Social Psych Exam

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social influence

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the effect that the words, actions, or mere prescence of other ppl have on our thoughts, feelings, and behavior

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social psychology

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the scientific study of the way in which ppl's thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the real or imagined prescence of other ppl

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construal

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the way in which ppl perceive, comprehend, and interpret the social world

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individual differences

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the ascpects of people's personalities that make them different from other people

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fundamental attribution error

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the tendency to overestimate the extent to which ppl's behavior is due to internal, dispositional factors, and to underestimate the role of situational factors

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behaviorism

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a school of psychology maintaining that to understnad human behavior, one need only consider the reinforcing properties of the environment--that is, how positive and negative events in the environment are associated with specific behaviors

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gestalt psychology

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a school of psychology stressing the importance of studying the subjective ways in which an object appears in ppl's minds rather than the objective, physical attributes of the object

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self-esteem

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ppl's evaluation of their own self-worth--that is, the extent to which they view themselves as good, competent, and decent

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social cognition

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how ppl think about themselves and the social world; more specifically, how ppl select, interpret, remember, and use social information to make judgements and decisions

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automatic thinking

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thinking that is nonconscious, unintentional, involuntary, and effortless

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schemas

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mental structures ppl use to organize their knowledge about the social world around themes or subjects and that influence the information ppl notice, think about, and remember

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assecibility

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the extent to which schemas and concepts are at the forefront of ppl's minds and are therefore likely to be used when we are making judgements about the social world

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priming

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the process by which recent experiences increase the accesibility of a schema, trait, or concept

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perseverance effect

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the finding that ppl's beliefs about themselves and the social world persist even after the evidence supporting these beliefs is discredited

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self-fufilling prophecy

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the case whereby ppl have an expectation about what another person is like, which influences how they act toward that person, which causes that person to behave consistently with ppl's orginal expectations, making the expectations come true

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judgmental heuristics

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mental shortcuts ppl use to make judgments quickly and efficiently

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availability heuristic

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a mental rule of thumb whereby ppl base a judgment on the ease with which they can bring something to mind

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representative heuristic

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a mental shortcut whereby ppl classify something according to how similar it is to a typical case

ex: that man is wearing a tweed vest and smoking a pipe, he must be a psych professor

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base rate information

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information about the frequency of members of different categories in the population

ex: the % of students from NY at a NY university, an actual statistic

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controlled thinking

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thinking that is conscious, intentional, voluntary, and effortful

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counterfactual thinking

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mentally changing some aspect of the past as a way of imagining what might have been

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thought suppression

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the attempt to avoid thinking about something we would prefer to forget

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overconfidence barrier

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the fact that ppl usually have too much confidence in the accuracy of their judgments

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social perception

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the study of how we form impressions of and make inferences about other ppl

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nonverbal communication

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the way in which ppl communicate, intentionally or unintentionally, w/o words; nonverbal cues include facial expressions, tone of voice, gestures, body position and movement, the use of touch, and gaze

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encode

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to express or emit nonverbal behavior, such as smiling or patting someone on the back

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decode

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to interpret the meaning of the nonverbal behavior that other ppl express, such as deciding that a pat on the back was an expression of condescension and not kindness

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affect blend

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a facial expression in which one part of the face registers one emotion while another part of the face registers a different emotion

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6 universal emotions:

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anger, fear, suprise, disgust, suprise, and happiness

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display rules

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culturally determined rules about which nonverbal behaviors are appropriate to display

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emblems

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nonverbal gestures that have well understood definitions within a given culture; they usually have direct verbal translations, such as the "OK" sign

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social role theory

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the theory that sex differences in social behavior are due to society's division of labor between the sexes; this division leads to differences in gender-role expectations and sex-typed skills, both of which are responsible for differences in men's and women's social behavior

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implicit personality theory

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a type of schema ppl use to group various kinds of personality traits together; for example, many ppl believe that someone who is kind will be generous as well

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attribution theory

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a description of the way in which ppl explain the causes of their own and other ppl's behavior

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internal attribution

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the inference that a person is behaving a certain way because of something about the person, such as attitude, character, or personality

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external attribution

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the inference that a person is behaving a certain way because of something about the situation he or she is in; the assumption that most ppl would respond the same way in that situation

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covariation model

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a theory that states that to form an attribution about what caused a person's behavior, we systematically note the pattern between the prescence or abscence of possible causal factors and whether or not the behavior occurs

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consensus information

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information about the extent to which other ppl behave the same way toward the same stimulus as the actor does

ex: does everyone at the store yell at Hannah?

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distinctiveness information

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information about the extent to which one particular actor behaves in the same way to different stimuli

ex: does the boss yell at EVERYONE?

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consistency information

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information about the extent to which the behavior between one actor and one stimulus is the same across time and different circumstances

ex: does the boss yell at Hannah regularly and frequently, whether the store is full or empty?

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correspondence bias

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the tendency to infer that ppl's behavior corresponds to (matches) their disposition (personality)

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perceptual salience

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the seeming importance of information that is the focus of ppl's attention

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two-step process of attribution

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analyzing another person's behavior FIRST by making an automatic internal attribution and only THEN thinking about possible situational reasons for behavior, after which one may adjust the original internal attribution

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actor/observer difference

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the tendency to see other ppl's behavior as dispositionally caused but focusing more on the role of situational factors when explaining one's own behavior

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self-serving attributions

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explanations for one's successes that credit internal, dispositional factors and explanations for one's failures that blame external, situational factors

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defensive attributions

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explanations for behavior that avoid feelings of vulnerability and mortality

ex: "that could NEVER happen to me"

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belief in a just world

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a form of defensive attribution wherein ppl assume that bad things happen to bad ppl and that good things happen to good ppl

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self-concept

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the content of the self; that is, our knowledge about who we are

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self-awareness

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the act of thinking about ourselves

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self-schemas

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mental structures that ppl use to organize their knowledge about themselves and that influence what they notice, think about, and remember about themselves

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self-reference effect

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the tendency for ppl to remember information better if they relate it to themselves

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independent view of self

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a way of defining the oneself in terms of one's own internal thoughts, feelings, and actions and not in terms of the thoughts, feelings, and actions of other ppl

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interdependent view of self

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a way of defining the self in terms of one's relationships to other ppl; recognizing that one's behavior is often determined by the thoughts, feelings, and actions of others

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introspection

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the process whereby ppl look inward and examine their own thoughts, feelings, and motives

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self-awareness theory

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the idea that when ppl focus their attention on themselves, they evaluate and compare their behavior to their internal standards and values

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casual theories

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theories about the causes of one's own feelings and behaviors; often we learn such theories from our culture

ex: abscence makes the heart grow fonder

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reasons-generated attitude change

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attitude change resulting from thinking about the reasons for one's attitudes; ppl assume their attitudes match the reasons that are plausible and easy to verbalize

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self-perception theory

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the theory that when our attitudes and feelings are uncertain or ambiguous, we infer these states by observing our behavior and the situation in which it occurs

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intrinsic motivation

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the desire to engage in an activity because we enjoy it or find it interesting, not because of external rewards or pressures

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extrinsic motivation

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the desire to engage in an activity because of external rewards or pressures, not because we enjoy the task or find it interesting

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overjustification effect

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the tendency for ppl to view their behavior as caused by compelling extrinsic reasons, making them underestimate the extent to which it was caused by intrinsic reasons

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task-contingent rewards

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rewards that are given for performing the task, regardless of how well the task is done

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performance-contingent rewards

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rewards that are based on how well we perform a task

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two-factor theory of emotion

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the idea that emotional experience is the result of a two-step self-perception process in which ppl first experience physiological arousal and then seek appropriate explanation for it

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misattribution of arousal

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the process whereby ppl make mistaken inferences about what is causing them to feel the way they do

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appraisal theory of emotion

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theories holding that emotions result from people's intrepretations and explanations of events, even in the absence of physiological arousal

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social comparison theory

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the idea that we learn about our own abilities and attitudes by comparing ourselves to other ppl

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downward social comparison

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comparing ourselves to ppl who are worse than we are on a particular trait or ability

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upward social compoarison

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comparing ourselves to ppl who are better than we are on a particular trait or ability

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social tuning

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the process whereby ppl adopt another person's attitudes

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impression management

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the attempt by ppl to get others to see them as they want to be seen

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ingratiation

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the process whereby ppl flatter, praise, and generally try to make themselves likable to another person, often of higher status

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self-handicapping

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the strategy whereby ppl create obstacles and excuses for themselves so that if they do poorly on a task, they can avoid blaming themselves

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self-enhancement

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the tendency to focus on and present positive information about oneself and to minimize negative information