Lessons Social Psychology PDF

LESSON I **SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY** *"scientific study of how people think about, influence and relate to one another"* **WHITE DISCIPLINE**: theories didn't come with a systematic way, with bits and pieces from different philosophers and intellectuals You can construct your reality with others, with...

LESSON I **SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY** *"scientific study of how people think about, influence and relate to one another"* **WHITE DISCIPLINE**: theories didn't come with a systematic way, with bits and pieces from different philosophers and intellectuals You can construct your reality with others, with negotiation you build a common society, your linked to this shared society. The way other behave influences how you behave and your identity HISTORY OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY First social experiments were reported in 1898, but the interest in the field has been around for much longer, especially by philosophers, making assumptions and hypotheses. In later years they tried to see through experiments if it was true 18^th^ century: period were huge contributions were made in the field, thanks to experts from Europe and north America It's a discipline in which debate is still very much alight, regarding applications and efficiency of treatment. We can only see behaviours and processes, but it's hard to enter the process of the mind DAVID HUME **(1711-1776)** Philosopher, he wrote the "*Treatise On Human Nature*." Part of the enlightenment movement, century where nationalism started being developed, the idea of revolution and independence being prevalent all throughout the world He starts looking through the human nature, highlighting that humans are pushed by strong emotions and the relation between the self and others. He believed that **sympathy** contributed to **social conformity** (tendency to conform to the behaviour of others) and is the basis of our attachment to society. The attachment is translated in social identity. He tried to understand that there are **national traits** that characterised the people of other countries: if you stay with people in a same context you will acquire their national traits (culture). ADAM SMITH **(1723-1790)** Economist, in his book *"The Theory Of Moral Sentiments"* he considered the formation of the "self," your identity is largely shaped by your interaction with others. If you live in a context you will be influenced by it if you stay long enough. The self is not an essence that has to be developed, it's always shaped by your interactions. NOW: we know that we have a biological personality that has to adapt to the social context it comes into **IMMANUEL KANT** **(1724-1804)** Rejects the idea that the mind only reflects reality, because if you reflect an external reality it has to exist. The mind is constructing this reality, it builds it. but you interpret reality through your experience so it will never be an objective view of the world. Everyone will have their world built from their own experiences *(foundations for Gestalt psychology, where the belief that the mind constructs reality is the main focus)* Culture (social representations): As a social group we agree on a common reality, even if personally we have different realities, finding a common ground. With this done in a country it creates a common culture that can be continued. GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY Deals with how your perception shapes your world It's a **holistic theory** of mind and brain that focuses on how these actively structure our perceptions and impressions. It emphasises that one needs to look at the comprehensive situation to fully understand the human conscious experience, asserting that: the whole is more than the sum of its parts KURT LEWIN **(1890-1947)** Took the Gestaltic approach, thought that analysing small behaviours is just a little part, you have to search the context, actual research starts when you look at a broader field, seeing how they behave in their context (1930s). To understand a phenomenon you have to go in the field, you can't just look at only some of the elements. A group is not the sum of the people in it, but a completely different entity, with its own rules (gestalt applied) Lewin's "action research" tried to understand and tackle prejudice and foster positive intergroup relations. JOHANN FRIEDRICH HERBART **(1776-1841)** He stressed the link between individual and society , saying that *"human being is nothing outside society".* It identifies **society as a group** with its **own rules** that detaches itself from the individuality of the person. Herbart inspired German scholars who first formulated **VOLKERPSYCHOLOGIE**. He is also said to be the actual founder of social psychology. WILHELM WUNDT (1832-1920) He's considered the father of experimental psychology. VOLKERPSYCHOLOGIE Sometimes called mass psychology, folk psychology or "psychology of the people". It claims that people who belong to the **same social groups** tend to **think in the same way**, holding collective beliefs, norms and values. *"those mental products which are created by a community of human life and are, therefore inexplicable in terms merely of individual consciousness since they presuppose the reciprocal action of many"* There are items that can't be explained only through individual psychology, but contextually, like culture, which has to exist in a context. you can't study things on an individual level, we share our personal representation to get a whole. At the same time he didn't dismiss individual mental function as irrelevant, advocating the use of laboratories to investigate perception, mental disorders and abnormal behaviour. EMILE DURKHEIM **(1858-1917)** Laid the basis of *Social Representation Theory (Moscovici)*, calling it **Collective Representation**. He highlighted the difference between individual and collective thought. **COLLECTIVE THOUGHT**: social ideas and values that exist independently from individuals, they cannot change. For him collective thought is static, while having a great influence on individuals **MOSCOVICI THEORY**: social representation changes fast with the times, it's a constant co construction during the time CROWDS 19^th^-20^th^ century: period of crowds, riots, it becomes an important aspect of study, how does it influence individuals. There is shared social identity due to the sense of belonging, we retrieve self-esteem through the success of others, the group's success becomes your own. You lose your morals and identity in the group, because you think that the responsibility is shared and that its ok to go with the flow In a crowd everything becomes contagious, everyone is more **suggestible** by the stimuli of the group. A crowd is easy to manipulate GUSTAVE LE BON **(1841-1931)** In *"Psychologie des Foules" (1895)*, he believed that when individuals become immersed in a crowd they lose their conscious rationality and more primitive instincts take over. As the "unconscious" takes over, crowds behave aggressively. He studied crowds, in a period of huge riots *(unification of Italy, France, etc)*, so they had a central role **CHARACTERISTICS**: 1. Contagiousness 2. Loss of responsibility (crowd members stop believing in their responsibilities as a part of the crowd, feeling like they become "invisible") 3. High suggestibility AUGUSTE COMPTE **(1798-1857)** **POSITIVISM** Social phenomena should stop being analysed by deductive, philosophical backgrounds, and if you study it from a sociological perspective you are able to have a wider view. For him social sciences can be studied alike scientific methods, since there are general existing laws in science, so he wanted to reveal the truths of sociology through **positivism** (factum positum). *(everything can be known through science, mysteries do not exist, just ignorance in a field. True knowledge can be achieved only through sense perception and empirical investigation)* "the aim for researchers is to research through positivistic methods" NORMAN TRIPLETT **(1898)** He's accredited to have conducted the **first social psychological experiment**, where he observed that people's behaviour is often facilitated by the presence of others *(people perform better when they are competing than when they are competing against themselves).* This experiment was a stepping stone, bringing social psychology closer to the status of a science. WILLIAM JAMES **(1842-1910)** ***"PRINCIPLES OF PSYCHOLOGY"*** he deals with the idea of **social self**, how people behave differently in social contexts. With this we go back to individualism, the idea of a person in your mind is always different from one person to the other. You exist in the mind of the people around you, they will have a view that is based on their experience around you. *"a man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him and carry an image of him in their mind"* There is no co-constructed social representation of an individual (common idea), for James there will be infinite social selves based on the people you interact with. 1908, A CRUCIAL YEAR To crucial social psychology books were published 1. **INTRODUCTION TO SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY** **(McDougall):** it's the basis of EVOLUTIONARY PSYCHOLOGY. it was heavily influenced by the evolutionary theory. Instinctive dispositions were part of our evolutionary heritage and these instincts made human social life possible. 2. **SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY (Ross): he focused on the relationship between individuals and their group discussing topics like social influence, crowds and control.** **Social psychology became well established as an empirical and experimental science in the USA. But the s**ocial psychology in the USA reflected the history and ideological values of individualism which characterized it - **FLOYD ALLPORT** (1924): *"there is no psychology of groups which is not essentially and entirely a psychology of individuals".* Social psychology comes back to being an **individualistic study**, even if we live in a social context, society is composed of individuals, and that individuality returns as the centre. CRISIS IN SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY Because of the increasing emphasis on individual psychology, in the late 1960s and early 70's questions about the direction of the discipline and how it reflected and acknowledged the cultural values of the people it south to study **CRITICISMS**: - **Overreliance on experimental methods** at the expense of more naturalistic approaches such as observation and interviews - **Excessive focus of individuals**, instead of considering the social/political/cultural context After trying to bring back the context in social psychology, psychologists arrived to the conclusion that to understand human beings, we need different **LEVELS OF EXPLANATION** human behaviour can be understood and interpreted at different levels - Personal - Interpersonal - Group - ideological Two European sociologists put back the social aspect in social psychology, while in America they stayed behind *(how is social psychology now compared to Europe. For America the social psychology happens in the individual and not in the context, while in Europe they put the context back)* 1. HENRI TAJFEL SOCIAL IDENTITY THEORY: Experiments used to investigate how identity and behaviour are influenced by the social groups one belongs 2. SERGE MOSCOVICI Examined the role of everyday **language** in constructing and communicating human beings collective ways of understanding the social world, as embodied in **social representation theory** CRITICAL SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY A movement that promotes a social psychology that recognizes its own political/cultural/political historical situation, how its analysis is due to the social context, pursuing social change and reform. **SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONISM**: an approach to how our understanding of reality is formed and structured, which argues that all cognitive functions originate in social interaction, and must therefore be explained as products of social interactions. **DISCURSIVE PSYCHOLOGY**: language is a "social action", speakers construct the social world, trying to understand what happens in interactions. It examines how cognitive entities and psychological phenomena are constructed in discourse **PHENOMENOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY**: its influenced by phenomenological philosophy and argues that subjective conscious experience and a sense of being in the world, being aware of what is going on, awareness of being in the context are fundamental in understanding human social behaviour. We are fully immersed in the world, rather than being somehow separated from the external world SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY AND HUMAN VALUES We're in a very euro-centric world, we are aware that we belong to a context, but we have to step back and understand if what we think is only influenced by our context Social psychologists values penetrate their work in ways obvious and subtle. As we are humans, our values seep into our studies. This was a main reason of conflict between Kuhn and Taylor, with Kuhn who believed that since all science involves human scientists, then none of it can be objective, as it relies on the degree of human interpretation. Science isn't purely objective, it's interpreted using our mental categories. If scholars come from the same culture, assumptions may go unchallenged, since they form our **SOCIAL REPRESENTATION** (shared beliefs) - **OBVIOUS**: choice of research topics, object of social psychological analysis *(how values form)* - **SUBTLE**: subjective aspects of science, psychological concepts contain hidden personal values *"science doesn't simply describe and explain nature, it is part of the interplay between nature and ourselves; it describes nature as **exposed to our method of questioning**" - Heisenberg* SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY'S KEY IDEAS SOCIAL THINKING 1. We construct our social reality *(based on our context, culture, interests, values)* 2. Our social intuitions are powerful, sometimes perilous *(they can be erroneous at times)* 3. Attitudes shape, and are shaped by behaviour SOCIAL INFLUENCES 1. There are social influences on behaviour *(behaviourism: psychology should study only observable behaviour, since thoughts and motives are unavailable for research)* 2. Dispositions shape behaviour 3. Behaviour is influenced by our social group memberships SOCIAL RELATIONS 1. Social behaviour is also biological behaviour 2. Feelings and actions towards people are sometimes negative and sometimes positive 3. Behaviour is shaped by our intragroup and intergroup relations RECAP LESSON II RESEARCH METHODS "I knew it all along" *Social psychology isn't simply common sense. The point is that common sense is usually correct, after the fact has happened. Its often obfuscated by hindsight. This can lead to arrogance, and overestimation of our intellectual powers.* *We easily deceive ourselves into thinking that we know more than we actually do and did. This is why we need science to help us sift reality from illusion and genuine predictions from easy hindsight* ***HINDSIGHT BIAS**: the tendency to exaggerate, after learning an outcome, one's ability to have foreseen it* APPROACHES TO DOING RESEARCH **[QUANTITATIVE]** an approach to science based on studying the relationship between **variables**. We have a theoretical background in our mind, building up a hypothesis. These variables will be expressed numerically and statistics will give the answer about the relationship between the variables. The analyses will have to be statistically significant. *Quantitative research can consider any characteristic (demographics, feelings, cognitions, behaviours etc)* - Pursue systematic measurements of phenomena - Controlled lab settings - Make predictions about the outcome of the research - Aim at establishing general laws and principles about types of phenomena MAIN STAGES OF QUANTITATIVE RESEARCH *Even if a theory is proven correct thanks to empirical data, the theory will increase in credibility, but that doesn't mean that it will stay that way forever. The theory will keep being plausible until proven wrong (falsification theory) **CONJECTURES AND REFUTATIONS** (Popper, 1963)* 1. **Research question** what question will be addressed in the research 2. **Theory** set of interrelated assumptions and propositions used to define and explain a specific phenomenon 3. **Hypothesis** a testable proposition 4. **Method** specific research procedure used to test the hypothesis. Maily used are the correlational and experimental approaches There are different methods used to perform research: ***CORRELATIONAL RESEARCH*** study of the naturally occurring relationships among variable. Considerations for **questionnaire design** (nature of sample, order of questions, response options, wording of questions, validity and reliability of measures) - *ASSOCIATION* (relationship) AND *CAUSATION*: we can have variables that have a relationship with one another (Association), but finding the cause isn't obvious. It doesn't necessarily tell us whether changing one variable will cause changes in another A great strength in correlational research is that it tends to occur in real-world settings **CONFOUNDING VARIABLES**: uncontrollable variable that interact with the independent variable during research **EXPERIMENT: STUDIES OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON WELL-BEING** *TRUMHOLT wanted to see whether unhappiness and Facebook had a correlation. For the experiment of a duration of 7 days, he created 2 groups:* 1. ***EXPERIMENTAL CONDITION**: group not allowed to go on Facebook* 2. ***CONTROL CONDITION**: group allowed to go on Facebook* *The participants were asked to compile a happiness questionnaire before and after the experiment* ***CONCLUSIONS:** the experimental group showed higher levels of happiness correlational studies indicate causal relationships.* ***EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCH***: studies that seek to understand cause-effect relationships by manipulating one or more factors (independent variables) while controlling others (holding them constant). Every social psychological experiment has two essential ingredients: control and random assignment 1. **[CONTROL]**: By manipulating the value of just one variable at a time (**independent variable**), the experimenter pinpoints their influence on another variable (**dependent variable**)manipulating variables. 2. **[RANDOM ASSIGNMENT]**: the process of assigning participants to the conditions of an experiment such that all people have the same chance of being in a given condition **QUASI-EXPERIMENTS:** sometimes research cannot be conducted in laboratory, so to still follow the principles of experimental research, two basic types of research are used: 1. [NATURAL EXPERIMENTS]: the researcher doesn't directly manipulate the independent variable. It has high ecological validity, but many confounding variables 2. [FIELD EXPERIMENTS]: there is some manipulation of independent variables from researchers, but it still maintains high ecological validity, still having uncontrollable confounding variables In research there must be a reminder to not always generalize an experiment to all life. For Social psychology experiments its hard to have reliable replication. Researchers here have a neutral role **[QUALITATIVE]** based on interpretation of **qualitative** data, not statistical analysis of numerical data explore a topic out of interpretative research. You take qualitative data *(what people said, what they feel)* and try to put it in a theory - Focus on the interpretation of phenomena as emerged in naturalistic, unconstrained situations - Are open to new and surprising findings - Aim at providing description and understanding a phenomena - Researcher recognize the influence of their presence in the experiment **reflexivity** **COLLECTING DATA**: interviews *(structured/unstructured etc)*, focus groups, observation *(as participant or researcher)*, naturally occurring conversation, text, internet *(support groups, dating sites etc.)* STYLES OF INTERVIEWING  DATA ANALYSIS **GROUNDED THEORY** (Glaser and Strauss, 1967) In their model, data collection comes first. From the data collected, concepts are developed and from these concepts categories are formed and using the **method of constant comparison** become the basis for the creation of the theory which seeks to account for every single piece of data (no generalization) **DISCOURSE ANALYSIS** (Potter and Wetherell, 1987) They are convinced that language is the mean by which social life is constructed, since through language we create the world around us. They studied the language used in interviews, using as an analytical tool the *interpretative repertoire*, that refers to the linguistic resources of people. **CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS** (Foucault and the role of power in shaping language) **INTERPRETIVE PHENOMENOLOGICAL ANALYSIS** (Jonathan Smith) Based on philosophy of phenomenology, which studies the relationship between the mind and the outside world (lifeworld). In their research they try to obtain as much description and knowledge of the participants lifeworld, engaging with the meaning conveyed by the participants in their experiences **RESEARCH ETHICS**: informed consent, use deception only if essential and justified, protect participants, confidentiality, debriefs, ethics in online research LESSON III ATTITUDES DEFINITION A favourable or unfavourable evaluative reaction toward something or someone (often rooted in one's beliefs, and exhibited in one's feelings and intended behaviour) -- Eagly & Chaiken COMPONENTS OF ATTITUDES ***THE ABC OF ATTITUDES***: affect (feelings), behaviour tendency (verbal and non verbal) and cognition (thoughts, our knowledge and beliefs) **CRITIQUES**: 1. **STABILITY**: it assumes that attitudes are enduring across space and time. Others believe that attitudes are constructed in the moment and are tailored for a specific context 2. **RELATION TO BEHAVIOUR**: it assumes that attitudes are linked to behaviour **LaPiere**, in 1964 demonstrated that attitudes do not necessarily predict behaviour (Chinese guest hotel in USA) **Festinger's theory of cognitive dissonance (1957)**: he affirms that changing people's attitudes hardly affects their behaviour, since we are good at finding reasons for what we do, but no good at doing what we find reasons for. people are motivated to keep their attitudes, beliefs and behaviour consistent They provide an efficient and fast guidance on how to respond quickly to something. FORMATION OF ATTITUDES BEHAVIOURISM 1. **CLASSICAL CONDITIONING**: a learned response which results from the repeated pairing of a neutral stimulus with a conditioned stimulus 2. **INSTRUMENTAL LEARNING** (operant conditioning): when attitude/behaviour is modified on the basis of consequences (rewards or punishment) SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY 1. **MODELLING** (bandura, 1973): the acquisition of behaviour on the basis of observing that of others, based on models. You learn attitudes by observing others 2. **SOCIAL COMPARISON**: base our attitudes on those of people that we consider similar to ourselves, the people we look up to (shared identity) when we don't know what our attitude should be 3. **SELF-PERCEPTION** (Bem's theory): you look at your own behaviour to try to deduce what your attitudes are (prejudice=attitude, implicitly there can be prejudice) COGNITIVE THEORIES As we acquire experience of objects in the social world we develop attitudes about them. We don't like pain, so we will try to avoid in any way possible, even if it's not dealt with well (ex. Self-harm, binge eating) 1. **BALANCE THEORY** (Heider): people ill avoid having contradicting attitudes and evaluations of one object. If attitudes don't match, you will try to find justification. This contradiction creates discomfort and uncertainty in the individual, which they try to avoid. We tend to assume people see the world in the same way we do GENETIC INFLUENCES Bouchard and McGue found that genetics paly a heavier role in influencing attitudes FUNCTIONS Attitudes provide us with information about how to respond to an attitude-object. They filter our unnecessary features of our environment. They aid our memory, free up space and help us making decisions Katz enunciated the four main functions: 1. **KNOWLEDGE**: provide a sense of structure and order, helping us to understand and explain the world. 2. **INSTRUMENTAL**: allow us to maximise our chances of receiving rewards and minimizing the likelihood of negative outcomes (help understand what is good or bad for us) 3. **EGO DEFENSIVE**: holding attitudes that protect our self-esteem or that justify actions that make us feel guilty) 4. **VALUE EXPRESSION**: attitudes form our identity, they allow us to express and reinforce our senso of self, we display the attitudes we consider important. Attitudes allow us to express and reinforce our senso of self and identity We display those attitudes we consider important We tend to change our attitudes when they no longer serve our psychological needs (it isn't our perception of the object that changes, but our psychological requirements) MEASURING ATTITUDES  - **THURSTONE SCALE**: A questionnaire about a particular issue, participants have to rate their feelings towards each of the items - **LIKERT SCALE**: It rates a series of statements using five response categories. It deals with self-report of knowledge, with all the problems of self-perception it entails - **OSGOOD'S SEMANTIC DIFFERENCIAL SCALE**: Participants have to rate their feelings on a topic on a bipolar scale of opposing adjectives. Osgood affirms that attitudes contain emotional meaning - **SOCIAL DISTANCE SCALE (Bogardus):** Measures people's willingness to have close social contact with people from diverse social groups - **IMPLICIT ASSOCIATION TESTS**: Created by Greenwald. It measures attitudes we hold unconsciously based on automatic association between concepts/objects It addresses social desirability around sensitive issues - **STROOP TEST**: test that measures how long it takes a participant to state the colour a word is presented in, where the word is either congruent with the colour, or incongruent. *For example, the word pink presented in a pink colour should elicit a quick response (pink). However the word pink presented in the colour blue will elicit a slower response* ISSUES OF ATTITUDE SCALES 1. Restricting people's responses 2. Social desirability 3. Unawareness of their own attitudes self-report is unlikely and we have implicit attitudes CRITIQUES TO IAT 1. Construct validity: does IAT measure attitudes or only reaction time 2. Doesn't work well with all attitudes (not well with self) 3. Predictive validity: IAT results are poor predictors of future behaviour BEHAVIOUR Social psychologists tried to understand to what extent does **attitude** (ideals) **predict behaviour** (factual actions). **WICKER**: found that attitudes hardly predict behaviour **MORAL HYPOCRISY**: appearing moral while talking but avoiding the costs of being so. When greed and easy fulfilment clash with morality, greed wins **ATTITUDES PREDICT BEHAVIOUR:** - Attitude becomes apparent when we look at a person's average behaviour rather than isolated facts, following the *principle of aggregation.* - When **external influences** (or other variables) on what we say or do are minimal (ex. Nobody is observing us or there are no environmental constraints) - When attitudes **specific** to the behaviour are examined (attitudes towards health fitness -- theory of planned behaviour). The more specific the attitude considered, the more precise and strong the behaviour will be (in questionnaires you can't predict behaviour, but the intention to behave in a certain way) - When attitudes are **strong:** novel situations or somebody makes us aware of them or we strongly believe in something, since behaviour is **automatic**, which helps us in having more mental space, by making some processes automatic. So our attitudes become more potent if we think about them. - Self-aware people have a tendency of being in touch with their attitudes THEORY OF REASONED ACTION Created by Ajzen and FishbeinIt affirms that a person's intended behaviour depends on their attitude about that behaviour and subjective norms. Seeing weak spot it got revisited and became TPB (t. planned behaviour) It wants to predict behavioural intention, by analysing 4 things: 1. Their expectations of significant others **(subjective norms***)* 2. Their **attitude** 3. Their **behavioural intention** 4. Actual **behaviour** THEORY OF PLANNED BEHAVIOUR Very similar to TRA but with the addition of perceived control (can become illusion of control in certain situations) *AVAILABILITY HEURISTIC: people judge the likelihood of things based on their availability in memory. If something comes readily to mind, we presume its commonplace* CRITIQUES TO THE TPB It could explain only 19% of health behaviour. Its intention predicts well behaviour, but only on a short term It introduced great utility in suggesting that behaviour was not, as suggested in previous theories, a mere reflection of attitudes. (changing attitudes doesn't change behaviour, there are other aspects to consider) BEHAVIOUR AFFECTS ATTITUDES While its certain that attitudes define behaviours, behaviour determines attitudes *(we may come to believe what we stand up for)*. This can happen in different scenarios or cases: **ROLE PLAYING**: when we are assigned a role, at first we behave following the expectations of the position. At first it may feel fake ***(imposter syndrome)*** but with time we adjust to the new role and it becomes part of our attitudes - **ROLE:** a set of norms that defines how people in a given social position ought to behave - **IMPOSTER SYNDROME:** fear of being exposed as a fraud based on perceived self-incompetency **SAYING IS BELIEVING**: people tend to adjust the messages they say to their listeners and tend to believe the altered message instead of the reality **EVIL AND MORAL ACTS**: the attitude follow behaviour works also for moral and immoral acts. - **IMMORAL ACTS**: evil may be the result of gradually escalating commitments, since they lower progressively our moral sensitivity *(Stanford prison experiment, Zimbardo)*. - Hurt who we dislike - **Dislike who we hurt (victim blaming)**: finding reasons to dislike someone we are hurting to help lift the guilt off the shoulders of the perpetrator. - **MORAL ACTS:** our character is reflected in what we do when we think no one is doing, this way we see our innate ideals and morality. Also positive behaviour fosters liking for the thing/person/event. HOW BEHAVIOUR AFFECTS ATTITUDES There are theories that explain how behaviour affects attitudes. Two of these *(cognitive dissonance and self-presentation)* deal with the innate western conflict of trying to appear **consistent**, expressing attitudes that match our actions COGNITIVE DISSONANCE THEORY Thought of by Festinger, this theory states that our attitudes change to maintain consistency among our cognitions. Cognitive dissonance describes the tension *"dissonance"* that arises once we are aware of two inconsistent cognitions *"beliefs"*, like acting contrary to our attitudes with little justification To reduce this unpleasant arousal, we often adjust our thinking and attitudes *(rationalising, minimising, avoiding to think about it)* This theory explains self-persuasion, offering several predictions: - **INSUFFICIENT JUSTIFICATION** when we don't find enough external justification for our actions, we tend to adjust our attitude *(belief)* by internally justifying accordingly, to lessen the felt dissonance **The study also found that attitudes follow behaviour for which we feel responsibility, so people are unlikely to internalize forced behaviour.** - **EDUCATION AND AUTHORITARIAN LEADERSHIP** **big rewards and punishments do not contribute to internalised behaviours. Also authoritarian management will be effective, only when the authority is present. For an individual to internalise a behaviour there needs to be self-conviction, so a non-coercive type of communication is advised, especially for children, to create motivation in the child to behave in a certain way** - DISSONANCE AFTER DECISIONS **after a decision there always is dissonance and to reduce it we usually upgrade the chosen alterative and downgrade the other one** **If we feel like it's forced choice that goes against our way of acting, we will be less prone to change our behaviour** **If we feel like we're left with the freedom of choice we tend to change our behaviour since its based on our volition** - GROUP IDENTITY AND DISSONANCE **if a group adopts behaviours that differ from ours, there are two solutions** - **DISTANCE oneself from the group** - **Try to CHANGE the group norms *(might be because they identified the most with the group, having a more profound bond, so renouncing the group would be renouncing part of their identity)*** SELF-PRESENTATION THEORY **IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT**: for strategic reasons we express attitudes that make us appear consistent, since no one wants to look **inconsistent**, so we express attitudes that match our actions. - To appear consistent we may pretend those attitudes but no real attitude change occurs - So we only *seem* to change our attitudes **OUR EXPRESSIONS INFLUENCE OUR ATTITUDES:** - **Facial** **expressions** - **Gait** *(strong gait: happy, shuffling steps: sad)* - **Expressions of others**: we often engage in **mimicry** to connect with someone SELF-PERCEPTION THEORY based on Bem's theory, that when our attitudes are weak or ambiguous, we are in the position of someone observing us from the outside. We observe our behaviour and make reasonable inferences about our attitudes, much as we observe other people and infer their attitudes. This is especially so when we can't easily attribute the behaviour to external constraints. The acts we freely commit are self-revealing of our attitudes - **OVERJUSTIFICATION EFFECT**: the take of self-perception theory on insufficient justification. It's the result of bribing people to do what they already like doing: this way they may see their actions as externally controlled rather than intrinsically appealing. - When people do something they enjoy **without a reward** they attribute their behaviour to their love for the activity - **External rewards** undermine intrinsic motivation *(love for the activity)*, leading people to attribute their behaviour to the incentive. COMPARING THE THEORIES Cognitive and self-perception theory can be conflicting on occasions. But in the end the feeling of dissonance boils down to **social consistency**. We wish to appear consistent in front of other people to maintain our own perception of self-worth and personal competence. We can surely affirm that inconsistency is arousing due to the **SELF-AFFIRMING THEORY**: it says that people often experience a self-image threat after engaging in an undesirable behaviour, so they wish to compensate for it by affirming another aspect of their self. - So this means that justifying our actions has a function of self-affirmation, protecting our sense of integrity After having ascertained that dissonance causes tension, social psychologists wanted to understand if arousal is necessary for the attitudes-follow behaviour effect - **ATTITUDE ADJUSTMENT YES**: following the cognitive dissonance theory, **Steele**, after having conducted an experiment on proposing or not treatment to drug users, those who weren't offered immediate treatment after the experiment, they wished to pursue it independently. this happened because they were put in a condition of **high dissonance** and so to reduce it they shifted not only their **behaviour** but also their **attitudes** - **ATTITUDE FORMATION NO:** following the theory of self-perception, in situations where our attitudes aren't well formed, we don't feel dissonance, so as we act and reflect we develop attitudes to guide future behaviour ATTITUDES AS SOCIAL ACTIONS **POTTER AND WHETERELL** question some of the claims and assumptions made by social psychologists: - ***ATTITUDES AS COGNITIVE ENTITIES:* attitudes aren't as reliable as researchers make them out to be. Organically in a conversation, attitudes change constantly. So they can be considered a form of argumentative thinking, as they change as the dialogue progresses** - ***ATTITUDES PREDICT BEHAVIOUR:* sometimes attitudes don't lead to behaviour, but *are* the behaviour** - ***ATTITUDES CAN BE MEASURED:*** attitudes shouldn't be too relied upon in statistical research, since people adapt their attitudes to best fit the task given - ***ATTITUDES ARE FORMED TOWARDS PREDEFINED OBJECTS IN THE ENVIRONMENT*** LESSON IV PERSUASION DEFINITION **The process by which a message induces change in beliefs, attitudes or behaviours** - It happens over time - There is a sender and a message and a receiver - Induces change: it is another form of social influence - Persuasion targets beliefs and attitudes to ultimately change someone's behaviour **MUNDANE PERSUASION**: we encounter persuasion in our everyday lives inextricably CAVEATS by BILLIG (1996) Persuasion is inextricably linked to local and broader social context and as this varies across time and space, from individual to individual, group to group What works in one case may not work in another Beware of abstract generalisable lists of factors of persuasion as you will always come across the exception to the rule PATH TO PERSUASION Studied by **Hovland** during WWII  ELABORATION-LIKELIHOOD (ELM) MODEL CENTRAL ROUTE it occurs in **arguments** when, after careful consideration of the content of the message, people find the argument persuasive. The receiver will have knowledge of the tentative of the speaker to convince them. In the end the receiver will decide whether they have been convinced or not. It is a rational approach PERIPHERAL ROUTE occurs when people are influenced by incidental cues (such as the speaker's attractiveness) and find the argument persuasive, rather than by careful consideration of the argument's validity. It focuses on enhancing feelings rather than rational conviction, it will increase pre-existing doubts and suggestions that can push the individual to be persuaded by the implicit message Chaiken (1980) proposed the **heuristic-systematic model (HSM)**: very similar to ELM - **Systematic processing**: use of cognitive engagement - **Heuristic processing**: deals with information quicky using mental shortcuts *(speaker is articulate, many arguments etc.)* CRITIQUES The central /peripheral and systematic/heuristic path can be integrated into a **unimodal of persuasion** - In the real world, messages contain a variety of content and cues in order to achieve their rhetorical effects - Both work towards persuading the receiver GOAL OF PERSUASION BEHAVIOUR CHANGE the central route is more likely to lead to attitude and behaviour changes that stick, whereas the peripheral route may lead merely to superficial and temporary attitude change ELEMENTS OF PERSUASION COMMUNICATOR *it expresses who is credible* - ***CREDIBILITY**: if the communicator is perceived as an expert and trustworthy, then people will likely believe him more* *Culture and context, depending categories of individuals carry with them implicit knowledge about what such people know (category entitlements) and how they ought to behave (category bound activities)* - **Non credible speaker**: if persuasive, the message sticks more and will be remembered - ***PERCEIVED EXPERTISE**: compared to non-experts, expert sources elicit more processing of persuasive messages because of expectations that the information is likely to be valid or accurate* *The message wont be scrutinized if the audience agrees.* *When messages are **counter attitudinal**, experts motivate greater processing because of expectation that they strong arguments to support their claims more likely to promote shift of attitudes from an unfavourable stance to a favourable one* - ***PERCEIVED TRUSTWORTHINESS**: speech style, appearance, perceived impartiality and trustworthiness.* - ***DILEMMA OF STAKE AND INTEREST**: it's the managements of self-interest in language.* *people having a personal interest or motivation in persuading others may not be regarded as trustworthy or credible* - ***ATTRACTIVENESS AND LIKING**: we tend to like and pay more attention to an appealing communicator. Our liking may open us up to the communicator's arguments (central route), or it may trigger positive associations when we see the product later (peripheral route)* - ***SIMILARITY**: we tend to like people who are like us and be influenced by them, we will seek their opinion before making a decision.* MESSAGE - REASON VS EMOTION emotional messages affect more uninterested audiences through the peripheral route (they will be more prone to consider it if they don't have an opinion) studies found that whether emotional or rational messages are more persuasive depends on age: - Young adults: find more persuasive and remember more negative emotional messages - Older adults: recall emotional and rational messages equally, but prefer rational and positive messages EFFECT OF AROUSING FEAR The more frightened people are, the more they respond, thus the more they are influenceable. It's a good strategy to convince people to act in their best interests. Though its important to remember that fear-framed messages work better when trying to prevent a bad outcome than when trying to promote a good outcome - - - EFFECT OF GOOD FEELINGS People who are in a good mood make faster, more impulsive decisions; they rely more on peripheral cues, thus this enhances persuasion - Messages must also feel "right" DISCREPANCY -- DISCOMFORT -- PERSUASION Disagreement produces discomfort, and discomfort prompts people to change their opinions **SOCIAL JUDGEMENT THEORY**: opinion change is possible only when the message is in the acceptability or non-commitment range - - - **DISCREPANCY AND COMMUNICATOR CREDIBILITY** a credible source would elicit the most opinion change when advocating a position greatly discrepant from the recipients who have strong positions about the issue. Credible sources paired with a discrepant message from the recipient elicits engagement with the message and change *Deeply involved people tend to accept only a narrow range of views, since to them a moderately discrepant message may seem radical* HOW TO DEAL WITH OPPOSING ARGUMENTS: ONE AND TWO SIDED APPEALS Acknowledging opposing arguments disarms them and increases the speaker's perceived credibility and trustworthiness **TWO-SIDED**: a two sided presentation that acknowledges the counterarguments is more efficient and persuasive when people are aware of opposing arguments **ONE-SIDED**: it stimulates an informed audience to think of counter-arguments and to view the communicator as biased PRIMACY VS RECENCY Primacy works when messages are told back to back. Recency when they are separated in time - **PRIMACY**: information presented first holds most influence - **RECENCY**: information presented last holds most influence, but it's a less common effect  HOW THE MESSAGE IS COMMUNICATED **CHANNEL OF COMMUNICATION**: the way the message is delivered -- whether face to face, in writing, on film or in some other way The major influence on us is not the media but our contact with people. So behaviour change is most effective when face-to-face influence is fostered There is a difference in persuasion between active and passive reception: the major influence on us wont be the media (which will have a mostly indirect influence) but our contact with people, so peer-learning. Experience-based attitudes are more confident and less likely to change. *If you're more familiar with an issue you will be less influenceable (if u have an informed opinion on a war, there will need to be a lot more persuasion for it to stick)* We're also influenced by the world around us, following the **broken-window theory**: it states that visible displays of disorder set norms for crime and anti-social behaviour *(if a neighbourhood is dirty, with graffiti etc it can lead to higher crime rates in the area)* MEDIA INFLUENCE - **Two-step flow of communication**: the process by which media influence often occurs through opinion leaders who in turn influence others COMPARING MEDIA: - The more lifelike the medium, the more persuasive its message - The order of persuasiveness seems to be: live (face to face), videotaped, audiotaped and written - Messages are best comprehended and recalled when **written** The difficulty of the message interacts with the medium to determine persuasiveness THE AUDIENCE People's personality traits often don't predict their responses to social influence but: - **Self-esteem**: people with moderate self-esteem are the easiest to influence - **Age**: the teens and early twenties are important years when people develop attitudes and habits, since it's the moment attitudes solidify. Older adults tend to keep the attitudes they developed while they were younger, causing generational gaps with younger people who are still developing their attitudes - The attitudes is not set in stone, but it still holds significant weight - **Need for cognition**: the individual's motivation and need to think and analyse what is being said. For those, the central route works best. Those with a low need for cognition (and those who are distracted) -- are quicker to respond to peripheral cues such as the communicator's attractiveness and the pleasantness of the surroundings WAYS TO STIMULATE PEOPLE'S THINKING - Using **rhetorical questions** - Presenting **multiple speakers** saying the same thing - Making people **feel responsible** for evaluating or passing along the message - **Repeating** the message - Getting people's **undistracted attention** **RESEARCH FINDING**: stimulating thinking makes strong messages more persuasive and (because of counterarguing) weak messages less persuasive. We often find ourselves trying to defend our ideas *(defensive rhetoric: developing our own arguments for the possible counter-arguments other people can think of)* or try to think of counter-arguments *(offensive rhetoric: attacking the ideas of a speaker by finding counter-arguments)* Immagine che contiene testo, Carattere, linea, diagramma Descrizione generata automaticamente EXTREME PERSUASION: HOW DO CULTS INDOCTRINATE A **cult** (also called new religious movement) is a group typically characterized by: 1. Distinctive **rituals and beliefs** related to its devotion to a god or a person 2. **Isolation** from the surrounding, evil culture 3. A **charismatic** **leader** A **sect**, by contrast, is a fraction from a major religion PERSUASIVE ELEMENTS - Communicator - Message - audience EXPLOITING THE ATTITUDES FOLLOW BEHAVIOUR EFFECT - Compliance breeds acceptance: cult initiates become committed advocates. - Behavioural rituals, public recruitment and fund-raising strengthen the initiates identities as members - The greater the personal commitment, the more the need to justify it ATTITUDES FOLLOW BEHAVIOUR MANIPULATIVE TECHNIQUES - **FOOT IN THE DOOR PHENOMENON:** a manipulation technique in which getting people to first agree to a small request increases the chances that they will later comply with a larger request - **DOOR IN THE FACE TECHNIQUE:** facilitating the likelihood of a second less-demanding request being accepted by presenting a more demanding request first - **LOW BALLING:** works by getting someone to agree to an attractive, often cheap deal and then raising the charge for it **GROUP EFFECTS** **SOCIAL IMPLOSION**: - Individuals get isolated from social support systems Cultists replace such systems (creating a new social identity) - Cut off from families and former friends, novices lose access to counter-arguments - The group's social isolation facilitates more bizarre thinking - In extreme cases, intimidation and violence make the rest These techniques do not, however, have unlimited power RESISTING PERSUASION - **STREGHTENING PERSONAL COMMITMENT**: prior personal and public commitment to a position reduces the effectiveness of persuasion (Asch experiment) - **STRENGHTENING CONFIDENCE**: the more confidence we have in what we beliee, the less likely our attitudes are to change - **CHALLENGING BELIEFS AND DEVELOPING COUNTER ARGUMENTS:** this can be achieved through ***ATTITUDE INOCULATION*** exposing people to weak attacks upon their attitudes so that when stronger attacks come, they will have refutations available - **INOCULATION PROGRAMMES**: Mostly this can happen through EDUCATIONAL/PREVENTION INTERVENTIONS which will make the individual aware LESSON V THE SELF **DEFINITION**: the self is a complex web of psychological entities and processes concerning one's own person. It also is how the social world influences how we think and feel Our self isn't innate, developing during our childhood, before the second year of age. We develop it in our environment and social interactions. Our sense of self can improve us by enhancing the controle we have on our life *(since we're able to take our past in account, assess our present and prepare for the future)* The interplay of our sense of self and our social world can be seen in many examples: - **SPOTLIGHT EFFECT**: tendency think that others are pauing more attention to one's appearance and behaviour than they really are - **ILLUSION OF TRANSPARENCY:** illusion and belief that our concealed emotions leak out and can be easily read by others - **Social surroundings** affect our **self-awareness:** we become self-aware when we are in an environment where we feel like we are different than the norm - **Self-concern** motivates our **social behaviour:** we adjust our behaviour based on the expectations and behaviour of others to fit in - **Social relationships** define our **self:** creation of different selves based on the social groups with which we interact *(more typical for interdependent and collectivistic cultures)* CHARACTERISTICS - Uniqueness (the self is embodied in only one body) - Continuity (you feel you are the same person as before and 10 years ago, even though we have changed) - Distinction between I and me (distinction between I= subject and me=object, you can think and reflect on yourself as an object of your own thinking metacognition) - Culturally-specific ones **Our interaction with people shapes our self**: people who listen to us and read what we write form ideas about us, and relate to us on the basis of their own versions of who we are, which in turn impacts upon our sense of self. Because of that, the self is *distributed* and embedded in our social interactions, becoming more contextual rather than unitary SELF-CONCEPT A person's answer to the question "who am I?". our self-definition affects how we see the world around us. The information about us is organized in schemas. Our understanding and perception of ourselves is different from how other people understand and perceive us. SELF-KNOWLEDGE There is one thing and only one in the whole universe which we know more about than we could learn from external observation. That one thing is ourselves We may err: - When predicting our behaviours. (in social situations, we think of ourselves as our ideal self, and not our actual self - When predicting our feelings: we might exaggerate or underestimate the emotional impact of situation we are in Such findings do not indicate that we never have genuine self-insight, but only that when influences are subtle, self-insight is vulnerable to error. This is why we need a science of behaviour ***SELF-SCHEMAS***: beliefs about self that organise and guide the processing of self-relevant information. The characteristics of yourself make you: - It makes you aware of the characteristics in others - aware of the characteristics in yourself when situations are relevant - quick recall experiences that refer to them - welcoming of information coherent with them ***SELF REFERENCE EFFECT***: It's the tendency to process efficiently and remember well information related to oneself our self-guides how we process information, so our context confirms our self, while our self tends to confirm itself through our experiences. We remember information better when its related to own self, *(ex. Remembering birthdays in your birth month better).* It allows you to have richer elaboration of memories and a better organization of memories, since the center of our world is our self *When our environment is aligned with our sense of self, we feel more self-assured and perform better* ILLUSION OF SELF-ANALYSIS When the causes of our behaviour are evident *(conspicuous)* and the correct explanation fits our intuition, then our self-perception will be accurate We are mostly aware of the results of our thinking than it's process ***POSSIBLE SELVES***: images of what we dream of or dread becoming in the future ***PREDICTING OUR BEHAVIOUR AND FEELINGS***: to predict our future behaviour, we need to consider our past. - *[FACIAL MIMICRY]: humans hace a tendency to react with congruent facial expressions when looking at an emotional face* **[IMPACT BIAS]**: our prediction of future emotions influence our decisions. It can often be misleading ***SELF-DISCREPANCY THEORY***: it deals with self-domains: - **actual** self features that people believe they possess - **ideal** self how you want to be. - **ought** self how you feel you should be if your actual self doesn't coincide with your ideal and ought self, anything you do doesn't feel fulfilling, it might give dissonance there are standpoints of the self: your own, a significant other's. combining self-domains with standpoints will define six basic types of self-state representation, designed by Higgins (1987) actual self=self-concept the ideal self and the ought self represent our **self-guides** When there's a discrepancy in our conception of ourselves, we may feel: - self-concept vs own ought self GUILT - self-concept vs other ought self SHAME - self-concept vs own ideal self DISAPPOINTMENT - self-concept vs other ideal self DEJECTION-LACK OF PRIDE - ideal self vs ought self AGITATION DETERMINANTS OF SELF-CONCEPT/SOCIAL SELF Self concept helps guide our thinking and social behaviour. Our sense of self is heavily influenced by our **[environment]**. These influences are: - **roles** we play - **social identities** we form - **comparisons** with others - our **successes** and **failures** - how others **judge** us - our **cultural values** ***ROLES***: the roles you assume and perform. When you change your role, your self-concept enriches. **ROLE PLAYING BECOMES REALITY**: When taking on a new role, we at first feel self-conscious, but as time passes and we make statements that support this new role (even when we don't believe it at the beginning), to justify this support we will believe more strongly in it. ***SURROUNDING CULTURE*** We live in a context with different values and we conform to those. Western societies tend to have a more individualistic mindset, while Asian countries tend to have a collectivistic one - INDIVIDUALISM and INDEPENDENCE: individual is more important than the group. Identity is commonly defined in terms of personal attributes rather than group identification. The group is in the background for the individual We will choose what protects and elevates our sense of self - Western culutrs assume that your life will be enriched by defining your possible selves and believing in your power of personal control - COLLECTIVISM and INTERDEPENDENCE: the group is more important than the individual. Priority tends to be given to the goals of the group and identity is defined accordingly People will be more self-critical - INTERDEPENDENCE: we construe (interpret) our social identity in relation to others In countries, individualism and collectivism can coexist (ex. Italy is a very individualistic society, but family, which is a collectivistic characteristic holds a very important space in our culture A person's socio-cultural context is likely to shape the neural mechanisms that underlie cognition. *Ex aquarium* - INDEPENDENT: will have one focal point *(only one fish)* - INTERDEPENDENT: will focus more on the relationship between the elements in the environment ***SOCIAL IDENTITIES*** how you behave in social contexts, the parts of the self-individuals choose to show when you interact in groups and society. There is a distinction between our personal and social identities. - **PERSONAL IDENTITY**: our unique attributes - **SOCIAL IDENTITY**: sense of self and identity based on membership in social groups ***SUCCSSES AND FAILURES*** Our self-concept is fed by our daily experiences. By undertaking and succeeding in difficult tasks we feel more competent. We learn more about ourselves by trying new things and succeeding and failing to see what we're good at. COMPARISONS WITH OTHERS We evaluate our abilities and opinions by comparing ourselves with others, since others determine the standard by which we define ourselves To feel better about ourselves we tend to put down others, this is especially true with schadenfreude. - **SHADENFREUDE**: to take pleasure in somebody else's (or another group's) misfortune Comaprisons can diminish our satisfaction, since the more we gain the more we compare ourselves with the people that have more. - When we are feeling low about ourselves we protect our self-esteem by comparing downwards following the **DOWNWARDS COMPARISON THEORY**: when our self-esteem is threatened we compare ourselves to those that have less to restore it SELF-ESTEEM A person's overall negative or positive self-evaluation or sense of self-worth. Crocker and Wolfe believe that we feel good about the domains that are important to our self-esteem. - Brown and Dutton instead believe that people who value themselves in a general way are more likely to value their looks, abilities etc *(ex. If you think you are good at math you will be more likely to do well in it)* SELF-ESTEEM MOTIVATION we are highly motivated to maintain our self-esteem. Comparisons with people we deem capable and close to us may lower our self-esteem, while also motivating us to do better to enhance our wounded self-esteem Culture has a role in our feelings and self-esteem *(ex. Pakistani women value marriage more than work and career)* **MOTIVE TO MAINTAIN SELF-ESTEEM**: since relationships enable survival, we have a "self-esteem gauge" that alerts us to threatened social rejection, motivating us to act with greater sensitivity to toethrs expectations to enhance our self-esteem THE DARK SIDE OF SELF-ESTEEM people who find their favourable self-esteem threatened often react by putting others down, sometimes with violence, since wounded pride can motivate retaliation - NARCISSISM If people become extremely focused on themselves they may start to love themselves more than anybody else. This is known as narcissism. Those affected by this psychiatric condition tend to feel an uncontrolled, compulsive self-love **OTHER CHARACTERISTICS** - Desire to be admired - Pervasive pattern of grandiosity - Lack of empathy - Selfishness - Machiavellianism: a manipulative behaviour aimed at obtaining an advantage for the self, without any moral concern and regard for the dignity of others - High self-esteem **SECURE SELF-ESTEEM**: confidence that leads to less defensiveness, less judgement towards others, and more wellbeing SELF-SERVING BIAS The tendency to perceive oneself favourably The main biases are: - **SELF-SERVING ATTRIBUTIONS**: attribute one's success to ability and effort and failures to external factors - **COMPARING ONESELF FAVOURABLY TO OTHERS**: most people see themselves as better than the average person on subjective and socially desirable dimension. People see themselves as freer from bias than most people, while seeing others as biased - **UNREALISTIC OPTIMISM**: optimism gives a positive approach to life. People will see themselves as less likely to experience negative events and more likely to experience positive ones - Adam smith calls this the "absurd presumption in our own good fortune" Optimism promotes self-efficacy, since viewing favourably the future helps create happiness in the present As a counterpart there is **DEFENSIVE PESSIMISM**: an adaptive value of anticipating problems and harnessing our anxiety to motivate effective action. It reduces anxiety by anticipating problems - **FALSE CONSENSUS AND UNIQUENESS**: to enhance our self-images. - **False consensus effect**: matters of *OPINIONS*. we overestimate the commonality of our opinions and failures. We do that because we generalize froma limited sample that includes us. We're also more likely to spend time with people who share our attitudes and behaviours and so, to judge the world from the people we know - **False uniqueness effect**: matters of *ABILITY*. It's the tendency to underestimate the commonality of our ability and our successes. We serve our self-image by seeing our talents and mroal behaviours as unusual and unique. This way we see our failings as relatively normal and our virtues as exceptional **FALSE CONSENSUS EFFECT** **FALSE UNIQUENESS EFFECT** ---------------------------- ----------------------------- Common opinions Unique talents Common failures Unique successes - **REFLECTIONS ON SELF-ESTEEM AND SELF-SERVING BIAS**: self-esteem my be positive or negative in some cases - **[ADAPTIVE] SELF-SERVING BIAS**: self-serving pride may help protect us from feeling sad and useless and it can buffer and lower anxiety. When good things happened people with higher self-esteem tend to savour the good feelings, as opposed to those with low self-esteem. - [Terror Management Theory:] desire of one to live while realizing the death is inevitable. Those with high self-esteem, when reminded of their mortality will affirm their self-worth - **[MALADAPTIVE] SELF-SERVING BIAS:** it can poison a group (downplaying own failures and elevating own successes) as those groups disintegrate because of self-glorifying tendencies IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT People are also motivated to present themselves favourably to others To be well perceived by the people around us, we tend to present a different self than what we feel FALSE MODESTY it comes from the social dilemma when people are complimented. On one hand they do not want to reject the compliment, but at the same time they don't want to appear arrogant. So people tend to bring themselves down through false modesty and praising others. People can also engage in "**[shallow gratitude]**", a superficial gratitude that appears humble, by thanking others for our success. It may appear when we outperform others and feel uneasy about other people's feelings towards us. We use false modesty and shallow gratitude because: - Can elicit reassurance - Reduces performance pressure - Prevents others from being envious or resentful SELF-HANDICAPPING protecting one's self-image with sabotaging behaviour that create an excuse for later failure (or a boost to our self-image -- if succeeded). It has a self-protecting function. This is a defense mechanism that serves to preserve self-esteem when confronted with their ***fear of failure***. Because of this fear people ten to handicap themselves, because it would be more self-deflating to fail after trying than to fail after having had an \"impediment\" that gives a ready excuse. This serves to cling onto a sense of competence *"with no attempt there can be no failure; with no failure no humiliation" -- James 1890* Two types of self-handicapping: 1. **BEHAVIOURAL:** when people actively acquire an obstacle to their performance *(choosing to not revise before a test, drinking before an interview...)* 2. **CLAIMED:** when people "state" the presence of a barrier *(such as anxiety or depression)* SELF-PRESENTATION the act of expressing oneself and behaving in ways designed to create a favourable impression or an impression that corresponds to one's ideals. We wish to present a desired image both to an external audience and to an internal audience. We work at managing the impressions we create. - In unfamiliar situations, we wish to impress and so are acutely self-conscious of the impressions we create **ONLINE SELF-PRESENTATION**: many scholars wonder how our online presentation reflect on our actual self - ***Idealized virtual reality hypothesis**:* we use the internet to display idealized selves that do not match actual personality characteristics - ***Extended real-life hypothesis**:* the personal information that people include mirrors their real thoughts Scholars believe that the extended real-life hypothesis is the most correct one SELF-PRESENTATION STRATEGIES (JONES, 1990) **SELF PRESENTETIONAL STRATEGY** **IMPRESSION SOUGHT** **PROTOTYPIC BEHAVIOURS** **SELF-PRESENTETIONAL RISKS** ---------------------------------- ----------------------- --------------------------- ------------------------------- *INGRATIATION* Likable Compliments, favours Insincere, deceitful *SELF-PROMOTION* Competent Boasting, showing off Conceited, fraudulent *INTIMIDATION* Powerful, ruthless Threats Reviled, ineffectual *EXEMPLIFICATION* Virtuous, moral Self-denial, martyrdom Hypocritical, sanctimonious *SUPPLICATION* helpless Self-deprecation Manipulative, demanding - **SELF-MONITORING**: letting situational cues guide the way one presents oneself in social situations and asjusting one's performance to create the desired impression. These kind of people become like social chameleons, exposing attitudes they don't really hold. This happens since they are conscious of others, they are less likely to act on their attitudes People want to appear as able but also modest and honest this is what bring the false modesty phenomenon LOSS OF SELF Our memories form an important part of our self. In case of mnemo-degenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer\'s and dementia, a portion, or all of the memory of the patient is deleted or altered. In this case we can affirm that their sense of self might be changed - This will always depend on which aspects of the self we wish to focus on: if its the more autobiographical, then yes, the disease changes the self. But if we're considering a more socio-cultural one, then no, the impact of the loss of memories is different PERCEIVED SELF-CONTROL How much control do we fell to have on ourselves and on outcomes in general. The self has a limited capacity for willpower, if these reserves of will deplete, many things can happen, such as: - Quitting complicated tasks faster - Decreased physical stamina - Becoming more aggressive - Less restrained in sexual thought and behaviour This is because our brain consumes available blood sugar when engaged in self-control, acting like muscular strength. Our self-concepts do influence our behaviour: - **SELF-EFFICACY**: one's sense of competence and ability to handle different situations and produce an intended result. Its distinguished from self-esteem *(you can believe yourself to be competent at a task, but still feel bad about themselves)* LOCUS OF CONTROL A person's belief about who or what is responsible for what happens. Can either be internal or external - **INTERNAL**: people believe that what happens depends on their skills and efforts. People with this locus of control tend to do better in life - **SELF-DETERMINATION**: the belief that we can be whoever we want thanks to our freedom of choice. However, psychologists have found out that having too much choice can be detrimental to our mental state. In fact, having too much choice can lead to decreased life satisfaction and increased clinical depression, since too many choices lead to paralysis, cause with more choices comes an information overload and more opportunities for regret. - **EXTERNAL**: people feel like what happens to them is governed by external forces, such as the environment or higher forces - **LEARNED HELPLESNESS**: hopelessness and resignation learned when a human or an animal perceives no control over repeated bad events, possibly leading to depressive symptoms. People become helpless because they believe their efforts have no effect, also leading to paralysis of will, passive resignation and motionless apathy LESSON VI SOCIAL BELIEFS AND JUDEGEMENTS How we understand, explain and evaluate events has consequences on our social perceptions. Such social beliefs are: - **Perceive** events through the filters of our own assumptions - **Judge** events by implicit rules that guide our judgements and by our moods - **Explain** events by attributing them to the situation or person - **Expect** certain events sometimes can bring them about PERCEIVING OUR SOCIAL WORLD Assumptions and prejudgements guide our pereptions, interpretations and recall We respond not to reality as it is bt to reality as we interpret it. here are different aspects of perception of the world: - Priming - Categorical thinking - Perceiving and interpreting events - Belief perseverance - Constructing memories of ourselves and our worlds **PRIMING** Information or stimuli given beforehand guide our perception of following information or stimuli. This means that unattended stimuli can subtly predispose how we will interpret and recall events. As a definition it means activating particular associations in memory and it reveals how one thought, even without awareness, can influence another thought *Examples in everyday life:* - *watching a scary movie alone primes our thinking, making us believe that creaking doors are ghosts* - *being depressed primes for negative associations for the present and the past. Instead if you're in a good mood youre primed for positive associations, thinking the past more rosy than it is and the future brighter* ***CATEGORICAL THINKING*** It means perceiving someone in terms of cues that indicate their social group membership Our social information processing is automatic, being unintentional, so categorical thinking may mislead you. Our brain tends to take shortcuts to save energy, so its more succetible to bias. The way we categorize within our social world has implications for stereotyping, prejudice and discriminatory behaviour. **Stereotyping** will occur when: - its relevant to the perceivers information-processiong goals - the perceiver already holds prejudiced beliefs about such groups - the perceiver has sufficient attentional resources to engage in this information processing - the cues are easy to process and are presented for an extended period of time PERCEIVING AND INTERPRETING EVENTS We see and interpret events based on our past experiences and preconceptions. Social perceptions depend on the observer, so even a simple stimulus will strike tow people very differently, based on their past preconceptions that will influence their reaction - **KULECHOV EFFECT**: ability to control people's perceptions of emotion by manipulating the setting in which they see a face. *Example: showing the face of a man there can be two descriptions, in one the man is a nazi in the other he is a UN hero. Afterwards people were asked to evaluate this man's expression.* - *Nazi description cruel expression* - *Hero description kind expression* **SPONTANEOUS TRAIT INFERENCE**: when we say something good or bas about another person, people spontaneously tend to associate that trait with us. This is a prime example about how interpretational processes influence others' perceptions of us. Basically, we view our social world through the spectacles of our beliefs, attitudes and values. These are shaped by the normative framework of the culture, society and community in which we live - **WHY ARE OUR BELIEFS IMPORTANT** they shape our interpretation of everything else ***BELIEF PERSEVERANCE*** persistence of one's initial conceptions, as when the basis for one's belief is discredited but an explanation of why the belief might be true survives - One the individual finds their own justification for the belief, then it will stick Evidence from experiments in which a falsehood was implanted in participant, who were then asked to explain why the information was true, and then the falsehood persisted even after it was discredited Steps of the experiment: 1. Implant a belief based on falsehoods 2. Make the participant explain why its true 3. Researchers discredit the belief that was implanted, proving it to be false. they also say the truth: that the belief was fake In the end, even after knowing the truth, the participants stuck with the falsehood, since they had retained their invented explanations for the belief This is because its difficult to demolish a falsehood, once the person cojures up a rationale for it This theory explains that the ore we examin our theories and explain how they might be true, the more closed we become to information that may challenge our beliefs Our beliefs and expectations powerful affect how we mentall construc events, becoming prisoners of our own thought patterns **REMEDY FOR BELIEF PERSEVERANCE**: explaining the opposite of our theory. This way it will diminish our belief, but it wont necessarily change our feeling on the matter - *"changes of beliefs are possible, but such changes generally occur slowly, and more compelling evidence is required to alter a belief than to create it" -- Ross and Lepper* CONSTRUCTING MEMORIES OF US AND OUR WORLDS Our memories are NOT exact copies of experiences that remain in our memory bank. **Rather, we construct memories at the time of withdrawal , as well as when we store experiences**. So we will reconstruct our distant past by using our current feelings and expectations to combine information fragments. Thus we can easily revise our memories to suit our current knowledge. - **MISINFORMATION EFFECT**: incorporating "misinformation" into one's memory of the event, after witnessing an event and receiving misleading indormation about it. this is because memory is extremely suggestible *(ex. Testimony of crimes)* **WE INTERPRET PAST ATTITUDES** People who change their attitude tend to report that they always felt as they currently feel. This can bring a dangerous downward spiral: the worse your current view on an event, the worse your memories are, which only further confirms your negative attitudes - ***ROSY RETROSPECTION*** *(enhance the positive aspects of our memorie and minimize the negative ones)*. This is the base principle that was observed, but its generalized to basically explain how our current feelings influence our memories of the past - *If now happy* *past memories are happier* - *If now sad* *past memories are sadder* **WE REINTERPRET PAST BEHAVIOURS** Everyone is affected by the hindsight bias. This is a proof that there can be many influences on our perceptions and also that our perception of our social world can become distorted - **HINDSIGHT BIAS**. If we feel we've improved, we may even misrecall the past as more unlike the present than it actually is *Example: given a test you answer. After they give you a sheet with all the answers and you have to remember what your answer in the first test was. People recalled their original answers as being closer to the correct answer than it actually was* JUDGING OUR SOCIAL WORLD How do people make judgements INTUITIVE JUDGEMENT - ***Intuitionists***: believe that important information is immediately available apart from our conscious analysis - ***Sceptics***: believe that intuition is our "belief of being right, even when we're not" Primary research shows that the unconscious controls much of our behaviour, so intuitionists are mostly right *"to be able to do anything at all (driving dating, dancing) action initiation needs to be separated from the inefficient and slow workings of the conscious mind, otherwise inaction inevitably would prevail" -- Macrae and Johnson* Conscious decisions are slower but as important as automatic ones POWERS OF INTUITION We have limited access to what's going on in our minds *"we know more than we know we know" -- Pascal* Our thinking processes is both: - **CONTROLLED PROCESSING**: mental activities that require conscious, deliberate and reflective thinking. - **AUTOMATIC PROCESSING**: mental activities happening with little or no conscious awareness. Automatic thinking happens mostly "off-screen", where reason does not go. Its important to remember that what is now automatic is because it has been learned consciously previously Social judgements have great influence on our behaviour, for automatic processes to occur we need pre-existing knowledge. Our behaviour is driven by the environmental stimuli and this is preconscious and automatic - There can be implicit rather than explicit cognitions when making judgements. This indicates that people can behave in a stereotypical way without even realizing it SOCIAL NEUROSCIENE There also are different memory systems for different patterns of leaning and behaviour. **DUAL PROCESS MODEL OF THE BRAIN** (Spunt and Lieberman): 1. Automatically identifying a person's behaviour spontaneous 2. Make judgements about a person\'s behaviour controlled, because you weight the causes of someone\'s behaviour to understand it They also think that it would be impossible to function in the social world if all our social cognition was controlled Social neuroscience argues that our biology helps shape our social environments, it also wishes to understand the structure and functions of the brain that underlie our behaviour and enable our emotional experiences Research is important in two ways for social psychology/neuroscience: 1. Investigate how neurochemical events influence social processes. (*Neuro social)* 2. Investigate how social processes influence neurochemical events. (*Social neuro)* ***SOCIAL SCHEMA THEORY*** **SCHEMA**: a construc used to illustrate how we store information we receive about the world, people, roles and how to behave in particular situations. It will sort things from less important to more important etc FUNCTIONS: - Guiding our memory - Predicting what will happen - Informinf us how to behave appropriately - Work out what to do when itss not obvious There are **[four]** main [**types** **of schemas**]: 1. **[SELF] SCHEMAS**: the most complex. Its about the information regarding ourselves, that define "who I am" 2. **[PERSON] SCHEMAS**: include the personality traits so we can cateforize people when we meet them on the basis of their perceived personality 3. **[ROLE] SCHEMAS**: contain information about what behaviour and norms to expect of someone holding a particular role in society 4. **[EVENT] SCHEMAS**: information about appropriate behaviour for events Before a schema is activated, we first **categorize** the event appropriately. This is an automatic process. Rosch argued that we hold prototypes for each category so we can compare new instances to see if it belongs there LIMITS OF INTUITION Automatic thinking processes information fast and repeatedly. But we have to consider that we are error prone, especially when it comes to our **[capacity for illusion]**, that deals with perceptual misinterpretations, fantasies and constructed beliefs. As we categorize people, it can lead to stereotypical judgements, since the generalisations needed for schemas may be inaccurate. People use scheams to structure their social environment but use conceptual metaphors to make sense of the world - **CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS**: unique cognitive mechaisms that shape social thought and attitudes, relying on taken-for-granted shared knowledge *(ex. [Shallow] person)* These metaphors complement the schema through the way people use them to infer personal attrivues and to interpret and evaluate abstract social concepts ***SOCIAL ENCODING*** the process of getting social information into memory, it comprises initially attendint to and perceiveving social information, understandinf it and making connections with information already in memory. Our previous experiences are a very important aprt of the process. **OVERVIEW:** - Person traits vary in their centrality and therefore in the influence they exerty on person impression. If it affects us more, we perceive them more *(ex. Unkind person isn't helpful to me)*. - We tend to construct a coherent image of the person thereby attributing more or less "dominance" to contradictory traits - The social context can influence encoding social encoding occurs within social cognition. - **SOCIAL COGNITION**: refers to the way we perceive our social world and our beliefs about people, their behaviour and the causes of social events. It can also be called "the knowing of people" Social encoding involves how we think about ourselves and other people, regarding how we select, interpret, remember and use social information to make decisions Processing of the social world involves: - **PREATTENTIVE ANALYSIS:** the unconscious and automatic taking in of information - **FOCUSING OF ATTENTION:** identigying and categorizing information - **COMPREHENSION:** give meaning to the information - **ELABORATIVE REASONING:** link information together Social information is ambiguous, so when we encode information about a person, relevant information is activated which helps us to make sense of the new information. - If the behaviour is salient they will become an easily accessible mental representation that will facilitate the encoding. This means that if these aspects are distinctive they sill stand out and capture the attention of the one who is encoding the information. When memorizing information based on behaviour, the encoding will be about the most memorable aspects of the behaviour ASCH He conducted multiple experiments regarding encoding. 1. **OUTSTANDING TRAITS**: In one experiment he argued that people appear to configure impressions of people holistically rather than considering independent traits. In his configural model he affirms that central traits will have a stroner influence in creating an impression, rather than peripheral ones a. Also, once we form an impression its difficult to change it 2. **CONTRADICTORY TRAITS**: if a person is seen to have traits that contradict each other, to create a unified configuration of a person an individual will attempt to reconcile inconsistencies by considering one trait as **dominant** (usually the positive trait), while the other will be less dominant and considered as temporary and dependent on the context this means that focusing on the dominant trait its less complicated when describing a person we strive for unity when configuring an image, so we will assimilate the inconsistencies to have a comprehensive image to keep having a unified image, new information will be incorporated and encoded harmoniously **HIGGINS and MCCANN**: they propose that the way we encode social information is "context-driven", and this process interacts with personal foals, person perception and interpersonal communication - **INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATION**: the way other people in social context view a person will influence our own judgements of that person. We will be more likely to badmouth someone if people in our social context do so, especially when we wish to make a good impression **PHYSICAL APPEARANCE**: physical appearance plays a huge role in the way we encode information. there has always been a belief the "what is beautiful is good" (kalos kai agathos for the greeks). People will have a more positive image of an attractive person, considering them trustworthy and more likely to have a successful life OVERCONFIDENCE Our brain makes autonomous automatic intuitions. But sometimes these efficient shortcuts err, since we are unaware of our flaws. **OVERCONFIDENCE PHENOMENON** the tendency to be more confident than correct, to overestimate the accuracy of one's belief The most confident people will tend to be prone to be overconfident. *Brain imaging shows that confidence in the recollection of a memory is located in different places of the brain depending on whether it was a real event or an illusory one* **INCOMPETENCE FEEDS OVERCONFIDENCE**: those who don't know what competence in a field is will often be unaware that they lack it our ignorance of our ignorance sustains our self-confidence **WHAT PRODUCES OVERCONFIDENCE**: people tend to recall their mistaked judgements as being *almost right*, making them unable to confront reality CONFIRMATION BIAS Its the tendency to search for information that confirms, rather than disconfirm, one's preconception. This happens because people tend not to seek information that might disprove what they believe When people for a belief (be it right or erroneous), they will search for *confirming* evidence rather than attempting to *disconfirm* their theory. - The confirmation bias explains why our self-images are so stable, since people will search for feedback that confirms their beliefs about themselves REMEDIES FOR OVERCONFIDENCE Be wary of people that make dogmatic statements, speaking in absolutes. Three techniques have been thought off to reduce the overconfidence bias: 1. **PROMPT FEEDBACK:** receiving constant feedback helps estimating probable accuracy 2. **UNPACK A TASK:** to reduce "planning fallacy" breaking down a task in its subcomponents helps estimating a more correct time for completion of the task 3. **FIND DISCONFIRMING INFORMAITON:** since when we think an idea might be true, it starts becoming it for us, if people think about one food reason why their judgement could be wrong it will force them to consider the disconfirming information. HEURISTICS: MENTAL SHORTCUTS **It's a thinking strategy and problem solving method that enables quick and easy judgements and search procedures**. This is because people interpret others' behaviour by making inferences based on people's intentions, thoughts and personality. Since these shortcuts are made in haste, they are prone to error and biases. Social inference involves two processes: - **TOP-DOWN:** it relies on stored information in memory such as schemas and steretypes - **BOTTOM-UP:** it relies on specific events Having little time to process information, our cognitive system specializes in mental shortcuts, enabling us to form impression, make judgements and inventing explanations There are different kinds of heuristics: - **REPRESENTATIVENESS HEURISTIC**: it's the tendency to presume, sometimes despite contrary proof, that someone or something belongs to a particular group if resembling (representing) a typical member of such group. - **BASE RATE**: its factual information about people and categories. Errors will happen in representativeness heuristics when we ignore these base rates - **AVAILABILITY HEURISTIC**: it's a rule of thumb that judges the likelihood of things based on their availability in memory. If something comes readily to mind, we presume it to be commonplace. So it's a shortcut based on whatever information is most readily available, it will be mostly based on strong impressions and feelings and so, prone to error and likely to ignore important information The availability heuristic explains why powerful anecdotes are more compelling than statistical information and why perceived risk is out of proportion with real risks *(ex. More risks going by plane or car?)* **BASIC PRINCIPLE OF SOCIAL THINKING:** - From general to particular slow. People are slow to deduce particular instances from a general truth - From particular to general fast. People are quick to infer general truth from a vivid instance - **COUNTERFACTUAL THINKING**: its imagining alternative scenarios and outcomes that might have happened but did not to alleviate aggravating feelings or heighten positive ones. This happens when we can easily picture an alternative outcome This principle underlies our feelings of luck: - Good luck: when we barely escape a bad event and we imagine a what could have been negative outcome, thus we feel lucky - Bad luck: bad events that di happen but easily might not have - **ANCHORING AND ADJUSTMENT**: when inferences are based on an initial starting point (standard) and are adjusted accordingly through new information. - ANCHOR: our first impression - ADJUSTMENT: later information How far we adjust depends on how much confidence we have in our anchor, the more confident we are the less we will adjust and vice versa. Studies show that multiple inferences can happen at the same time, but it will always follow a hierarchy: 1. Intentionality 2. Desire 3. Belief 4. Personality ILLUSORY THINKING Another influence on everyday thinking is our search for order in random events. This can manifest in illusory correlation and the illusion of control ILLUSORY CORRELATION perception of an association between events where none exists or perception of a stronger association than actually exists. When we expect to find significant relationships, we easily associate random events. - This also happens when a behaviour is displayed by a rarely encountered group and thus it is quickly attributed to the entire group, forming a group stereotype People will also misperceive random events as confirming their beliefs. - **BARNUM EFFECT**: If we believe that premonitions correlate with events, we will notice and remember the joint occurrence of the premonition and the event's later occurrence *(ex. You're thinking of a friend (premonition) and then that friend calls you (event)).* ILLUSION OF CONTROL Perception of uncontrollable events as subjects to one's control or as more controllable than they are. This is mostly seen in areas where luck plays a huge role, such as gambling and stock market - **GAMBLING**: in gambling we have the most flagrant representation of the illusion of control. Gamblers will believe wholeheartedly that they have control over the games. They even become convinced that it takes SKILL to win, thus encouraging continuous play as the gambler becomes familiar with the machine and develops their "skills" This illusion of control breeds overconfidence - **REGRESSION TOWARDS THE AVERAGE:** the statistical tendency for extreme scores or extreme behaviour to return towards one's average. Tversky and Kahneman argue that another way in which the illusion of control manifests is this phenomenon. - When things reach a low point, its more likely that we will improve than deteriorate - When you reach an all time high its almost certain that something will go "wrong". This is because exceptional performance tends to regress towards normality Regression to the average has benefits, cause we moderate our behaviour positively or negatively towards the average, to fit in with others who we identify with. SUMMARY +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | STRATEGY | EXAMPLES | DEFINITION | +=======================+=======================+=======================+ | BIAS | Priming | The activation of | | | | learned or | | when our assumptions | | experienced | | and prejudgements | | associations in | | guide our perceptions | | memory | | and interpretations | | | | of the social world | | | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Belief Perseverance | The persistence of | | | | one's initial | | | | conceptions | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Misinformation Effect | The incorporation of | | | | false information | | | | into memory, guided | | | | by assumed relevance | | | | and appropriateness | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Intuition | When past learning | | | | and repeated | | | | experience cause us | | | | to process | | | | information | | | | automatically | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Overconfidence | To overestimate the | | | | accuracy of one's | | | | beliefs, memory or | | | | account of some | | | | aspect of social | | | | reality | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Confirmation Bias | To search for | | | | information that | | | | confirms one's | | | | preconceptions | | | | (ignoring | | | | disconfirming | | | | information) | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | HEURISTICS | Representative | The tendency to | | | Heuristic | assume something is | | thinking strategies | | an instance of a | | that enable quick and | | group or category | | efficient judgements | | based on its | | | | perceived similarity | | | | to typical members | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Availability | The assumption that | | | Heuristic | what comes to mind | | | | most easily is more | | | | correct and | | | | commonplace | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Recognition Heuristic | To assume that what | | | | is easily recognized | | | | is important | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Anchoring and | When inferences are | | | Adjustment | guided by an initial | | | | starting point and | | | | adjusted accordingly | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | | Counterfactual | Imagining counter | | | Thinking | scenarios and | | | | outcomes that didn't | | | | actually happen | +-----------------------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ | ILLUSORY THINKING | Illusory Correlations | The perception that a | | | | relationship exists | | to search for order | | between things where | | in othe