Psy 352AB Social Psychology

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Psy 352A/BSocial Psychology
why are you here?
what are your goals?
Who is responsible for the quality of your
education?
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Teaching to Transgress (Bell Hooks)

• banking system versus critical thinking
• outcomes of interest
• learning as liberation to be changed by ideas
• education as freedom, exciting, engaging
• responsibility for the classroom dynamic
• communal versus traditional
• education as self-actualization
• knowledge as enriching and self-enhancing

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The angel of history does not move dialectically
into the future but has her face turned back
towards the past. Where we see a chain of events
she sees one single catastrophe which keeps
piling wreckage upon wreckage and hurls it at her
feet. The Angel would like to stay, awaken the
dead, and join together that which has been
smashed to pieces, but a storm is blowing from
paradise. It has got caught in her wings and
irresistibly propels her into the future to which
her back is turned, while the pile of ruins
before her grows skyward. This storm is what
we call progress. Walter Benjamin
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social psychology
what is social psychology?
scientific
The study of how peoples

• thoughts,
• feelings,
• and behaviors
• are influenced by the
• actual,
• implied,
• or imagined presence of others

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social psychology
other social sciences
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social psychology
theoretical perspectives
socio- cultural
evolutionary
social learning
phenomenological
social cognitive
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social psychology
theoretical perspectives and perceived causes of
behavior
socio- cultural
social cognitive
evolutionary
phenomenological
social learning
inherited tendencies
attention, memory, interpretation
subjective interpretations
group forces
rewards punishments
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social psychology
two shared assumptions about behavior
socio- cultural
social cognitive
evolutionary
phenomenological
social learning
inherited tendencies
attention, memory, interpretation
subjective interpretations
group forces
rewards punishments
human behavior is

• goal driven

• due to the person-situation interaction

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social psychology
behavior is goal driven
socio- cultural
social cognitive
evolutionary
phenomenological
social learning
inherited tendencies
attention, memory, interpretation
subjective interpretations
group forces
rewards punishments
ensure survival
perpetuate society
to pursue conscious goals stimulated by the
current situation
to obtain rewards avoid punishments
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social psychology
fundamental motives/functions/goals of social
behavior
To establish social ties To understand ourselves
and others To gain and maintain social
status To defend ourselves and those we
value To attract and retain mates
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social psychology
behavior is due to the person-situation
interaction
socio- cultural
social cognitive
evolutionary
phenomenological
social learning
inherited tendencies
attention, memory, interpretation
subjective interpretations
group forces
rewards punishments
environment triggers internal states
cultural demands on the individual
connection between mental representations and
the environment
rewards punishments in the environment
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social psychology
manifestations of the mutual person-situation
interaction process
Different situations activate different parts of
the self Situations have different facets -
elicit different motives Individuals respond
differently to similar situations People change
their situations choose their
situations Situations change people choose
people
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social psychology an overview

• defining social psychology
• lessons of social psychological research
• the foundations of social psychology
• how the topics fit together

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lessons of social psychology

• individual differences
• power of situations
• the subtlety of situations
• the predictability of human behavior
• social research versus everyday life

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foundational principles

• situationism
• construal
• tension systems

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situationism

• behavior person situation PXS
• 3rd wave
• group decision making
• channel factors

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construal

• impact of objective stimulus depends on..
• true stimulus situation as construed
• tools of construal
• cognitive structures
• cognitive strategies
• consistently fail to
• see own experience as construed

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construal
I call em as I see em
I call em as they are
they aint nothing till I call em
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tension systems

• people/groups/nations tension systems
• behavior derived from a totality of coexisting
  facts
• these coexisting facts dynamic fields
• interdependence of various parts
• three contributions
• understand inherent restraining factors
• small changes can have large effects
• paradoxical results

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predictability and indeterminacy

• goals of predictions
• particular people in novel situations
• people in general/particular groups
• situations/people
• complex, interactive, nonlinear systems
• lay predictions
• overestimate individual differences
• predictability?

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how the topics fit

• understanding our
• feelings,
• thoughts,
• actions

• affect,
• cognitions,
• behavior

attitudes

• and how they are influenced by
• the actual,
• implied,
• or imagined
• presence of others

our construal of the situation
the situation
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social psychology
typical topics
methods
self
prejudice
Social cognition
aggression
social psychology
attitudes
altruism
persuasion
relation- ships
group influence
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social psychology
theoretical frameworks
R E L A T I O N S H I P S
prejudice
aggression
Attitudes Self Social Cognition
group influence
persuasion
altruism