SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY READINGS

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DAVID MYERS - McGRAW-HILL

TEXTBOOK CHAPTER 1

>>1 SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY is the scientific study of how peopl think about, influence and relate to one another

- Social Thinking - how we perceive others, what we believe, judgements we make, attitudes

- Social Influence - cluture, pressure to confirm, persuasion, groups of people

- Social Relations - prejudice, aggression, attraction and intimacy, helping

>>2 SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY'S BIG IDEAS

>SOCIAL THINKING

- we construct our social reality

- our social intuitions are powerful and sometimes perilous

- attitudes shape and are shaped by behavior

>SOCIAL INFLUENCES

- social influences shape behavior

- dispositions shape behavior

>SOCIAL RELATIONS

- social behavior is also biological behavior

- feelings and actions towards people are sometime negative and sometimes positive

>>3 HOW DO HUMAN VALUES INFLUENCE SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

>OBVIOUS INFLUENCES ON PSYCHOLOGY

- choice of research topics

- object of analysis

>SUBTLE INFLUENCES ON PSYCHOLOGY

- science is subjective

- personal values come to the fore - definition of the good life, professional advice, forming concepts, labelling

- hidden assumptions

>>4 COMMON SENSE?

- not simply common sense even though seems obvious

- called Hindsight Bias

>>5 RESEARCH METHODS

>FORMING AND TESTING HYPOTHESES

- a theory is an integrated set of principles that explain and predict observed events - "scientific shorthand" - ideas that summarize and explain facts - guess --> theory --> fact

- a theory implies a testable prediction called a hypotheses

- allow us to test a theory by trying to falsify it

- give direction to research

- predictive feature makes them practical

- a good theory summarizes many observations and makes a clear prediction

>CORRELATIONAL RESEARCH

- laboratory research controlled) vs field research (everyday situations)

- correlational (2 or more factors that are naturally associated) vs experimental (manipulating a factor to see its effect on another)

- correlational research deals with important variables but causes correlation errors - cause and effect

- correlations indicate a relationship but not a cause and effect - allow us to predict a result but not a cause and effect of changing a variable

- correlation causation

- correlation ranges from -1 to +1

>SURVEY RESEARCH

- aims to describe the whole population by taking a random, representative sample

- random means every person in the population has a chance of being selected

- 4 bias influences - unrepresentative samples, order of questions, response options, wording of questions

>EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCH

- looks for cause and effect by controlling independent variables

- 2 important ingredients - control and random assignment

- random assignment allows to conclude on cause and effect - it eliminates extraneous factors

>ETHICS

- mundane realism (like everyday behavior) vs experimental realism (must engage participants)

- deception a key element experimentation

- try to reduce demand characteristics

>>1 SPOTLIGHTS AND ILLUSIONS

- spotlight effect - belief that others are paying more attention to our appearance and behavior than they really are

- illusion of transparency - we think our concealed emotions leak out and can be easily read by others

- our social surroundings affect our self awareness

- self-interest colors our social judgement

- self-concern motivates our social behavior

- social relationships held define our sense of self

>>4 SELF-CONTROL

- self-control depletes our limited willpower reserves and leaves us tired and weak

- like muscles - weaker after exertion, replenished with rest and strengthened by exercise

- self-efficacy - a sense that one is competent and effective - distinguished from self-esteem

- locus of control - extent to which people perceive outcomes as internally controllable by their own efforts or as externally controlled by chance or outside forces - internal or external locus of control

- learned helplessness - the sense of hopelessness and resignation learned when a human or animal perceives no control over repeated bad events

- excess choice causes decreased life satisfaction and increased rates of clinical depression

>>2 SELF-CONCEPT

- self concept is what we know and believe about ourselves

- self-schema - beliefs about self that organise and guide the processing of self-relevant information (e.g. overweight, smart etc)

- social comparisons is the act of comparing one's abilities and opinions with others - we always compare upward and hence are prone to unhappiness

- individualism - concept of giving priority to your own goals over the group's goals; defining one's identity in terms of personal rather than group identifications

- collectivism - opposite of individualism

- independent self versus interdependent self - strongly influenced by culture

- self knowledge - we don't know ourselves like we think we do, and don't really know what makes us happy. We are poor at predicting our feelings.

- planning fallacy - underestimating how long it will take to do something

- dual attitude system - implicit (automatic) vs explicit (consciously controlled). Explicit can change quickly but implicit takes a long time and practice

>>3 SELF ESTEEM

- self-esteem - a person's overall self-evaluation or sense of self-worth

- most people very motivated to maintain their self-esteem, can be easily threatened and more so by people we know

- self-esteem acts as a gauge and corrects our behavior when it has been dented/hurt

- terror management theory - self-protective emotional and cognitive responses in response to a fear of death/mortality

- narcissism - the love of oneself

>>5 SELF-SERVING BIAS

- the tendency to perceive oneself favorably

- self-serving attributions - a form of self-serving bias, the tendency to attribute positive outcomes to oneself and negative outcomes to other factors

- people are all naturally optimistic and believe they are better than average

- defensive pessimism - the adaptive value of anticipating problems and harnessing one's anxiety to motivate effective action

- false consensus effect - the tendency to overestimate the commonality of one's opinions and undesirable or unsuccessful behavior's.

- false uniqueness effect - the tendency to underestimate the commonality of one's abilities and one's desirable or successful behavior's.

>>6 SELF-PRESENTATION

- self-handicapping - protecting one's self image with behavior's that create a handy excuse for later failure

- self-presentation - the act of expressing oneself and behaving in ways designed to create a favorable impression or an impression that corresponds with one's ideals.

- self-monitoring - being attuned to the way one presents oneself in social situations and adjusting one's performance to create the desired impression

MYERS CHP1

MYERS CHP2