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Psychology Unit 4: Social psychology and personality

Social psychology studies how people think about, influence and relate to one another; personality explains consistent individual differences.

Covers: Attribution and person perception, attitudes and persuasion, conformity, obedience and group influence, prejudice and prosocial behavior, motivation and emotion, personality theories and assessment

Study guide

Social psychology examines how situations shape behavior. Attribution theory asks whether we explain behavior by dispositional (personal) or situational causes. The fundamental attribution error overemphasizes personality when judging others, while the actor-observer bias and self-serving bias shape how we see ourselves. Attitudes affect actions, and actions affect attitudes: cognitive dissonance pushes us to change beliefs to match behavior, and the foot-in-the-door and door-in-the-face techniques exploit this. Persuasion follows a central route (strong arguments) or a peripheral route (cues like attractiveness).

Groups strongly influence individuals. Asch's experiments showed conformity to an obviously wrong majority, and Milgram's experiments showed obedience to authority. Social facilitation improves performance on easy tasks with an audience, social loafing reduces effort in groups, deindividuation lowers self-restraint in crowds, and group polarization and groupthink push groups toward extreme or poor decisions. Prejudice involves stereotypes and discrimination, supported by in-group bias, scapegoating and the just-world phenomenon; contact and superordinate goals reduce conflict. Prosocial behavior is affected by the bystander effect, where more witnesses means less helping.

Motivation theories include drive-reduction, arousal theory (the Yerkes-Dodson law), Maslow's hierarchy of needs, and intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation. Emotion theories include James-Lange (arousal comes first), Cannon-Bard (simultaneous) and Schachter-Singer two-factor theory (arousal plus a cognitive label). Personality theories include psychodynamic (Freud's id, ego, superego and defense mechanisms), humanistic (Maslow, Rogers' unconditional positive regard), social-cognitive (Bandura's reciprocal determinism and self-efficacy) and trait theories, especially the Big Five (openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism). Assessments include projective tests and more reliable personality inventories.

We tend to like people and things we encounter often (the mere-exposure effect), and attraction depends strongly on proximity, similarity and physical attractiveness. A self-fulfilling prophecy happens when an expectation about someone leads us to act in ways that make the expectation come true. People with an internal locus of control believe their own actions determine outcomes. People with an external locus believe luck or others control their fate. A pessimistic explanatory style blames bad events on stable, personal, widespread causes.

Conformity rises as the group grows to about three or four people and then levels off. It drops sharply when even one other person dissents. Normative social influence is conforming to be accepted, while informational social influence is conforming because we think others know more. The bystander effect happens largely through diffusion of responsibility: with more people present, each feels less personally responsible to act. Helping also follows the norm of reciprocity (helping those who helped us) and the social-responsibility norm (helping those who depend on us).

Drive-reduction theory says we act to restore homeostasis, a stable internal state. Incentive theory says external rewards pull us toward behaviors. Self-determination theory says people need competence, autonomy and relatedness. Ekman's research found that basic facial expressions are recognized across cultures, although display rules about showing emotion vary. The facial-feedback hypothesis says our expressions can intensify the feelings themselves. Maslow's hierarchy runs from physiological needs to safety, belongingness and love, esteem, and finally self-actualization. Freud's defense mechanisms include repression, denial, projection (seeing your own unacceptable traits in others), displacement, reaction formation, rationalization, regression and sublimation.

Projective tests, like the Rorschach inkblots and the Thematic Apperception Test, give ambiguous images on the assumption that people project hidden feelings onto them. They have low reliability and validity compared with objective inventories like the MMPI (used to identify clinical problems) and Big Five questionnaires.

Key ideas

• We often over-blame personality and under-blame situations for others' behavior.
• Cognitive dissonance can change attitudes to fit actions.
• Conformity and obedience experiments show the power of situations.
• Group effects include social loafing, groupthink and the bystander effect.
• The Big Five traits are the most researched personality model.

Formulas and rules

Common mistakes

• Confusing conformity (going along with peers) with obedience (following authority).
• Thinking the bystander effect means people don't care; it reflects diffusion of responsibility.

Words to know

Fundamental attribution error

Overestimating personality and underestimating the situation when judging others.

Self-serving bias

Taking credit for success and blaming failure on the situation.

Cognitive dissonance

Discomfort when actions and beliefs conflict.

Foot-in-the-door

Getting agreement to a small request, then a larger one.

Central route persuasion

Persuasion through strong evidence and arguments.

Peripheral route persuasion

Persuasion through cues like attractiveness or emotion.

Conformity

Adjusting behavior to match a group (Asch).

Obedience

Following orders from an authority (Milgram).

Social facilitation

Better performance on easy tasks when others watch.

Social loafing

Less effort when working in a group.

Deindividuation

Loss of self-awareness and restraint in groups.

Groupthink

Desire for harmony overriding realistic decision-making.

Group polarization

Group discussion strengthening members' existing views.

Bystander effect

Less likely to help when other people are present.

In-group bias

Favoring your own group.

Superordinate goal

A shared goal that requires cooperation between groups.

Maslow's hierarchy

Needs from physiological to self-actualization.

Intrinsic motivation

Doing something for its own sake.

Yerkes-Dodson law

Performance is best at moderate arousal.

Two-factor theory

Emotion = physical arousal + cognitive label (Schachter-Singer).

Defense mechanism

An unconscious way of reducing anxiety, like repression or projection (Freud).

Unconditional positive regard

Acceptance without conditions (Rogers).

Self-efficacy

Belief in your ability to succeed (Bandura).

Big Five

Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism.

Sample practice questions

5 more questions like these, from level 1 to 5, are in the practice set.