PSYCH101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 11: Leon Festinger, Cognitive Dissonance, Fundamental Attribution Error

• School: University of Waterloo
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYCH101
• Professor: Steve Spencer

Document Summary

Social cognitive psychology: includes cognitions (perceptions, thoughts, and beliefs) an individual may have about the social contexts (other people, groups, situations) Intuitive thought: quick, effortless, automatic thinking (requires great effort when you try to control it) Deliberative thought: more careful, effortful and rational process (slower, requires some effort, usually takes place on step at a time) Person perception: process by which indivs. form judgements and categorize others. Begins immediately in our social encounters, guided by past experiences. Schemas: clusters of knowledge and expectation about indivs. and groups. Persons gender, race and style of dress all activate schemas and these schemas bring certain traits to mind automatically. Thin slices: basing judgements of others on very limited info. Self-fulfilling prophecy: when a first impression affects the observer"s behaviour and, as a result, the first impression comes true. Attributions are the explanations we make about the causes of behaviour (start out to be automatic, intuitive explanations)