chapter 3

Question 1

Daniel Kahneman notes that we have have two brain systems. What are the two systems?

Answer 1

System 1: The intuitive, automatic, unconscious, and fast way of thinking

• functions out of our awareness (“gut feeling” or “intuition”)
• influences more of our actions than we realize

System 2: the deliberate, controlled, and slower way of thinking
- requires our conscious attention and effort

Question 2

Activating particular associations in memory is referred to as what?

Answer 2

Priming

Question 3

what significance have experiments revealed about priming?

Answer 3

priming one thought, even without awareness, can influence another thought or even an action

Question 4

What is our embodied cognition?

Answer 4

The mutual influence of bodily sensations on cognitive preferences and social judgements

Question 5

After receiving a cold shoulder treatment, people judge the room as colder than after being treated warmly. After holding a cold ice pack, people feel lonelier than those who hold the same pack warmed to 98 degrees. Why is this?

Answer 5

because Social exclusion literally feels cold, and cold feels like social exclusion

Question 6

what do advocates of “intuitive management” believe?

Answer 6

they believe we should tun into our hunches and use system 1.

Question 7

According to advocates of “intuitive management” what should we do when judging others? What should we do when hiring, firing and investing?

Answer 7

• we should plug into the nonlogical smarts of our “right brain” (use SYSTEM 1)
• we should listen to our premonitions (use SYSTEM 2)

Question 8

what does priming research hint?

Answer 8

Priming research hints that the unconscious indeed controls much of our behaviour

Question 9

what processes is our thinking based on?

Answer 9

automatic processing

controlled processing

Question 10

what is automatic processing?

Answer 10

“implicit” thinking, that is effortless, habitual, and without awareness; roughly corresponds to “intuition”.
also known as system 1

Question 11

what is controlled processing?

Answer 11

“explicit’ thinking that is deliberate, reflective, and conscious.
also known as system 2

Question 12

how soon do emotional reactions happens?

Answer 12

often nearly instantaneous, before there is time for deliberate thinking

Question 13

fill in the blanks:
one neural shortcut takes information from the eye or ear to the brain’s sensory switchboard, the ____, and out to its emotional control centre, the _____, before the _____ has had any chance to intervene.

Answer 13

1) Thalamus
2) Amygdala
3) Thinking Cortex

Question 14

As perception researchers study visual illusions for what they reveal about our normal perceptual mechanisms, what do social psychologists study?

Answer 14

Social psychologists study illusory thinking for what it reveals about normal information processing
- they want to give us a map of everyday social thinking, with the hazards clearly marked

Question 15

as we interpret our experiences and construct memories, our ____ __ ____ are sometimes wrong because we are usually unaware of our errors.

Answer 15

System 1 Intuitions

Question 16

what is the overconfidence phenomenon?

Answer 16

The tendency to be more confident than correct.

- to overestimate the accuracy of one’s beliefs

Question 17

Fill in the blanks:

Ironically _____ feeds overconfidence.

Answer 17

imcompetence

- “ignorance of one’s imcompetence” occurs mostly on relatively easy-seeming tasks

Question 18

A tendency to search for information that confirms one’s preconceptions is referred to as what?

Answer 18

confirmation bias

Question 19

Fill in the blanks:
Confirmation bias appears to be a _____ __ ___ _____, where our default reaction is to look for information consistent with our presuppositions

Stopping and thinking a little, calling up ____ __, makes us less likely to commit this error

Answer 19

System 1 snap judgment

System 2

Question 20

which three techniques have successfully reduced the overconfidence bias?

Answer 20

1) prompt feedback
2)
3)

Question 21

what are Heuristics?

Answer 21

A thinking strategy that enables quick, efficient judgements

Question 22

define representative heuristics.

Answer 22

the tendency to presume, sometimes despite contrary odds, that someone or something belongs to a particular group if resembling (representing) a typical member.

Question 23

fill in the blanks:

If examples are readily available in our memory, then we presume that the event is _______.

Answer 23

commonplace

Question 24

what is the availability heuristic?

Answer 24

a cognitive rule that judges the likelihood of things in term of their availability in memory.

Question 25

what is counterfactual thinking?

Answer 25

Imagining alternative scenarios and outcomes that might have happened, but didn't

Question 26

define illusory correlation

Answer 26

A perception of a relationship where none exists or a perception of a stronger relationship than actually exists

Question 27

What will people do when experiencing a lack of control?

Answer 27

People like feeling in control and so, when experiencing a lack of control, they will act to create a sense of predictability.

Question 28

what is regression toward the average?

Answer 28

The statistical tendency for extreme scores or extreme behaviour to return toward the person's average

Question 29

Fill in the blank: | Our ____ infuse our judgements.

Answer 29

moods

Question 30

what is the bright side to sadness?

Answer 30

a depressed mood motivates intense thinking - a search for information that makes one's environment more memorable, understandable, and controllable.

Question 31

What is belief perserverance?

Answer 31

persistence of your initial conceptions, as when the basis for your belief is discredited but an explanation of why the belief might be true survives.

Question 32

what has psychological research proved to be true about memories?

Answer 32

Many memories are not copies of experiences that remain on deposit in a memory bank, rather, we construct memories at the time of withdrawal.

Question 33

what is a misinformation effect?

Answer 33

incorporating misinformation into one's memory of an event, after witnessing an event, and then receiving misleading information about it.

Question 34

fill in the blank: The worse your current view of your partner is, the worse your _____ are, which only further confirms your _____ attitudes

Answer 34

memories, negative

Question 35

what is misattribution?

Answer 35

mistakenly attributing a behaviour to the wrong cause

Question 36

what is the attribution theory?

Answer 36

the theory of how people explain the behaviour of others - for example, by attributing it to either internal dispositions, or,

Question 37

what is a dispositional attribution?

Answer 37

attributing behaviour to the person's dispositions and traits.

Question 38

what is a situational attribution

Answer 38

attributing behaviour to the environment.

Question 39

what is spontaneous trait inference?

Answer 39

an effortless, automatic inference of a trait after exposure to someone's behaviour.

Question 40

what is the fundamental attribution error?

Answer 40

The tendency for observers to underestimate situational influences and overestimate dispositional influences on others' behaviour. - also called the correspondence bias because we so often see behaviour as corresponding to a disposition.

Question 41

when our action feels intentional and admirable, what do we attribute it to?

Answer 41

our own good reasons, not to the situation.

Question 42

A week after hearing someone argue a position that he or she did not choose, people were more likely to credit what?

Answer 42

the situation

Question 43

fill in the blanks: | people in eastern asian cultures are somewhat more sensitive to the importance of what?

Answer 43

situations

Question 44

fill in the blanks: passage of time ____ the tendency toward the fundamental attribution error

Answer 44

decreases

Question 45

illusory thinking is often a by-product of our mind's strategies for _______ complex information.

Answer 45

simplifying

Question 46

why might we focus on the fundamental attribution error?

Answer 46

- our capacity for illusion and self-deception - humanitarian - we are mostly unaware of them and can benefit from greater awareness

Question 47

what is a self-fulfilling prophecy?

Answer 47

beliefs that led to their own fulfilment

Question 48

when someone loves and admires us, what does this help us with?

Answer 48

becoming more the person he or she imagines us to be

Question 49

what is behavioural confirmation?

Answer 49

A type of self-fulfilling prophecy whereby people's social expectations lead them to act in ways that cause others to confirm their expectations

Question 50

what effects do cognitive biases have when we are making judgements??

Answer 50

even small biases can have profound social effects when we are making important social judgements?