Chapter 14

• Social Psychology


  The field of psychology that studies the nature and causes of behavior and mental processes in social situations
• Social Psychology


  • Effects of social influences on individuals
• Changing attitudes through persuasion


  Persuasion
• Elaboration likelihood model


  Describes the way in which people respond to persuasive messages, evaluated on the basis of central and peripheral cues
• Elaboration likelihood model


  • Two routes to persuading others to change attitudes: Central route (inspires thoughtful consideration of arguments and evidence) and Peripheral route (associates objects with positive or negative cues or rewards)
• Factors in persuasion

  • The message
  • The messenger
  • The context of the message
  • The audience
• Factors in persuasion - The message


  • Repeated exposure to people and things enhances their appeal
  • Forewarning about the arguments of the opposition creates some sort of psychological immunity to them
  • Fear appeal (type of persuasive communication that influences behavior on the basis of arousing fear instead of rational analysis)
• Factors in persuasion - The messenger

  • Characterized by expertise, trustworthiness, attractiveness, or similarity to the audiences
• Factors in persuasion - The context of the message

  • When we are in a good mood, we apparently are less likely to evaluate situations carefully
• Factors in persuasion - The audience

  • People with high self-esteem and low social anxiety are more likely to resist social pressure
• Prejudice


  Attitude toward a group that leads people to evaluate members of a group negatively even though they have never met them
• Prejudice

  • Cognitive level (linked to expectations that they will behave poorly)
  • Emotional level (associated with negative feelings such as fear, dislike, or hatred)
  • Behavioral terms (connected with avoidance, aggression, and discrimination)
• Discrimination

  Hostile behavior directed against groups toward whom one is prejudiced
• Stereotyping


  Erroneous assumptions that all members of a group share the same traits or characteristics
• Sources of prejudice


  • Dissimilarity
  • Social Conflict
  • Social Learning
  • Information Processing
  • Social categorization
• Attribution

  Belief concerning why people behave in certain way
• Dispositional attribution


  Assumption that person's behavior is determined by internal causes such as personal traits
• Situational attribution


  Assumption that person's behavior is determined by external causes such as social pressure
• Fundamental attribution error


  Assumption that others act predominantly on the basis of their dispositions, even when there is evidence suggesting the importance of their situations
• Actor-Observer Effect


  Tendency to attribute our own behavior to situational factors but to attribute the behavior of others to dispositional factors
• Self-serving bias


  The tendency to view one's successes as stemming from internal factors and one's failures as stemming from external factors
• Why people obey authority (Milgram studies)

  • Socialization: We learned to obey
  • Lack of social comparison: Having no other references
  • Perception of legitimate authority
  • Foot-in-the-door technique: It gets progressively harder to extricate themselves from the situation
  • Inaccessibility of values: The more emotionally involved, the less accessible their attitudes
  • Buffers between perpetrator and victim
• Conformity

  Change our behavior to adhere to social norms
• Conformity


  • Many norms have evolved because they promote comfort and survival, but they can also promote maladaptative behavior
  • Likelihood of conformity increases rapidly as group size grows, yet finding just one other person who supports your opinion is enough to encourage you
• Social facilitation


  The process by which a person's performance is increased when other members of a group engage in similar behavior
• Social facilitation

  • The presence of other people increases our levels of arousal or motivation
  • At high levels of arousal, our performance of simple tasks is facilitated, but our performance of complex responses may be impaired (Social inhibition)
  • Evaluation apprehension (concern that others are evaluating our behavior)
• Bystander effect


  Tendency to avoid helping other people in emergencies when other people are also present and apparently capable of helping
• Diffusion of responsibility


  The spreading or sharing of responsibility for a decision or behavior within a group
• Factors that make people more likely to help in an emergency

  • In a good mood
  • Empathic
  • An emergency exists
  • Assume responsibility
  • Know what to do
  • Know the person in trouble
  • Similarities