SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGYVIDEO-FILMING AND RESEARCH

GROUP MEMBERS: YAP CHOE HOONG (0323161)

ZACHARY OOI

ADAM WONG

THERESA THIA AI MIN (0323170)

SESSION: MONDAY (8.00 - 10.00 am)

SUBMISSION DATE: 1st FEBRUARY 2016

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First and foremost, who to thank most none other than our respectable lecturer, Mr. Shankar, for his comprehensive and clear lecture which enabled us to grasp the ideas taught upon us easily. On a side note, social psychology is not an easy subject to be fathom.

Up next, thanks to the contributing members Yap Choe Hoong, Theresa Thia Ai Min, Zachary Ooi and Adam Wong for the effort to make this video and assignment a success. All of us were dedicated to help and were very keen to film a great memorable video for ourselves and all!

Last but not least, we also wish to pay gratitude to our friends for being in the crew and casting team. They were very cooperative and were able to put up a good act to what was wanted for our film.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION2. METHOD3. PLOT4. CONCEPTS USED5. LITERATURE REVIEW6. CONCLUSION7. APPENDICE

INTRODUCTION

We are required to brainstorm and put together a few concepts in this video-filming of approximately 3 to 5 minutes. The motive is to test our understanding on the concepts learnt on different chapters and our ability to integrate the concepts and ideas in one single video. However, stories cannot be taken from anywhere. It helps us to be able to be flexible and versatile in critical thinking. It also gave us a much deeper insight on the social psychology concepts we chose to work on and their roles in daily life. It leads to improvement of innovative and creative thinking.

The video was filmed in different places with different people and we were able to expose ourselves to places to match and fit with our video background. Besides that, we were also able to interact with unknown people to improve our communication skills. It was really challenging and was very time consuming to record several times for a good angle.

Our story plot is about two young teens who are in love but their love was rejected and made forbidden by one of the parents who is a triad’s leader due to different family background. The concepts that we integrate are Mere Exposure Theory, In-Group Favouritism, Route Influences, and Cultural Norm. Our concepts are made obvious and simple to allow others to watch and learn more from our video.

METHOD

APPARATUS

The apparatus used for filming this video are a DSLR and an IPhone. We did not use a tripod which is why the outcome was quite shaky. Props like vape, cigarettes and poker cards were used for filming. We used Windows Movie Maker for editing the video.

PROCEDURE

11th January 2016, Monday:

We had our first meeting with all groupmates to discuss the plot and concepts for the video.

15th January 2016, Friday:

We had our second meeting to finalize the plot as well as set the dates for filming.

23rd January 2016, Saturday:

Our first day of filming. We filmed the almost every scenes.

24th January 2016, Sunday:

The second day of filming. We filmed the fighting and loan shark scenes which required people from other groups to help act in.

BROKE LOVE PLOT

The story starts off with a boy and a girl walking together in the park. While walking, the boy, Zac looks at Theresa, his close friend in university. He starts to get flashbacks about the times they spent together and believes that it is time to confess. He gives her a heart shaped leaf and confesses to her. She accepts. One day after class they exited the lift and entered the carpark. Theresa was just beginning to make plans for the day. She suggested to go to Sunway Pyramid. In their surprise, Theresa’s father, Mr Yap was there waiting at the carpark. It should be made clear here that Theresa comes from a very wealthy family, and Mr Yap is a highly successful and respected man in society. She greets her father and gets on the car as requested by him. With Theresa out of the picture, Mr Yap reveals his true colours to Zac. He refuses to shake Zac’s hand, all while making a discriminative face at Zac. He requests for Zac to meet him at a nearby café someday.

At the café, Mr Yap makes it clear that he does not want Zac to continue this relationship with his daughter. A distraught Zac is to be seen at the harbour, looking at the sea desolately. Zac’s close friend, Adam happens to walk by and notices Zac sitting alone. Adam is a very carefree person but a bad influence to his friends. He likes smoking and gambling. Adam walks over and asks if Zac is alright. Zac says he is not. Adam invites him to go over the casino for a gamble but Zac refuses, saying that he is not into gambling. Adam says he’ll see him around later.

On the second day while Zac was looking through Theresa’s pictures, he received a text from Adam, inviting him to the casino again. Zac refuses several times until Adam mentions that gambling will make him rich. Zac agrees to go gambling as he believes that if he becomes rich he will be accepted by Mr Yap, and He will get to continue his relationship with Theresa. At the casino, luck is seen to be by Zac’s side at every round. As he wins each round with increasing confidence, the gamblers around him are shocked by his luck, even Adam. At last, luck left Zac and he lost a round, losing a huge amount of money. He begins to borrow money from a loan shark boss. For the next consecutive days, Zac loses every round he gambles and his debt towards the loan shark accumulates to a massive sum. He even started smoking due to the immense pressure faced. All these unethical acts were snapped down in pictures and shown to Theresa by an angry Mr Yap. Theresa could not believe what she was seeing as Zac was a very good student.

Zac gets a final warning from the loan shark boss. He promises that it will be his last time and that he will pay back the amount of money to the boss. At the final round in the casino, Zac loses all his money once more. He storms out of the casino while Adam follows him. In anger, Zac shoves Adam to the ground and yells at him, blaming him for introducing gambling to him and causing him to lose everything. A few days later, Zac is seen to be sitting in an outdoor space, worrying about what he is going to do to repay the debt. He is found by the loan shark boss and this time, the boss brought all the other loan sharks to teach him a lesson. The loan shark boss yells at Zac, asking where his money is while Zac pleads him for mercy. The other loan sharks begin to give Zac a good whacking while the random strangers look on, shaking their head and not helping. The random strangers believe that Zac got what he deserved for being addicted to gambling.

After the whacking stops, an injured Zac lies on the ground, tossing around in pain while thinking, “I tried to get rich for you, but in the end, it broke me.” The video blacks out after that scene and returns back with a dark twist. Mr Yap passes money on to Adam, telling him to make sure to ruin Zac through gambling. The video ends.

CONCEPTS USED

MERE EXPOSURE THEORY

The Mere Exposure Theory discusses that the more frequent the exposure towards an object or person, the more favourable the attitude towards them. This is because familiarity causes us to become more comfortable in the presence of the object or person we are exposed to and start to develop positive feelings towards it. Humans tend to prefer familiar things over unfamiliar ones, which goes to show that constant exposure increases the attraction towards the object or person.

In our short video, the Mere Exposure Theory is highlighted when Zac mentions that he and Theresa sees each other every day, and do most of the activities together most of the time. Zac is attracted to Theresa due to the constant interaction and exposure he has with her throughout his days studying in University. He is already familiar with her attitude and behaviours and is comfortable around her. It is this secure feeling that has him attracted to her, as he already understands her and believes that after all these time together she understands him too. If given a choice to be in a relationship with someone, he would definitely choose Theresa over someone he has not interacted or been exposed to as much as with her, because he will not be that comfortable or secure around them.

ROUTE INFLUENCES (VALENCES)

The type of valence that is produced through a message received is a big factor when it comes to influencing which route we take or what decisions we make while faced with persuasion. Messages that elicit positive valences can be very useful when it comes to persuading people as it means that they evoke good thoughts or feelings such as hope and happiness. People will be more inclined to follow the route intended by the message as the positive valences will have them believe that following that route will bring positive results.

In the video, Adam’s text message towards Zac evoked positive valences which succeeded in persuading him to do what Adam wanted him to do. Zac was a very virtuous boy that stayed away from bad activities such as smoking and gambling. He rejected Adam a few times when Adam tried to persuade him to go gambling. When Adam sent a text message saying that gambling could make Zac rich, Zac immediately had hope that he could really earn enough money to become rich, and get approval from Mr Yap to date his daughter. All these thoughts influenced Zac to try out gambling as intended by Adam.

IN-GROUP FAVOURITISM

In-group favouritism is the positive bias that humans have towards members of their in-group, while potentially being prejudicial and discriminative towards members of their out-group. This behaviour is believed to be closely linked to the Social Identity Theory, which discusses that certain intergroup behaviours are affected by the perceived differences in group statuses and the perceived legitimacy as well as stability of those status differences. In-Group Favouritism can be distinct when a person believes that their in-group is of higher status than the out-group that another person belongs in.

In the video, Mr Yap displays clear signs of In-Group Favouritism through the discrimination and prejudice he has towards Zac, who is perceived to belong in his out-group due to their social wealth differences. Zac comes from a poor family, while Mr Yap is a successful and wealthy man. Mr Yap’s sense of social identity causes him to believe that Zac belongs in a lower social class. He does not want his daughter to have anything to do with Zac as it might bring down his daughter’s social identity. He also believes that rich people are better than poor people, and poor people are unable to provide a happy life for his daughter. Only people that are members of his in-group are capable of giving his daughter a comfortable life.

FRUSTRATION AGGRESSION

Frustration often occurs when a person is hindered from getting something that they have been expecting. In return, the person will direct some degree of aggression towards the source of interference as a result of the frustration inside them. In some cases, the source of interference cannot be touched or have the aggression directed to. In this case, the person will displace their aggression towards another available target, be it a person who happens to be nearby at the moment or a person who has some level of connection with the situation that has caused the frustration. Aggression is the hostile or violent behaviour towards another person with varying levels.

In the video, Zac displays aggressive behaviour when he shoves Adam to the ground and shouts at him. This contradicts with Zac’s usual behaviour as Zac is a very mellow and amiable person. The reason why Zac displayed this type of behaviour was because of his frustration. He was frustrated because he expected to win a huge of money and get rich by gambling. When he lost all his money, it resulted in a huge debt to be repaid to the loan sharks, and the frustration became too much to bear. He could not vent out his aggression towards the people who won his money at the casino, so when Adam followed him, he displaced that aggression towards Adam whilst blaming Adam for introducing the world of gambling to him.

CULTURAL NORMS

Cultural norms are the standards we live by. They are the shared expectations and rules that guide behaviour of people within social groups. Cultural norms are learned and reinforced from parents, friends, teachers and others while growing up in a society. As such, they are an  acceptable and expected way of behaving in any given social situation. Cultural norms play an important role in deciding whether or not a person decides to help another person in an emergency.

In the video, the random strangers chose not to help Zac when he was getting beaten up by the loan sharks due to the fact that they overheard the loan shark boss asking Zac where the money went. Gambling is a prominent activity in Chinese culture. Even so, it is still frowned upon among Chinese people to have the habit of excessive gambling till the extent where even loan sharks are involved. Because of this, the random strangers believe that Zac deserves the beating that he gets, and choose not to help him even though the situation was bad.

LITERATURE REVIEW

The main topic of our video would be social class discrimination. Classism is prejudice or discrimination on the basis of social class. It includes individual attitudes, behaviours, systems of policies, and practices that are set up to benefit the upper class at the expense of the lower class or vice versa. For example, middle-class and upper-class individuals in the U.S. referring to working class, white Americans as "poor white trash" can be regarded as a form of class prejudice, the insult having the capacity to be historically analogous to racist language against African-Americans. Based on Henri Tajfel's Social Identity Theory, certain intergroup behaviours are affected by the perceived differences in group statuses and the perceived legitimacy as well as stability of those status differences. In our video, social class discrimination is prominent throughout the whole plot as Mr Yap who comes from a rich background discriminates Zac who comes from a poor background.

CONCLUSION

The video was filmed in different places with different people and we were able to expose ourselves to places to match and fit with our video background. Besides that, we were also able to interact with unknown people to improve our communication skills. It was really challenging and was very time consuming to record several times for a good angle.

The second challenge was associating and integrating our videos with concepts learnt in class to fit well and logically. Research was carried out to study deeper into social discrimination where it is vastly happening around the globe. We did understand better and hope to be able to spread around the negative impact of prejudice, and hope to bring clarification and justification to social discrimination.

APPENDICE

Filming the casino scene on the first day

Filming the conflict scene on second day