PSY220 midterm

Question 1

What is social psychology?

Answer 1

study of people thinking about, influencing, relating

Question 2

Construals, needs related to construals

Answer 2

interpretation of social environment. Construals come from need to feel good (self esteem) and desire to be accurate (social cognition)

Question 3

Social psych vs. sociology

Answer 3

social psych is more individual, focus on immediate stimuli, psychological states, predict behavior, use experiments. Sociology is more holistic, looks into social structure, poverty, institutions. Try to describe and explain behavior, describe and explain behavior, survey and aggregate data

Question 4

Social psych vs. personality psychology

Answer 4

social psych is less focused on personality and more on fundamental attribution

Question 5

Scientific method (theory, hypothesis, operational definition):

Answer 5

A theory is a set of principles used to explain observed phenomena. Hypothesis is a testable statement for relationship between variables. Operational definition is creating a measurable thing to measure constructs. Explain how to measure

Question 6

Major themes in social psychology

Answer 6

social thinking, social influences, and social relations contribute to social psychology. Social thinking says we construct our social reality, and our intuitions are very strong. This is due to dual processing. Basically me locking myself up like a prisoner of my own sanity. Social influences shape our behavior, but so does our disposition. Basically me being influenced by UofT to stfu and not talk, like ever (stuff like fatshaming depends on where you’re from) (China’s fucked up beauty standards: LMFAOOO). But then again my INTP 5w6 predisposes me too. Soial relations say social behavior is biological, we need to relate to people. And to that? Fuck you bitch I don’t need to mortal companion (I do and I think I’m starting to hallucinate)

Question 7

Correlational method or research

Answer 7

Systematic measurement. Examples include surveys, good at using one thing to predict another and can use variables hard to observe. No causal statements and sometimes people lie

Question 8

Observational/field method or research

Answer 8

You can or not intervene. Need clear definition of variable and judges judge similarly. No causal statements and you only describe. Very spontaneous (most)

Question 9

Experimental method or research

Answer 9

can explore cause and effect, some variables not ethical. Expensive. Need to increase mundane and experimental realism, reduce effects of demand characteristics.

Question 10

Random sampling, representative sampling, random assignment

Answer 10

random sampling helps generalize things to a population. You could have a random sample but not representative if you sample the wrong population. Random assignment helps with cause and effect

Question 11

Correlation coefficient (r) and spurious correlation

Answer 11

positive means one increase other does. Spurious is third variable (murder and ice cream). The more blob like the more close to 0

Question 12

Probability level (p-value)

Answer 12

how likely something is caused by chance

Question 13

Ethics surrounding social psych studies

Answer 13

respect for dignity, informed consent, freedom to withdraw, privacy, less deception

Question 14

Informed consent

Answer 14

constant, need to know enough to choose if want to participate

Question 15

Naturalistic fallacy

Answer 15

define what is observable or common as good

Question 16

The rouge test

Answer 16

greater apes have sense of self

Question 17

Self-concept

Answer 17

comprised of self schemas, answers the question of “who am I”. High self concept clarity increases life satisfaction, well being and compassion.

Question 18

Self-esteem

Answer 18

Personal self-esteem is more prominent in western cultures. It is context specific. Tends to be more unconditional sounding and broader: “I am a god” “I am so good at this”

Question 19

Self-efficacy

Answer 19

belief you can do something. Having low self esteem but high self esteem would be knowing I can do Mikitaka’s makeup, but feeling overall not built to be a makeup artist and disliking my makeup. “I am capable of doing eyeliner without shaky hands” “I know how to do math”

Question 20

Self-knowledge

Answer 20

information about explaining and predicting yourself. Affected by planning fallacy and impact bias

Question 21

Introspection

Answer 21

self analysis, it is one way to gain knowledge about yourself

Question 22

Individualism and collectivism

Answer 22

individualism is prioritizing your own goals above that of your group’s and defining yourself with personal attributes (I am good at makeup). And collectivism is giving priority to the goals of your groups and defining your identity according to your group. People tend to be more self critical and focus less on positive self view. I am literally smack dab in the middle of these two. I describe myself with groups I’m in but I don’t give a shit about the goals of my groups (cosplayers want to be more inclusive, my dorm house wants participation).

Question 23

Self-schemas

Answer 23

beliefs about the self to process information, such as attitudes, preferences, and personality. Basically the pieces of the vase that you break your soul into. Include memories, beliefs, generalizations of own behavior. I am good at makeup. I am an INTP. I am gay. I hate JK Rowling. I hate talking to people

Question 24

Self-concept clarity

Answer 24

low clarity is related with low self esteem, depression, neuroticism, self-handicapping, lower awareness of mental states.

Question 25

Self-handicapping

Answer 25

protects self image and self esteem

Question 26

Self-presentation

Answer 26

our desire to express ourselves that is admirable or agrees with your ideas. The image is presented to external audience and ourselves. For example, me trying to pretend like I’m normal and do not have violent urges

Question 27

Self-awareness theory

Answer 27

if we get a cue to focus on self, we become aware and compare internal standards/values to thoughts and behavior. Then change behavior or thoughts or disengage from self awareness.

Question 28

Self-perception theory

Answer 28

when we are unsure of how we feel, we look at our past behavior to see if that’s how we feel. We observe ourselves from a third person perspective to see the behavior and circumstances when it happened

Question 29

Planning fallacy

Answer 29

tendency to underestimate how long it would take for a task

Question 30

Looking-glass self

Answer 30

we use how we think others perceive us as a way to perceive ourself. The only thing that matters is how we imagine people see us, not how they actually see us

Question 31

Social comparison theory

Answer 31

common when there is no objective standard and we feel uncertain about ourselves. Downward can make you feel better unless it’s threatening and downward. Upward tends to make you worse unless its achievable

Question 32

Self-serving bias and self-serving attributions

Answer 32

to attribute positive outcomes to yourself and negative ones to external factors. Self-serving attributions are a type of self-serving bias and both are to help with self-esteem. Very outcome focused compared to FAE.

Question 33

Explanatory style

Answer 33

a habitual way of explaining events. Internal, global, and stable attributions are depressive (it’s going to last and ruin me and it’s my fault). Me a masochist: lol haha. My attributional style is pretty internal, somewhat global, and somewhat stable. Oh fuck

Question 34

Better-than-average effect:

Answer 34

part of self serving bias. On subjective, socially desirable and common traits, we see ourselves above average (subjective as in “I am tall” and not “I am taller than 6 feet”)

Question 35

Defensive pessimism

Answer 35

anticipating problems and harnessing anxiety to motivate actions. Some pessimism is needed for excellence.

Question 36

False consensus and false uniqueness effects

Answer 36

false consensus is when we think everyone agree with is, thinking our friends agree with us more than they actually do. False uniqueness is when we appeal to our self images by seeing our talents and morals as unusual. (Me thinking romance is for peasants and being able to draw lower lashes without batting an eye and contouring my face into something I’m not is a rare talent) Basically I’m not like other girls

Question 37

Learned helplessness

Answer 37

hopelessness after human or animal perceives no control after repeatedly experiencing bad things. Linked with illness as it lowers body’s resistance, and so does stress.

Question 38

Automatic and controlled thinking

Answer 38

system 1 is intuitive, automatic, unconscious. System 2 is slow, deliberate.

Question 39

Priming

Answer 39

related to schema activation. Exposure to stimuli increase salience of schemas

Question 40

Schemas (including function and accessibility of schemas):

Answer 40

to make sense of, organize information. To reduce the amount of information, fill in knowledge gaps, interpret new and ambiguous information

Question 41

Self-fulfilling prophecy

Answer 41

essentially beliefs that result in their own fulfillment. Teachers subconsciously teach more to gifted students, set higher goals, and thus they improve more. Also happens with discrimination, if you think people are homophobic you will perform badly with them

Question 42

Heuristics

Answer 42

thinking strategy that enables quick, efficient judgement. System 1 is in charge as these are very speedy

Question 43

Representativeness heuristic

Answer 43

thinking people are of a group if they look similar.

Question 44

Base rates and base rate fallacy: base

Answer 44

base rates are the proportion of individuals in a population frequency. Fallacy is when you ignore this information in favor of distinctive features. Similar with representativeness heuristic

Question 45

Conjunction fallacy

Answer 45

more extreme predictions for joint occurrences than single ones

Question 46

Counterfactual thinking

Answer 46

mentally stimulating what might have been, happens when we can easily picture alternative outcomes. Less likely if it was not as close of a call. Does not need to be a meaningful group

Question 47

Illusory correlation

Answer 47

perception of relationship when none exists, or perception of stronger than real relationship. People tend to misperceive random events as confirmation. We are likely to notice things that confirm what we believe than otherwise. If expect, perceive. Due to desire for order. Common between rare events.

Question 48

First impressions (accuracy, speed)

Answer 48

very fast exposure to faces allows us to know trustworthiness, competence, likability, aggressiveness, attractiveness. Very accurate and 100ms is enough. 50 for gaydar

Question 49

Overconfidence phenomenon

Answer 49

to be more confident than correct, college students still overestimated how much they think they would exercise even if they thought about barriers. The more incompetent, the more overconfident

Question 50

Confirmation bias

Answer 50

tendency to look for info that confirms preconceptions. Contemplation causes confirmation. Interviewers test for trait by looking for info that confirms it. Framing

Question 51

Belief perseverance

Answer 51

persistence of old beliefs even after discrediting explanation. The more we examine theories and reasons why it might be true, the more likely to be closed off to challenging beliefs

Question 52

Nonverbal communication

Answer 52

can be intentional or not, includes eye contact and body movement and tone of voice, facial expression. The function is to express personality and elicit empathy.

Question 53

Facial expressions of emotions

Answer 53

if you read a story that does not match with a facial expression, you will think the face matches the story. Fear and surprise were easily confused but most expressions are universal. Some crosscultural variation does exist. Spontaneous naming of emotions, context matters.

Question 54

Implicit personality theory

Answer 54

personality traits are linked together, such as kind and helpful. This is to make better quick impressions. Liking sexual partners linked with thinking they don’t have stds.

Question 55

Attribution theory

Answer 55

theory of how people explain others’ behavior: internal or external. Does not say you must do which.

Question 56

Fundamental attribution error (FAE)

Answer 56

easily confused with self-serving bias, which is more self-centered and concerns making judgments in your favor rather than against the favor of others. Tendency to underestimate situational and overestimate dispositional.

Question 57

Ultimate attribution error (UAE)

Answer 57

saying negative behavior for outgroup is internal, positive is external. Positive behavior for ingroup is internal, negative external. Basically batch FAE

Question 58

Perceptual salience

Answer 58

the cause of FAE. When trying to figure out reasons of a person’s behavior, you focus on the person and the surroundings become less prominent. Thus the perception is salient on the person and you ignore other factors. a cognitive bias that predisposes individuals to focus on or attend to items, information, or stimuli that are more prominent, visible, or emotionally striking.

Question 59

Two-step process of FAE

Answer 59

automatically make internal attribution then with time, energy and motivation consider alternatives.

Question 60

Attitudes, including tripartite model

Answer 60

tripartite model is affective, behavioral, and cognitive. Affective is emotional attitude with facial expressions, behavioral is decisions and actions, and cognitive is thoughts and beliefs. Affective refers to sensory reactions like “it’s plain wrong” and usually are moral and religious (most of these disgust me; this is my affective attitude towards others affective attitudes). Cognitively based attitudes give logical reasons, and behaviorally based is observations of behavior regarding the object of attitude. Self perception theory, you don’t know attitude until you think about behavior

Question 61

Ambivalent sexism

Answer 61

when asked how competent men and women are, masculine women are seen as bad socially, if they are not masculine they are seen incompetent. Negative traits of women are highlighted regardless

Question 62

Explicit versus implicit attitude

Answer 62

explicit attitudes are deliberate and conscious and introspective. You need to think about them, and they are thus considered slow and cold, they are reported. Implicit is the opposite and are associative, they connect concepts instead of asking you to reflect. They are tested by response time.

Question 63

Implicit association test (IAT):

Answer 63

used to test implicit associations, asses people’s reaction time to make automatic associations between things and words. Faster responses are unconscious associations.

Question 64

When do attitudes predict behaviour?

Answer 64

When influences on behavior are minimal and the attitudes are behavior specific, and our attitudes are strong when we think about them

Question 65

Theory of planned behaviour:

Answer 65

our specific attitudes, social norms, and perceived control over said behavior contribute to a behavioral intention which contributes to behavior.

Question 66

When does our behaviour affect our attitudes?

Answer 66

When role playing, like the Stanford prison experiment

Question 67

Role-playing

Answer 67

authority can create an environment completely different. Artificial roles can turn into something that is real.

Question 68

Foot-in-the-door phenomenon, low-ball technique, door-in-the-face technique

Answer 68

foot in the door is a small request followed by a bigger one because we desire to be consistent. Door in face is when we feel bad about saying no to a big request and that makes a smaller second deal seem better. Low ball is low price offered then modify the price. You need to apply the initial request to the final for low ball. Foot in door doesn't need relevant first request

Question 69

Cognitive dissonance theory, post-decision dissonance, justification of effort:

Answer 69

cognitive dissonance is discomfort in realizing inconsistency, feeling dumb and immoral, and trying to get rid of dissonance. If you write article contrary to irl beliefs and take arousal pill, your beliefs will not change as you believe discomfort is due to pills. Else, you will change beliefs to reduce discomfort as there is nowhere to blame the discomfort. Post-decision dissonance is to make thing you didn’t get seem worse. Justification of effort is me with pinkyparadise lens. You gave me a bit of stuff, so I feel like there is a need to further justify by liking it to make it worthwhile

Question 70

Internal vs external justification

Answer 70

internal is changing attitudes and behavior for yourself, and external is for someone else or smth else (you told your friend something, now need to be consistent)

Question 71

Insufficient justification

Answer 71

reduce dissonance by providing internal justification.

Question 72

Self-affirmation theory

Answer 72

people with high self esteem reduces dissonance. If you are good at something unrelated to the dissonance, the dissonance amount goes down. High self esteem