Social Psychology (Pp 3-14)

Elliot AronsonUniversity of California, Santa Cruz

Timothy D. WilsonUniversity of Virginia

Robin M. AkertWellesley College

slides by Travis LangleyHenderson State University

6th edition

Chapter 1Introducing

Social Psychology

“The head monkey at Paris puts on a traveller's cap, and all the monkeys in America do the same.”

–Henry David Thoreau

WHAT IS SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY?

Social psychologyThe scientific study of the way in which people's thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the real or imagined presence of other people.

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

• At the very heart of social psychology is the phenomenon of social influence: We are all influenced by other people.

• Social psychologists are interested in understanding how and why the social environment shapes the thoughts and feelings of the individual.

WHAT IS SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY?

Social InfluenceThe effect that the words, actions, or mere presence of other people have on our thoughts, feelings, attitudes, or behavior.

The Power of Social Interpretation

To understand social influence it is more important to understand how people perceive and interpret the social world than it is to understand that world objectively.

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

The term "construal" refers to the world as it is interpreted by the individual.

Given the importance placed on the way people interpret the social world, social psychologists pay special attention to the origins of these interpretations.

The Power of Social Interpretation

Example: Consider what happens in a murder trial.

• Even when the prosecution presents compelling evidence, these construals rest on a variety of events and perceptions that often bear no objective relevant evidence.

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

Example: Consider what happens in a murder trial.

• Even when the prosecution presents compelling evidence, these construals rest on a variety of events and perceptions that often bear no objective relevant evidence.

• Did a key witness hesitate before answering, suggesting to some jurors that she might not be certain of her data?

• Or did some jurors consider the witness too remote, arrogant, certain of herself?

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

A special kind of construal is what Lee Ross calls “naïve realism.”

Naïve RealismThe conviction all of us have that we

perceive things “as they really are.”

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

A special kind of construal is what Lee Ross calls “naïve realism.”

Naïve RealismThe conviction all of us have that we

perceive things “as they really are.”

Example:Although both Israelis and Palestinians understand intellectually that the other side perceives the issues differently, both sides resist compromise, fearing that their “biased” opponent will benefit more than they.

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

Another distinctive feature of social psychology is that it is an experimentally based science.

As scientists, our goal is to find objective answers to a wide array of important questions:

• What are the factors that cause aggression? • How might we reduce prejudice? • What variables cause two people to like or

love each other? • Why do certain kinds of political

advertisements work better than others?

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

How Else Can We Understand Social Influence?

Social psychologists approach the understanding of social influence differently than philosophers, journalists, or the lay person.

Social psychologists develop explanations of social influence through experiments in which the variables being studied are carefully controlled.

How Else Can We Understand Social Influence?

Why do people behave the way they do?

• One way to answer this question might be simply to ask them.

• The problem with this approach is that people are not always aware of the origins of their own responses and feelings.

Folk Wisdom

Although a great deal can be learned from “common sense” knowledge, there is at least one problem with relying entirely on such sources: They frequently disagree with one another, and there is no easy way of determining which of them is correct.

• Are we to believe that “out of sight is out of mind” or that “absence makes the heart grow fonder”?

• Which is true, that “haste makes waste” or that “he who hesitates is lost”?

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

Philosophy  • Throughout history, philosophy has been

a major source of insight about human nature.

• The creativity and analytical thinking of philosophers are a major part of the foundation of contemporary psychology.

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

• But what happens when philosophers disagree?

• Social psychologists address many of the same questions that philosophers address, but we attempt to answer them scientifically.

One of the tasks of the social psychologist is to make educated guesses (called hypotheses) about the specific situations under which one outcome or the other would occur.

• Just as a physicist performs experiments to test hypotheses about the nature of the physical world, the social psychologist performs experiments to test hypotheses about the nature of the social world.

• The next task is to design well-controlled experiments sophisticated enough to tease out the situations that would result in one or another outcome.

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

Common Sense vs Scientific Research

Social Psychology Quiz

Social Psychology Compared with Personality Psychology

• When trying to explain social behavior—how an individual act within a social context (in relation to others)--personality psychologists explain the behavior in terms of the person's individual character traits.Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

Social Psychology Compared with Personality Psychology

• While social psychologists would agree that personalities do vary, they explain social behavior in terms of the power of the social situation (as it is construed by the individual) to shape how one acts.

Source of image: Microsoft Office Online.

ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS:

(1) Do you often make contributions to class discussions in small seminars?

(2) Are you more of a talker than a listener on a first date?

(3) Do you regularly strike up conversations with strangers on buses or airplanes?

(4) Are you typically lively and outgoing at a party?

(5) Are you typically lively and outgoing with your close friends?

Raise your hand if you responded “yes” or “no” to

ALL OF THE QUESTIONS

PURPOSE OF EXERCISE:

To illustrate that personality traits do not account for all of the variance in social behavior

Since few students invariably will raise their hand. discuss the relative contributions of traits versus situational factors to behavior.

Social Psychology Compared with Sociology

• Sociologists are more concerned with why a particular society or group within a society produces behavior (e.g., aggression) in its members.

• The major difference is that sociology, rather than focusing on the psychology of the individual, looks toward society at large.

Social Psychology Compared with Other Social Sciences

The difference between social psychology and other social sciences in level of analysis reflects another difference between the disciplines: what they are trying to explain.

• Other social sciences are more concerned with broad social, economic, political, and historical factors that influence events in a given society.

• For the social psychologist, the level of

analysis is the individual in the context of a social situation.

The End