2023/2024 Social Psychology Final Exam Study Guide
Exam 1 Material
What is Social Psychology?
● Definition of social psychology
○ The scientific study of how individuals think, feel & behave in a social context
● What is the social nature of social psychology?
○ Sometimes, psychologists will examine non-social factors that affect
people’s thoughts, emotions, motives & actions
○ Sometimes they study people’s thoughts or feelings about non-social things
■ Ex: Nike vs Adidas
● What did the belonging experiment find?
○ Hearing that you belong reassures people & improves their performance on a task
● How is social psychology distinct from other psychology disciplines?
○ Social Psychology vs Sociology
■ Similarities
● Both share the same training & publish in the same journals
● When these two fields intersect, the result can be a more complete
understanding of important issues
■ Differences
● Sociology tends to focus on the group level while social
psychology tends to focus on the individual level
● Social psychologists are more likely to conduct experiments with
variables
○ Social Psychology vs Clinical Psychology
■ Similarities
● Both may address how people cope with anxiety or pressure in
social situations
○ Examine how social contexts help or hinder anxiety
○ Examine effects of bullying on health
■ Differences
● Clinical psychologists treat people with mental disorders &
psychological difficulties
● Social psychologists do not focus on disorders; they focus on more
typical ways people think, feel, behave & influence each other
○ Social Psychology vs Personality Psychology
■ Similarities
● Both are concerned with individuals & their thoughts, feelings, and
behaviors
● Joint journals / programs
, ■ Differences
● Personality psychologists seek to understand differences
between individuals that remain relatively stable across a variety
of situations
○ Interested in cross-situational consistency
● Social psychologists seek to understand how social factors
affect individuals regardless of their different personalities
○ Social Psychology vs Cognitive Psychology
■ Similarities
● The study of social cognition
■ Differences
● Cognitive psychologists study learning, reasoning & mental
processes
● Social psychologists are more interested in how people think,
learn, remember, etc with respect to social contexts
○
● Who is considered the founder of social psychology?
○ Kurt Lewin
● What historical event had the biggest impact on social psychology?
○ Hitler & the Holocaust
■ This event caused people to search for answers to social psychological
questions
Doing Social Psychology Research
● What is the scientific method?
○ Systematic observation, measurement, and experiment, and the
formulation, testing, and modification of hypotheses
,● Different types of research
○ Applied: designed to find solutions to practical problems
■ Enlarge understanding of naturally occurring events
■ Ex: trying to understand what happened to Kitty Genovese
○ Basic: designed to test a specific hypothesis from a specific theory
■ Increase our understanding of human behavior →
doesn’t necessarily have to solve a problem
■ Ex: how someone’s facial structure may affect their personality
● Empirical realization
○ Translating the conceptual or abstract variables contained in your hypothesis
to real, measurable constructs
● Conceptual vs operational variables
○ Conceptual variable: abstract level
■ Ex: how a body position affects feelings of power
○ Operational variable: the way you measure the conceptual variable
○ Conducting an experiment on a conceptual variable makes it an operational
variable
● Construct validity
○ Used to evaluate the manipulation and measurement of variables.
○ Refers to the extent to which:
■ The manipulations in an experiment really manipulate the conceptual
variables they were designed to manipulate.
■ The measures (often self-report) used in the study really measure the
conceptual variables
● Self report
○ When participants disclose their thoughts, feelings, desires & actions
○ Challenges / Limitations
■ Not always accurate & can be misleading
● People don’t always like to admit to things so they try to
make themselves look better
● Bogus pipeline: telling people that they are
connected to a lie detector when they
actually aren’t
→ get more honest responses
■ Affected by the way in which you ask the question
● Ex: asking how many hours of TV people watch
● ‘Up to 30 min’ as min & ‘more than 2.5 hours’ as
max
→ less people said more than 2.5 hours
● ‘Up to 2.5 hours’ as min & ‘more than 4.5
hours’ as max → more people said more than
2.5 hours
■ Affected by participants’ memory for past events
● Can compensate for this through experience sampling
, ● Experience Sampling
○ Interval contingent
■ Participants are asked to report ‘state’ feelings at regular intervals
○ Signal contingent
■ Participants are asked to report ‘state’ feelings upon signals
○ Event contingent
■ Participants are asked to report ‘state’ feelings in certain situations like at
school, work, etc
● Observations
○ Can be simple or elaborate
○ Interrater reliability: the degree to which multiple observers agree on
their observations
○ Advantages
■ Avoid our sometimes faulty recollections & distorted interpretations of
our own behavior
○ Disadvantages
■ Observation risks altering behavior of the observed
● Technology
○ Physiological / biological measures
■ Levels of cortisol, cardiovascular responses, breathing
○ Brain imaging
■ fMRI: how certain images may provoke certain responses in certain areas
of the brain
○ Eye tracking technology that measures where & how long a subject looks at a
stimulus
■ To what extent are you watching your current situation
■ Ex: sitting in an audience → who you are
watching, what part of their body are you
looking at & for how long
● Correlational design
○ Represents the strength of the relationship between two variables
■ Correlational constant → -1 < r < 1
■ Use absolute value to compare which is a stronger correlation
○ Not preferred because correlation does not equal causation
○ Advantages
■ Allows for assessment of behavior as it occurs in people’s everyday lives
■ Allows the study of variables that cannot be studied in experimental
designs like gender, age & race
■ Establishes that a relationship between two variables exist
○ Disadvantages
■ Correlation does not equal causation
Exam 1 Material
What is Social Psychology?
● Definition of social psychology
○ The scientific study of how individuals think, feel & behave in a social context
● What is the social nature of social psychology?
○ Sometimes, psychologists will examine non-social factors that affect
people’s thoughts, emotions, motives & actions
○ Sometimes they study people’s thoughts or feelings about non-social things
■ Ex: Nike vs Adidas
● What did the belonging experiment find?
○ Hearing that you belong reassures people & improves their performance on a task
● How is social psychology distinct from other psychology disciplines?
○ Social Psychology vs Sociology
■ Similarities
● Both share the same training & publish in the same journals
● When these two fields intersect, the result can be a more complete
understanding of important issues
■ Differences
● Sociology tends to focus on the group level while social
psychology tends to focus on the individual level
● Social psychologists are more likely to conduct experiments with
variables
○ Social Psychology vs Clinical Psychology
■ Similarities
● Both may address how people cope with anxiety or pressure in
social situations
○ Examine how social contexts help or hinder anxiety
○ Examine effects of bullying on health
■ Differences
● Clinical psychologists treat people with mental disorders &
psychological difficulties
● Social psychologists do not focus on disorders; they focus on more
typical ways people think, feel, behave & influence each other
○ Social Psychology vs Personality Psychology
■ Similarities
● Both are concerned with individuals & their thoughts, feelings, and
behaviors
● Joint journals / programs
, ■ Differences
● Personality psychologists seek to understand differences
between individuals that remain relatively stable across a variety
of situations
○ Interested in cross-situational consistency
● Social psychologists seek to understand how social factors
affect individuals regardless of their different personalities
○ Social Psychology vs Cognitive Psychology
■ Similarities
● The study of social cognition
■ Differences
● Cognitive psychologists study learning, reasoning & mental
processes
● Social psychologists are more interested in how people think,
learn, remember, etc with respect to social contexts
○
● Who is considered the founder of social psychology?
○ Kurt Lewin
● What historical event had the biggest impact on social psychology?
○ Hitler & the Holocaust
■ This event caused people to search for answers to social psychological
questions
Doing Social Psychology Research
● What is the scientific method?
○ Systematic observation, measurement, and experiment, and the
formulation, testing, and modification of hypotheses
,● Different types of research
○ Applied: designed to find solutions to practical problems
■ Enlarge understanding of naturally occurring events
■ Ex: trying to understand what happened to Kitty Genovese
○ Basic: designed to test a specific hypothesis from a specific theory
■ Increase our understanding of human behavior →
doesn’t necessarily have to solve a problem
■ Ex: how someone’s facial structure may affect their personality
● Empirical realization
○ Translating the conceptual or abstract variables contained in your hypothesis
to real, measurable constructs
● Conceptual vs operational variables
○ Conceptual variable: abstract level
■ Ex: how a body position affects feelings of power
○ Operational variable: the way you measure the conceptual variable
○ Conducting an experiment on a conceptual variable makes it an operational
variable
● Construct validity
○ Used to evaluate the manipulation and measurement of variables.
○ Refers to the extent to which:
■ The manipulations in an experiment really manipulate the conceptual
variables they were designed to manipulate.
■ The measures (often self-report) used in the study really measure the
conceptual variables
● Self report
○ When participants disclose their thoughts, feelings, desires & actions
○ Challenges / Limitations
■ Not always accurate & can be misleading
● People don’t always like to admit to things so they try to
make themselves look better
● Bogus pipeline: telling people that they are
connected to a lie detector when they
actually aren’t
→ get more honest responses
■ Affected by the way in which you ask the question
● Ex: asking how many hours of TV people watch
● ‘Up to 30 min’ as min & ‘more than 2.5 hours’ as
max
→ less people said more than 2.5 hours
● ‘Up to 2.5 hours’ as min & ‘more than 4.5
hours’ as max → more people said more than
2.5 hours
■ Affected by participants’ memory for past events
● Can compensate for this through experience sampling
, ● Experience Sampling
○ Interval contingent
■ Participants are asked to report ‘state’ feelings at regular intervals
○ Signal contingent
■ Participants are asked to report ‘state’ feelings upon signals
○ Event contingent
■ Participants are asked to report ‘state’ feelings in certain situations like at
school, work, etc
● Observations
○ Can be simple or elaborate
○ Interrater reliability: the degree to which multiple observers agree on
their observations
○ Advantages
■ Avoid our sometimes faulty recollections & distorted interpretations of
our own behavior
○ Disadvantages
■ Observation risks altering behavior of the observed
● Technology
○ Physiological / biological measures
■ Levels of cortisol, cardiovascular responses, breathing
○ Brain imaging
■ fMRI: how certain images may provoke certain responses in certain areas
of the brain
○ Eye tracking technology that measures where & how long a subject looks at a
stimulus
■ To what extent are you watching your current situation
■ Ex: sitting in an audience → who you are
watching, what part of their body are you
looking at & for how long
● Correlational design
○ Represents the strength of the relationship between two variables
■ Correlational constant → -1 < r < 1
■ Use absolute value to compare which is a stronger correlation
○ Not preferred because correlation does not equal causation
○ Advantages
■ Allows for assessment of behavior as it occurs in people’s everyday lives
■ Allows the study of variables that cannot be studied in experimental
designs like gender, age & race
■ Establishes that a relationship between two variables exist
○ Disadvantages
■ Correlation does not equal causation
