PSYC 201 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Cognitive Dissonance, The Party Animal, Cognitive Bias
4 Jan 2018
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Social schemas: categories we make up about people. Stereotypes: an exaggerated correlation (can be based on truth or not) Stereotypes are used to define a social schema group. Easier to think of stereotypes for people that are not you - other ethnicities, other religions, other income levels, other countries: automatic impulse. Stereotypes exist because we are looking for further correlations with our environment. Stereotypes become a problem when we use them to judge others: we block out all counter-evidence - we only pay attention to evidence that matches our bias and confirms the stereotype. You pay less attention to people who do not match a stereotype: we don"t understand human complexities - stereotypes put you in categories, there is no spectrum. In group perception: how we perceive our own group > hard to stereotype calgary, but easy to stereotype quebec. Out group perception: how we perceive other groups, how others perceive us.
