PSYC 001 Chapter Notes - Chapter 9: Cognitive Dissonance, Demand Characteristics, Jonestown
Social Psychology
● Social psych: The study of how we influence each other’s behavior and thinking.
● Conformity: A change in behavior/belief to conform to a group norm (real or imagined)
○ Informational social influence (Sherif Study): our desire to be right in situations where
the answer is unclear. We often conform assuming other people are right.
○ Normative social influence (Asch Study): we change our behavior to gain the approval
and acceptance of others (even if it is clearly wrong/bad).
● Compliance: Agreeing to act on a request from a person/group.
○ Foot-in-the-door technique: starting with a small request and moving to a big one.
○ Door-in-the-face technique: starting with a huge unreasonable request and following up
with something chiller. Obligation.
○ Low-ball technique: people who agree to a low price will still buy it if the price goes up
and they already “agreed”. Obligation
○ That’s-not-all technique: Things seem more worth it if “extras” are added in.
● Obedience: Following the commands of someone in authority.
○ Milgram’s Experiment: Had someone administer shocks to another person. They
continued to do what the experimenter told them to even if the other person starts to
scream and protest. 60% obeyed to max capacity. (BUT there was a high rate of
disobedience with people they knew).
■ Sparked the board to require informed consent and voluntary withdrawal in all
experiments
○ Destructive Obedience: Carrying out orders that you know will harm another person
■ Studies found that nurses will often administer a known overdose if ordered by a
doctor.
■ Jonestown Massacre: over 1000 followers of a Reverend voluntarily drank
poisoned kool-aid for a mass suicide as part of their cult. Once the most radical
followers did it, people followed with a “herd-like mentality.”
○ Experimenter bias: When the person performing the research influences the results
● Social Facilitation: when a novice is worse at something under pressure (or with an audience)
but an expert is better.
● Social Loafing: When people put less effort into a group task because they can get away with it.
(The larger the group, the less likely loafers will be detected).
○ Diffusion of Responsibility: responsibility is diffused across members so there is less
accountability.
○ Bystander Effect: If there are a lot of bystanders, people are less likely to help because
they don’t feel personally responsible.
○ Deindividuation: When people feel less responsible for their actions in big groups (like
riots or mobs)
● Group Polarization: When you surround yourself with a group that agrees with you, and you talk
about it and this opinion strengthens/becomes more polarized (cough cough trump)
○ Groupthink: When the desire for group harmony overrides individual opinions and
pressures people to all agree/act on bad decisions
● Fundamental Attribution Error: we tend to think that other people’s behavior is based more on
their personality rather than their external circumstances
○ Just-world hypothesis: the assumption that the world is just and people get what they
deserve
○ Primacy effect: first impressions are weighted more heavily than later info
○ Self-fulfilling prophecy: if you have an assumption about someone, the way you act
towards them might make that assumption come true
○ Actor-observer bias: thinking our own behavior is situational, and others behavior is
dispositional
○ Self-serving bias: we make positive attributions to our disposition and negative
attributions to our situation
Document Summary
Social psych: the study of how we influence each other"s behavior and thinking. Conformity: a change in behavior/belief to conform to a group norm (real or imagined) Informational social influence (sherif study) : our desire to be right in situations where. Normative social influence (asch study) : we change our behavior to gain the approval the answer is unclear. We often conform assuming other people are right. and acceptance of others (even if it is clearly wrong/bad). Compliance: agreeing to act on a request from a person/group. with something chiller. Foot-in-the-door technique: starting with a small request and moving to a big one. Door-in-the-face technique: starting with a huge unreasonable request and following up. Low-ball technique: people who agree to a low price will still buy it if the price goes up. That"s-not-all technique: things seem more worth it if extras are added in. Milgram"s experiment: had someone administer shocks to another person.
