unit 14

• social cognition 


  how we think about ourselves and others in social situations
• social influence 


  how we are influenced by others in a social situation
• social behavior 


  how we behave in social situations
• self-schema


  a construct about himself and his experiences
• possible selves 


  aspects of ourselves that we either aspire to be or could conceivably be
• self-serving biases 


  tendencies to perceive ourselves in a positive light
• attribution


  the way in which we explain the causes or cause of a behavior
• internal attribution 


  an assumption that behavior is driven by such internal characteristics as traits or feelings
• external attribution 


  responding to external stimuli
• stable attributions 


  internal and stable attributes within a given person
• unstable attribution


  attributing achievements and such to hard work rather than just "being smart"
• attribution theory 


  Fritz Heider: causes of behaviors compromise two dimensions, internal vs external and stable vs unstable
• just- world hypothesis 


  states that we all need to believe in a "just world" in which people get what they deserve and deserve what they get
• actor-observer bias


  we have a tendency to attribute internal, stable explanations of behaviors when we observe other peoples behaviors, but we attribute external or temporary explanations of behaviors when we explain our own behaviors
• fundamental attribution error 


  the tendency to attribute others behaviors to internal and stable factors while ignoring external and unstable factors
• intimate attribution error 


  when we apply the fundamental attribution error to an entire group
• attitudes


  how you feel towards various objects
• cognitive dissonance 


  Leon festinger: identifies the discomfort felt when we hold two contradictory views simultaneously or act in a way that conflicts with our beliefs.
• role playing


  people assume the characteristics of the roles they play. being confident (holding your head higher, sitting with more pose etc) will elicit more testosterone In someone, essentially taking on the role of confidence
• Philip zimbardo


  did the prisoner guard experiment and coined the Lucifer effect
• primary effect


  explains that information that comes early has a greater persuasive power than information that comes later
• recency effect


  information that comes to an individual more recently has more persuasion over their actions than information that came to them longer ago
• reason vs emotion 


  important in persuasion and persuasion research
• elaboration likelihood 


  part of a model of attitudes and persuasions that takes two routes: central route and the peripheral route
• central route 


  reason and logic and an audience highly motivated to think and make decisions about the topic at hand.
• peripheral route 


  relies on emotion or other superficial factors, which can be effective if the audience is not especially motivated to think about the topic or make good decisions.
• foot-in-the-door approach 


  based on the idea that if you ask people to do a small thing first, they are much more likely to comply with a larger request
• door-in-the-face approach 


  you begin by asking people for a very large request, a request that most people will not comply with, but then ask them for a smaller request later they are more likely to comply.
• normative social influence


  when your behavior is influenced by social norms
• informational social influence 


  provides non-coercive information that helps solve a problem or make a decision
• conformity 


  behavior that is in accord with accepted group standards
• Solomon asch 


  gestalt psychologist, studied how other people influence our opinions
• stanley milgram 


  randomly assigned subjects to be a "learner" or a "teacher"
• debrief 


  after an experiment you tell the person being experimented on that it was in fact an experiment so that they don't get traumatized.
• social facilitation 


  when your performance is enhanced by the presence of others
• social inhibition 


  your performance is poorer when you are watched by others
• social loafing


  the tendency to exert less effort when working in a group if individual effort cannot be measured independently.
• deindividuation


  the loss of identity as a result of participation in a larger group, which lessons the sense of personal responsibility for ones actions and can lead to a higher degree of aggression.
• risky shift


  the shift from a 50/50 decision to a riskier decision
• group polarization 


  the tendency for people to hold even more extreme views on topics after group discussion of like-minded people .