©Prentice Hall 2003 14-1

Understanding Psychology6th Edition

Charles G. Morris and Albert A. Maisto

PowerPoint Presentation byH. Lynn Bradman

Metropolitan Community College

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-2

Chapter 14

Social Psychology

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-3

What Is Social Psychology?

• The scientific study of the ways in which the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of an individual are influenced by the real or imagined behavior of others.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-4

Social Cognition

• Impression formation• Attribution• Interpersonal attraction

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-5

Impression Formation

• Schemata• Primacy effect• Self-fulfilling prophecies• Stereotypes

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-6

Schemata

• The use of schemata speeds information processing.

• Schematic processing aids in encoding and recall of personal information.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-7

Primacy Effect

• The theory that early information about someone weighs more heavily than later information in influencing one’s impression of that person.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-8

Self-Fulfilling Prophecies

• The process in which a person’s expectation about another elicits behavior from the second person that confirms the expectation.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-9

Stereotypes

• A special type of schema about members of a social category.

• Stereotypes may contribute to self-fulfilling prophecies.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-10

Attribution Theory

• The theory that addresses the question of how people make judgments about the causes of behavior.

• Behavior is typically explained as being the result of either internal or external factors.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-11

Three Types of Information Used to Determine Causality

• Distinctiveness: – Uniqueness of circumstances

• Consistency: – Degree to which behavior is typical of the

individual in similar circumstances

• Consensus: – Degree to which behavior in this

circumstance is typical of most people

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-12

Biases in Attributions

• Fundamental attribution error• Defensive attribution• Just-world hypothesis

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-13

Fundamental Attribution Error

• The tendency of people to overemphasize personal causes for other people’s behavior and to underemphasize personal causes for their own behavior.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-14

Defensive Attribution

• Sometimes referred to as the self-serving bias.

• Our successes are attributed to internal factors

• Our failures are attributed to external factors.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-15

Just-World Hypothesis

• An attribution error based on the assumption that bad things happen to bad people and good things happen to good people.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-16

Factors Involved in Interpersonal Attraction

• Proximity: – How close two people live to each other.

• Physical attractiveness: – We tend to ascribe a host of positive

qualities to physically attractive individuals.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-17

Factors Involved in Interpersonal Attraction

• Similarity: – We tend to be attracted to people who

share our attitudes, interests, values, and beliefs.

• Exchange: – We are attracted to those individuals with

whom we exchange rewards.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-18

Exchange

• Equity: – We prefer to have equitable (equal give and

take) relationships.

• Gain-loss theory: – We prefer increases in positive evaluation

by others to steady positive evaluation.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-19

Factors Involved in Interpersonal Attraction

• Intimacy: – The quality of genuine closeness and trust

achieved in communication with another person.

• Self-disclosure: – The revealing of personal experiences and

opinions.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-20

Attitudes

• Attitudes are important because they often influence behavior.

• We cannot always tell people's attitudes from their actions.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-21

What is an attitude?

• A relatively stable organization of beliefs, feelings, and behavior tendencies directed toward something or someone—the attitude object.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-22

Three Components of an Attitude

• Evaluative beliefs about the attitude object

• Feelings toward the attitude object• Behavioral tendencies toward the

attitude object

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-23

Self-Monitoring

• The tendency for one to observe a situation for cues about how to react.

• High self-monitors may change their behavior to meet the demands of the situation.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-24

How Do We Acquire Our Attitudes?

• From early, direct personal experiences• Parents, teachers, friends, famous

people• The mass media

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-25

Prejudice and Discrimination

• Prejudice: – An unfair, intolerant, or unfavorable attitude

toward a group of people.

• Discrimination: – An unfair act or series of acts taken toward

an entire group of people or individual members of that group.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-26

Sources of Prejudice

• Frustration-aggression theory• Authoritarian personality

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-27

Frustration-Aggression Theory

• The theory that under certain circumstances people who are frustrated in their goals turn their anger away from the proper, powerful target toward another, less powerful target that is safer to attack.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-28

Authoritarian Personality

• A personality pattern characterized by rigid conventionality, exaggerated respect for authority, and hostility toward people who defy society’s norms.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-29

Two Types of Racism

• Modern racism: – A subtle and less extreme form of prejudice

reflected by agreement with statements that civil rights groups are too extreme or that African Americans receive more respect and benefits than they deserve.

• Institutional racism: – Discrimination that occurs because of the

overall effect of institutions and policies.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-30

Using the Contact Hypothesis to Reduce

Prejudice• Members of opposing groups must have

equal status.• One-on-one contact is necessary.• Contact improves under cooperation.• The social norms should encourage

contact.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-31

The Process of Persuasion

• Must attend to the message,• Comprehend the message,• And accept it as convincing

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-32

Four Elements of Effective Persuasion

• The source• The message• The medium of communication• Characteristics of the audience

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-33

The Source

• Must appeal to the audience • Must be credible

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-34

The Message

• Novel arguments are more persuasive than old arguments.

• The message is more successful when both sides of arguments are presented.

• The use of fear sometimes works.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-35

The Medium of Communication

• The most effective medium is face-to-face appeals or the lessons of our own experience.

• Writing is best suited for complex arguments.

• Videotape or live media is best for an audience that already grasps the basics of an argument.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-36

Characteristics of the Audience

• Certain personality characteristics make some people more susceptible to attitude change:– People with low self-esteem are more easily

influenced.– Highly intelligent people tend to resist

persuasion because they can think of counterarguments more easily.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-37

Characteristics of the Audience

• Attitudes are most resistant to change if:– The audience has a strong commitment to

its present attitudes.– Those attitudes are shared by other people.– The attitudes were instilled during early

childhood by such pivotal groups as the family.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-38

Cognitive Dissonance

• Perceived inconsistency between two cognitions (a piece of knowledge or a belief).

• An unpleasant psychological tension is created and we want to alleviate this tension.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-39

Cognitive Dissonance

• Attitude change can occur due to cognitive dissonance if a small reward is given for a behavior that is attitude discrepant.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-40

Ways to Reduce Cognitive Dissonance

• Increase the number of thoughts that support one of the beliefs.

• Reduce the importance of one of the cognitions.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-41

Social Influence

• The process by which others individually or collectively affect one’s perceptions, attitudes, and actions.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-42

Social Influence and Culture

• Culture: – All the goods, both tangible and intangible,

produced in a society.

• Cultural truism: – The belief that most members of a society

accept as self-evidently true.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-43

Social Influence and Culture

• Norm: – A shared idea or expectation about how to

behave.

• Cultural norm: – A behavioral rule shared by an entire

society.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-44

Conformity

• Voluntarily yielding to social norms, even at the expense of one’s own preferences.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-45

Asch’s Findings

• Overall, subjects conformed on about 35% of the trials.

• Two factors influence the likelihood a person will conform:– Characteristics of the situation– Characteristics of the individual

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-46

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-47

Characteristics of the Situation

• Size of the group: – Likelihood of conformity increases until four

confederates are present

• Degree of unanimity– Just one “ally” eases the pressure to

conform

• Nature of task: – When task is difficult, poorly defined, or

ambiguous there is higher conformity

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-48

Characteristics of the Individual

• Likelihood to conform increases when one:

• Is attracted to the group• Expects future interaction with the

group• Has low status in the group• Does not feel completely accepted

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-49

Compliance

• A change of behavior in response to an explicit request from another person or group.– Foot-in-the-door effect– Lowball procedure– Door-in-the-face effect

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-50

Foot-in-the-Door Effect

• Once people have granted a small request, they are more likely to comply with a larger request.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-51

Lowball Procedure

• First, one must be induced to agree to do something.

• Then, the cost of compliance is raised.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-52

Door-in-the-Face Effect

• A person initially refuses to grant a large request, but agrees to grant a smaller second request.

• This technique may work because people interpret the smaller request as a concession by the person asking for the request.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-53

Obedience

• A change of behavior in response to a command from another person, typically an authority figure.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-54

Milgram’s Obedience Studies

• Classic work by Stanley Milgram showed that many people were willing to obey orders to administer harmful shocks to other people.

• This obedience to an authority figure was more likely when certain situational factors were present.

• For example, people found it harder to disobey when the authority figure issuing the order was nearby.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-55

Milgram’s Obedience Studies

• They were also more likely to obey the command when the person being given the shock was some distance from them.

• According to Milgram, obedience is brought on by the constraints of the situation.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-56

Factors Influencing Obedience

• The amount of power vested in the person giving orders.

• Surveillance: – Whether or not someone is watching you

• Whether or not responsibility for actions is shared. – If it is, then one is more likely to obey.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-57

Social Action

• Deindividuation: – The more anonymous people feel in a

group, the less responsible they feel as individuals.

• Helping behavior• Group decision making• Organizational behavior

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-58

Helping Behavior

• Altruistic behavior: – Helping behavior that is not linked to

personal gain.

• Bystander effect: – The tendency for an individual’s helpfulness

in an emergency to decrease as the number of bystanders increase.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-59

Factors Influencing Helping

• Situational variables– Presence of other people– Ambiguity of situation

• Personal characteristics– Amount of personal responsibility felt– Amount of empathy felt– One’s present mood

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-60

Group Decision Making

• Group polarization: – Group discussion leads attitudes to be more

extreme

• Risky shift: – Greater willingness to take risks in decision

in a group

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-61

Factors Affecting Group Effectiveness

• Nature of the task• Resources of group members• Interaction among members• Group size• Cohesiveness• Social loafing:

– Tendency to exert less effort on a task when working in a group

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-62

Leadership

• Great person theory: – Leadership is a result of personal qualities

and traits that qualify one to lead others.

• Today this theory is rejected because it ignores social and economic factors.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-63

Transactional View of Leadership

• A number of factors interact to determine who becomes a leader:– Traits of the potential leader– Aspects of the situation in which the group

finds itself– Response of the group and the leader to

each other

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-64

Fiedler’s Contingency Model

• There are two types of leaders:– Task-oriented; Mainly focuses on doing the

task well – Relationship-oriented; Focuses on

maintaining group harmony and cohesiveness

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-65

Effectiveness of Leadership Styles

• The effectiveness of leadership style depends on:– The nature of the task.– The relationship between the leader and

group.– The leader’s ability to exercise the proper

amount of power over the group.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-66

Effectiveness of Leadership Styles

• Task-oriented leadership is more effective when conditions are either very favorable or unfavorable for the leader.

• Relationship-oriented leadership is more effective when conditions are moderately favorable for the leader.

©Prentice Hall 2003 14-67

Industrial/Organizational (I/O) Psychology

• I/O psychology is concerned with the application of psychological principles to the problems of human organizations.

• Hawthorne effect: – The principle that people will alter their

behavior because of researcher’s attention and not necessarily because of any treatment condition.