H1 – INTRODUCTION
Social cognition: the study of how people make sense of other people and themselves. This can be studied by
e.g. phenomenology: a subjective description of how people say they experience the world (used by Gestalt
psychologists). Two main viewpoints in social cognition are:
1. Naïve psychology: the common sense belief that people hold about the thoughts and behavior of
themselves and others.
2. Cognition viewpoint: involves detailed and systematic analyses of how people think about themselves
and others; relies heavily on tools of cognitive psychology.
Asch noticed that people describe others by using a set of descriptors: traits. Together, these form a unifying
concept of that person: an impression. He made up two competing models:
1. Configural model: states that people form a unified overall impression of others, that can be changed
by context. When a certain behavior does not fit with someone's overall impression of a person, this
behavior is interpreted in such a way that it still supports the overall impression: e.g. an intelligent
child is clever and an intelligent grandmother is wise. All these impressions of traits and their
relationships eventually form mental schemas that keep being updated.
2. Algebraic model: states that each individual trait is evaluated in isolation and then combined into a
summary evaluation. It is thus algebraic because traits are added up together to form a total picture.
Two approaches to social cognition are:
1. Holistic approach (Kant, Gestalt psychologists) aligns with the configural model in that it links parts of
a thing into a whole. It focuses on the entire combination of relationships among them. In terms of a
song: it looks at the melody, instead of the notes (elemental).
2. Elemental approach (Wundt, Ebbinghaus): aligns with the algebraic model in that it breaks scientific
problems down into pieces that are analyzed separately before being combined. The more often two
ideas are paired, the easier and stronger the association becomes.
Lewin: brought Gestalt to social psychology. Field theory: behavior is the result of the interaction between
individual traits and environment. Psychological field: the social environment, as perceived/interpreted by
someone. A full understanding of someone’s psychological field cannot result from an objective observation by
others, but must be described in their own words. The psychological field (and thus behavior) is determined by:
1. The person in a certain situation: neither a person or a situation alone is sufficient to predict behavior.
The person contributes needs, beliefs, perceptual abilities, etc., which interact with the environment.
2. Cognition and motivation: jointly predict behavior as well. Cognitions determine what you might do,
but motivation determines whether you will do it at all. Within the psychological field, there are forces
that influence both cognition and motivation.
Wundt wanted to reveal the internal experiences of an individual by using introspection. This method was
quickly dismissed, since it was too unscientific and subjective. As a result, psychologists started avoiding
cognition and focused their efforts on behavior. Behaviorists began measuring stimuli (S) and responses (R).
In the 1960s, people became critical of behaviorism as well, as a new approach was developed. Information
processing approach: states that mental operations can be split into stages, occurring between stimulus and
response. Using new scientific tools, such as a computer, psychologists were now able to trace these processes.
Social behavior has always been cognitive in at least three ways:
1. Social behavior is a function of people’s perceptions.
2. Social psychologists look at the causes and end results of social interaction in cognitive
structures/terms, such as motivation, memory and attribution.
3. The individual is a thinking organism.
Five general models about the social thinker in social psychology:
1. Consistency seeker (1950): people are driven to reduce the discomfort they experience from perceived
discrepancies, also called cognitive dissonance. These theories rely on perceived inconsistency, which
motivates people to reduce it; also called drive reduction model.
2. Naïve scientist (1970): people are driven by internal and external attributions about themselves and
others. In these theories, motivation is solely seen as a supporter for the attribution process.
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3. Cognitive miser (1980): people are limited in their ability to process information and therefore take
shortcuts whenever they can.
4. Motivated tactician (1990): people are fully engaged thinkers that use multiple cognitive strategies,
depending on their goals, motives and needs. In some situations people are motivated and accurate,
and in some cases they choose for the purpose of speed.
5. Activated actor (now): people are activated actors with social concepts. These concepts are (often
unconsciously) cued by social environments, activating the associated cognitions, affects, evaluations,
motivation and behaviors.
Most researches about social cognition share four basis characteristics:
1. Mentalism: the belief that cognitive representations are important. After all, we use these elements to
make sense of other people and situations.
2. Cognitive processes: includes the way in which cognitive elements form, operate, interact and change
over time. Behaviorists avoid this discussion.
3. Cross-fertilization: there is a big overlap between cognitive and social psychology. They both adopt
elements of each other in researches.
4. Daily problems: daily matters such as group behavior, propaganda, teambuilding all include social
cognition.
Behaviorists argue that the cognitions of people aren’t visible, so we might as well be robots. Yet we are
people. We influence our environments, are unavoidably complex, have intents and traits with ambiguous and
unclear influences on behavior, and so on.
Some neuroscientific techniques used to study social cognition are:
fMRI: functional magnetic resonance imaging Electrodermal responses
EMG: electromyography Cardiovascular activity
EEG: electroencephalography Hormone levels
TMS: transcranial magnetic stimulation Immune functioning
Most research is not cross-culturally valid, since many researchers focus on western, educated, industrialized,
rich, democratic undergraduates. One major distinction that can be made, is the difference between cultures:
1. Eastern: interdependence and harmonious
2. Western: independence and autonomy
H2 – DUAL MODES IN SOCIAL COGNITION
Subliminal priming: when a concept is activated in your mind by some environmental cue that doesn’t
penetrate the surface of your consciousness. Priming can be used to put the brain in a state of mind that
contributes to a certain goal. X-system: the brain regions involved in these automatic processes. E.g.:
Amygdala: responds to emotional priming, especially when negative or threatening.
Ventromedial prefrontal cortex
Basal ganglia
Lateral temporal cortex
Chronically accessible concepts are the associations we learn through experience. These act as mental
shortcuts that save us effort and time. Proceduralization: the practice of developing automaticity. Something
can become a procedure after a couple of trials. The better a judgment is practiced, the quicker it is and the
more greater priority it has, leading to issues like susceptibility to prejudice.
Although automaticity is useful and prevalent, both subliminal (unconscious) and supraliminal (conscious)
activations of mental representations can influence us.
Goal-dependent automaticity: a process that is mostly automatic but requires some intentional/controlled
processing. E.g. it may determine who we choose to socialize with at a party when our goal is meeting new
people. Goal-inconsistent automaticity: occurs when automatic processes steer us away from achieving our
actual goals. E.g. trying not to think about a burger will cause a rebound effect. Finding a substitute thought is
the only way to counter this rebound effect. One of the symptoms of depression is that it makes negative
thoughts more accessible and difficult to repress, leading to rumination on unwanted thoughts.
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Some situations automatically trigger certain motives: auto-motives. To what extent does free will control our
behavior? Wegner: states that conscious will is an illusion. People are more likely to experience agency (feeling
in control for the outcome of something) when subliminally primed before a situation, so we don’t control our
own behaviors as much as we think we do.
James called consciousness the stream of thought within which things may surface and disappear out of sight
again. Since it is immeasurable, many behaviorists treated it as if it didn’t exist. However, cognitive
psychologists did give it attention. They saw consciousness as a executive controller that directs mental
structures. It helps people form new associations and is necessary for choice, since two options must be held in
awareness at the same time.
1. First-order consciousness: the mindful state of experiencing cognitions and intentionally using them.
2. Second-order meta cognitions: made up of people’s beliefs about their own thinking processes.
Ongoing consciousness: described by social-personality psychologists as a stimulus field, consisting of body
sensations, emotional experiences and thoughts. These factors can compete with the external world.
Stimulus dependent thoughts: focused on the current environment of an individual.
Stimulus independent thoughts: occur when we daydream of let our mind wander.
Operant thoughts: thoughts that solve problems.
Respondent thoughts: distractions and uninvited images.
Peoples thoughts can be researched via:
1. Experience-sampling methods: allow researchers to ask participants about their current states and
thoughts, at random moments throughout the day. They often involve a trigger device like a beeping
timer that randomly asks them to write down (or say out loud) their thoughts.
2. Naturalistic social cognition: asks participants to point out moments when they remember having a
particular thought or feeling. This can help us study the interaction of people’s feelings and their
environment. Also, it may help us explore empathic accuracy: how accurate people are in guessing
what another person is feeling.
3. Role-play participation: allows researchers to sample people’s thoughts in a relatively realistic but
controlled setting. Results suggest that people tend to have more irrational thoughts in stressful,
evaluative social situations.
Automatic and controlled processes
We move between our unconscious and automatic and our controlled and conscious thoughts via motives.
Important human motives are:
1. Need to belong: we want to be accepted by others, especially our own group. When being ostracized
or rejected, the social pain feels like physical pain.
2. Understanding: we are motivated to reach an understanding with others. Sometimes, we even change
our own viewpoint to be more like others of a group: affiliation.
3. Being in control: we want to feel in control in situations and outcomes. We avoid feeling pressure for
urgency (quick decision) or permanence (lasting decision), where possible.
4. Self-enhancement: we want to see ourselves in a positive light. Automatic reactions tend to favor a
positive self-esteem, while controlled reactions are more realistic, no matter how negative.
5. Trusting ingroup: because of self-enhancement, we expect good from other people and may judge
others better than they actually are. We have an intention to trust others; this correlates with the
oxytocin hormone, especially active in women and implicated in befriending behavior.
Depending on the circumstances, people try to make sense of themselves and others in different ways. There
are two main models on how we perceive others:
1. Dual-process model of impression formation : we place someone in an initial category. If the person is
not relevant to our goals, this is enough. If they are relevant, we make more distinctions to our mental
representation, especially if they exhibit traits that do not fit in our category.
2. Continuum model of impression formation: we place someone in an initial category, somewhere in the
continuum. Then, we re-categorize and specialize as we find data that contradicts our assumption. We
begin with category-based responses and then advance to attribute-based responses.
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