Define social psychology.
The study of the way in which thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of one individual are influenced by groups or other people.The ways in which people think, influence, and relate to one another
What is the attribution theory?
The theory that we explain someone's behavior by crediting either the situation or the person's disposition
Contrast dispositional and situational attributions.
Dispositional:We can attribute behavior to the person's stable, enduring traitsSituational:We can attribute it to the situation
What is the fundamental attribution error?
The tendency for observers, when analyzing other's behavior, to underestimate the impact of the situation and overestimate the impact of personal disposition
Define the concept of "attitude.
Feelings, often influenced by our beliefs, that predispose us to respond in a particular way to objects, people, and events
Under what conditions do attitudes guide our behavior?
Attitudes are likely to affect behavior when external influences are minimal, and when the attitude is stable, specific to the behavior, and easily recalled
What is the relationship between attitudes and behavior?
Attitudes follow behavior, actions can affect attitudes
Describe the foot-in-the-door phenomenon.
The tendency for people who have first agreed to a small request to comply later with a larger request
What is cognitive dissonance and how does it operate?
Tension that we experience when we are aware that our actions and attitudes don't coincide
What is social influence?
What is social influence?
What are the major categories of social influence studied by social psychologists?
Culture.Conformity.Obedience.Group Influencebehavior/polarization.
Peripheral route persuasion.
Occurs when people are influenced by incidental cues, such as a speaker's achievement.
Central route persuasion.
Occurs when interested people are focused on the arguments and respond with favorable thoughts.
Role.
A set of expectations (norms) about a social position, defining how those in the position ought to behave.
Cognitive dissonance theory.
The theory that we act to reduce the discomfort (dissonance) we feel when two of our thoughts (cognitions) are inconsistent. For example, when we become aware that our attitudes and out actions clash, we can reduce the resulting dissonance by changing our attitudes.
Culture.
The enduring behaviors, ideas, attitudes, values, and traditions shared by a group of people and transmitted from one generation to the next.
Norm.
An understood rule for accepted and expected behavior. Norms prescribe "proper" behavior.
Conformity.
Adjusting our behavior or thinking to coincide with a group standard.
What do experiments on conformity and compliance reveal about human behavior?
We change our behavior based off Automatic Mimicry, helping us feel what others feel
Describe Asch's conformity experiments and his findings.
Asch devised a simple test to test the conformity within a group when debating on being oddball or going with the groupWe are likely to conform when we are made to feel incompetent or insecure or are in a group with at least three peoplePeople only conformed ⅓ of the time.
Discuss the conditions that strengthen conformity.
Are made to feel incompetent or insecureAre in a group with at least three peopleAre in a group in which everyone else agreesAdmire the groups status and attractivenessHave not made a prior commitment to any responseKnow that others in the group will observe our behaviorAre from a culture that strongly encourages respect for social standards
What are the major reasons for conforming behavior?
Normative Social Influence:Informational Social Influence:
Normative social influence.
Influence resulting from a person's' desire to gain approval or avoid disapproval.We want to fit in.
Informational social influence.
Influence resulting from one's willingness to accept others' opinions about reality.We want to belong.
Define obedience.
Compliance with an order, request, or law or submission to another's authority
Describe Milgram's study and his findings.
This study tests how easy one is to obey and comply with the teacher, testing to see how far until you refuse the experimenter's commands
What does the author of your text conclude with regard to conformity and obedience studies?
People who resisted were the minority.After first acts of compliance or resistance, attitudes began to follow and justify behavior. Culture does have an influence.Strong social influences can make people conform. People "just doing their job".Utilizes the foot in the door phenomenon.
Social facilitation.
Improved performance on simple or well-learned tasks in the presence of others.
Social loafing.
The tendency for people in a group to exert less effort when pooling their efforts toward attaining a common goal than when individually accountable.
Deindividuation.
The loss of self-awareness and self-restraint occuring in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity.
Group polarization.
The enhancement of a group's prevailing inclinations through discussion within the group.After a discussion about racism, people becoming more racist.
Groupthink.
The mode of thinking that occurs when the desire for harmony in a decision-making group overrides a realistic appraisal of alternatives.
Trait.
A characteristic pattern of behavior or a disposition to feel and act, as assessed by self-report inventories and peer reports.
Personality inventory.
A questionnaire (often with true-false or agree-disagree items) on which people respond to items designed to gauge a wide range of feelings and behaviors; used to assess selected personality traits.
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI).
The most widely researched and clinically used of all personality tests. Originally developed to identify emotional disorders (still considered its most appropriate use), this test is now used for many other screening purposes.
Empirically derived test.
A test (such as the MMPI) developed by testing a pool of items and then selecting those that discriminate between groups.
Reciprocal determinism.
The interacting influences of behavior internal cognition, and environment.
Social-cognitive perspective.
View behavior as influenced by the interaction between people's traits (including their thinking) and their social context.
Self.
In contemporary psychology, assumed to be the center of personality, that organizer of our thoughts, feelings, and actions.
Self-serving bias.
A readiness to perceive oneself favorably.
Spotlight effect.
Overestimating others' noticing and evaluating our appearance, performance, and blunders (as if we presume a spotlight shines on us).
Self-efficacy.One's sense of competence and effectiveness
Self-efficacy.One's sense of competence and effectiveness
Self-esteem.
One's feelings of high or low self-worth.
Narcissism.
Excessive self-love and self-absorption.
Psychological disorder.
A syndrome marked by a clinically significant disturbance in an individual's cognition, emotion regulation, or behavior.
Individualism.
Giving priority to one's own goals over group goals and defining one's identity in terms of personal attributes rather than group identifications.
Collectivism.
Giving priority to the goals of one's group (often one's extended family or work group) and defining one's identity accordingly.
Define personality.
Personality refers to the relatively stable pattern of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors exhibited by a person over time and situationsDifferences in patterns between people
What are the two dimensions of Eysenck's personality theory?
Introversion-extraversionStability-instability
Medical model.
The concept that diseases, in this case psychological disorders, have physical causes that can be diagnosed, treated, and, in most cases, cured, often through treatment in a hospital.
Epigenetics.
The study of environmental influences on gene expression that occur without a DNA change.
Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
A psychological disorder marked by extreme inattention and/or hyperactivity and impulsivity.
DSM-5.
The American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition; a widely used system for classifying psychological disorders.
Anxiety disorders.
Psychological disorders characterized by distressing, persistent anxiety or maladaptive behaviors that reduce anxiety.
Generalized anxiety disorder.
An anxiety disorder in which a person is continually tense, apprehensive, and in a state of autonomic nervous system arousal.
Panic disorder.
An anxiety disorder marked by unpredictable, minutes-long episodes of intense dread in which a person experiences terror and accompanying chest pain, choking, or other frightening sensations. Often followed by worry over a possible next attack.
Phobia.
An anxiety disorder marked by a persistent, irrational fear and avoidance of a specific object, activity, or situation.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).
A disorder characterized by unwanted repetitive thoughts (obsessions), actions (compulsions), or both.
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
A disorder characterized by haunting memories, nightmares, social withdrawal, jumpy anxiety, numbness of feeling, and/or insomnia that lingers for four weeks or more after a traumatic experience.
Major depressive disorder.
A disorder in which a person experiences, in the absence of drugs or another medical condition, two or more weeks with five or more symptoms, at least one of which must be either depressed mood or loss of interest or pleasure.
Bipolar disorder
A disorder in which a person alternates between the hopelessness and lethargy of depression and the overexcited state of mani. (Formerly called manic-depressive disorder).
Mania.
A hyperactive, wildly optimistic state in which dangerously poor judgement is common.
Rumination.
Compulsive fretting; overthinking about our problems and their causes.
Psychotherapy.
Treatment involving psychological techniques; consists of interactions between a trained therapist and someone seeking to overcome psychological difficulties or achieve personal growth.
Eclectic approach.
An approach to psychotherapy that uses techniques from various forms of therapy.
Biomedical therapy.
Prescribed medications or procedures that act directly on the person's physiology.
Resistance.
In psychoanalysis, the blocking from consciousness of anxiety-laden material.
Psychoanalysis.
Sigmund Freud's therapeutic technique. Freud believed the patient's free associations, resistances, dreams, amd transfereces - and the therapist's interpretations of them - released previously repressed feelings, allowing the patient to gain self-insight.
Interpretation.
In psychoanalysis, the analyst's nothing supposed dream meanings, resistances, and other significant behaviors and events in order to promote insight. Transference.In psychoanalysis, the patient's transfer to the analyst of emotions linked with other relationships (such as love or hatred for a parent).
Psychodynamic therapy.
Therapy deriving from the psychoanalytic tradition; views individuals as responding to unconscious forces and childhood experiences, and seeks to enhance self-insight.
Unconditional positive regard.
A caring, accepting, nonjudgmental attitude, which Carl Rogers believed would help clients develop self-awareness and self-acceptance.
Insight therapies.
A humanistic therapy, developed by Carl Rogers, in which the therapist uses techniques such as active listening within a genuine, accepting, empathetic environment to facilitate clients' growth. (Also called person-centered therapy.)
Active listening.
Empathetic listening in which the listener echoes, restates, and clarifies. Feature of Rogers' client-centered therapy.
Behavior therapy.
Therapy that applies learning principles to the elimination of unwanted behaviors.
Counterconditioning.
Behavior therapy procedures that use classical conditioning to evoke new responses to stimuli that are triggering unwanted behaviors; include exposure therapies and aversive conditioning.
Exposure therapies.
Behavioral techniques, such as systematic desensitization and virtual reality exposure therapy, that treat anxieties by exposing people (in imagination or actual situations) to the things they fear and avoid.
Systematic desensitization.
A type of exposure therapy that associates a pleasant, relaxed state with gradually increasing anxiety-triggering stimuli. Commonly used to treat phobias.
Virtual reality exposure therapy.
An anxiety treatment that progressively exposes people to electronic simulations of their greatest fears, such as airplane flying, spiders, or public speaking.
Aversive conditioning.
A type of counterconditioning that associates an unpleasant state (such as nausea) with an unwanted behavior (such as drinking alcohol)
Token economy.
An operant conditioning procedure in which people earn a token of some sort for exhibiting a desired behavior and can later exchange their tokens for various privileges or treats.
Cognitive therapy.
Therapy that teaches people new, more adaptive ways of thinking; based on the assumption that thoughts intervene between events and our emotional reactions.
Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT).
A popular integrative therapy that combines cognitive therapy (changing self-defeating thinking) with behavior therapy (changing behavior).
Group therapy.
Therapy conducted with groups rather than individuals, permitting therapeutic benefits from group interaction.
Family therapy.
Therapy that treats the family as a system. Views an individual's unwanted behaviors as influenced by, or directed at, other family members.
Evidence-based practice.
Clinical decision making that integrates the best available research with clinical expertise and patient characteristics and preferences.
Psychopharmacology.
The study of the effects of drugs on mind and behavior.
Therapeutic alliance.
A bond of trust and mutual understanding between a therapist and client who work together constructively to overcome the client's problem.
Biomedical therapy.
Prescribed medications or procedures that act directly on the person's physiology.
Antipsychotic drugs.
Drugs used to treat schizophrenia and other forms of severe thought disorder.
Antianxiety drugs.
Drugs used to control anxiety and agitation.
Antidepressant drugs.
Drugs used to treat depression, anxiety disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and posttraumatic stress disorder.
Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT).
A biomedical therapy for severely depressed patients in which a brief electric current is sent through the brain of an anesthetized patient.
Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS).
The application of repeated pulses of magnetic energy to the brain; used to stimulate or suppress brain activity.
Psychosurgery.
Surgery that removes or destroys brain tissue in an effort to change behavior.
Lobotomy.
A psychosurgical procedure once used to calm uncontrollably emotional or violent patients. The procedure cut the nerves connecting the frontal lobes to the emotion-controlling centers of the inner brain.
Resilience.
The personal strength that helps most people cope with stress and recover from adversity and even trauma.
Posttraumatic growth.
Positive psychological changes as as result of struggling with extremely challenging circumstances and life crises.
What are the main traits assessed by the Big Five?
ConscientiousnessAgreeablenessNeuroticismOpennessExtraversion
What does the research suggest about the stability of personality traits?
Personality continues to develop and change through childhood and adolescence.Maturity principle grows until age 40.People become more conscientious and abreeable and less neurotic.
What does modern research suggest about trait theory?
Research supports the consistency of personality traits over time and across situations
Describe the person-situation controversy.
Our behavior is influenced by our inner disposition and our environment, but which is more importantWalter Mischel (1968, 1984, 2004) points out that people do not act with predictable consistencyThe inconsistency makes personality tests weak predictors of behaviorHowever, people's average outgoingness, happiness, or carelessness over many situations is predictableTrait theorists argue that behaviors from a situation may be different, but average behavior remains the same. Therefore, traits matter.
What does modern research suggest about trait theory?
Research supports the consistency of personality traits over time and across situations
What is the social-cognitive perspective?
Views behavior as influenced by the interaction between people's traits (including their thinking) and their social contextBandura (1986, 2001, 2005) believes that personality is the result of an interaction between a person and their social contextHe emphasized this interaction when he proposed the social-cognitive perspectiveBandura proposed that people are biopsychosocial organismsPersonality is the result of biologically influenced psychological traits with our situationsReciprocal determinism is key concept
What is reciprocal determinism?
The interacting influences of behavior, internal cognition, and environmentBandura views the person-environment interaction as reciprocal determinism - behavior, internal cognition, and environment all influence one another.
What are some criticisms of the DSM, and diagnostic labeling more generally?
DSM-5 is criticized for casting too wide of a net and putting too many people in the category of having a mental disorderAll types of behavior or thought can come under psychiatry.
Describe the bio-psycho-social perspective of mental disorder.
Today's psychology studies how biological, psychological, and social-cultural factors interact to produce specific psychological disorders
How common are psychological disorders?
According to World Health Organization, the U.S. has almost ⅓ occurences of mental illnessU.S. National Institue of Mental Health estimated 1 in 4 Americans suffer from a mental disorder in the last year.
Describe the various risk and protective factors for mental disorders described in your text.
Risk factors:Academic failure, birth complications, chronic pain, poor work/skill habits, etc...Protective factors:Economic independence, feelings of mastery and control, security, literacy, etc...
List and describe the mood disorders described in your text.
Major Depressive Disorder.Bipolar Disorder.
Compare and contrast the symptoms of major depressive disorder and bipolar disorder.
MDD occurs when at least five signs of depression the last two weeks are not caused by medication or conditionBP is an alternation between the lows of depression and the euphoric, hyperactive state of mania
How do genetics contribute to depression and bipolar disorder?
Many depressive and bipolar disorders run in families, increasing the risk of obtaining that disorder if you have a parent of sibling with the disorder
What brain functions/dysfunctions have been associated with depression?
During depression, brain activity slows, reduced amounts of norepinephrine (increases arousal and boosts mood) are released, Serotonin is reduced as well
How are thought and mood related?
The negative explanations coincide with a depressed mood, and they are indicators of depression
Describe the social-cognitive perspective of depression.
This explores how people's assumptions and expectations influence what they perceiveExpecting the worst, depressed people magnify bad experiences and minimize good ones
What factors are associated with suicide?
Depression, social suggestion, prior known suicides
Describe explanatory styles and depression.
Depressed people's explanatory style is who or what they blame for their failuresWhen bad events happen, depression-prone people tend to blame themselves
What is flat affect?
A state of no apparent feeling
Describe how the learning/conditioning perspective attempts to explain anxiety disorders.
People with anxiety disorders learn to associate anxiety with certain cues, and why anxious people are hyperattentive to possible threats58% of those with a social anxiety disorder said their disorder began after a traumatic event
Describe how the biological perspective attempts to explain anxiety disorders.
Genes, the brain (learned fears that alter brain pathways)Natural selection (inherited responses that had survival value for those who came before us)
Describe the causes of anxiety disorders.
Some people can have a genetic predisposition to them, and it can also be caused by an imbalance of hormones and chemical messengers in areas of the brain
Describe the symptoms of dissociative identity disorder.
A rare dissociative disorder in which a person exhibits two or more distinct and alternating personalities
List and describe some common techniques of behavior therapy.
Exposure therapy.Reality exposure.Counterconditioning.Token Economy.
Explain the methods used in Psychoanalysis including free association and interpretation.
Interpretation:In psychoanalysis, the analyst's noting supposed dream meanings, resistances, and other significant behaviors and events in order to promote insightFree association:Relating memories with dreams, allowing the patient to talk and work through these emotions by themselves, you edit your thoughts
How are paraphrasing, clarification, and reflection involved in "active listening?
Paraphrasing:Checking your understandings by summarizing the person's words in your own wordsClarification:My encourage the person to say moreReflection Mirror what you're sensing from the person's body language and intensity
Identify the goals and objectives of Rational-Emotive therapy.
It is therapy in which the therapists aim to resolve emotional and behavioral disturbances in orderto help the patient lead a happier and more fulfilling life through insight into distorted thinkingpatterns.Focus is more on verbal interactions and thoughts rather than on feelings.Theory is that illogical self-talk creates negative feelings and behavior
Describe the ABC theory of Rational-Emotive therapy.
A = antecedent stimulusB = beliefC = consequence Negative feelings and behavior have ideological antecedents that are learned and need to beunlearned. If the client is able to learn belief is illogical and replace negative thoughts withrational thinking, then behavior and feelings will be changed
Describe the origins of Gestalt therapy.
Derived from Psychoanalytic perspective (focuses on unconscious conflict) but focuses more onpresent rather than past.
What are the goals and techniques of Gestalt therapy?
Recover lost potential by integrating conflicting polarities• Recognize verbal game playing • Move from environmental support to self-support• Seeks to provide patient with opportunities to discover self, which is achieved byfrustrating the patient to confront self.• Focuses on non-verbal interaction and feelings
Compare and contrast the three therapy approaches discussed in class and illustrated in the videos on psychotherapy.
Person-Centered Therapy (Carl Rogers) aims to boost self-fulfillment by helping growth in self-awareness and self-acceptance - passive. Gestalt Therapy (Fritz Perls) aims to recover lost potential by integrating conflicting polarities, recognize verbal game playing, and move from environmental support to self-support - aggressive. Rational-Emotive Theory (Albert Ellis) is that illogical self talk creates negative feelings and behavior - interactive.
In what contexts is group therapy used?
Saves therapists money and timeSocial laboratory for exploring social behaviors and developing social skillsEnables clients to see that other people share the same problemsProvide feedback as clients try out new ways of behaving
What does the research evidence suggest regarding the relative effectiveness of variousforms of therapy?
Suggests that therapy is most effective when the issue is clear cut (such as phobias/panic) asopposed to anxiety and depression which may be effective in the short term but often leads torelapses in the long term.Undergoing therapy helps people improve more quickly and effective manner lowering thechances of relapse.
What is the rationale behind family therapy?
Treats the family as a system. Views an individual's unwanted behavior as influenced by, ordirected at, other family members.
Is psychotherapy effective? Support your answer with research evidence.
Clients perception: 90% of patients believe psychotherapy is effective.Clinician's perception: highly effective! However, patients are vulnerable to cognitive errors suchas confirmation bias and illusory correlationResearchers have found that those undergoing psychotherapy are more likely to improve more quickly than those not in treatment, and with less chance of relapse
What role do clients' perceptions play in the effectiveness of therapy?
Client testimonials are useful, but don't persuade everyoneClients often enter therapy in crisis, the placebo effect plays a role, and clients will generally speak kindly of their therapists
What role do the clinician's perceptions play in the effectiveness of therapy?
It helps therapists' asses the effectiveness in different clients and make adjustments accordinglyto help the patient overcome or cope with disorder more effectively in the future.However, therapists like the rest of us, are vulnerable to cognitive errors as well
Describe the various types of biomedical therapies for psychological disorders.
Drug therapy: antipsychotic drugs, anti-anxiety drugs, antidepressant drugs)Brain stimulation: Electro conclusive therapy, alternative neuro stimulation therapyPsychosurgery: Lobotomy
What is an antipsychotic drug? Provide several examples by describing their uses.
Drug used to treat schizophrenia and other forms of severe thought disorderAn antipsychotic drug is a medication drug that helps to manage Psychosis (hallucination,delusions etc) in the short term however in the long term may have adverse effects such asinvoluntary movement disorders, gynecomastia, weight gain etc.
How effective are drug therapies?
Very effective! US mental hospitals said that clients being accommodated has dropped.When antipsychotic drugs were introduced in the 1950's there was a significant rapid decline in the populations of those in state and country mental hospitals
What are potential side effects of antipsychotic drugs?
Sluggishness, tremors, and twitches, tardive dyskinesia (involuntary movement for the facial muscles, tongue, and limbs), obesity, diabetes
Is electroconvulsive shock therapy effective? Why or why not?
It is a procedure, done under general anesthesia, in which small electric currents are passedthrough the brain, intentionally triggering a brief seizure. ECT seems to cause changes in brainchemistry that can quickly reverse symptoms of certain mental health conditionsCould be a placebo effect no one knows 100%
What is a lobotomy? Describe the history of its use with patients.
A psychosurgical procedure once used to calm uncontrollably emotional or violent patientsThe procedure cut the nerves connecting the frontal lobes to the emotion-controlling centers of the inner brainThis leads to immaturity and uncreative personalities.
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