LB - Critical Social Psych

• Critical Social Psychology

  A theoretically-informed way of questioning what we know, why we know it, and the consequences that knowledge systems have in the real world
• Critical Social Psychology is a way of conceptualising the person and their experiences of the social world
• Critical Social Psychology

  • Takes a sceptical approach to what is considered 'truth', 'natural', or taken-for-granted
  • Ways of thinking about people, phenomenon, and populations is built through social interactions
• Social constructionism

  An interpretative approach to understanding how and why people make sense of their social worlds in the way that they do
• Social reality is constructed through three 'moments', and these moments constantly interplay with each other. These moments are: externalization, objectivation and internalization.
• The aim of critical social psychology to understand the consequences of the way social reality has been constructed and what this means for how people are treated
• Postcolonial Psychology

  • Focuses on how social knowledge, and subsequently power, is influenced by colonization and its aftermath
  • Aims to identify and challenge what is considered colonial imperatives
• Critical social psychology can be used to question and problematise existing theories and research, such as in the areas of personality and aggression
• Personality

  The dynamic organization within the individual of those psycho-physical systems that determine our unique adjustment to our environment
• Critical social psychologists argue that 'personality' is a construct that is used to categorise people that does not reflect who they are as 'people', and that these categories have been informed through sexist, ableist, classist, and racist lenses
• Personality measures

  • Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)
  • Big Five
• Aggression


  A behaviour intended to harm another individual
• Types of aggression


  • Hostile aggression
  • Proactive/instrumental aggression
  • Reactive/emotional aggression
• Traditionally, men are considered to be more aggressive than women, but this is based on a masculinised conceptualisation of aggression that focuses on physical forms
• Critical social psychologists argue that this accepted understanding of aggression as predominantly a male enterprise is problematic, as it fails to consider non-physical forms of aggression that are more commonly used by women
• CSP arguments for Personality

  • it categories a person, not reflect
  • these categories are informed by racist, sexist etc. lenses
• Goffman Dermaturgical Approach

  • Front Stage: masks presented to others
  • Backstage: shed public self, not really 'true' self