Social Psychology Flashcards
Why is it difficult to define the self?
Multiple definitions in psychology
What does the definition of the self include/require?
Dickerson - ‘The self is any aspect of who or what the individual is considered to be’
Self = Includes what we possess, social self & what we are in a given situation & perception of self which is consistent
Requires ‘I’ (actor) & Me (object) - The I must be able to think about ‘me’
Each time you think about ‘me’, you are drawing attention to the self
What is the significance of the self?
Distinguishes us from other animals - Ability for reflexive thought & to think about ourselves
We can rethink/redefine ourselves
Self/selves can be viewed as outcomes or consequences of social interactions of antecedents (cues that trigger behaviour)
What is the twenty statements test for?
Tests the question of ‘who am i ?’ in relation to the self
How does the twenty statements test work?
Asked to write 20 ‘I am …’ statements in a certain time
Two types of statements were given = Consensual (I am a student) & sub-consensual ( I am happy)
TST = LED TO IDEA OF SELF-CONCEPT
What is meant by self-concept?
Knowledge, idea or set of ideas, attitudes & beliefs about who i am
- Individual or personal self-descriptions (e.g. traits)
- Collective/social descriptions
- Relational self-descriptions
What are criticisms of self-concept?
Brewer & Gardner (1996) - No evidence of relational self - only collective & individual self
Self may differ across cultures & gender groups
What is meant by self-schemata?
Information about the self is organised and stored cognitively & is derived from past experiences
How does the self schemata work?
People have clear conceptions of themselves on some level but not others
Have large number of discrete self-schemata
Higgins - 3 types of self schemata (actual self, ideal self and ought self)
Think more about things that are consistent in the self-schema
Information stored cognitively as separate contextual nodes
What is self-coherence?
Majority of us maintain an integrated or coherent picture of who we are
How is self-coherence achieved?
Restricting our lives to a limited set of contexts in order to have consistency & reinforcing how we view ourselves. Any change that occurs is due to circumstances (not us)
When addressing ‘How do i know who i am?’ what are the sources of self-knowledge that helps?
Introspection, Self-perception, Feedback from others, social comparisons, self-categorisation theory
What is introspection as a tool of self knowledge? Limitations?
Examining our own thoughts, feelings, motives & reasons for behaving in a particular way
L:
- Poor awareness of influence of situation (workmen study) - Poor explanation of past behaviours - Poor awareness of learning (carpenter et al - Professor study)
What is self-perception? (self-knowledge technique)
Makes inferences about myself from behaviour/imagined behaviour
(picturing a certain behaviour makes it more likely to occur)
How are social comparisons a form of self-knowledge?
When comparing to people inferior or superior to us it can have an impact on self-esteem
What is self-categorisation theory as a form of self-knowledge?
Knowledge of the self is derived from group membership, which produces a sense of social identity
Why do we seek self-knowledge?
- Self-assessment motive - Seeking accurate/valid information to find out what can of person we really are
- Self-verification motive - Making information that verifies or confirms our prior beliefs
- Self-enhancement motives - Seeking/wanting favourable information about self
How do we evaluate ourselves positivley?
Global self-esteem = Our overall sense of self-worth
Positive self-esteem = Important for psychological well-being & more likely to develop positive relationships
Positive self-esteem can act as a self-protective function
How does maintaining self-esteem/protective illusion mechanism be beneficial?
- Self-serving attributions (positive outcomes due to ourselves but negative results down to external factors
- Above-average effect - Less people are unable to recognise their incompetence at specific tasks
Unrealistic optimism - Perceive ourselves to have more positive outcomes than we expect
False consensus (if i fail, others will too)
What are possible threats to self-worth?
Failures, inconsistencies, stressors
as they arouse negative emotions & can contribute to physical illness & can impact immune system
How can you cope with threats to self-worth?
Escape physically, denial, downplay threat via re-evaluation, attack threat via self-handicapping
Self-handicapping - Behaviours designed to sabotage our performance in order to provide a subsequent excuse for failure
Why does the self matter?
Positive self-esteem = Important for psychological well-being
Self schemata influences the way I process self-relevant information & mood
Concepts of self can help guide/regulate behaviour (LOC etc.)
What is Higgins’ Regulatory focus theory?
Perceived discrepancies between actual & ideal selves = Create different emotions/behaviours
(dejection-related emotions when discrepancy between actual & ideal)
(agitation-related emotions when discrepancy between actual & ought)
What are the two self-regulatory systems in the Regulatory focus theory?
- Promotion = Motivated to attain our ideals, aware of the absence of positive events so adopt a strategy to maintain own goals
- Prevention = Motivated to fulfil out duties and obligations = Generates sensitivity to presence or absence of negative events - adopt avoidance strategy
People are either promotion or prevention focused
How do others know who we ‘are’?
Present ourselves through what we do & say Authentic self presentation Impression management (try to shape how others perceive us)
What are some self-presentation strategies?
Self-promotion, ingratiation (motivated to get along with others), exemplification (to regard self as morally respectable), supplication (attempts to get others to take pity), intimidation
What is social cognition?
How we perceive our social world, recall events, use social information to make judgements, how we respond to reality as we really perceive it
What is the difference between controlled and automatic thinking?
Controlled thinking - Putting thinking effort into our judgements/decisions
Automatic thinking - Our judgements & decisions are automatic. involving low-level thinking/awareness (often using biases)
How does automatic thinking work using the schemata?
We have different schemata for specific people/groups of people
Schemata = Cognitive structures & represent our knowledge about a concept/response to a stimulus
Allows us to make a quick judgement of someboday
Can be direct or indirect schemas
What are the functions of schemata?
Help organise the world, guide perception, allow us to make sense of people & events. Allows us to interpret new or ambiguous information
How do schemas work?
- Affect what we notice (filters out inconsistent information)
- Encoding of information & memories we construct
- Recall
What determines which schemata are applied?
Accessibility to schema (ease of recall/frequency that its used)
Priming = Activation of certain associations
Schemas persist as they are resistant to change
How can the representations in the schemata come true?
Acting on schemata leads to behaviours of other to be consistent with it through influence
(IQ study - some students told they would academically bloom & they did more so than others)
What are the biases in automatic thinking?
Overconfidence in judgements, false consensus (overestimate that our behaviour is the same as others), illusion of control & illusory correlation (when we make inferences about the co-occurrence of two things)
What are some evaluative points of social cognition?
It’s not really social = Takes no account of language, interaction or communication
Assume unflattering image of people as cognitive misers
The same cognitive biases have been seen in driving errors
What’s the difference between compliance & conformity?
Compliance - When we publicly comply with someone’s behaviour/beliefs but are privately not convinced
Conformity - When the norm is internalised and used as standard behaviour as we believe they are correct & reliable
Can be good as without = social chaos
View of conformity is influenced by culture - In Japan, conformity is seen as socially strong
What are norms? How do they work?
Norms - Shared beliefs among a group about what is the appropriate way to behave
Norms are often resistant to change
Sherif & Sherif - How are norms formed and how do they influence behaviour?
Used via autokinetic effect
Spot of light in dark room = There are individual differences in perceived movement = When in a group = Estimates converged on group mean even when removed from group = Internalised norm
