1. Wadsworth, a division of Thomson Learning
Social Psychology
Wadsworth, a division of Thomson Learning

2. Social Psychology
Subfield in Psychology concerned with how individuals are influenced by others

3. Person Perception Defined-the process of forming impressions of others
Impressions are influenced by
physical appearance
good looking people are seen as intelligent, friendly, and confident
Schemas-organized clusters of ideas about categories of social events and people
Stereotypes
gender, race, job

4. Attitude Formation Components Cognitive Components-what you believe
Affective-How you feel about it
Behavioral-what you are willing to do about it

6. Attribution Theory
Defined-inferences that people draw about the causes of events, others’ behavior, and their own behavior
Function-People like to explain and understand behavior and the events that impact their lives
Attributions are made when an event is unusual and personal

7. Attributions-Internal or External?
Internal-Internal attributions assume behavior is due to personal characteristics
External-External attributions assume behavior is due to external demands or environmental conditions

9. Bias in Attribution
Actor-Observer Bias-actors favor external attributions for their behavior, while observers favor internal attributions
Defensive Attribution-when a victim is blamed for their misfortune, so that one feels less likely to be victimized in a similar way
Self-Serving Bias-tendency to attribute one’s successes to personal factors and one’s failures to situational factors

10. Attraction Contributors to Attraction Proximity-physical closeness
Physical attractiveness-pleasant physical appearance increases attraction
Similarity-commonalities between two people
Reciprocity-the tendency to like those who like you

11. Results of Attraction
Friendship-an attraction driven by a set of rules that must be followed for the relationship to continue
Examples of rules:
help when needed
trust and confide in each other
Love-the triangular theory of love

13. Conformity and Obedience
Conformity-yielding to social pressure
Asch’s Conclusions
1) subjects often conform to a group, even when the group states clearly inaccurate conclusions
2) conformity to a group increases with the size of the group, up to four, but only when the group is unanimous in its beliefs
Obedience
Milgram’s Conclusions
1) situational pressures can make people obey instructions that go against their belief systems

15. Behavior in Groups
Bystander Effect-people are less likely to help others when they are in groups than when they are alone
Social Loafing-individuals in groups produce less work than when working by themselves
reduced efficiency
reduced effort
Decision Making
group polarization-when group discussion leads to a more “polar” point of view by the group
groupthink-when group members feel pressure to conform to the group and cause these members to stop critically thinking to avoid dissention in the group
Ex: Kennedy and the Bay of Pigs

18. Prejudice and Discrimination
Prejudice-a negative attitude held toward members of a group
Composed of three parts:
beliefs (ex: “Hispanics are lazy”
emotions (ex: “I dislike blacks”
behavioral disposition (ex: I would never work with a homosexual)
Discrimination-behaving unfairly toward the members of a group