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CHAPTER 01 Research on personality increases our

INTRODUCING SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY understanding of human behavior

Intended Learning Outcome Social Psychologists

At the end of the lesson, the student should be able to: - believe that explaining behavior primarily
o Describe social psychology, and distinguish it through personality traits ignores a critical part
from other disciplines. of the story: the powerful role played by social
o Understand how people explain and interpret influence.
events—and their own and others’ behavior.
o Explain what happens when people’s need to feel Personality psychologists study qualities of the
good about themselves conflicts with their need individual that might make a person shy, conventional,
to be accurate. rebellious, and willing to wear a turquoise wig in public
or a yellow shirt in a sea of blue. Social psychologists
Defining Social Psychology study the powerful role of social influence on how all of
us behave.
Social Psychology
- the scientific study of the way in which people’s Social psychology is related to other disciplines in the
thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced social sciences, including sociology, economics, and
by the real or imagined presence of other people: political science.
parents, friends, employers, teachers, strangers - Each examines the influence of social factors on
— indeed, by the entire social situation (Allport, human behavior, but important differences set
1985). social psychology apart—most notably in their
level of analysis.
Social Influence
- a broader than attempts by one person to change
another person’s behavior. It includes our For
thoughts and feelings as well as our overt acts, the
and takes many forms other than deliberate social
attempts at persuasion.

Social Psychology, Philosophy, Science and Common

Sense
- The work of philosophers is part of the
foundation of contemporary psychology. psychologist, the level of analysis is the
- Psychologists have looked to philosophers for individual in the context of a social
insights into the nature of consciousness (e.g., situation.
Dennett, 1991) and how people form beliefs
about the social world(e.g., Gilbert, 1991).
- Sometimes, however, even great thinkers find Sociology
themselves in disagreement with one another. - focuses on such topics as social class, social
structure, and social institutions.
Hypothesis - about the specific situations under which - The major difference is that in sociology: the
one outcome or the other would occur. level of analysis is the group, institution, or
society at large.
How Social Psychology Differs from Its Closest
Cousins

Personality Psychologists
- who generally focus on individual differences,
the aspects of people’s personalities that make
them different from others.
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behavior also depends on their interpretation, or

construal, of their social environment

The people in this photo can be studied from a variety of Gestalt psychology: holds that we should study the
perspectives: as individuals or as members of a family, a subjective way in which an object appears in
social class, an occupation, a culture, or a region. people’s minds (the gestalt, or whole) rather than the
Sociologists study the group or institution; social way in which the objective, physical attributes of the
psychologists study the influence of those groups and object combine.
institutions on individual behavior.
Where Construal come from: Basic Human Motives
The goal of social psychology is to identify properties of Social psychologists emphasize the importance
human nature that make almost everyone susceptible to of two central motives: the need to feel good about
social influence, regardless of social class or culture. ourselves and the need to be accurate.

Social Psychology Compared to Related Disciplines The Self-Esteem Motive: The Need to Feel Good
About Ourselves
Sociology Social Personality
Psychology Psychology Self-Esteem
- People’s evaluations of their own self-worth—
The study of The study of The study of the that is, the extent to which they view themselves
groups, psychological characteristics as good, competent, and decent
organizations, processes people that make
and societies have in common individuals The Social Cognition Motive: The Need to Be
rather than that make them unique and Accurate
individuals. susceptible to different from one
social influence. another. Social Cognition
- How people think about themselves and the
social world; more specifically, how people
The Power of the Situation select, interpret, remember, and use social
information to make judgments and decisions
a. The Importance of Explanation - how people select, interpret, remember, and use
Fundamental Attribution Error: the tendency to information to make judgments and decisions
explain our own and other people’s behavior entirely
in terms of personality traits and to underestimate CHAPTER 02
the power of social influence and the immediate METHODOLOGY: HOW SOCIAL
situation. PSYCHOLOGISTS DO RESEARCH

b. The Importance of Interpretation Intended Learning Outcome

Behaviorism: a school of psychology maintaining At the end of the lesson, the student should be able to:
that to understand human behavior, one need only o Determine how do researchers develop
considers the reinforcing properties of the hypotheses and theories
environment. o Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of
various research designs that social
 Behavioral psychologists, notably the pioneering psychologists use.
behaviorist B. F. Skinner (1938), believed that o Explain how social psychologists ensure the
all behavior could be understood by examining safety and welfare of their research participants,
the rewards and punishments in the organism’s while at the same time testing hypotheses about
environment the causes of social behavior.
 For social psychologists, the relationship
between the social environment and the Social Psychology: An Empirical Science
individual is a two-way street. Not only does the
situation influence people’s behavior; people’s
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Hindsight Bias - whereby after people know that Correlational Method - two variables are
something occurred, they exaggerate how much they systematically measured, and the relationship between
could have predicted it before it occurred them—how much you can predict one from the other—
is assessed.
Formulating Hypotheses and Theories
- Social psychological research begins with a Surveys - the correlational method is often used in
hypothesis about the effects of social influence. surveys, research in which a representative sample of
- Hypotheses often come from previous research people are asked questions about their attitudes or
findings. behavior.
Advantages of Surveys
RESEARCH DESIGNS  Researchers can judge the relationship between
variables that are difficult to observe, such as
Research Methods how often people engage in safer sex.
 Another advantage of surveys is the ability to
Method Focus Question sample representative segments of the
Answered population.
Observational Description What is the  As long as the sample is selected randomly, we
nature of the can assume that the responses are a reasonable
phenomenon match to those of the population as a whole.
Correlational Prediction From knowing
X, can we Positive vs. Negative Correlation
predict Y?
Experimental Causality Is variable X a Positive correlation - INCREASES in the value of
cause of one variable are associated with INCREASES in the
variable Y? value of the other variable
- Height and weight are positively correlated
The Observational Method: Describing Social (taller people tend to weigh more [r = 0.45])
Behavior
Negative Correlation - INCREASES in the value of
Observational Method - this is the technique whereby a one variable are associated with DECREASES in the
researcher observes people and records measurements or value of other Variable
impressions of their behavior. - Vaccination rate correlates negatively with
disease rate (more vaccination, less diseases [r =
Ethnography - the method by which researchers -0.45])
attempt to understand a group or culture by observing it
from the inside, without imposing any preconceived Potential Problem of Surveys
notions they might have.  Accuracy of responses often people simply
do not know the answer—but they think
Archival Analysis - The researcher can also examine they do.
the accumulated documents, or archives, of a culture, a
technique known as an archival analysis Limits of the Correlational Method: Correlation
Does Not Equal Causation
Limits of the Observational Method - The major shortcoming of the correlational
 Certain kinds of behavior are difficult to observe method is that it tells us only that two variables
because they occur only rarely or only in private. are related, whereas the goal of the social
 Archival data tells us little about the effects on psychologist is to identify the causes of social
their attitudes and behavior of doing so. behavior.

The Correlational Method: Predicting Social The Experimental Method: Answering Causal
Behavior Questions
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Experimental Method - here, the researcher 1. Psychologists seek to promote accuracy,

systematically orchestrates the event so that people honesty, and truthfulness in the science,
experience it in one way teaching, and practice of psychology.

Independent Variable - the variable a researcher 2. Psychologists respect the dignity and worth of
changes or varies to see if it has an effect on some all people, and the rights of individuals to
other variable. privacy, confidentiality, and self-
determination.
Dependent Variable - the variable a researcher
measures to see if it is influenced by the independent 3. When psychologists conduct research in
variable the researcher hypothesizes that the person or via electronic transmission or other
dependent variable will depend on the level of the forms of communication, they obtain the
independent variable informed consent of the individual.

Internal Validity - which we can now define as 4. When obtaining informed consent
making sure that the independent variable, and only psychologists inform participants about (1)
the independent variable, influences the dependent the purpose of the research, expected duration,
variable. and procedures; (2) their right to decline to
participate and to withdraw from the research
External Validity - the extent to which the results once participation has begun; (3) the
of a study can be generalized to other situations and foreseeable consequences of declining or
other people. withdrawing; (4) reasonably foreseeable
factors that may be expected to influence their
Field Experiments - one of the best ways to willingness to participate such as potential
increase external validity risks, discomfort, or adverse effects; (5) any
prospective research benefits; (6) limits of
Ethical Issues in Social Psychology confidentiality; (7) incentives for
 To obtain informed consent, the researcher participation; and (8) whom to contact for
explains the nature of the experiment to questions about the research and research
participants before it begins and asks for participants rights.
their permission to participate.
 Psychologists use deception only if it is the 5. Psychologists have a primary obligation and
only way in which they can test a hypothesis take reasonable precautions to protect
about social behavior. confidential information obtained through or
stored in any medium.
Debriefing - the process of explaining to the
participants, at the end of an experiment, the true 6. Psychologists do not conduct a study
purpose of the study and exactly what transpired. involving deception unless they have
determined that the use of deceptive
Institutional Review Board (IRB) - a group made techniques is justified by the study’s
up of at least one scientist, one nonscientist, and one significant prospective scientific, educational,
member not affiliated with the institution that or applied value and that effective non-
reviews all psychological research at that institution deceptive alternative procedures are not
and decides whether it meets ethical guidelines; feasible.

Selected Ethical Principles of Psychologists in the 7. Psychologists explain any deception that is an
Conduct of Research integral feature of the design and conduct of
(Adapted from APA Ethical Principles of Psychologists an experiment to participants as early as is
and Code of Conduct, 2010) feasible.

8. Psychologists provide a prompt opportunity

for participants to obtain appropriate
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information about the nature, results, and A great deal of social cognition—how people think
conclusions of the research, and they take about themselves and the social world—involves
reasonable steps to correct any automatic thinking, which is non-conscious,
misconceptions that participants may have of unintentional, involuntary, and effortless.
which the psychologists are aware.
People as Everyday Theorists: Automatic Thinking
with Schemas
An important part of automatic thinking is using our past
knowledge to organize and interpret new information

Schemas: mental structures for organizing their

knowledge about the social world around themes or
subjects and for influencing what they notice, think
CHAPTER 03 about, and remember
SOCIAL COGNITION: HOW WE THINK ABOUT - schemas contain our basic knowledge and
THE SOCIAL WORLD impressions that we use to organize what we know
about the social world and interpret new situations.
Intended Learning Outcome: - Schemas are extremely useful tools for reducing
At the end of the lesson, the student should be able to: ambiguity about the social world and are
o Describe automatic thinking, and determine particularly useful when we are in confusing
how are schemas an example of that kind of situations, because they help us figure out what is
thought. Evaluate also the advantages and going on.
disadvantages of schemas.
o Identify other types of automatic thinking and Tragically, this is what happens to people who suffer
explain how they operate. from a neurological disorder called Korsakov’s
o Understand how culture influences social syndrome.
thinking.
o Discuss some of the drawbacks of controlled Which Schemas Do We Use?
thinking and point out the improvement of its
effectiveness. Accessibility: the extent to which schemas and concepts
are at the forefront of the mind and are therefore likely
Social Cognition to be used when making judgments about the social
- How people think about themselves and the social world
world; more specifically, how people select,
interpret, remember, and use social information to Something can become accessible for three reasons.
make judgments and decisions. a. First, some schemas are chronically accessible
due to past experience
Two kinds of social cognition: b. Second, something can become accessible
because it is related to a current goal.
1. Automatic Thinking: When we meet someone c. Lastly, schemas can become temporarily
for the first time, we often form lightning- quick accessible because of our recent experiences
impressions of him or her, without consciously
deliberating about it. Similarly, we often make Priming: the process by which recent experiences
decisions “without thinking,” increase the accessibility of a schema, trait, or concept.

2. Controlled Thinking: which people pause and

think carefully about the right course of action.

ON AUTOMATIC PILOT: LOW-EFFORT

THINKING
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way, however, that we choose what goals to follow.

In our everyday lives there are often competing
goals, and the choice of which one to follow can
happen automatically.

Automatic Decision Making

- People’s unconscious minds often help them make
good decisions. A good procedure is to analyze all
the alternatives, spend some time analyzing the
options consciously, and then distract oneself to
allow unconscious processes to operate.

Automatic Thinking and Metaphors About the Body

and the Mind
- In addition to using schemas to reduce ambiguity
about the world, people use metaphors about the
mind and the body. Physical sensations can prime a
Making Our Schemas Come True: Self-Fulfilling metaphor, which then influences people’s
Prophecies judgments

This self- fulfilling prophecy operates as follows:

People have an expectation about what another person is
like, which influences how they act toward that person,
which causes that person to behave consistently with
people’s original expectations, making the expectations Mental Strategies and Shortcuts: Judgmental
come true. Heuristics
- Another form of automatic thinking is to apply
specific rules and shortcuts when thinking about
the social world.

Judgmental Heuristics: which are mental shortcuts

people use to make judgments quickly and efficiently

Availability Heuristic: whereby people base a judgment

on the ease with which they can bring something to
mind.

Representativeness Heuristic: whereby people classify

something according to how similar it is to a typical case

CULTURAL DIFFERENCES IN SOCIAL

COGNITION

Cultural Determinants of Schemas

- Although everyone uses schemas to understand the
TYPES OF AUTOMATIC THINKING world, the content of our schemas is influenced by
the culture in which we live
Automatic Goal Pursuit
- When it comes to setting goals for ourselves, such Analytic thinking style
as what career path to follow, we often do so - a type of thinking in which people focus on the
carefully and consciously, deliberating for some properties of objects without considering their
time about what we want to do. That’s not the only surrounding context.
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- Western cultures greater confidence in our judgments than we

should
Holistic thinking style - Anyone trying to improve human inference is
- a type of thinking in which people focus on the thus up against an overconfidence barrier
overall context, particularly the ways in which - Another approach is to directly teach people
objects relate to each other. some basic statistical and methodological
- East Asian cultures principles about how to reason correctly, with
the hope that they will apply these principles in
CONTROLLED SOCIAL COGNITION: HIGH- their everyday lives.
EFFORT THINKING

Controlled thinking - It is defined as thinking that is

conscious, intentional, voluntary, and effortful.

Controlled Thinking and Free Will

- There can be a disconnect between our
conscious sense of how much we are causing
our own actions and how much we really are
causing them
- Sometimes we overestimate or underestimate
the amount of control we have.
- But the more people believe in free will, the
more willing they are to help others in need and
the less likely they are to engage in immoral
actions such as cheating.

Mentally Undoing the Past: Counterfactual

Reasoning

Counterfactual reasoning: whereby people mentally

change some aspect of the past as a way of imagining
what might have been
- can have a big influence on our emotional
reactions to events.
- The easier it is to mentally undo an outcome, the
stronger the emotional reaction to it.
- Sometimes the emotional consequences of
counterfactual reasoning are paradoxical.
- This is not so good if counterfactual thinking
results in rumination, whereby people
repetitively focus on negative things in their
lives.

Rumination has been found to be a contributor to

depression

Improving Human Thinking

- One purpose of controlled thinking is to provide
checks and balances for automatic thinking. One
approach is to make people a little more humble
about their reasoning abilities. Often we have
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Nonverbal communication - refers to how people

communicate, intentionally or unintentionally, without
words.

Most frequently used and most revealing channels of

nonverbal communication:
 Facial expressions
 Tone of voice
 Gestures
 Body positions and movement
 The use of touch
 Eye gaze

Facial Expressions of Emotion

- The crown jewel of nonverbal communication is

the facial-expressions channel.

- This aspect of communication has a long history

of research, beginning with Charles Darwin’s
book The Expression of the Emotions in Man
and Animals

The argument that all humans:

Encode - or express, these emotions in the same way
Decode - or interpret them, with comparable accuracy.

- Darwin’s interest in evolution led him to believe

that nonverbal forms of communication were
species specific and not culture specific.

CHAPTER 04
SOCIAL PERCEPTION: HOW WE COME TO - Six major emotional expressions: anger,
UNDERSTAND OTHER PEOPLE happiness, surprise, fear, disgust, and sadness.

Intended Learning Outcome

At the end of the lesson, the student should be able to:
1. Recognize how people use nonverbal cues to
understand others.
2. Understand how quickly do first impressions
form and why do they persist.
3. Understand how people determine why others
do what they do.
4. Determine the role of culture play in processes
of social perception and attribution.

Social perception - the study of how we form

impressions of other people and how we make Paul Ekman and Walter Friesen (1971) traveled to
inferences about them. New Guinea, where they studied the decoding ability of
the South Fore, a preliterate tribe that, until that time,
had had no contact with Western civilization.
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- They told the Fore people brief stories with

emotional content and then showed them Personal space and touching
photographs of American men and women - Societies vary in whether they are high-contact
expressing the six emotions; the Fores’ job was cultures, where people stand close to each other
to match the facial expressions of emotion to the and touch frequently, or low-contact cultures,
stories. where people maintain more interpersonal space
- The Fores were as accurate as Western subjects. and touch less often.
- The researchers then asked the Fore people to
demonstrate, while being photographed, facial Hand and head gestures
expressions that would match the stories they
were told. a. The “OK” sign: The OK sign is formed by
- These photographs, when later shown to making a circle with your thumb and index
American research participants, were also finger, with your three other fingers extended
decoded accurately. upward.
- United States, this means “okay.”; Japan means
“money.”; France, means “zero”; Mexico, it
means “sex.”; Ethiopia, it means
“homosexuality.”

b. The thumbs-up gesture: In the United States,

raising one thumb upward with the rest of the
fingers in the fist means “OK.” Several
European countries have a similar meaning for
this gesture; for example, in France it means
Culture and the Channels of Nonverbal “excellent!” However, in Japan, the same
Communication gesture means “boyfriend,” while in Iran and
Sardinia, it is obscene.
For decades, Paul Ekman and his colleagues have
studied the influence of culture on the facial display of c. The “hand - purse” gesture: This gesture is
emotions. They have concluded that display rules are formed by straightening the fingers and thumb
particular to each culture and dictate what kinds of of one hand and bringing them together so the
emotional expressions people are supposed to show. tips touch, pointing upward. This gesture has no
clear meaning in American culture. However, in
Other channels of nonverbal communication besides Italy, it means “What are you trying to say?”; in
facial expressions. Spain, it means “good”; in Tunisia, it means
- Eye contact and gaze are particularly powerful “slow down”; and in Malta, it means “you may
nonverbal cues; how people use personal space. seem good, but you are really bad.”
- These nonverbal cues are strongly shaped by
culture. d. Nodding the head: In the United States,
nodding one’s head up and down means “yes”
Emblems - gestures of the hands and arms are also a and shaking it from side to side means “no.”
fascinating means of communication. However, in some parts of Africa and India, the
Exercise 1 opposite is true: nodding up and down means
“no,” and shaking from side to side means
Cultural Differences in Nonverbal Communication “yes.” To complicate this situation even more, in
Korea, shaking one’s head from side to side
Eye contact and gaze means “I don’t know” (which in the United
States is communicated by a shrug of the
- In American culture, direct eye contact is valued; shoulders). Finally, Bulgarians indicate
- In many parts of the world, direct eye contact is disagreement by throwing their heads back and
considered disrespectful, especially with then returning them to an upright position—
superiors.
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which is frequently mistaken by Americans as Internal attribution - the inference that a person is
meaning agreement. behaving in a certain way because of something about
the person, such as attitude, character, or personality and
FIRST IMPRESSIONS: QUICK BUT LONG-
LASTING External attribution - the inference that a person is
behaving a certain way because of something about the
Thin-slicing: situation he or she is in; the assumption is that most
- We form impressions of other people based on people would respond the same way in that situation.
their facial structure, possessions, attire, and a
variety of other cues, and this process begins The Covariation Model: Internal versus External
within milliseconds. Attributions
- Indicates that these snap judgments are not just
quick; they also pick up on meaningful The first, essential step in the process of social
information and converge with the impressions perception is determining how people decide whether to
formed by perceivers with even longer exposure make an internal or an external attribution.
to the target in question.
Covariation model - the idea that we notice and think
Primacy effect in social perception: What we learn about more than one piece of information when forming
first about another person colors how we see the such judgments
information we learn next.
- In addition to primacy effects, we also have - To form an attribution about what caused a
schemas regarding which traits tend to appear person’s behavior, we systematically note the
together in clusters. That is, we use a few known pattern between the presence or absence of
characteristics to determine what other possible causal factors and whether the behavior
characteristics a person likely has occurs

Belief perseverance: or standing by initial conclusions Three key types:

even when subsequently learned information suggests 1. Consensus Information - refers to how other
we shouldn’t. people behave toward the same stimulus
2. Distinctiveness Information - refers to how
the actor (the person whose behavior we are
trying to explain) responds to other stimuli
CAUSAL ATTRIBUTION: ANSWERING THE 3. Consistency Information - refers to the
“WHY” QUESTION frequency with which the observed behavior
between the same actor and the same stimulus
Attribution Theory - the study of how we infer the occurs across time and circumstances.
causes of other people’s behavior
According to Kelley’s theory, when these three sources
Heider discussed what he called “naive,” or of information combine into one of two distinct patterns,
“commonsense,” psychology. a clear attribution can be made.
- Fritz Heider (1958) is frequently referred to as
the father of attribution theory. The covariation model assumes that people make causal
- In his view, people were like amateur scientists, attributions in a rational, logical way.
trying to understand other people’s behavior by
piecing together information until they arrived at Fundamental Attribution Error
a reasonable explanation or cause - The tendency to overestimate the extent to which
other people’s behavior is due to internal,
One of Heider’s most valuable contributions is a simple dispositional factors and to underestimate the role
dichotomy: of situational factors.

Self-Serving Attributions
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- Explanations for one’s successes that credit o Determine when did people likely to succeed at
internal, dispositional factors and explanations self-control and when they are likely to fail.
for one’s failures that blame external, situational o Explain how people portray themselves so that
factors. others will see them as they want to be seen.
o Evaluate the pros and cons of having high self-
Bias Blind Spot esteem.
- The tendency to think that other people are more
susceptible to attributional biases in their THE NATURE OF THE SELF-CONCEPT
thinking than we are. - Human self-recognition develops at around 18 to
24 months of age
Holistic versus Analytic Thinking - Rudimentary sense of self develops into a full-
blown self-concept
The values inherent in individualistic Western cultures
cause people, as they grow up, to develop more of an Self-concept - the overall set of beliefs that people have
Analytic Thinking Style. about their personal attributes.
- This style involves focusing on the properties of - child’s self-concept is concrete, with references
objects (or people) while paying much less to clear-cut, easily observable characteristics
attention, if any, to the context or situation that like age, sex, neighborhood, and hobbies.
surrounds that object. - As we mature, we place less emphasis on
physical characteristics and more on
The values of collectivistic cultures, such as those of psychological states
East Asia (e.g., China, Korea, and Japan), cause people
to develop more of a Holistic Thinking Style. CULTURAL INFLUENCES ON THE SELF-
- Here, people focus on the “whole picture”—that CONCEPT
is, the object (or person) and the context that - An important influence on our self-concepts is
surrounds that object as well as the relationships the culture in which we grew up.
that exist between them
In many Western cultures, people have an independent
view of the self, which is a way of defining oneself in
terms of one’s own internal thoughts, feelings, and
actions and not in terms of the thoughts, feelings, and
actions of others.

In contrast, many Asian and other non-Western cultures

have an interdependent view of the self, which is a way
CHAPTER 05 of defining oneself in terms of one’s relationships to
THE SELF: UNDERSTANDING OURSELVES IN other people and recognizing that one’s behavior is often
A SOCIAL CONTEXT determined by the thoughts, feelings, and actions of
others.
Intended Learning Outcome
At the end of the lesson, the student should be able to: FUNCTIONS OF THE SELF
o Describe self-concept and explain how it There are four main functions:
develops.
o Understand the limitation of how people know 1. Self-knowledge - the way we understand who we
are and formulate and organize this information;
themselves through introspection and identify
2. Self-control - the way we make plans and
the consequences of introspection.
execute decisions, such as your decision to read
o Identify the ways people come to know
this book right now instead of going out for ice
themselves by observing their behavior.
cream;
o Identify the ways people use others to know
3. Impression Management - the way we present
themselves. ourselves to other people and get them to see us
the way we want to be seen; and
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4. Self-esteem - the way in which we try to

maintain positive views of ourselves.

KNOWING OURSELVES THROUGH

INTROSPECTION
b. Second, people judge whether their behavior
Introspection - which is looking inward to examine the really reflects how they feel or whether it was
“inside information” that we—and we alone—have the situation that made them act that way.
about our thoughts, feelings, and motives.
- People use the same attributional principles to
- It is not always pleasant to be thinking about infer their own attitudes and feelings.
ourselves
- Reasons for our feelings and behavior can be KNOWING OURSELVES THROUGH
hidden from conscious awareness. INTROSPECTION

Causal Theories Intrinsic Motivation - The desire to engage in an

o When people introspect about why they feel the way activity because we enjoy it or find it interesting, not
they do because of external rewards or pressures.
o People have a great deal of information about
themselves, such as how they have responded in the Extrinsic Motivation - The desire to engage in an
past and what they happen to have been thinking activity because of external rewards or pressures, not
about before making a choice because we enjoy the task or find it interesting.

SELF-AWARENESS THEORY Over justification Effect - Results when people view

their behavior as caused by compelling extrinsic reasons,
- We evaluate and compare our current behavior such as a reward, making them underestimate the extent
to our internal standards and values to which their behavior was caused by intrinsic reasons.
- We become self-conscious in the sense that we
become objective, judgmental observers of Fixed Mindset - idea that they have a set amount of the
ourselves, seeing ourselves as an outside ability that cannot change.
observer would. Growth Mindset - the idea that their abilities are
malleable qualities that they can cultivate and grow.

TWO-FACTOR THEORY OF EMOTION

- Stanley Schachter’s theory
- Understanding our emotional states requires two
steps:
- We must first experience physiological arousal,
KNOWING OURSELVES BY OBSERVING OUR and
OWN BEHAVIOR - We must seek an appropriate explanation or
label for it
Self-perception Theory
- when our attitudes and feelings are uncertain or
ambiguous, we infer these states by observing
our behavior and the situation in which it occurs

a. First, we infer our inner feelings from our

behavior only when we are not sure how we
feel.
PSY 313: SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
BSPSY 3104

USING OTHER PEOPLE TO KNOW OURSELVES Self-Esteem - people’s evaluations of their own self-
worth—that is, the extent to which they view themselves
Social Comparison Theory - we learn about our own as good, competent, and decent
abilities and attitudes by comparing ourselves to other
people. High self-esteem - which has the benefits of avoiding
depression, allowing us to persevere in the face of failure
The theory revolves around two important questions:
1. When do people engage in social comparison? Terror Management Theory - protecting us from
2. With whom do they choose to compare thoughts about our own mortality.
themselves?
- In order to protect themselves from the anxiety
Upward Social Comparison - which is comparing caused by thoughts of their own deaths, people
ourselves to people who are better than we are with embrace cultural worldviews that make them
regard to a particular trait or ability. feel like they are effective actors in a
Downward Social Comparison - comparing ourselves meaningful, purposeful world.
to people who are worse than we are with regard to a - What happens when that dose is too large?
particular trait or ability. There is a form of high self-esteem that is
unhealthy, namely, narcissism, which is the
Social Tuning - the process whereby people adopt combination of excessive self-love and a lack of
another person’s attitudes—can happen even when we empathy toward others
meet someone for the first time, if we want to get along
with that person.

SELF-CONTROL: THE EXECUTIVE FUNCTION

OF THE SELF
- An important function of the self is to be the
chief executive who makes choices about what
to do, both in the present and in the future

Thought suppression - whereby we try to push thoughts

out of our minds.

IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT: ALL THE

WORLD’S A STAGE

Impression Management - the attempt by people to get

others to see them as they want to be seen.

Ingratiation - using flattery or praise to make yourself

likable to another, often a person of higher status.

Self-handicapping - whereby people create obstacles

and excuses for themselves so that if they do poorly on a
task, they can avoid blaming themselves.

SELF-ESTEEM: HOW WE FEEL ABOUT

OURSELVES