from group norms, pay emotional price - High price of deviation compels people to support what they don’t believe in or to suppress their disagreement When we fear rejection, we’re more likely to follow along Friends have extra influence (normative & informational) ➔ Influence the experiences that inform our attitudes ➔ Conformity may genuinely shape perceptions (scared of being wrong) Who Conforms? ➔ 3 predictors: personality, culture, social roles Personality ➔ People higher in agreeableness (value getting along w/ others) & conscientiousness (follow social norms for neatness & punctuality) are more likely to conform ➔ People who want to please others ➔ Favor smooth social experiences over disagreement, follow rules, traditional beliefs, doubt the existence of free will  Less likely to conform: people high in openness to experience (trait connected with creativity, socially progressive thinking) ➔ Less likely: people with strong belief in own free will Culture - Conformity rates are higher in collectivist countries and more conformist times Biological explanations: - Nonconformity supports creative problem solving - Groups thrive when coordinating responses to threats Cultural differences also exist within social classes: - Working-class people preferred similarity to others - Middle-class people preferred seeing themselves as unique Social Roles - Social roles allow some freedom of interpretation to those who act them out, but some aspects of any role must be performed - When only few norms associated w/ social category (escalator), don’t regard position as social role - Takes whole cluster of norms to define a role - Roles have powerful effects - Social situations can move most normal ppl to behave in abnormal ways Role playing can also be positive force - Intentionally playing & conforming to expectations, people change or empathize - Roles often come in pairs defined by relationships Do We Ever Want to Be Different? Reactance = a motive to protect or restore one’s sense of freedom - Arises when someone threatens our freedom of action - Individuals value sense of freedom & self-efficacy, when blatant social pressure threatens sense of freedom -> rebel ➔ E.g. we know we should do something that’s healthy, becomes difficult to do it without feeling freedom compromise ➔ If we know others are doing it (normative), more likely to do it too Asserting Uniqueness - People feel uncomfortable when appear too different - But also if too similar to everyone else (especially individualistic) - Bc nonconformity associated with high status ➔ People feel better when they see themselves as moderately unique & act in ways that asserts their individuality ➔ One is conscious of oneself insofar as, and in the ways that, one is different ➔ Rivalry is often most intense when other group closely resembles you ➔ Want to be distinctive but not too distinctive ➔ Seek distinctiveness in the right direction -> not to be different but be better than average  CHAPTER 7 PERSUATION What paths lead to persuasion? Persuasion: the process by which a message induces change in beliefs, attitudes and behaviors →Examples: - Spread of false beliefs - Climate change skepticism Central route to persuasion: occurs when interested people focus on the arguments and respond with favorable thoughts Peripheral route to persuasion: occurs when people are influenced by incidental cues, such as a speakers attractiveness →Focus on cues that trigger automatic acceptance without much thinking Different paths for different purposes - Central route processing can lead to more enduring change than the peripheral route →when people think carefully, they rely not just on persuasive appeals but on their own thoughts in response - Often we take the peripheral route because its quicker →simple rule-of-thumb heuristics are often used, such as trust the experts or long messages are credible →when a speaker is articulate and appealing, has apparently gid motives, and has several arguments, we usually take the peripheral route What are the elements of persuasion? Among the ingredients of persuasion explored by social psychologists are - Communicator - Message - How the message is communicated - Audience →Who says what, by what method, to whom? Who says? The communicator - One important characteristic of the communicator is credibility, or believability o Credible communicator is perceived as both expert and trustworthy o Sleeper effect: a delayed impact of a message that occurs when an initially discounted message becomes effective, such as we remember the message but forget the reason for discounting it - Credibility is affected by perceived expertise, speaking style, and perceived trustworthiness - Attractiveness and liking have a powerful influence What is said? The Message Content - Choice of reason or emotion in persuasion depends on the audience - Good feelings often enhance persuasion - Messages can also be made effective by evoking negative emotions such as fear - Primacy is more commonly effective than recency o Primacy effect: other things being equal, information presented first usually has the most influence o Recency effect: Information presented last sometimes has the most influence How is it said? The Channel of Communication - Channel: the way the message is delivered - Active experience strengthens attitudes - Written and visual appeals are both passive and many are relatively ineffective → Repetition and rhyming of a statement, however, serve to increase its fluency and believability - Contact has greater influence than the media o Two-step flow of communication: media influence often occurs through opinion leaders, who in turn influence others. To Whom Is It Said? The Audience - Two audience characteristics: age and thoughtfulness. - Social psychologists offer two explanations for the effects of age: o Life cycle explanation: attitudes change as people grow older. o Generational explanation: attitudes do not change; older people largely hold onto the attitudes they adopted when they were young - Degree of thoughtfulness is important. →Crucial aspect is not the message but the responses it evokes. - What is the audience thinking? o Need for cognition: the motivation to think and analyze. o Stimulating thinking makes strong messages more persuasive and weak messages less persuasive. o Degree of thoughtfulness is important. How can persuasion be resisted? - Being persuaded comes naturally —it is easier to accept persuasive messages than to doubt them. - To understand an assertion is to believe it —at least temporarily. - Attitude inoculation: exposing people to weak attacks upon their attitudes so that when stronger attacks come, they will have refutations available. - Counterarguments: reasons why a persuasive message might be wrong CHAPTER 8 GROUP INFLUENCE What is a group? - Group: two or more people who, for longer than a few moments, interact with and influence one another and perceive one another as "us." - Different groups help us meet different human needs. (Affiliation, Achievements, Social Identity) Social facilitation: How are we affected by the presence of others? The Presence of Others and Dominant Responses →Social facilitation: (1) Original meaning: the tendency of people to perform simple or well-learned tasks better when others are present. (2) Current meaning: the strengthening of dominant (prevalent, likely) responses in the presence of others. →In many cases, others' presence boosts performance on easy tasks but impairs performance on difficult tasks →Social facilitation is an obvious explanation for the home advantage in sports. Crowding: The Presence of Many Others - Effect of others' presence increases with their number →Large audiences can interfere with even well-learned, automatic behaviors. - Being in a crowd also intensifies positive or negative reactions. →When they sit close together, friendly people are liked even more, and unfriendly people are disliked even more. →Fun shared with others is more energizing —and fun. - Crowding has a similar effect to being observed by a crowd: it enhances arousal Why Are We Aroused in the Presence of Others? - Enhancement of dominant responses is strongest when people think they are being evaluated. →Evaluation apprehension: concern for how others are evaluating us. - We are also driven by distraction. →When we wonder how co-actors are doing or how an audience is reacting, we become distracted —and this causes arousal. Social loafing: Do individuals exert less effort in a group? Collective effort is often less than the sum of individual efforts. - Group members may be less motivated in additive tasks. - Social loafing: the tendency for people to exert less effort when they pool their effort toward a common goal than when they are individually accountable Effort decreases as group size increases. →Free riders: people who benefit from the group but give little in return Deindividuation: When do people lose their sense of self in groups? When arousal and diffused responsibility combine, people may commit acts that range from a mild lessening of restraint to impulsive self-gratification to destructive social explosions. Deindividuation: loss of self-awareness and evaluation apprehension. →Occurs in group situations that foster responsiveness to group norms, good or bad. Doing Together What We Would Not Do Alone - Group size is significant. o Larger the group, the more its members lose self-awareness and become willing to commit atrocities. o People's attention is focused on the situation, not on themselves. - Anonymity might lessen inhibitions →Makes one led self-conscious more group-conscious, and more responsive to cues present in the situation —whether negative or positive. - Arousing and distracting people's attention, even with minor actions, increases the likelihood of aggressive outbursts by large groups o When we act in an impulsive way as a group, we are not thinking about our values; we are reacting to the immediate situation Diminish Self-Awareness - Group experiences that diminish self-consciousness tend to disconnect behavior from attitudes. - Opposite of deindividuation is self-awareness. o Self-awareness: a self-conscious state in which attention focuses on oneself and makes people more sensitive to their own attitudes and dispositions. Group polarization: Do groups intensify our opinions? Group polarization: group-produced enhancement of members preexisting tendencies →strengthening of the members average tendency, not a split within the group The Case of the "Risky Shift" "Risky shift phenomenon": group and individual decisions tend to be riskier after group discussion. ➔ Risky shift is not universal-some dilemmas lead people to be more cautious after discussion. Do Groups Intensify Opinions? - Discussion typically strengthens the average inclination of group members.  - Group polarization occurs in everyday life, where people associate mostly with others whose attitudes are similar to their own o In communities, as people self-segregate. o In politics, where like-minded communities serve as political echo chambers. o On the Internet, where we "selectively expose" ourselves to like-minded media. Groupthink: Do groups hinder or assist good decisions? - In work groups, team spirit can increase motivation. - When making decisions, however, close-knit groups may pay a price. - Decision-making groups can have a tendency to suppress dissent in t - he interest of group harmony. →Groupthink: "the mode of thinking that persons engage in when concurrence-seeking becomes so dominant in a cohesive in-group that it tends to override realistic appraisal of alternative courses of action" (Janis, 1971). Symptoms of Groupthink - Two groupthink symptoms lead group members to overestimate their group's might and right. (1) Illusion of invulnerability. (2) Unquestioned belief in the group's morality - Group members also become closed-minded. (3) Rationalization. (4) Stereotyped view of opponent. - Finally the group suffers from pressures towards uniformity (5) Conformity pressure. (6) Self-censorship. (7) Illusion of unanimity. (8) Mindguards-protecting a leader or group members from information that would call into question the effectiveness or morality of the group's decisions Influence of the minority: How do individuals influence the group? - Determinants of minority include consistency, self-confidence, and defection. →Minority slowness effect: a tendency for people with minority views to express those views less quickly that do people in the majority. - Consistency and persistence convey self-confidence, and a minority that conveys self-confidence tends to raise doubts among the majority. - Lone defector from the majority tends to be even more persuasive than a consistent minority voice. The Influence of Leaders Leadership: the process by which certain group members motivate and guide the group. - Formal and informal group leaders exert disproportionate influence. - Task leadership: organizes work, sets standards, and focuses on goals. - Social leadership: builds teamwork, mediates conflict, and offers support.  - Transformational leadership: enabled by a leader's vision and inspiration, exerts significant influence. CHAPTER 12 HELPING Why do we help? - Altruism: a motive to increase another´s welfare without conscious regard for one´s own self- interest. Social Exchange and Social Norms - Social-exchange theory: the theory that human interactions are transactions that aim to maximize one's rewards and minimize one's costs →Does not contend that we consciously monitor costs and rewards, only that such considerations predict our behavior. - Rewards that motivate helping may be external. - Rewards may also be internal-often focused on increasing positive emotions →Do-good/feel-good effect-helping boosts self-worth - Guilt is a painful emotion that people seek to relieve. o Reduce private guilt and restore a shaken self-image. o Redeem ourselves and reclaim a positive public image. - Emotions like anger and grief tend not to produce compassion. - Happy people are helpful →In a good mood, people are more likely to have positive thoughts and commit themselves to positive actions - Researchers have identified two social norms that motivate altruism: - Reciprocity norm: an expectation that people will help, not hurt, those who have helped them. →Helps define the social capital-the mutual support and cooperation enabled by a social network-that keeps a community healthy. - Social-responsibility norm: an expectation that people will help those needing help. Evolutionary Psychology - Humans exhibit multiple mechanisms for overcoming selfishness. o Kin selection: the idea that evolution has selected altruism toward one's close relatives to enhance the survival of mutually shared genes. o Reciprocity, which works best in small, isolated groups. Comparing and Evaluating Theories of Helping - Each view of altruism proposes two types of prosocial behavior: o Tit-for-tat reciprocal exchange. o More unconditional helpfulness. - Each view is also vulnerable to charges of being speculative and after the fact. - Each, however, offers a broad perspective that illuminates both enduring commitments and spontaneous help. Genuine Altruism and Empathy - Our willingness to help is influenced by both self-serving and selfless considerations - When we feel empathy, we focus not so much on our own distress as on the sufferer. →Empathy: the vicarious experience of another's feelings— putting oneself in another's shoes. - With their empathy aroused, people may help even when they believe no one will know about their helping. When will we help? - Social psychologists curious and concerned about bystanders' inaction have undertaken numerous experiments. Number of Bystanders - As the number of bystanders increases, any given bystander is less likely to: o Notice an incident.  o Interpret the incident as a problem or an emergency. o Assume responsibility for taking action. - Bystander effect: the finding that a person is less likely to provide help when there are other bystanders. Who will help? - We do tend to help with someone else does so →Prosocial models promote altruism. - Time pressures affect whether people help. →When hurried, preoccupied, and rushing, people often do not take time to tune in to a person in need. - Because similarity is conducive to liking, and liking is conducive to helping, we are more empathetic and helpful toward those who are similar to us. Personality Traits and Status - Attitude and trait measures seldom predict a specific act; but they can predict average behaviors. o Individual differences in helpfulness persist over time and are noticed by one's peers. o Network of traits— positive emotionality, empathy, and self-efficacy —predisposes a person to helpfulness. - Status and social class also affect altruism. Gender - When faced with potentially dangerous situations, men more often help. - In safer situations, women are slightly more likely to help. o women respond with greater empathy and spend more time helping o Women tend to be more generous. Religious Faith - Although often associated with opposition to government assistance such as support for the poor, religiosity also promotes prosocial values. How can we increase helping? - One way to promote altruism is to reverse those factors that inhibit it. o Reduce ambiguity, increase responsibility o Awaken people's guilt and concern for their self-image. - Socialize altruism. Reduce Ambiguity, Increase Responsibility - Helping should increase if we can prompt people to correctly interpret an incident and assume responsibility. - Personal appeals are much more effective. o Verbal and nonverbal appeals. o Reducing anonymity. o Anticipation of interaction. Guilt and Concern for Self-Image - People who feel guilty will act to reduce guilt and restore their self-worth. o Guilt-inducing messages on signs. o Asking for contributions so small that people can't say no. - Labeling people as helpful can also strengthen a helpful self-image and influence their willingness to contribute. Socializing Altruism - Morally inclusive people are more likely to help others. o Moral exclusion: the perception of certain individuals or groups as outside the boundary  within which one applies moral values and rules of fairness. o Moral inclusion is regarding others as within one's circle of moral concern o First step in socializing altruism is therefore to counter people's natural ingroup bias. CHAPTER 13 CONFLICT AND PEACEMAKING What Creates Conflict? Conflict = perceived incompatibility of actions or goals - Ingredients of conflict are common to all levels of social conflict, whether ingroup (us vs them) or interpersonal (me vs us) Peace = a condition marked by low levels of hostility and aggression and by mutually beneficial relationships - Outcome of creatively managed conflict - Parties reconcile their perceived differences, reach genuine accord Social Dilemmas - Many problems arise as various parties pursue their self-interests - Often ironically to their collective detriment How can we reconcile individual self-interest with communal well-being? Social Traps = a situation in which the conflicting parties, by each rationally pursuing its self-interest, become caught in mutually destructive behavior ➔ E.g. The Prisoners Dilemma The Tragedy of the Commons = when individuals consume more than their share, with the cost of their doing so dispersed among all, causing the ultimate collapse -> tragedy - the commons (shared resource, including air, water, energy sources) - if all use the resource in moderation, may replenish itself as rapidly as harvested - if not: tragedy of the commons ➔ We deplete our natural resources because immediate personal benefits outweigh the seemingly inconsequential costs ➔ Everybody’s business becomes nobody’s business ➔ When resources are more difficult to quantify, people often consume more than they realize The Fundamental Attribution Error - Both games tempt to explain their own behavior as due to external forces, explain others’ behavior as due to internal forces - Violence explanations vary by whether the act is by or toward one’s side Evolving Motives - Motives often change - Experiments, people reminded of past violent conflicts or more recent ones found more meaning in life and more meaning in violent conflict -> self-perpetuating cycle Resolving Social Dilemmas - Many people approach commons dilemmas with cooperative outlook and expect similar cooperation from others, thus enabling collective betterment Ways to further encourage: - Regulation (rules to safeguard common good, fishing & hunting are regulated) (cost of administering regulations, costs of diminished personal freedom) - Small is beautiful (make the group small -> as group becomes larger, don’t feel as they make  a difference; small groups -> more identified with group’s success; residential stability also strengthens communal identity & procommunity behavior; 150 people natural group size) - Communication (enables cooperation, discussing dilemma forges group identity, enhances concern for welfare; devises group norms and expectations and pressures to follow them -> commit to cooperation, noncooperation feeds further mistrust) - Changing the payoffs (reward cooperation, punish exploitation, cars in city -> give incentives) - Appealing to Altruistic Norms o just knowing consequences of noncooperation has little effect, knowing what is good does not necessarily lead to doing what is good ➔ still, most people do adhere to norms of social responsibility, reciprocity, equity, keeping one’s commitments -> how to tap such feelings ➔ influence of charismatic leader who inspires to cooperate, education, defining situations in ways that invoke cooperative norms ➔ communication can activate altruistic norms -> permitted to communicate -> appeal to social- responsibility norm -> if you defect on rest, live with it for the rest of your life Summary: ➔ establishing rules that regulate self-serving behavior, by keeping groups small, enabling people to communicate, changing payoffs to make cooperation more rewarding, invoking compelling altruistic norms Competition - Hostilities arise when groups compete for scarce jobs, housing, resources - When interests clash, conflicts erupt - Even perceived distant threats -> increase people’s intolerance - Perceived threats feed prejudice & conflict, prejudice also amplifies perception of a threat - Competition’s effect: Robbers Cave - Group identity established, competitive activities, open warfare (intense conflict, negative images of outgroup, strong ingroup cohesiveness and pride), group polarization exacerbated the conflict ➔ In competition-fostering situations, groups behave more competitively than individuals ➔ All this occurred without cultural, physical, economic differences ➔ Evil behavior was triggered by evil situation ➔ Also believed in reconciling power of cooperation Perceived Injustice - Conflicts bred by perceived injustice - Answer depends on cultural perspective - Collectivist cultures: justice is defined as equality or need fulfillment -> everyone getting same share or getting share they need - Individualist cultures: more likely to follow principle of equity: distribution of rewards in proportion to individuals’ contributions - Golden rule: whoever has the gold makes the rule Misperception - Small core of truly incompatible goals - Bigger problem: misperception of other’s motives & goals Seeds of misperception: - Self-serving bias (leads to accept credit for good deeds, no responsibilities for bad deeds) - Tendency to self-justify (deny wrong of evil acts, didn’t hit him) - Fundamental attribution error (each side sees hostility as evil disposition) - Preconceptions (groups filter information, interpret to preconception) - Polarize (self-serving, self-justifying, biasing tendencies) - Groupthink (tendency to perceive group as strong/moral, other group opposite)  - Ingroup bias (just being in group triggers it) - Negative stereotypes (of outgroup are resistant to contradictory evidence) A group in intractable conflict - Sees own goals as supremely important - Takes pride in “us”, devalues “them” - Believes itself victimized - Elevates patriotism, solidarity and loyalty to group’s needs - Celebrates self-sacrifice - Suppress criticism ➔ Enemy images are predictable, types of misperception too Mirror-Image Perceptions = reciprocal views of each other often held by parties in conflict - e.g.: each may view itself as moral & peace-loving, other as evil and aggressive - Misperceptions of those in conflict are mutual - When 2 sides have clashing perceptions, at least one is misperceiving the other - Myside bias -> ban accident-prone German car in U.S. rather than American one, even torture seems more justified when “we” rather than “they” do it - Political polarization -> see love and benevolence on their side, hatred on other, far left and far right use more angry and negative language than political moderates ➔ Such conflicts engage “two-category world” -> US & THEM ➔ Opposing sides in conflict tend to exaggerate their differences (abortion) ➔ Opposing sides tend to have “bias blind spot” -> own understandings at not biased by (dis)liking, those who disagree -> biased and unfair ➔ Reason why people protesting for social change feel justified in using extreme actions (violent actions have opposite effect -> reducing popular support) ➔ Group conflict fueled by illusion -> evil leader-good people -> leader is evil, people on their side Simplistic Thinking - When tension rises, rational thinking becomes more difficult - Views of enemy more simplistic, stereotyped, seat-of-the-pants judgments - Even mere expectation of conflict can lead to freeze thinking, impede creative problem solving (inflexible thinking) - Simplistic we are good/they are bad thinking immediately prior to aggressive action Shifting Perceptions - Misperceptions accompany conflict -> appear and disappear as conflicts arise/go - Images of enemies can change easily (same process that create image, can reverse image) - When experiencing conflict, both sides have misperceptions until something enables both to give up misperception, work at reconciling actual differences ➔ Share & compare perceptions (others don’t fail to share values, perceive situation differently) How Can Peace Be Achieved? 4 C’s 4 peace-making strategies: contact, cooperation, communication, conciliation Contact Does Contact Predict Attitudes? - Generally, contact between those of different groups predicts tolerance - 94% of studies: increased contact decreased prejudice - Especially true: for majority group attitudes toward minorities & individualistic cultures Does Desegregation Improve Racial Attitudes? When it doesn’t: - Race influences contact ➔ Desegregated neighborhoods, cafeterias, restaurants may likewise fail to produce integrated interactions ➔ Even within same race, people tend to self-segregate based on other factors ➔ Anxiety around interracial interaction may explain why desegregation doesn’t always lead to better attitudes ➔ Effort to facilitate contact sometimes helps, sometimes doesn’t ➔ Lack of mixing stems partly from pluralistic ignorance (say want more contact but other doesn’t) When it does: - Contact reduces prejudice, increase support for racial equality by: o Reducing anxiety (more contact, greater comfort) o Increasing empathy o Humanizing others (discover similarities) o Decreasing perceived threats (eliminating overblown fears, increasing trust) ➔ People who have contact with other races become more flexible and creative in thinking - Group Salience (visibility) also bridges divides, BUT if you see friend solely as individual, positive feelings may not extend to other members (if friend is black but don’t think of him as black, friendship doesn’t have much impact on attitudes towards Blacks in general) ➔ Especially likely to befriend dissimilar people when outgroup identity is initially minimized ➔ Make friends regardless of race, but don’t deny existence of race ➔ Friendship is a key to successful contact Equal-status Contact = contact on an equal basis, should be equal in status - Negative contact increases disliking (not all contact improves) -> have greater effect - Relationships of unequal status breed attitude consistent with their relationship, so do relationships of equal status - To reduce prejudice -> interracial contact should be equal status Cooperation - Make them depend on each other -> fighting a common enemy, shared threats, thriving towards common goal Common External Threats Build Cohesiveness - Survivors of shared pean report spirit of cooperation and solidarity - Differences often don’t seem that large anymore - Common enemy: just being reminded of outgroup heightens responsiveness to own group ➔ To perceive discrimination against racial/religious group -> feel more bonded & identified ➔ Imagining or fearing extinction serves to strengthen ingroup solidarity ➔ Shared threats produce rally round the flag effect -> support for leaders spike dramatically Superordinate Goals Foster Cooperation Superordinate Goals = a shared goal that necessitates cooperative effort  - Goal overrides differences from another - Working cooperatively, especially favorable effects under condition -> lead people to define a new, inclusive group that dissolves former subgroups ➔ Groups become interconnected and interdependent -> develop overarching social identity ➔ Conflict may worsen if groups fail in cooperative effort Cooperative Learning Improves Racial Attitudes ➔ Working together as equals reduce prejudice ➔ Work and play unites -> more positive racial attitude - More positive peer relationships among adults (working cooperatively) ➔ Cooperative, equal status contacts exert positive influence Group and Superordinate Identities - Being mindful of multiple social identities enables social cohesion - Ethnically diverse cultures -> how balance ethnic identities with national identities? - Bicultural or omnicultural identity (identifies with larger culture, ethnic and religious) - Identification with new culture often grows (children of immigrants don’t feel culture as strongly, but grandchildren feel more comfortable identifying with ethnicity) - Positive ethnic/culture identity contributes to positive self-esteem (neither -> low self-esteem) ➔ Bicultural people have strongly positive self-concept -> alternate between 2 cultures, adapt language and behavior (code-switching) - Debate over ideals of multiculturalism (diversity) vs colorblind assimilation (meshing values w prevailing culture) - In threatening situations, highlighting multicultural differences can enhance hostilities (fixed diff.) ➔ Diversity within unity: adhere basic values/framework of society, free to maintain subcultures Communication Role of communication: 3 primary strategies - Bargaining = seeking an agreement to a conflict through direct negotiation between parties - Mediation = attempt by neutral third to resolve conflict by facilitating comm., offer suggestions - Arbitration = resolution by neutral 3rd party who studies both sides, imposes settlement Bargaining - Those who demand will get ➔ Being tough bargainer may lower others’ expectations, making side willing to settle for less - It can backfire: time delay often lose-lose (labor strike) - Others respond with equally tough stance, both locked in positions Mediation Turning Win-Lose into Win-Win - Rethink conflict, gain information about others’ interests (think successful if other loses) - Prodding both sides to set aside conflicting demands, think about each other’s underlying needs, interests and goals - Integrative agreement = w-w agreements that reconcile both parties’ interests to mutual benefit - Compared to compromises, IA mutually rewarding Unraveling Misperceptions with Controlled Communications ➔ Helps reduce self-fulfilling misperceptions (snowballing effect) - Outcome of conflicts is HOW communicated ➔ Key factor is trust - Even simple behaviors can enhance trust (mimics) (meeting people face2face) - Mediation comes into play when two parties mistrust & communicate unproductively - Mediator trusted by both -> each party identify and rank goals Arbitration - If underlying interests very divergent, mutually satisfactory resolution unattainable - Having 3rd party impose settlement ➔ If people know, face arbitrated settlement if mediation failed, tried harder to resolve issue, less  hostility, more likely to reach agreement ➔ When differences seem irreconcilable, arbitration causes freezing of positions (optimistic overconfidence) hoping to gain advantage when compromise is chosen (final-offer arbitration, motivates to make reasonable proposal, third party chooses one of two final offers) ➔ Final offer not as reasonable as it would be if both mediated Conciliation - When communication and resolution become impossible - Being unconditionally cooperative often doesn’t help (being exploited) - One-sided pacifism is out of the question Grit - GRIT = graduated & reciprocated initiatives in tension reduction - Strategy designed to de-escalate international tensions - Aims to reverse the “conflict spiral” by triggering reciprocal de-escalation - Draws on social-psychological concepts: norm reciprocity & attribution of motives - Announcing a conciliatory intent - Requires one side to initiate a few small de-escalatory actions 1. Initiator: states desire to reduce tension, declares each conciliatory act before making it, invites adversary to reciprocate ➔ Announcements create framework that helps the adversary correctly interpret what otherwise might be seen as weak/tricky actions - Also public pressure on advisory to follow reciprocity norm 2. Initiator establishes credibility and genuineness by carrying