Social Psychology

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Social Psychology

• Impression Formation

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Social Psychology

• Is the scientific study of the way in which the
  thoughts, feelings, and behavior of one
  individual are influenced by the real imagined of
  inferred behavior or characteristics of other
  people

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Social Cognition

• Are 1st impressions of other people accurate?

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Social Perception

• Even in fleeting encounters we form impression
  and seek to understand why people act as they do.
  
• We receive impressions from people walking toward
  us.
• In intimate relationships
• We judge and evaluate others all of the time.

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Impression Formation

• What are some of the things we notice when we
  meet someone for the first time?

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Clothes
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What about her?
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Gestures
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Whats this guy doing?
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Manners of speaking and Tone of Voice

• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vlbrmG7dk9cQ
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?v8EvNJWM_NDg

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AppearanceWhich guy would you hire?
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Schemas

• Drawing on these cues we assign people into ready
  made categories.
• Associated with each category is a schema
  (schemata pl.)
• Schema is a set of beliefs or expectations
  about something that is based on past experiences
  and presumed to apply to all members of a category

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Important Factors

• Why do humans do this?
• Helps us to make inferences about others
• Infer Judge bases on evidence
• Rothbart, Evans and Fulero, 1979
• In their study Half of the participants were
  told that they would be receiving information
  about friendly, sociable men, whereas the other
  half were informed that they would be learning
  about intellectual men.
• Both groups were given the same information about
  a set of 50 men.

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What would you expect to find based on this
experiment?

• Both groups grossly overestimated the number of
  friendly and intellectual men respectively.
• Moreover, both groups forgot many of the details
  they received about the men that were
  inconsistent with their expectations.
• In short, participants tended to hear and
  remember what they were EXPECTED TO.
• What does this mean?

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Pygmalion Effect
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Answer

• Schematas lure us into remembering things about
  people that we never actually observed.
• Why do we do this?
• Because we are cognitive misers.
• In fact, even though we are constantly adding new
  information to our mental files, our later
  experiences generally dont impact us nearly so
  much as our earliest impressions.
• This is known as the PRIMACY EFFECT.

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Pygmalion Effect

• Moreover, first impression can lead to a
  phenomenon called the Self-Fulfilling Prophecy.
• The process in which a persons expectations
  about another elicits behavior from the second
  person that confirms the expectation.
• Rosenthal and Jacobs (1968) Classic experiment
• At the beginning of the school year the
  researchers gave all students at a California
  elementary school a test.
• Based on the finding of the test, the researchers
  provided the teachers of that school a list that
  the test identified as Bloomers.
• Bloomers students who WOULD demonstrate
  intellectual growth in the coming year.

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Pygmalion Continued

• Bloomers were chosen at random
• Nevertheless, the children made greater gains in
  test scores and were rated better by teachers
  than in the control group.
• WHY?

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Answer

• Teachers were warmer and friendlier.
• Provided them with more positive feedback.
• Assigned them more challenging tasks.
• A correlation between teacher expectation and
  student performance.

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Primacy Effect Nullified

• Primacy Effect can be nullified if people are
  warned to beware of first impressions, or if they
  are encouraged to interpret information about
  others slowly and carefully.

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What are stereotypes?

• A stereotype is a set of characteristics believed
  to be shared by all members of a social category.
• A stereotype is a special kind of schema that
  may be based on any distinguishing feature, but
  is most often applied to sex, race, occupation,
  physical appearance, place of residence, and
  membership in a group.

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Pictures by Edward Curtis
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Surviance
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Simulations of Indians?
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Chief Wahoo

• Is this a stereotypical view of Indians?

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Is this?
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Florida State Seminoles
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Is this?
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Redskins? As a mascot?
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Stereotypes

• When we stereotype we tend to infer things about
  them solely on the basis of their social
  category.
• And ignore facts about individual traits that are
  inconsistent with the stereotype.
• We remember things selectively or inaccurately
  thus perpetuating stereotypes.

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• Stereotypes can be the basis of self-fulfilling
  prophecies too.
• But people are more apt to apply stereotypes in a
  chance encounter rather than a structured, task
  oriented situation.
• Or when pursuing a common goal.