Exam 1 Flashcards
(124 cards)
1
Q
Do we construct our social reality?
A
Yes, we have an urge to explain behavior, to attribute it to some cause, and therefore to make it seem orderly, predictable and controllable.
We react differently to situations because we think differently.
2
Q
Do our intuitions shape our fears, impressions and relationships?
A
Yes, intuitions are often powerful but sometimes perilous and in error.
Our intuitions are due to automatic processing.
3
Q
True or False: our behavior is shaped by social forces
A
True-External social forces shape our behavior
4
Q
What internal forces influence behavior?
A
Personal attitudes and personality dispositions- different people may react differently
5
Q
Is social behavior biological rooted?
A
Yes, our inherited human nature predisposes us to behave in ways that helped our ancestors survive and reproduce.
6
Q
How are social psychology’s principles applicable in everyday life?
A
It can make visible the subtle influences that guide your thinking and acting
Gives ideas about how to know ourselves better
How to influence people can help with social justice
7
Q
How do values enter the work of psychology?
A
The obvious way and the subtle way
8
Q
What are some obvious ways values enter psychology?
A
Choosing the research topic reflect current issues in society, your town, country, etc
Types of people who are attracted to various disciplines
As the object of social psychology
9
Q
What are some not so obvious ways values enter psychology?
A
Culture
Social representations
Psychologists’ own values play a role in the theories and judgments they support
How we define how best to live
Professional advice
Forming concepts
Labeling-psychological language
10
Q
What is a society’s widely held ideas and values, including assumptions and cultures ideologies that helps us make sense of our world?
A
Social representations
11
Q
What is a problem with common sense?
A
We invoke it after we know the facts.
12
Q
What term matches this definition: The tendency to exaggerate after learning an outcome, one’s ability to have foreseen how something turned out?
A
Hindsight bias
13
Q
What are some things to look out for when doing surveys to collect data?
A
Order of questions
Response options
Wording of questions
14
Q
What is framing?
A
The way a question or an issue is posed, framing can influence people’s decisions and expressed opinions.
15
Q
What is Mundane realism?
A
The degree to which an experiment is superficially similar to everyday situations
16
Q
________ is the degree to which an experiment absorbs and involves its participants
A
Experimental realism
17
Q
What is the Spotlight Effect?
A
The belief that others are paying more attention to our appearance and behavior than they really are.
18
Q
What is the Illusion of Transparency?
A
The illusion that our concealed emotions leak out and can be easily read by others.
19
Q
What is Self-Concept?
A
What we know and believe about ourselves.
20
Q
What is a Schema?
A
Mental templates by which we organize our worlds.
21
Q
What is a Self-Schema?
A
Beliefs about self that organize and guide the processing of self-relevant information.
22
Q
What are Possible Selves?
A
Images of what we dream of or dread becoming in the future.
23
Q
What is Social Comparison?
A
Evaluating one’s abilities and opinions by comparing oneself with others.
24
Q
What is the Looking-Glass Self?
A
How we imagine others perceive/see us.
25
What is Individualism?
The concept of giving priority to one’s own goals and defining one’s identity in terms of personal attributes rather than group identification.
26
What is an Independent Self?
Construing one’s identity as an autonomous self.
27
What is Collectivism?
Giving priority to the goals of one’s group (often one’s extended family or work group) and defining one’s identity accordingly.
28
What is an Interdependent Self?
Construing one’s identity in relation to others.
29
What is Impact Bias?
Overestimating the enduring impact of emotion-causing events.
30
What is Immune Neglect?
The human tendency to underestimate the speed and the strength of the “psychological immune system,” which enables emotional recovery and resilience after bad things happen.
31
What is a Dual Attitude System?
Differing implicit (automatic) and explicit (consciously controlled) attitudes toward the same object. Verbalized explicit attitudes may change with education and persuasion; implicit attitudes change slowly, with practice that forms new habit.
32
What is Self-Esteem?
A person’s overall self-evaluation or sense of self-worth.
33
What is Terror Management Theory?
Proposes that people exhibit self-protective emotional and cognitive responses (including adhering more strongly to their cultural worldviews and prejudices) when confronted with reminders of their mortality.
34
What is Self-Efficacy?
A sense that one is competent and effective, distinguished from self-esteem, which is one’s sense of self-worth. A sharpshooter in the military might feel high self-efficacy and low self-esteem.
35
What is the Locus of Control?
The extent to which people perceive outcomes as internally controllable by their own efforts or as externally controlled by chance or outside forces.
36
What is Learned Helplessness?
The sense of hopelessness and resignation learned when a human or animal perceives no control over repeated bad events.
37
What is the Self-Serving Bias?
The tendency to perceive oneself favorably.
38
What are Self-Serving Attributions?
A form of self-serving bias; the tendency to attribute positive outcomes to oneself and negative outcomes to other factors.
39
What is Defensive Pessimism?
The adaptive value of anticipating problems and harnessing one’s anxiety to motivate effective action.
40
What is the False Consensus Effect?
The tendency to overestimate the commonality of one’s opinions and one’s undesirable or unsuccessful behaviors.
41
What is the False Uniqueness Effect?
The tendency to underestimate the commonality of one’s abilities and one’s desirable or successful behaviors.
42
What is the Group-Serving Bias?
Explaining away outgroup members’ positive behaviors; also attributing negative behaviors to their dispositions (while excusing such behavior by one’s own group).
43
What is Self-Handicapping?
Protecting one’s self-image with behaviors that create a handy excuse for later failure.
44
What is Self-Presentation?
The act of expressing oneself and behaving in ways designed to create a favorable impression or an impression that corresponds to one’s ideals.
45
What is Self-Monitoring?
Being attuned to the way one presents oneself in social situations and adjusting one’s performance to create the desired impression.
46
The term “possible selves” refers to:
Who we hope to be in the future and who we hope not to become.
47
Cultural differences in a person’s self-concept reflect:
Collectivism and Individualism.
48
How is self-esteem different from self-concept?
Self-esteem is subsumed under the idea of self-concept, AND self-esteem is an evaluative component of self-concept.
49
The term ______ is used to describe when a person’s confidence level moves into the realm of arrogance.
Narcissism
50
A young child brings her finger painting home to her narcissistic parent. What will the child most likely hear?
“Uh, what does that have to do with me?”
51
In the middle of a grueling exam, a student pauses momentarily and gives herself a silent cheer: “You can do it, you can do it. You can, you can.” She winds up earning an A. This would demonstrate which of the following concepts?
Being high in self-efficacy.
52
Julian Rotter’s concept of locus of control involves:
When someone attributes an event as being something that is under their control or as being outside of their control.
53
What term, originally observed by studying dogs in an experimental situation, who appeared passive and depressed after being forbidden to escape an electric shock and do not try to escape from the shock when permitted to do so, was extrapolated and applied to humans who give up and do not try to better themselves when faced with overwhelming adversities?
Learned helplessness.
54
Regarding research on subjects who are presented with choices about which they can make decisions, there is evidence that shows that:
Subjects are more satisfied after having fewer possible choices than more choices.
55
Self-serving bias involves:
The tendency to take credit for something when succeeding, and to blame others when one has failure experiences.
56
The results of research regarding rating one’s self, compared to others, in numerous domains, show that people tend to:
Rate themselves as being better than average compared to other people.
57
The results from research on optimism shows that:
People rate themselves in a manner that is unrealistically optimistic.
58
At the luncheon, Steven rambled on and on about his political views, thinking everyone at the table agreed. Little did he know, they were secretly groaning and rolling their eyes. Which of the following would this describe?
The false consensus effect.
59
The false uniqueness effect occurs when:
A person thinks they are overly special for being talented or performing a good deed, not realizing that they are relatively common and not so great.
60
Research regarding self-serving bias has shown that displaying a self-serving bias can:
Be adaptive and protect a person from stress and negative moods.
61
Group-serving bias involves:
Attributing positive aspects to a group that a person is affiliated with, and negative aspects to those who are not part of a person’s group.
62
Some people engage in _______ behavior by not trying their best, on purpose, out of fear of failure, to avoid dealing with negative feelings that might arise if they were to try their hardest and it was not good enough to succeed.
Self-handicapping.
63
Considering that most people want others to view them in a positive light, the particular way in which we strive to view ourselves and the way in which we want others to view us pertains to our ________.
Self presentation.
64
Someone who speaks their mind, as opposed to being a “yes-man” would be considered:
Low in self monitoring.
65
What is priming?
Activating particular associations in memory
66
What is embodied cognition?
The mutual influence of bodily sensations on cognitive preferences and social judgments
(Ex: Holding a warm drink, ppl will become more likely to rate someone warmly and behave more generously)
67
True or false: our assumptions about the world can make contradictory evidence seem supportive.
True; an example is when sports fans perceive referees as partial to the other side.
68
With regard to reconstructing our past behaviors, what are “totalitarian egos?”
Our egos revise the past to suit our present views; we underreport bad behavior and over report good behavior.
69
What is spontaneous trait transference?
When we say something good or bad about another person, people spontaneously tend to associate that trait with us
70
What is belief perseverance?
Persistence of one’s initial conceptions, such as when the basis for one’s belief is discredited but an explanation of why the belief might be true survives
TLDR: beliefs sprout their own legs and survive discrediting evidence
71
What is a remedy for belief perseverance?
Asking people to consider/explain the opposite stance on their views
72
True or false: our memories are exact copies of experiences that remain on deposit in a memory bank.
False; we construct memories at the time of withdrawal
73
What is the misinformation effect?
Incorporating “misinformation” into one’s memory of the event, after witnessing an event and receiving misleading information about it.
74
What is rosy retrospection?
Recalling mildly pleasant events more favorably than the experienced them.
75
True or false: our memories are subject to strong influence by the attutudes and feelings we hold at the time of retrieval.
True
76
With regard to making judgments, what is controlled processing?
“Explicit” thinking that is deliberate, reflective, and conscious.
77
What is automatic processing?
“Implicit” thinking that is effortless, habitual, and without awareness; roughly corresponds to intuition.
78
What are schemas?
Mental concepts or template that intuitively guide our perceptions and interpretations.
79
What are emotional reactions?
They are often nearly instantaneous, happening before there is time for deliberate thinking
80
What is the overconfidence phenomenon?
The tendency to be more confident than correct – to overestimate the accuracy of one’s beliefs
81
True or false: competence feeds overconfidence.
False; people who are incompetent tend to be overly confident. Our ignorance of our ignorance sustains over-confidence
82
What is the planning fallacy?
Overestimating and underestimating the amount of time is involved in doing things (how much free time you have, how long it will take to get a project done, etc.)
83
What produces overconfidence?
1. People tend to recall their mistaken judgments as times when they were “almost” right.
2. People tend to not seek out information that might disprove what they believe.
84
What is confirmation bias?
A tendency to search for information that confirms one’s perceptions
85
How can we remedy overconfidence?
1. Be wary of other people’s dogmatic statements
2. Prompt feedback: get feedback on shit you’re doing
3. To reduce “planning fallacy” overconfidence, unpack your tasks (break them down to its subcomponents and estimate the time for each)
4. Think of reasons why your judgments might be wrong to force yourself to consider disconfirming information.
86
What are heuristics?
A thinking strategy that enables quick, efficient judgments.
They enable us to live and make routine decisions with minimal effort
87
What is representativeness heuristic?
The tendency to presume, sometimes despite contrary odds, that someone or something belongs to a particular group if resembling/representing a typical member
(TLDR: judging something by intuitively comparing it to our mental representation of a category)
88
What is the availability heuristic?
A cognitive rule that judges the likelihood of things in terms of their availability in memory.
If instances of something come readily to mind, we presume it to be commonplace
89
What is counterfactual thinking?
Imagining alternative scenarios and outcomes that might have happened, but didn’t.
90
What is illusory correlation?
The perception of a relationship where none exists, or the perception of a stronger relationship than actually exists.
91
True or false: people easily misperceive random events as confirming their beliefs.
True; if we believe a correlation exists, we are more likely to notice and recall confirming instances.
92
What is an illusion of control?
The idea that chance events are subject to our influence (this is what keeps gamblers going)
93
What is the regression toward the average?
The statistical tendency for extreme scores or extreme behavior to return toward one’s average.
94
How do moods infuse judgments?
Good and bad moods trigger memories of experiences associated with those moods.
Moods color our interpretations of current experiences.
Moods can influence how deeply or superficially we think when making judgments.
95
With regard to causality, what is a misattribution?
Mistakenly attributing a behavior to the wrong source
96
What is the attribution theory?
How people explain others’ behavior
Example: by attributing behaviors either to internal dispositions (enduring traits, motives, and attitudes) or external situations.
97
What are dispositional attributions?
Attributing behavior to the person’s disposition and traits
| Example: lack of motivation and ability in students
98
What are situational attributions?
Attributing behavior to the environment
| Example: physical and social circumstances
99
What is an effortless, automatic inference of a trait after exposure to someone’s behavior?
Spontaneous trait inference
100
What are the three commonsense attributions we typically look for to explain behavior?
1. Consistency (how consistent a person’s behavior is)
2. Distinctiveness (how specific the person’s behavior is to this particular situation)
3. Consensus (to what extent do others in this situation behave similarly)
101
What happens when we’ve already found plausible causes for a person’s behavior?
We might discount another contributing cause to the behavior
102
What is the fundamental attribution error?
The tendency for observers to underestimate situational influences and overestimate dispositional influences upon others’ behavior.
(also called correspondence bias bc we so often see behavior as corresponding to a disposition)
103
Describe some cultural differences that influence attribution error.
- Children in Western cultures tend to explain behavior in terms of other’s personal characteristics
- People in Eastern Asian cultures are somewhat more sensitive than Westerners to the importance of situations.
104
Why is the fundamental attribution error considered “fundamental?”
Because it colors our explanations in basic and important ways
105
Define a self-fulfilling prophecy?
A belief that leads to its own fulfillment
106
When considering teacher expectations on students, can teachers conceal their feelings towards a particular student and behave impartially?
-Nope! Students are acutely sensitive to teachers’ facial expressions and body movements.
You can tell a teacher’s expectations of a student within 10 seconds of hearing the teacher talk about the student.
107
What is behavioral confirmation?
A type of self-fulfilling prophecy whereby people’s social expectations lead them to behave in ways that cause others to confirm their expectations.
Example: ppl who are belied to be lonely behave less sociably
108
How can we reduce our vulnerability to certain types of social errors?
1. Train people to recognize likely sources of error in their social intuition
2. Set up statistics courses geared to everyday problems of logic and social judgment; this will lead ppl to reason better
3. Make such teaching more effective by illustrating it richly with concrete, vivid anecdotes and examples from everyday life
4. Teach memorable and useful slogans, such as “It’s an empirical question” and others
109
What is the Implicit Association Test (IAT)?
A newer and widely used attitude measure that uses reaction times to measure how quickly people associate concepts
110
How does Potency and Specificity of an attitude predict behavior?
The more specific and more potent an attitude is, the more effect it will have on behavior. This relationship is stronger when “other influences” are minimized
111
What is a role regarding social psychology?
A set of norms that defines how people in a given social position ought to behave.
112
What is the Foot-in-the-door Phenomenon (FITD)?
People are more likely to agree to a favor is a smaller favor is asked before hand. This ties into low-balling because we often propose a favor that we know will be completed to start this FITD phenomenon.
113
What is the Low-Ball Technique?
A tactic for getting people to agree to something. People who have already agreed to something will often agree when the person has upped the stakes of the request. Think car salesman example. Advertising a really low priced car, get the buyer in asking about that car, but the dealership says they ran out even though the deal never existed, now you propose a more expensive similar car.
114
When does attitude affect behavior?
We can “think” ourselves into action, and “act” our way into thinking. This relationship also exists with writing.
115
What is the Cognitive Dissonance Theory?
Tension that arises when someone is simultaneously aware of two inconsistent cognitions. When we are doing one thing, but think we should be doing something else.
116
What is Selective Exposure?
The tendency to seek information and media that agree with one’s views and to avoid dissonant information.
117
What is Insufficient Justification?
Reduction of dissonance by internally justifying one’s behavior when external justification is “insufficient”.
118
What is Self-Perception Theory?
The theory that when we are unsure of our attitudes, we infer them much as we would someone observing us—by looking at our behavior and the circumstances under which it occurs.
119
What is the Facial Feedback Effect?
The tendency of facial expressions to trigger corresponding feelings such as fear, anger, or happiness.
120
What is the Overjustification Effect?
The result of bribing people to do what they already like doing; they may then see their actions as externally controlled rather than intrinsically appealing. Example from book. Pay someone to play with a puzzle and they will do it less for free, even if they previously enjoyed it. The association changes from “pleasure” to “work”.
121
What is the Self-Affirmation Theory?
A theory that:
(a) people often experience a self-image threat after engaging in an undesirable behavior
(b) they can compensate by affirming another aspect of the self. Threaten people’s self-concept in one domain, and they will compensate either by refocusing or by doing good deeds in some other domain.
122
What is the better predictor of behavior, implicit or explicit attitudes?
implicit attitudes
123
What are the three conditions under which attitudes will predict behavior?
1) when we minimize other influences upon our attitude statements and on our behavior
2) when the attitude is specifically relevant to the observed behavior
3) when the attitude is potent
124
What is dissonance after decisions?
Big decisions can produce big dissonance when we later ponder the negative aspects of what is chosen and the positive aspects of what was not chosen.
