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Social psychology

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The branch of psychology that studies how people think, feel, and behave in social situations

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Social cognition

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Study of the mental processes people use to make sense of their social environment

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Social influence

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Study of the effects of situational factors and other people on an individual's behavior

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Personal perception

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The mental processes we use to form judgments and draw conclusions about the characteristics and motives of others

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The four principles of personal perception

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1. Your reactions to others are determined by your perceptions of them, not by who or what they really are 2. Your goals determine the amount and kind of information you collect about others 3. You evaluate people partly in terms of how you expect them to act 4. Your self-perception influences how you perceive others

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Social norms

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The "rules" or expectations, for appropriate behavior in a particular situation

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Social categorization

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Mental process of categorizing people into groups on the basis of their shared characteristics

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Implicit personality theory

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A network of assumptions or beliefs about the relationships among various types of people, traits, and behaviors

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Physical attractiveness stereotype

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Commonly associated with a variety of desirable traits while actually not correlated with intelligence, mental health, or self-esteem

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Attribution

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The mental process of inferring the causes of your own and other people's behavior

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Fundamental attribution terror

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The tendency to attribute the behavior of others to internal, personal characteristics, while ignoring or underestimating the effects of external, situational factors

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Blaming the victim

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Tendency to blame an innocent victim of misfortune for having somehow caused the problem or for not having taken steps to avoid or prevent it

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Just-world hypothesis

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Assumption that the world is fair and that therefore people get what they deserve and deserve what they get

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Actor-observer discrepancy

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Tendency to attribute one's own behavior to external, situational causes, while attributing the behavior of others to internal, personal causes

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Self-serving bias

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The tendency to attribute successful outcomes of one's own behavior to internal causes and unsuccessful outcomes to external, situational causes

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Collectivistic cultures

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Cultures that emphasize the needs and goals of the individual over the needs and goals of the group

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Individualistic cultures

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Cultures that emphasize the needs and goals of the group over the needs and goals of the individual

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Attitude

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A learned tendency to evaluate some object, person, or issue in a particular way; such evaluations may be positive, negative or ambivalent

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Cognitive dissonance

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An unpleasant state of psychological tension or arousal (dissonance) that occurs when two thoughts or perceptions (cognitions) are inconsistent. This psychological tension can come about due to an inconsistency between a cognition and an action

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Prejudice

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An evaluative attitude, which is typically negative, toward people who belong to a specific social group

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Stereotype

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Cluster of characteristics that are associated with all members of a specific social group

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In-group

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A social group to which one belongs

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Out-group

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A social group to which one does not belong

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Out-group homogeneity effect

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Tendency to see members of out-groups as very similar to one another

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In-group bias

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Tendency to judge the behavior of in-group members favorably and out-group members unfavorably

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Ethnocentrism

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Belief that one's own culture or ethnic group is superior to all others

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Robbers Cave experiment

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An experiment by psychologist Muzafer Sherif that demonstrated how easily hostility and distrust could be created between two groups and, more important, how that hostility could be overcome

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Jigsaw classroom technique

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An experiment by psychologist Elliot Aronson that demonstrated how cooperative efforts between members in a classroom can help promote intergroup harmony

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Group conflict

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As demonstrated by social psychologist, group tension can be increased by engaging in competitive behavior and decreased by engaging in interdependent and cooperative behaviors

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Steps to combat prejudice

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The three steps are as follows: 1. Make a conscious decision that prejudice is wrong 2. Internalize that belief so it comes part of your self-concept 3. Inhibit prejudicial reactions and deliberately replace them with nonprejudicial responses

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Racism

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An institutionalized form of discrimination against a particular group of people that is based on the face of those people

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Discrimination

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A behavior, typically negative, against an individual on the basis of that individual's membership in a particular group

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Social influence

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Study of the effects of situational factors and other people on an individual's behavior

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Conformity

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Tendency to adjust one's behavior, attitudes, or beliefs to group norms in response to real or imagined group pressure

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Asch conformity studies

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The purpose of these studies was to determine if people would conform to a group even if the group was clearly wrong. In this study, subjects were asked to pick a comparison line that most matched an example line. This was a simple, objective task with an obvious answer. However, when subjects were put in a room with other people, and those other people selected an obviously wrong answer, there was a tendency to conform to the group, even though this meant selecting an obviously incorrect answer.

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Normative social influence

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Behavior that is motivated by the desire to gain social acceptance and approval

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Informational social influence

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Behavior that is motivated by the desire to be correct

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Obedience

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The performance of an action in response to the direct orders of an authority or person of higher status

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Milgram's obedience experiment

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The purpose of the experiment was to investigate obedience to authority figures. In this experiment, "teachers" were instructed to administer progressively strong electric shocks to the "learners" whenever they gave an incorrect answer. The results were that the majority administered the maximum possible shocks, even though they believed the shocks were both very painful and dangerous

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Altruism

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Helping another preson with no expectation of personal reward or benefit

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Prosocial behavior

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Any behavior that helps another, whether the underlying motive is self-serving or selfless

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Feel good, do good effect

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The tendency for people who feel good, successful, happy, or fortunate to help others

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Bystander effect

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The phenomenon where bystanders (those who witness an emergency situation) do not intervene. Diffusion of responsibility and other feelings are other reasons why people do not intervene. Some of these include: feeling that intervening is too much trouble; feeling foolish by intervening when no intervention is needed (as in the boy who cried wolf); worrying about safety issues, or that intervening is too much trouble, especially if one has to wait around for hours to tell a story fo the police.

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Diffusion of responsibility

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Phenomenon in which the presence of other people makes it less likely that any individual will help someone in distress because the obligation to intervene is shared among all the on-lookers

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Social loafing

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The tendency to expend less effort on a task when it is a group effort

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Social facilitation

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The tendency for the presence of other people to enhance individual effort

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Deindividuation

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Reduction of self-awareness and inhibitions that can occur when a person is a party of a group whose members feel anonymous

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Rule of reciprocity

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The tendency to feel obligated if someone gives you something or does you a favor

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Rule of commitment

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The tendency to feel psychological and interpersonal pressures to behave consistently with a prior public commitment

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Persuasion

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The deliberate attempt to influence the attitudes or behavior of another person in a situation in which that person has some freedom of choice

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