Chapter 10: Social Judgment Social Psychology by Tom Gilovich, Dacher Keltner, and Richard Nisbett

Topics we will cover Quality of information available How we judge probabilities Errors and biases in social though

Biases in Information Presented Firsthand Pluralistic Ignorance - misperception of a group norm that results from observing people who are acting at variance with their private beliefs out of a concern for the social consequences - behavior that reinforces the erroneous group norm

Biases in Information Presented Firsthand b. Memory Biases Sensory InputAttention Encoding Retrieval Sensory MemoryShort-Term MemoryLong-Term Memory Rehearsal

Biases in Information Presented Firsthand b. Memory Biases flashbulb memories - vivid recollections of the moment one learned some dramatic, emotionally-charged news

Biases in Information Presented Secondhand a. Sharpening and Leveling sharpening - emphasizing important or more interesting elements in telling a story to someone else leveling - eliminating or deemphasizing seemingly less important details when telling a story to someone else These processes influence our judgment of secondhand information in a number of ways.

The Information Available for Judgment b. Secondhand Impressions of Other People c. Ideological Distortions d. Distortion in the Media e. Perceptual Vigilance and the Asymmetry Between Positive and Negative

How Information is Presented: Impression Formation Impression Formation- how we form impressions of others – central traits (e.g., warm-cold) strongly shape the overall impression of a stranger – primacy effect- information presented first often has stronger impact on impressions – impressions of others consist of both exemplars (examples of specific behavior) and abstractions (mental summaries of general behavior)

How Information is Presented 2. Framing Effects the influence on judgment resulting from the way information is presented, including the order of presentation a. spin framing b. gains and losses

Prior Knowledge and Knowledge Structures Bottom-up processes - “data driven” mental processing in which one takes in and forms conclusions on the basis of the stimuli encountered in one’s experience Top-down processes - “theory driven” mental processing in which one filters and interprets new information in light of preexisting knowledge and expectations

Prior Knowledge and Knowledge Structures Schema- mental framework built around a specific theme (organizes social information) Types of Schemas – person- schemas about people “nerd”, “jock”, “librarian” – role- schemas relating to specific roles “professor”, “student”, “physician” – event (script)- indicates typical sequence of events “restaurant”, “exam”, “first date”

Prior Knowledge and Knowledge Structures 1. How Do Schemas Influence Judgment? a. AttentionAttention b. Inference and Construal c. Memory encoding - filing information away in memory based on what is attended to and the initial interpretation of information retrieval - the extration of information from memory

Sources of Error (“Tilts”) To understand the social world we can use: – rational processing- follows basic rules of logic – intuitive processing- relies on hunches (gut-level) intuitive processing used more for processing social information automobile safety devices (e.g., air bags) have not been proven to be safer, yet intuitively they should work

Psychic Powers Demo Pick a number from 1-9 Subtract 5 Multiply by 3 Square the number Add digits until you only get 1 digit If number < 5 add 5; else subtract 4 Multiply by 2 Subtract 6 Map the digit to a letter in alphabet Pick name of country that starts with letter Take second letter in country name and think of mammal Think of color of mammal

Reason, Intuition, and Heuristics Heuristics- mental shortcuts for making decisions (help to reduce information overload) Representativeness- judging by resemblance Representativeness – Bob is a lawyer, because he looks like typical lawyer Note: often population base rates are ignored Availability- judging by how quickly examples come to mind Availability – k as first letter seems more common than k as third priming- increased availability of information resulting from exposure (e.g., “medical student syndrome”) Forward

Rothman and Hardin Study More likely to rely on amount of information available. More likely to rely on ease with which they could bring information to mind. Hypothesis 1: Participants will rate their own gender (in-group) as more impolite when they had recalled six behaviors rather three behaviors. Hypothesis 2: Participants will rate the other gender (outgroup) as more impolite when they had recalled three behaviors rather six behaviors. Previous research shows it is easier to remember three examples as opposed to six examples of behavior. Thinking of three examples should affect ease of recall. Thinking of six examples should influence amount of information recalled. Asked male and female students to recall either 3 or 6 impolite behaviors they had recently seen by members of their own gender (in-group) and members of the other gender (outgroup). Asked them to rate women and men on several dimensions, including impoliteness.

Reason, Intuition, and Heuristics 2. The Representativeness Heuristic a. The Resemblance Between Members and Categories: Base-Rate Neglect Kahneman and Tversky (1973) b. The Planning Fallacy tendency for people to be unrealistically optimistic about how quickly they can complete a project c. The Resemblance Between Cause and Effect

Planning Fallacy Planning Fallacy (Optimistic Bias)- tendency to: – make optimistic predictions for completing a task – assume we are more likely than others to experience good outcomes, and less likely to experience bad It occurs because we tend to: – focus on future while ignoring related past events – overlook important potential obstacles as motivation to complete task increases, so does the planning fallacy

Buehler, Griffin, & MacDonald Persons expecting a refund predicted they would file much sooner than persons not expecting refund. Both groups submitted forms later than expected Phoned people at random and asked them if they expected a tax refund.Also asked people when they expected they would file their return. Hypothesized that people expecting a refund would have strong motivation to complete the task and therefore make overoptimistic predictions about when they would file their return.

Magical Thinking Magical Thinking- thinking based on irrational assumptions law of contagion- two objects in contact pass properties to one another – fear of wearing sweater worn by AIDS patient law of similarity- things that resemble each other share basic properties – fear of eating chocolate shaped like a spider

Thought Suppression Thought Suppression- preventing unwanted thoughts from entering consciousness Thought suppression involves two processes: – monitoring- automatically searches for unwanted thoughts – operating- conscious attempt to distract oneself Rebound effect- suppressing unwanted thoughts may actually increase them – people high in reactance- react negatively to threats to freedom- more likely to show rebound effect

Edwards & Bryan Participants told to ignore emotion provoking information rated him as most guilty and most deserving of a harsh sentence. Reasoned we have little control over our emotional reactions. Once we are exposed to emotion arousing information, it is difficult to ignore. Study participants read a transcript of a murder trial containing info about defendant’s past criminal record. In one condition, the transcript contained a detailed account of a vicious attack the defendant had made on a woman (EMOTION PROVOKING). In the other condition, the transcript mentioned the defendant was accused of a prior assault ( NEUTRAL). Half of the subjects in each condition were told this information was inadmissible and they should ignore it. Mental contamination- our judgements are influenced by unconscious, and uncontrollable mental processing. The subjects were then asked to rate the guilt of the suspect and recommend a sentence for the defendant..

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