Social Psychology How are our actions, thoughts and feelings influenced by others

Conformity : changing one’s own ___________ to more _________________ the actions of others

Solomon Asch & Conformity Answering orally after several confederates gave the wrong answer, subjects gave incorrect answers 30% of the time Factors: __________ dissenter ___________ responses

What kinds of power do social situations have in our lives? Start by listing at least 4-5 “groups” that you are a part of…. Do you behave differently when you are with different groups ? If so, why? Choose just one group to consider – what positive things does being part of this group bring to your life? Think of a time that being a group member influenced you in a negative way.

Group Process Social Facilitation: the presence of other people has a ________________on the performance of a relatively easy task

But…. The opposite is true for _______________ … AND…some people will put in MUCH _________effort when they work with others…this cultural influenced behavior is called Social Loafing

Group Polarization The enhancement of the group’s ___________ attitudes through discussions within the group

Groupthink When people want to maintain a cohesive group more than they want to consider the problems that the group is concerned with.

Have you seen this happen? Think about recent group behavior..have people continued with a bad plan even when its flaws are obvious? A famous tragic case – the Challenger Disaster

Deindividualization The loss of self awareness and ____________ that occurs in ___________ situations that foster arousal and anonymity

Diffusion of Responsibility

Bystander Effect: the likelihood of a bystander to help someone in trouble ______________ as the number of bystanders increases Famous Incidents Kitty Genovese LaShanda Calloway

Milgram Obedience to Authority When asked by an “experimenter” to administer obviously painful shocks __________ volunteer subjects administered the maximum 450 volt shock No one stopped before 300 volts..when the actor being shocked was “screaming in pain”

Why did they go this far? They had to resist these prompts from authority figure: Please continue. The experiment requires that you continue. It is absolutely essential that you continue. You have no other choice, you must go on.

Let’s think about… power and social roles What positions of power have you taken on in your life? How comfortable did you feel exercising authority? Did you live up to your own values?

Zimbardo’s Stanford Prison Experiment 1971 – Zimbardo sets up a fake prison. Volunteer students _____________ assigned to guard or prisoner role. Increasingly brutal behavior by guards and psychological trauma to “prisoners” shuts down the study after just ________ days

Zimbardo’s conclusions “good people can be readily induced into doing evil to other good people within the context of socially approved roles, rules, and norms…” Its not a few bad apples in the barrel…it’s a bad barrel

What does he mean by evil? The exercise of power to:  intentionally harm people psychologically  hurt people physically  destroy people mortally or ideas  commit crimes against humanity

Zimbardo’s Slippery Slope of Evil 1. Mindlessly taking the first step 2. Dehumanization of others 3. Deindividuation of self 5. Blind obedience to authority 6. Uncritical conformity to group norms 7. Passive tolerance of evil through inaction and indifference 4. Diffusion of responsibility

Scenario You are a soldier in the United States Army Reserve. You have been placed to work in a prison in Iraq. These prisoners are believed to be terrorists and have important information that can help with the war. It is your job to interrogate them.  Use the terms from Zimbardo’s slippery slope to describe what could happen in this situation. Be sure you are your partner understand each term.

Real situations: Mylai, Abu Ghraib

The Hero  The only way to prevent evil  Definition:  concern for other people in need  a concern to defend a moral cause,  knowing there is a personal risk,  done without expectation of reward.