Psych Midterm #2, Chapter 13 "social Psychology"

Front 1

Causal attribution

Back 1

an inference about what caused a person's behavior

Front 2

Situational attributions

Back 2

attributions that explain someone's behavior in terms of the circumstances rather than aspects of the person

Front 3

Dispositional attributions

Back 3

attributions that explain someone's behavior in terms of factors internal to the person such as trials or preferences

Front 4

Individualistic cultures

Back 4

cultures in which people are considered fundamentally independent and which value standing out by achieving private goals

Front 5

Collectivistic cultures

Back 5

cultures in which people are considered fundamentally interdependent and which emphasize obligations within one's family and immediate community

Front 6

Fundamental attribution error

Back 6

the tendency to attribute behaviors to a person's internal qualities while underestimating situational influences

Front 7

Implicit theories of personality

Back 7

beliefs about what kinds of behaviors are associated with particular traits and which traits usually go together; used to develop expectations about people's behavior

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Stereotypes

Back 8

schemas that are often negative and are used to categorize complex groups of people

Front 9

Prejudice

Back 9

a negative attitude toward another person based on that person's group membership

Front 10

Out-group homogeneity effect

Back 10

the tendency for a member of a group (the in-group) to view members of another group (the out-group) as "all alike" or less varied than members of his or her own group

Front 11

Self-fulfilling prophecies

Back 11

beliefs about how a person will behave that actually make the expected behavior more likely

Front 12

Attitude

Back 12

a fairly stable evaluation of something as good or bad that makes a person think or feel or behave positively or negatively about some person or group or social issue

Front 13

Central route to persuasion

Back 13

the process involved in attitude change when someone carefully evaluates the evidence and the arguments

Front 14

Peripheral route to persuasion

Back 14

the process involved in attitude change when someone relies on superficial factors such as the appearance or charisma of the person presenting the argument

Front 15

Cognitive dissonance

Back 15

an uncomfortable inconsistency among one's actions or beliefs or attitudes or feelings; people attempt to reduce it by making their actions or beliefs or attitudes or feelings more consistent with one another

Front 16

Self-perception theory

Back 16

the theory that we know our attitudes and feelings only by observing our own behaviors and deciding what probably caused them just as we do when trying to understand others

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Conformity

Back 17

a change in behavior due to explicit or implicit social pressure

Front 18

Informational influence

Back 18

a reason for conformity based on people's desire to be correct

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Normative influence

Back 19

a reason for conformity based on people's desire to be liked (or not appear foolish)

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Obedience

Back 20

a change in behavior in response to an instruction or command from another person

Front 21

Motivated social cognition

Back 21

thinking about the social world ways that serve an emotional need such as when people hold beliefs that help them feel less anxious

Front 22

Dehumanization of the victim

Back 22

thinking about a potential victim in ways that make him seem inhuman (as vermin for example or as a mere number); this view makes aggression toward the victim more likely and less troubling to the aggressor

Front 23

Compliance

Back 23

a change in behavior in response to a request

Front 24

Norm of reciprocity

Back 24

the social standard that suggests a favor must be repaid

Front 25

That’s-not-all technique

Back 25

a sales method that starts with a modest offer and then improves on it; the improvement seems to require reciprocation which often takes the form of purchasing the item

Front 26

Mere presence effect

Back 26

changes in a person's behavior due to another person's presence

Front 27

Social facilitation

Back 27

the tendency to perform simple or well-practiced tasks better in the presence of others than alone

Front 28

Social inhibition

Back 28

the tendency to perform complex or difficult tasks more poorly in the presence of others

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Social loafing

Back 29

a pattern in which people working together on a task generate less total effort than they would have if each had worked alone

Front 30

Deindividuation

Back 30

a state in which an individual in a group experiences a weakened sense of personal identity and diminished self-awareness

Front 31

Stanford prison experiment

Back 31

Philip Zimbardo's study of the effect of roles on behavior; participants were randomly assigned to play either prisoners or guards in a mock prison; the study was terminated early because of the "guards'" role-induced cruelty

Front 32

Group polarization

Back 32

a pattern in group discussions in which each member's attitudes become more extreme even though the discussion draws attention to arguments that could have moderated their views

Front 33

Risky shift

Back 33

a pattern in which a group appears more willing to take chances or to take an extreme state than any individual members would have on their own

Front 34

Groupthink

Back 34

a pattern of thinking that occurs when a cohesive group minimizes or ignores members' differences of opinion

Front 35

Pluralistic ignorance

Back 35

a type of misunderstanding that occurs when members of a group don't realize that the other members share their perception (often their uncertainty about how to react in a situation); as a result each member wrongly interprets the others' inaction as reflecting their better understanding of the situation

Front 36

Bystander effect

Back 36

one reason people fail to help strangers in distress: the larger the group a person is in then the less likely he is to help party because no one in the group thinks it is up to him to act

Front 37

Altruism

Back 37

helping behavior that does not benefit the helper

Front 38

Halo effect

Back 38

the tendency to assume that people who have one good trait also have other good traits

Front 39

Homogamy

Back 39

the tendency of like to mate with like

Front 40

Romantic love

Back 40

an emotional state characterized by idealization of the beloved and obsessive thoughts of this person and turbulent feelings

Front 41

Romeo-and-Juliet effect

Back 41

the intensification of romantic love that can occur when the couple's parents oppose relationship

Front 42

Companionate love

Back 42

an emotional state characterized by affection for those whose lives are deeply intertwined with one's own