INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHOLOGY Chapter 12 Social Cognition and Emotion

At the end of this Chapter you should be able to: Learn the importance of perceiving and understanding others Learn the importance of perceiving and understanding ourselves Understand the Attitudes Learn about Emotion

Perceiving and understanding others Social Cognition: How we perceive and think about ourselves and each other; how we process and make meaning about our encounters One focus: why did someone else act as they did? We make attributions about others’ actions – and about our own

Attribution Kelly: early social psychologist – According to Kelly… we specifically look for ways that events co-vary: “cause and effect” – Or: Causal attributions 2 types of attributions – Situational attributions and Dispositional attributions Attributional styles also vary by culture – E.g., individualistic and collectivistic

Fundamental Attribution Error In an individualistic culture, the most common error made is the fundamental attribution error; a bias to explain others’ behavior by attributing it to their disposition, our own to our situation In collectivistic cultures: focus on group actions / contextual cues to explain behavior

Actor-observer difference : Observer who watched from behind Actor A believed that B controlled the conversation, and the observer who watched from behind Actor B thought the reverse. The observer who watched from midway between the two believed that both were equally influential.

Person Perception and Cognitive Schemas Cognitive schemas: shortcuts when limited information is available Schemas: operate when trying to explain why people behave the way they do Implicit theories of personality: our schemas for - How we remember other people – How we perceive them – How we interpret what they have done

Stereotypes One type of schematic thinking – Stereotypes often are used when we think about identified groups of people: e.g., Greeks, women, old people, etc. Origins of stereotypes: explicitly and implicitly communicated to us by others Used more often when we have little or no exposure in daily life to that group

Effects of stereotypes: Self-fulfilling prophecies – We often pick up on others’ expectations for us (dictated by a stereotype) and behave in that way Stereotype threat – When a stereotype about us is made salient, in a “performance” situation, we often feel under threat – which holds performance down – Poor performance then may confirm stereotype

Combating prejudice “Robbers cave” experiment (Sherif, 1966): – When groups compete, prejudice and hostility grow – When groups collaborate/cooperate to achieve an important task, prejudice and hostility decrease – To achieve this: Status must be held equal for all members Contact must be sustained for a long time

Perceiving and understanding ourselves Social psychology: also concerned with how we perceive ourselves – We are “actors” in the drama of the social world – We seek to understand our own behavior as well

Attitudes Attitude: belief, feeling, predisposition to act in a certain way Cover a wide range of topics about which we may feel quite strongly: nuclear power, abortion, bilingual education, etc.

Attitude Formation Occur as a result of… – Classical conditioning Advertising for expensive car always accompanied by beautiful surroundings/people – Operant conditioning If a reward given for behavior, attitude for that behavior will change – Observational learning

Attitude Change: Being Persuaded by Others Central route to persuasion: we attend to the message, the message-bearer, and make decisions accordingly Peripheral route to persuasion: context in which information is given is capable of determining our attitude

Attitude Change: Being Persuaded by Ourselves: Cognitive Dissonance Festinger & Carlsmith (1959): Under different conditions of reward, people justify behavior with different explanations “Insufficient justification”: the notion that we try to justify our own behavior; if we cannot justify it, we experience dissonance between beliefs and actions We try to resolve that “cognitive dissonance” through the process of bringing attitudes in line with our behavior

Emotion – Emotions encompass: changes in behavior, changes in subjective experience, and changes in physiology – Emotions: briefer and more targeted than moods Theories of emotion: developed for over a century Common sense notions: we feel an emotion and then take action: feel fear, then run!

James-Lange Theory of Emotion Posited the reverse: – Emotional experiences cause emotional behavior – See a bear, run, “feel” our behavior as fear only after we run – Support: facial feedback theory The configuration in which we hold our facial muscles influences the emotion we then claim as our experience

James Lang theory: We see a dangerous object (attacking bear); this triggers a bodily response (running, pounding heart), and the awareness of this response is emotion (fear).

Cannon-Bard Theory of Emotion Critique of James-Lange: our bodily experiences happen too slowly to be the source of our emotions Cannon-Bard: physiological and experiential responses occur simultaneously Both are triggered by changes in brain-state

Cannon-Bard theory: A stimulus (such as a bear) triggers changes in the brain, and this brain activity then causes changes in both physiology and experience

Functions of Emotion Help set up the body for reaction to threat/danger: “fight or flight” reaction and the accompanying emotion of fear Help recover from stress Aid in marking important memories Signal social intent/connection

Emotion Regulation Two primary forms: – Cognitive reappraisal: decrease emotional response by re-interpretation of stimuli – Suppression: Decrease in emotional reaction by decreasing strength of facial expression or denying other behavior appropriate to that emotion (e.g., refusing to frown or cry when sad)