Social Psychology

Department of Psychology

University of Glasgow

Kazuyo Nakabayashi

Learning Objectives

At the end of this session you should be able to: understand what attitudes and behaviour are understand what roles and self-identity are explain how role playing might influence our self-

identity describe what schemata, stereotypes, and

prejudice are explain how stereotypes are linked to prejudice

Topic 1: Does behaviour determine attitudes ?

• Demonstrate how role playing affects attitudes and our self identity (a part of self concept) - A simulated prison experiment (Stanford Prison Experiment)

Topic 2: Do attitudes determine behaviour ?

• Demonstrate how stereotypes are related to prejudice leading to prejudicial acts (discrimination)

Terminologies that you need to know

• Attitudes• Schemata• Roles• Behaviour• Self-concept (self-identity is a part of self-

concept)• Stereotypes• Prejudice

What is social psychology?

• It is the study of how individuals think, feel, and behave in regard to other people and how individuals’ thoughts, feelings, and behaviour are affected by other people.

E.g., prejudice, football hooligans, Big

Brother,

Attitudes Attitudes refer to our evaluations (feelings, beliefs, opinions) of

the social world. Social world involves people, objects, food, countries, activities,

etc.

Do you have any reactions (favourable or unfavourable) to

George Bush Cocaine Fish Animal testing

If so, you hold attitudes toward them

Schemata

• A schema is a cognitive structure that represents knowledge about everything that we know about the world, including oneself, others, events, etc.

A schema is important because it allows us to quickly

make sense of a person, situation, event, or a

place on the basis of limited information.

So, when a schema is activated, it “ fills in” missing details.

We have different types of schemata

For example,

- A schema for the self (self-schema) I am a Japanese (self-identity) I am a wife (a role I play)

- A schema for other individuals (person-schema) George Bush is American (identity) He is the American president (a role he plays)

- A schema for a group of people (a stereotype)

Schemata are normally built up from experience, but they can be formed without experience (for example, stereotypes).

1 forceful (M)2 warm (F)3 generous (N)4 loyal (N)5 quiet (F)6 has leadership abilities (M)7 tender (F)8 self-sufficient (M)9 fair (N)10 dominant (M)11 moody (N)12 affectionate (F)13 independent (M)14 careful (N)15 romantic (F) - Count the number of adjectives recalled. Of which how many of them are the circled items and how many of them are non circled items?

The self-reference effect

(A demonstration of schematic processing) • The self-reference effect, which occurs when

individuals show superior memory for information that pertains to their self-schema.

Schemata guide our attention to certain thingsin our environments, which ultimatelyinfluence the way we understand our worldand memory.

How attitudes and schemata differ ?

- An attitude can be used to explain the actions of a person. (He is always nice to her because he fancies her). - A schema guides an action. (I rushed out of the restaurant because I saw smoke coming out of the kitchen)

- A schema as a framework (what you know about a certain thing).

- An attitude as a response (how do you feel about a certain thing)

A schema (a framework) can beused to form an attitude (a responseor reaction) towards a certain object,person, event, etc.

feeds into

e.g., Rory is mean and arrogant (Rory-schema). So, I don’t like him (an attitude towards Rory).

Schema Attitude

A quick summary of terminology

• Attitudes are our responses to our environments

• Schemata represent our knowledge of the world

- A role refers to prescribed actions (e.g., a

mother role, a student role, a lecturer role)

- We tend to hold certain expectations (how a

role should be played) of each role.

So, you will be surprised if I …………

If this is the case, I am not playing a lecturer role.

Topic 1Does behaviour determine attitudes?

Behaviour

Behaviour refers to acts, activities, movements, processes, etc.

e.g., shouting, doing a sport, stretching, crying, making a plan for a holiday Behaviour can be verbal (e.g., swearing) or non-verbal

(e.g., facial expressions and eye contact)

A role becomes behaviour when it is enacted.

Self-concept

• Self-concept is the sum total of a person’s thoughts and feelings that defines the self as an object.

• Self-concept is made up of discrete self-schemata, including self-identity .

• Self-identity is a part of self-concept, which is subject concepts of oneself as an individual (who you think you are)

Self-concept

The total sum of knowledge, thoughts, and feelings about yourself

Self-identitySubjective concepts of who you are

A part of self-schema

Discrete self-schemata (all of them are parts of self-concept)

A quick summary of terminology

• A role is prescribed actions for that role

• A role becomes behaviour when enacted

• Behaviour is what you do, including non-verbal behaviour

• Self-concept is everything that you know, feel, and think about yourself, which is composed of different self schemata

Why is the prison experiment important?

Write down your views

Why is the prison experiment important?

• Demonstrated the impact that social roles can have on our self-concept.

• Demonstrated the impact that social roles can have on our behaviour

• Highlighted the ethical issues for conducting psychological experiments

A summary of topic 1

• Role playing can have strong effects on one’s attitudes and self- concept. Ultimately, this affects one’s behaviour.

So, behaviour can determine attitudes

Demonstrate how a negative group-schema (stereotype)

leads to negative attitudes toward a certain group of

people, and how this can lead to prejudice and prejudicial

acts (discrimination).

Topic 2Do attitudes determine behaviour?

What is a stereotype ?

• A stereotype is a schema (a mental framework) for a group of people (e.g., women, Italians, social workers, gays, etc).

• A stereotype contains information about their appearance, characteristic, and behaviour.

• Stereotyping is social categorization.

Categorisation

Categorisation is one of the cognitive tendencies - We tend to put things into groups (for example., lines and shapes) - Once categorisation has taken place, we exaggerate the differences between the groups and exaggerate the similarities within them (social categorisation)

Categorisation is closely related to prejudice

Problems with a stereotype It can be wrong. (It doesn’t always represent the truth or facts about a group of people). It can be used as lens, which distorts what we see (we do

not see people as they are). The lens is the stereotype. It ignores individual differences. It is difficult to change once formed

So, if our stereotypes have negative features, then wewill look for negative information about a group ofpeople, and tend to ignore the positive.

Why this happens?

Stereotyping reflects our need to be consistent.

It is our effort to process the maximum amount of information with minimal cognitive effort (cognitive short-cut).

As a result, stereotyping can create outgroup homogeneity effect - our tendency to see members within a particular outgroup (the group which you do not belong to) as being more alike than they actually are.

Stereotypes for Scottish people

• Drink too much, Eat too much• Unhealthy• Like deep fried food• Drink whisky• Eat haggis• Hates English

- How many of these items actually describe yourself? - How many of these items (do you think) are true? - How many of these items could also be used to describe other people (i.e., non-Scottish people)

Prejudice• Prejudice refers to negative attitudes directed toward people

simply because they are members of a specific social group.

A person who is prejudiced toward some group tends to ignore the individual qualities of its members.

Prejudice is important because our behaviour is often influenced by our attitudes. So, if we have a hostile attitudes to others, we are likely to treat them badly. This is discriminating against them.

So, if you think that all women are bad drivers (a negative attitude towards female drivers, i.e., prejudice), you might not allow your female friend to drive your car even if she is a better driver than you are (discrimination).

A Stereotype - Prejudice Link

Stereotyping encourages the creation and maintenance of negative attitudes to a certain group of people which may in turn be linked with negative feelings

- This is a basis of prejudice -

What are the implications demonstrated

by Stephen Lawrence Murder case?

The murder of Stephen Lawrencedemonstrated that

• The impact of a social group that has on our behaviour.

• How racism (negative attitudes toward a certain group and members of that group) can lead to extreme discriminatory acts

• How stereotypes lead to discriminatory acts in society

Can you think of real life examples,

illustrating the Stereotype - Prejudice link?

A summary of topic 2

• Prejudice is strongly related to discrimination. If we hold negative attitudes toward some people, we are more likely to behave towards them negatively.

• Many real life examples show that our attitudes can determine how we behave.

Essay Title

Describe what a stereotype and prejudice are. Explain (in your own words) how a stereotype might be related to prejudice.

Be aware of the differences between describe and explain

Writing an essay

Read the title carefully and think what you are required to do Answer the question

Describe and Explain

Describe includes, forexample:

1. To give an account of something by giving details of its characteristics

2. To label something3. To represent something

using a diagram

Explain includes, for example:

1. Same as Description 1, with enough clarity and detail to be understood by someone else

2. To make the meaning of something clear to someone else

3. To express ideas or thoughts in a way that is easily understood

Finally, please come to Psychology Department (58 Hillhead Street) and participate in some studies.

Of course, you will be paid and it is the easiest earn some money.

It is the best way to know how scientific studies are run