PSYCH 110 Exam 3 (Chp. 12)

Question 1

Social Psychology

Answer 1

study of how our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the real, implied, or imagined presence of others

Question 2

What is meant when it’s said ‘the brain is expensive”?

Answer 2

they use up 20% of our calories despite being 1-2% of our bodyweight

Question 3

What evolutionary problems led to humans’ intelligence?

Answer 3

social ones

Question 4

Social problems that contributed to human intelligence

Answer 4

keeping track of a friend/who can be trusted is complex; reading social cues and adapting accordingly is complex; etc

Question 5

T/F: “Loners” are more intelligent than animals who live in social groups

Answer 5

false; even w/in social groups coordinating behavior in larger groups requires larger brains (monkeys raised in groups sized from 1 to 7 others show a positive correlation between group size and amount of grey matter in the frontal lobes)

Question 6

All primates are social. Are humans the smartest of the primates?

Answer 6

yes; humans and chimps/orangutans show the same physical problem solving skills (puzzles, tool use, etc.) but humans have greater social problem solving (perspective taking tasks, responding to social cues, making social inferences, etc.)

Question 7

T/F: Humans want to belong socially but it’s not a fundamental need

Answer 7

false

Question 8

What’s the largest determinant of happiness and overall life satisfaction across cultures?

Answer 8

high quality social connections

Question 9

Effect of Social Isolation

Answer 9

largest predictors or poor physical and mental health; poorer sleep quality, lower immune function (higher rates of infection and slower wound healing), poorer mental health (higher rates of depression), higher rates of cardiovascular disease, higher mortality rates from numerous diseases

Question 10

T/F: social isolation explains as much variance in
mortality, as smoking, diabetes, and high blood pressure

Answer 10

true

Question 11

What is hunger, thirst, pain, cold, etc. examples of?

Answer 11

physiological signals resulting from threats to survival

Question 12

What’s the most basic survival signal?

Answer 12

pain

Question 13

Getting a bad grade hurts but doesn’t cause physical pain. Getting rejected or left out DOES cause physical pain. Why is this?

Answer 13

social exclusion (but not other types of ego threats) activate the physical pain network

Question 14

When we feel hunger, the discomfort drives us to go find food. So when we feel the discomfort of social exclusion/rejection, what does that drive us to do?

Answer 14

socially and emotionally smarter; pay attention to and remember social info, better at reading emotional expressions (real vs fake smiles), better at understanding emotional vocal tones, better at perspective taking (understanding other POVs), more cooperative in group tasks

Question 15

Why does the pain of social exclusion/rejection drive us to be socially smarter?

Answer 15

because it increases the likelihood that we’ll be liked and accepted again

Question 16

Normative Influence

Answer 16

we want to be liked, so we CONFORM to the norms of a group

Question 17

Informational Influence

Answer 17

we want to be right so whenever the situation is ambiguous we look to other for “correct” answer

Question 18

Looking at how many people eat at a restaurant to determine whether to eat there is an example of what?

Answer 18

informational influence; taking information from others to drive your decisions

Question 19

How did informational influence relate to “mask culture” with COVID?

Answer 19

whether a person wore a mask depended more on whether the people around them were as opposed to having actual knowledge about coronavirus

Question 20

Conformity

Answer 20

yielding to real or imagined social pressure

Question 21

Describe Asch’s Line Length Study

Answer 21

there was 1 participant and 5 confederates (people pretending to be participants when in reality they’re working with experimenter). they were given a line and then asked to compare it to three different lines and determine which of the 3 was closest in length to the initial length. There was an obvious answer, but the 5 confederates purposefully suggested one that was way off. 76% conformed on at least 1 trial.

Question 22

Which influence affects conformity?

Answer 22

a combination of normative and informational; normative - we want to be liked so we’ll do what it takes to fit in; informational - if situation ambiguous, will look to others for correct answer

Question 23

How does cohesiveness affect conformity?

Answer 23

liking for a group increases conformity - normative

Question 24

How does group size affect conformity?

Answer 24

increasing numbers increases conformity - can be normative or informational

Question 25

How does support affect conformity?

Answer 25

even 1 ally reduces conformity - normative; so if 4 of the 5 confederates agreed instead of the 5 that would decrease conformity; even if the ally is considered incompetent or has a different view (so chose a different line than you or other 4)

Question 26

What did Stanley Milgram want to explain?

Answer 26

the behavior of Germans in WW2; focused on power of the social situation by conducting Yale “teacher/learner” studies

Question 27

Explain Milgram study of destructive obedience

Answer 27

you’re a teacher and you have a learner who you correct by shocking; the learner is a confederate and is not actually being shocked but the teacher doesn’t know; every time the learner gets a question wrong you have to increase the volts and shock them; as the experiment proceeds the confederate shows increasingly painful responses (yelping, screams, bangs on wall, tells you to stop, tells you about heart condition, refuses to answer questions but moans in pain); if the teacher starts getting weary the experimenter tells them they need to keep going regardless

Question 28

Results of Milgram study

Answer 28

regular audience believed less than 5% of people would go all the way; clinical psychologists believed 1-3% would go all the way; in reality, 65% of people went all the way to the end

Question 29

What stops destructive obedience?

Answer 29

informational influence and knowing others feel like you do; seeing another person (also a confederate) refuse to follow orders (provides evidence that your instincts are right and the action is wrong) and obedience dropped to less than 10% as a result. seeing another person refuse helped participant know it was okay to disobey

Question 30

Things that did not chnage the Milgram study outcome

Answer 30

moving to a less reputable lab and making the experimenter dislikable (would have made people stop if normative influence played a role), making the learner a woman, and making the teacher a woman

Question 31

Were people just more obedient 60 years ago (in relation to Milgram study)?

Answer 31

a more ethical replication of the study was done in 2009 and mostly replicated Milgram’s findings with 70% of people going to the end

Question 32

What did bob Cialdini study?

Answer 32

compliance or day-to-day influence; not all instances of social influence are extreme like in the case of Asch or Milgram

Question 32

Compliance Techniques that Reflect Need for Social harmony/likability

Answer 32

door in the face and reciprocity norm

Question 33

Door in the Face technique

Answer 33

small request are granted more often if first get the refusal of a large request; because we want to be liked; “Can I have 50 dollars? Okay, how about 5?”

Question 34

Reciprocity Norm technique

Answer 34

more likely to comply with a request after given a small token; if we receive a gift we feel more obligated to do as they say; charities sending calendars or address labels with requests

Question 35

Role of consistency in social influence

Answer 35

we want our attitudes to be consistent, and
our actions to be consistent with past attitudes and actions

Question 36

Compliance Techniques that reflect needs for consistency

Answer 36

foot in the door and low ball technique

Question 37

Foot in the Door technique

Answer 37

large requests are granted more often if proceeded by small request; because we want to be consistent with our pats self; canned goods study (agreeing to do a small phone survey made it more likely people would later agree to allow day-long inventory)

Question 38

Low Ball technique

Answer 38

chnage terms of agreement AFTER verbal commitment and still get compliance; a potential buyer might purposely make an offer 15% below the asking price as a way to start negotiations and end up with a price that is ultimately 5% below the asking price