Intro ○ A systematic investigation, including research development,
● Social psychology definition (Gorden Allport 1954) testing and evaluation, designed to develop or contribute to
○ The scientific attempt to explain how the thoughts, feelings, generalizable knowledge
and behaviors of individuals are influenced by the actual, ○ Ethics
imagined, or the implied presence of other human beings ■ Risk assessment; Informed consent; Deception; debriefing
■ Empirical: based on systematic analysis of data ○ Statistics (Descriptive & Inferential)
● Social situation: the people we interact with every day Self
● Social influence: other people change our thoughts etc. and we ● Schema
change theirs ○ Mental structures that organize information
○ Kurt Lewin formula: Behavior = f (person, environment) ○ Eg. person, self, social, event schemas
● Self-concern: motivation to protect self and people related to us ● Self-concept
○ Kin-selection: strategies that favor the reproductive success of ○ A knowledge representation that contains knowledge about us,
one's relatives, even at a cost to our own survival including our beliefs about our personality traits, physical
○ Ingroup: we share close social connections characteristics, abilities, values, goals, and roles, as well as the
● Other-concern: motivation to affiliate with others knowledge that we exist as individuals.
○ Altruistic behaviors; behave morally towards others ● Self-schema
● Social norms: they ways of thinking, feeling, or behaving that are ○ A variety of different cognitive aspects of the self
shared by group members and perceived by them as appropriate ○ Organized from self-concepts (more abstract and complex
Research Methods version of it)
● Importance of scientific research ○ Information related to it is better remembered (self-reference
○ Hindsight bias: the tendency to think that we could have effect)
predicted something that we probably would not have been ● Self-complexity
able to predict. (we exaggerate how much we could predict ○ The extent to which individuals have many different and
after knowing the outcome) relatively independent ways of thinking about themselves
● →theory→hypothesis→prediction→study→data→ ○ People with high self-complexity tend to experience more
● Different Research designs positive outcomes (eg. self-esteem)
● Self-concept clarity
○ The extent to which one’s self-concept is clearly and
consistently defined
○ High clarity is positively related to high self-esteem
● Cultural differences of social self
○ Independent view of self
■ Individualism
○ Interdependent view of self
■ Collectivism
Looking inward: predicting feelings
● Affective misforecast
○ People have difficulty predicting the duration and intensity of
their future emotions
■ Focus problem - focus on the salient aspect, not else
■ Immune neglect - we are more resilient to cope with
negative events
■ Adaptation - hedonic saturation and wanting more
○ Observational
Looking inward: see the self in certain ways
○ Correlational (r)
● Self-enhancement motive
■ Correlation does not mean causation
○ We want to see ourselves (and others to see us) in a positive
○ Experimental
light
■ Control (experimentally manipulating A and examine its
○ Build or protect self-esteem
effects on B)
○ Basking in Reflected Glory (BIRG)
● Manipulation check
■ Associating with others who are successful
■ Random assignment v. sampling
○ Cutting off Reflected Failure (CORF)
■ IV; DV; control variables (irrelevant)
■ Distancing from others who fail
■ High internal validity (IV causes DV; ΔDV is bc of ΔIV)
○ Self-serving bias
■ Limits: construct validity (manipulation check,
● Self-consistency motive
operationalization) & external validity (be generalized
○ Self-awareness theory
outside the lab)
■ When we focus our attention on ourselves, we tend to
■ Factorial research designs (2 or more IVs)
compare our current behavior against our internal
● main effects & interaction
standards (we are self-conscious: observers of ourselves)
■ Deception: cover story; experimental confederate
○ Self-discrepancy theory
(experimenter pretends to be another participant)
■ When we perceive a discrepancy between our actual and
● Conceptual variables → operational definition (method that we use
ideal self, we feel distressed
to measure conceptual variables)
○ Cognitive dissonance theory
○ Method: Archival; Behavioral; Self-report; Physiological
■ We prefer cognitive consistency
● Research definition
■ Cognitive dissonance: discomfort that occurs when we
respond in ways that we see as inconsistent
, ■ Discomfort resolved by rejecting or changing one or more ■ Tendency to attribute others’ behaviors to dispositional
of the inconsistent cognitions factors and ourselves’ to situational factors
○ Self-affirmation theory ■ Self-serving bias
■ Reduce the threat to our self-concept posed by feelings of ● Attribute our success to dispositional reasons(stable,
self-discrepancy by focusing on their worth in another internal) and our failure to situational reasons
domain, unrelated to the issue at hand (unstable, external)
● Self-verification motive ● We see ourselves more favorably than others
○ People have a need to confirm their self-concept–positive or (better-than-average effect)
negative ■ Cultural differences
○ People want others to see them as they see themselves ○ Trait ascription bias
■ May conflict with self-enhancement motive ■ Tendency for people to view their own traits as more
Looking outward variable than those of others
● Reflected self-appraisal (social mirroring) ● Group attribution error
○ We develop our self-concept by observing what others think of ○ Tendency to make attributional generalizations about entire
us (not necessarily in line tho) outgroups based on a very small number of individuals
● The spotlight effect and illusion of transparency ● Less likely to correct FAE under “cognitive load”
○ We think that we are judged by everyone because of the illusion ● We are both intuitive scientists and cognitive misers
of transparency that everyone else is aware of our thoughts Stereotypes, Prejudice, Discrimination
● Social comparison theory ● Social categorization
○ We learn about our abilities and attitudes by comparing ○ We place individuals into social groups
ourselves to others ○ Outgroup homogeneity: view members of outgroups as more
○ When no objective standard or experiencing uncertainty about similar to each other than we see members of ingroups
self; compare is automatic ○ We tend to see others as members of a group, less as unique
○ Upward: if we want to be better individuals
○ Downward: if we want to feel better ● Stereotypes: Beliefs (cognition), positive or negative
● Social identity theory ○ Generalization about the characteristics of members of a group
○ We draw part of our sense of identity and self-esteem from the (any group faces it)
social group that we belong to ○ Stereotype content model
Attribution ■ Evolutionary pressure: one needs to assess others on two
● Attribution basic dimensions
○ How people explain the causes of behaviors ● Warmth/intention (primary) & competence
● Dispositional (internal) (secondary)
● Situational (external) ○ consequences:
● Hypothesis 1: the intuitive scientist ■ Pervasive effects in everyday life, affecting attributions,
○ We make attributions based on rational scientific-like evaluations (prejudice), and behaviors (discrimination)
case-effect analysis ■ Stereotype threat: Fear that one’s performance in a
○ Kelley’s Covariation Model: people make attributions based on domain may confirm a stereotype about one’s group
how behavior varies across people and situations ● Eg. women in STEM; Bian 2017
■ Consensus: other people also do it ● Prejudice: Negative attitudes (Affect)
● Yes → high → situational ● Discrimination: Negative behaviors (B)
● No → low → dispositional ● Explicit bias: speech or behaviors that demonstrate a conscious
■ Distinctiveness: this person behaves similar across acknowledgment of stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination
different situations (aware of)
● Yes → low → dispositional ● Implicit bias (automatically, unintentionally)
● No → high → situational ○ Implicit association test (IAT)
■ Consistency: this person usually do this in this situation Bian study 2017: “Brilliance = males” stereotype
● Yes → high → situational OR dispositional ● Study 1
● No → low → combination of situational and ○ “Really really smart” (only adult targets)
dispositional ○ At 5, boys and girls associated brilliance with their own gender
● Hypothesis 2: the cognitive miser to a similar extent
○ We have limited attention and time for effortful logical thinking, ○ Girls aged 6 and 7 were less likely than boys to associate
so we try to avoid engaging in effortful thoughts brilliance with their own gender
○ Fundamental attribution error (correspondence bias) ● Study 2
■ Eg. the castro study; unfair competition ○ Replicated initial findings with a larger sample & rate both
■ Tendency to overestimate dispositional factors and children and adult targets
underestimate situational factors ○ Similar results as study 1
■ Reason 1: role of perceptual salience - people are often the ○ Tho older girls believe girls get better grades (same as reality)
focus of attention, not the situation ● Study 3
■ Reason 2: system justifying beliefs (“just world”) and ○ Girls aged 6/7 were less interested than boys in the game for
meritocracy smart kids but not in the game for hard-working kids
● “Just world” belief: people get what they deserve in ○ Kids’ beliefs about who’s brilliant may guide their decisions
life ● Study 4
● Meritocracy: “if chances are equal, the winners ○ 5 year olds show no gender difference in interest
deserve their winnings” ○ 6 years olds show gender difference (in line with study 3)
○ Actor-observer bias