Ch. 18: Social Psychology

Front 1

What do social psychologists study?

Back 1

how we think about, influence, and relate to one another

Front 2

what are attitudes?

Back 2

-feelings based on our beliefs that predispose our reactions to objects, people, and events
-guide our actions sometimes

Front 3

attribution theory

Back 3

-how people explain explain others' behavior
-people usually attribute other's behavior either to their internal dispostions (personality) or to their external situations (environment)

Front 4

fundamental attribution error

Back 4

-the tendency for observers to underestimate the impact of the situation and to overestimate the impact of personality

Front 5

foot-in-the-door phenomenon

Back 5

the tendency for people who have first agreed to a small requewt to comply later with a larger request

Front 6

role playing

Back 6

Zimbardo assigned the roles of guards and prisoners to random students and found that guards and prisoners developed role appropriate attitudes
-had to stop study because it got out of hand; people changed attitudes

Front 7

congnitive dissonance

Back 7

-when we are aware that our attitudes and actions don't coincide we experience tension
-we change our attitudes to get rid of this

Front 8

conformity

Back 8

adjusting one's behavior or thinking to coincide with a group standard

Front 9

chameleon effect

Back 9

we unconsciously mimic others' expressions, postures, and voice tones to help us feel what they are feeling

Front 10

Milgram's obedience studies

Back 10

-tells subjects he is interested in the effect of punishment on learning
-one is teacher and the other is the learner
-learner led to adjoining room
-you sit in front of the electric shock machine with 30 switches that go from 15 to 450 volts
-the learner must learn word pairs
-63% of men complied fully

Front 11

social loafing

Back 11

the tendency for people in group to exert less effort when pooing their efforts toward attaining a common goal than when individually accountable

Front 12

social facilitation

Back 12

improved performance of tasks in the presence of others - occurs with simple or well-learned tasks but not with tasks that are difficult or not yet mastered

Front 13

deindividuation

Back 13

-the loss of self-awareness and self-restraint in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity (mob behavior)