Psychology 100:12Psychology 100:12

Chapter 15.2 Chapter 15.2

Social PsychologySocial Psychology

Outline

• Perceiving others

• Attitudes– Cognitive dissonance– Persuasion

• Social Impact

Study Question:• Describe cognitive dissonance. How can it be used as a

form of persuasion.

Social Psychology

• Biases in perceiving others– Fundamental attribution error -> too much emphasis on

dispositional factors when attributing causes of other’s behaviour

> Gives us a sense of control

– Actor-observer discrepancy -> we tend to make the fundamental attribution error judging other’s but not our own behaviour

– The self-serving bias -> Actor-observer discrepancy only holds for negative behaviour

– The primacy effect -> We weight first

impressions too heavily>Asch’s (1946) experiment

Intelligent & industrious, impulsive and critical, stubborn & envious

Stubborn & envious , impulsive and critical, intelligent & industrious

– Undue influence of surface characteristics>Attractive people: more intelligent, competent,

sociable and moral Neophyllus adults: more naive, honest, helpless, kind

and warm

Social Psychology

– Stereotypes -> Schema for identifiable groupsE.g,

> Women are less competent than men Both men and women attribute successful

performance • to luck (situational) for women• to skill (dispositional) for men

Social Psychology

– Ingroup/outgroup -> We have different schema for people in our group than for people out of our group>Ingroup is more heterogenous, rated more

favourably Ethnocentricism

>Outgroup is more homogenous, rated less favourably Even when groups are defined arbitrarily

Social Psychology

– The “Just-world” bias -> defensively assume that the world is fair

>Thorton’s experiment Women judged the fault of a victim in a rape

scenario Those who could see themselves in a mirror

blamed the victim

Social Psychology

Social cognition

• Attitude: An evaluative belief– LaPiere’s (1934)Study

> Visited 50 hotels and 200 restaurants with Chinese couple Only refused service by one hotel.

> Wrote to same hotels and restaurants 92 % said they would NOT serve Chinese.

• Functions and components of attitudes> Very influenced by social context

1. Attitudes are far removed from sensory experience.2. Attitutes hold strategic purposes in social interactions.

– Three components1. Cognitive: Beliefs2. Affective: Emotional reaction3. Behavioural: Actions

Social Psychology

Social Cognition

– Other factors> Subjective norms: Attitudes of people close to us.> Perceived control: Perceived environmental constraints.

– The relationship between cognition and behaviour> Three forms. E.g., A negative attitude towards GMPs.

Irrelevant: e.g., Lobster for supper. Consonant: e.g., Grow your own vegetables Dissonant: e.g., Still eat lots of tofu, corn and canola oil.

– Cognitive Dissonance> Festinger and Carlsmith’s (1959) forced compliance procedure.

Social Psychology

• Cognitive dissonance– How do we resolve dissonance?

1. Change your attitude Towards eating worms (Comer & Laird, 1975) Towards spending a lot of money on a car

• Low balling and dissonance

2. Change your behaviour Quit smoking

Social Psychology

Social Cognition

– Postdecisional dissonance>We focus on the positive aspect of our choices

E.g., University, car model, where we live, etc. Selective exposure and denial

• We seek out positive information and avoid negative

• E.g., Smoking.

– Justifying effort>E.g.s, Hazing and other cult initiations.

Social Psychology

Social Cognition

• Persuasion: The active and conscious effort to change attitudes through the transmission of a message.

– The Peripheral and central routes to processing>Controlled and automatic processing

– The peripheral and central routes to persuasion>Langer’s experiment

5 or 20 copies No reason, pseudo-reason, or logical reason “Because” is analyzed only for large requests

Social Psychology

Social Cognition

Peripheral cues:Source, content, and receiver

Social Psychology

Social Cognition

• Making attributions from behaviour– Attribution: An inference about the cause of a

behaviour.

– Fritz Heider -> People are naive psychologists. > We can attribute behaviour to:

1. Personality or internal characterstics (Dispositional)2. External factors (Situational) E.g., Someone screams during a movie

– While watching Hostel -> Situational– While watching Bambi -> Dispositional

Social Psychology

Social Cognition

• Kelley’s model– People take into account three factors

1. Consistency across time. Does the person always scream during horror

movies?

2. Consensus across people. Are other people watching the movie screaming

too?

3. Distinctiveness across situations. Does this person scream in other situations as

well?

Social Psychology

YES YES NO Situation

YES NO YES Disposition

YES NO NO Both

NO N/A N/A Extraneous

Does she always Scream at movies?

Is everyonescreaming?

Does she scream inOther situations?

Attribution

Social Psychology – Three questions asked before making an

attribution.