Social Psychology Lecture 1 PDF

PSYC1001: Social Psychology Lecture Series Semester 1 2024 Dr Rebecca Pinkus [email protected]  Social Perception I: Attributions & Attitudes Lecture 1  Learning Outcomes At the end of this lecture you will be able to: ▪ define social...

PSYC1001: Social Psychology Lecture Series Semester 1 2024 Dr Rebecca Pinkus [email protected]  Social Perception I: Attributions & Attitudes Lecture 1  Learning Outcomes At the end of this lecture you will be able to: ▪ define social psychology and distinguish among social cognition, social perception, and social interaction ▪ define attribution theory and distinguish between an internal and an external attribution ▪ explain how consistency, consensus, and distinctiveness information inform attributional explanations for behaviour in the Covariation Model ▪ describe the Fundamental Attribution Error and Correspondence Bias, and how these have been investigated in social psychological research ▪ explain how the Actor-Observer Effect is related to shifts in attributions for behaviour ▪ define attitudes and differentiate among the affective, behavioural, and cognitive components of attitudes ▪ recognise the difference between explicit and implicit attitudes, and the ways they are measured  Outline ▪ What is Social Psychology? ▪ Attributions and their consequences​ Attribution theories​ Person vs. situational attributions​ Attributional biases o Correspondence bias & Fundamental Attribution Error​ o Actor-Observer bias​ ▪ Attitudes​ Definitions​ Measurement  Definitions Social Psychology: “[T]he scientific investigation of how the thoughts, feelings, and behaviours of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others”. - Allport (1954a), p.5 The branch of psychology that studies the effect of social variables on individual behaviour, attitudes, perceptions, and motives Also the study of group and intergroup phenomena  Definitions cont’d. ▪ Social psychology links ordinary people’s affective states (feelings and emotions), behaviour (the way they act), and their cognition (their thought processes) to their social world ▪ Social psychology researchers want to predict what people will do and when, but also why they do it (i.e., causation)  Definitions cont’d. Social Cognition: Process by which people select, interpret, and remember social information Social Perception: Process by which people come to understand and categorise the behaviours of others Social Interaction: Process by which people interact with each other  Studying Social Behaviour ▪ Person perspective Features or characteristics that individuals carry into social situations ▪ Situational perspective Environmental events or circumstances outside the person ▪ Interaction between the person and the situation Situational Feelings Influences Person Behaviours Personal Influences Thoughts  Definitions Attribution Theory: We tend to give a causal explanation for someone’s behaviour, often crediting either internal dispositions or external situations ▪ Internal attribution: Explaining behaviour as due to dispositional factors ▪ External attribution: Explaining behaviour as due to situational factors  Covariation Model ▪ Consistency information Does the actor behave the same toward the stimulus in different situations? ▪ Consensus information Do other people behave the same toward the stimulus? ▪ Distinctiveness information Does the actor behave the same toward different stimuli? Explaining Taylor’s Behaviour Consistent? No Yes Just an Need to ask unusual more situation questions  Explaining Taylor’s Behaviour Distinctive? Yes No External Internal Yes No Consensus?  Covariation Model Consistency Consensus Distinctive Attribution high high high external (stimulus or situation) high low low internal (person) high low high interaction  Correspondence Bias and FAE ▪ Correspondence bias (CB): The tendency to infer that traits correspond to behaviour (Jones & Harris, 1967) ▪ Fundamental attribution error (FAE): The tendency to over-attribute behaviour to personality traits and underestimate situational influences (Ross, 1977)  Quiz Show Paradigm ▪ Ross, Amabile, & Steinmetz (1977): Ps randomly assigned to role of Contestant or Questioner Questioner prepares 10 challenging questions Second study: added the role of an Observer DV = ratings for Contestant and Questioner on general knowledge  Questioner’s Knowledge Contestant’s Knowledge 90 80 Ratings of general knowledge 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Ross, Amabile, & Steinmetz (1977)  Quiz Show Paradigm cont’d. Contestants answered 4 of the 10 questions correctly No difference in Questioners’ ratings of their own knowledge and Contestants’ knowledge Both Contestants and Observers rated the Questioners as more knowledgeable than the Contestants Influence of social roles was underestimated  Actor-Observer Effect Actor-Observer Bias: The tendency to attribute our own behaviour mainly to external (situational) causes but the behaviour of others mainly to internal (dispositional) causes ▪ Making attributions about other people’s behaviour? Focus on dispositional factors ▪ Making attributions about own behaviour? Focus on situational factors  Actor-Observer Effect cont’d. ▪ Altered via perspective-taking Both physical and psychological Observers: Dispositional Situational attributions attributions Actors: Situational Dispositional attributions attributions  (Some) Reasons for these Biases ▪ Perceptual salience Focus on person more than the situation when observing others; focus on the situation when observing our own behaviour ▪ Situations lack salience Notice the situation, but give it less weight ▪ Insufficient cognitive resources ▪ Cultural differences Western cultures: dispositional Eastern cultures: situational Taylor & Fiske (1975)  (Some) Reasons for these Biases cont’d. ▪ Insufficient cognitive resources Automatically make internal attributions With enough time, energy, or motivation, we might consider situational factors Witness Dispositional Consider Change behaviour attribution situation attribution Automatic Effortful  Definition ▪ Attitude: A relatively stable organisation of beliefs, feelings, and behavioural tendencies toward people, objects, ideas, or events An evaluation toward the categories listed above Tripartite Model of Attitudes Affective Behavioural Attitude object Cognitive  Explicit vs. Implicit Attitudes ▪ Explicit attitudes Conscious, deliberate ▪ Implicit attitudes Unconscious, automatic  1 2 3 4 5 Very cold Cold Neutral Warm Very warm -2 -1 0 1 2 Strongly Dislike Neutral Like Strongly dislike like 1 2 3 4 5 Strongly Mildly Equally Mildly Strongly prefer X prefer X prefer X prefer Y prefer Y to to Y to Y and Y to X X  Implicit Association Test (IAT) ▪ Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz (1998) ▪ Based on the idea that two particular concepts are strongly associated ▪ In some blocks of trials, compatible or congruent stimuli are responded to on a single response key e.g., flowers and “good” words; insects and “bad” words  IAT cont’d. ▪ Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz (1998) ▪ Should take longer to respond to incongruent pairings ▪ IAT effect: difference in response latency between congruent and incongruent trials Provides an index of the strength of the association  How the IAT Works Objects already Classification Responses associated in is easy are quick our minds? Objects An index of Classification inconsistent Responses in our is difficult are slow minds?  How the IAT Works Responses are quick Difference = strength of association An index of implicit attitudes Responses are slow Flower—Insect Example Greenwald et al. (1998)  Other Attitude Measures ▪ Physiological indices Heart rate, skin conductance, pupil dilation, eye-blink startle reflex, facial electromyography, event-related brain potentials o Polygraph test (lie detector) ▪ Unobtrusive measures Archival evidence, non-verbal behaviour ▪ Bogus pipeline  Next lecture Social Perception II