Experimental Psychology PSY 433 Chapter 13 Social Psychology (Cont.)

Dependent Variables Questionnaires measuring belief, attitude, preference (liking). Rating scales Behavioral measures: Aggression measured by shock given. Attraction measured by how long a man talks to a woman, smiles at her, whether he asks her out. Converging measures are better.

Independent Variables Characteristics of a social situation or of people (demographic variables). Factors believed to affect behavior are manipulated: Persuasiveness – manipulate number or type of arguments used. Aggression – manipulate temperature in a room to test whether heat affects behavior. Conformity – manipulate number of people who agree or disagree.

Experimenter Bias Subtle influences that experimenters may unknowingly exert on their outcomes. Tone of voice and emphasis may change across conditions. Expectancies may affect subject behavior. Blind and Double-blind procedures are not always possible. Replication guards against both experimenter bias and outright fraud.

Amy Cuddy & Power Posing http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2016/01/amy_cuddy_s_power_pose_research_is_the_latest_example_of_scientific_overreach.html Power posing is said to result in both psychological an physiological changes. Efforts to replicate her studies have been unsuccessful.

Demand Characteristics Are subjects acting normally in an experiment, or are they just doing what they think they are expected to do? Did Milgram’s subjects give shock because the experimental context demanded it? Placebo effect occurs when subjects are told they are taking medication and show effects because of their expectation. All experiments communicate an expectation explicitly and implicitly.

Orne’s Experiments Orne sought an experiment so meaningless than subjects would refuse to do it: 2000 sheets with random digits that subjects were to add up – impossible yet no one refused. Told to tear up the sheets, subjects persisted for hours, saying there must be a good reason Orne and Evans (1965) examined demand characteristics in a hypnosis study. Is behavior due to hypnosis or demand characteristics?

Hypnosis Demos http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lmgptd8bXfA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn171z-CPLs

Orne’s Results Hypnosis is not necessarily responsible for the behavior. Demand characteristics are sufficient to explain the behavior.

The Bystander Studies Several incidents pre-1970 got researchers interested in another area of social influence: The mere presence of other people The bystander effect -- the more people who observe a crisis, the less likely any one of them is to help the victim. Is this true in every situation?

Outside of a Small Circle of Friends http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4bSqSdto5g

Kitty Genovese (1964)

Darley and Latane (1968) Over an intercom, subjects discussed problems in college life with 1, 2, or 5 others. IV: Number of bystanders (0, 1, or 4) DV: whether subject responded & elapsed sec The more bystanders, the less likely subjects were to respond and the longer it took when they did respond Note: typo in Kantowitz Table 13-2.

Darley & Latane’s Results

Diffusion of Responsibility Piliavin et al. (1969) manipulated: Race of the victim simulating a crisis. Whether victim appeared ill or drunk. They recorded race of helper, number of helpers, racial composition of bystanders. Results: Help offered more readily to ill (95%) than drunk (50%). Race only mattered for drunk victims. Number of bystanders didn’t matter.

Where Did the Effect Go? Piliavin et al.’s study was done in the field not in the lab. Maybe other factors were present. If people are made to feel responsible for a situation they are more likely to help, regardless of bystanders. Milgram’s subjects were told that the experimenter was responsible. People may be reluctant to intervene due to potential embarrassment, loss of poise.

Stereotypes and Prejudice People may be unaware of their prejudices or misreport them in order to be consistent with social norms. Implicit memory tests and attitude measures permit observation of hypothesized correlates of prejudice without self-report. Implicit attitudes may influence behavior in real life, outside experimental contexts too.

Implicit Measures People may be unaware of their own prejudices or misreport them to be consistent with social norms against racism. Implicit attitude measures allow observation of correlates of prejudice without explicitly asking subjects about it. The IAT (Implicit Association Test) is one such measure – used in lab this week.

Payne’s Priming Study On each trial a black or a white face was flashed so quickly subjects were unaware of seeing it (200 ms). Next, either a weapon or a tool was presented. Subjects had to quickly identify whether it was a tool or a weapon. Tools were misidentified as guns more often after seeing the black face, suggesting a reliance on racial stereotypes.

Sample Stimuli Press a key indicating gun or tool

Payne’s Results Error patterns suggested that guns were associated with black faces. Response times showed a similar pattern