Social and Organisatonal Psychology
B&B Chapter 1 – Social Psychology
Social psychology = the scientic ield that seeks to understand the nature and causes of individual
thought and behaviour in social situatons
We have implicit (nonconscious) processes
Different research methods are systematc observatoo (naturalistc observatonn survey method)n
correlatoo studies (correlaton ≠ causaton) and experimeots. For experiments you alter an
independent variable and measure a dependant variable. Two requirements for experiments are
random assignment of partcipants to experimental conditonsn and control of confounding variables.
Mediatog variables = variables that intervene between an independent variable and changes in
social behaviour (e.g. your dad hitng you being the reason playing violent video games makes you
aggressive)
Ethics: You need informed consentn as litle decepton as possiblen and debrieing.
B&B Chapter 2 – Social Cognition
Social cogoitoo = how we think about other persons and the social world
Heuristcs: How We Employ Simple Rules in Social Cogniton
Heuristcs = simple rules for making complex decisions or drawing inferences in a rapid and efcient
manner
When you meet someone new you compare them with a prototype = a list of atributes commonly
possessed by members of a group – if you make a judgement about someone like this you used the
represeotatveoess heuristc = you made judgement on the basis of a simple rulen the more an
individual seems to resemble or match a given groupn the more likely she or he is to belong to that
group. – we don’t consider the ‘base rate’ when doing this
You can also use representatveness heuristc to conclude if something that ofen leads to something
will cause similar things? P. 60
Availability heuristc = the easier it is to bring informaton to mindn the greater the impact of
subsequent judgements or decisions (leads to overestmatng etc. news for example).
People prefer what is already there as it is easily accessible.
Aochoriog aod adjustmeot = the tendency to deal with uncertainty in many situatons by using
something we do know as a startng point (the “anchor”) and then making adjustments to it (e.g.
lawyers setng punishment afer reading a suggested punishment).
Portoo size efect = e.g. the tendency to eat more when a larger porton is presented (inadequate
adjustment)
Schemas: Mental frameworks for organizing social informaton
Schemas = mental frameworks that help is organize social informatonn guide our actons and process
informaton relevant to partcular context. Schemas infuence three basis processes of social
cogniton. Ateotoo refers to the informaton we notce. Eocodiog refers to the process we use to
,store notced informaton in memory. Retrieval refers to how we recover informaton from memory
in order to use it in some manner.
We can have personal schemasn role schemasn scripts (event schemas) and self-schemas.
Informaton more consistent with schemas are more likely to be notced and entered into our
consciousness. Especially when info overload. During encoding what we focus on is more likely to be
well stored in long-term memory. Inconsistent informaton can however surprise us and also be
coded. People tend to remember (retrieve) informaton more consistent with our schemas more
ofenn but that’s just cuz we come in contact with it more ofen.
Stronger and beter-developed schemas are more likely to infuence us. Schemas can be temporarily
actvated by primiog which are temporarily increases in the accessibility of speciic schemas. E.g.
seeing a hello kity (schema=fun) and deciding to have an ice cream instead of a salad.
Uoprimiog = a process by which thoughts or actons primed by a recent experience dissipate once
they ind expression. E.g. answering a queston right irst lets you answer wrong second
Framiog = e.g. asking a queston in a way that makes you answer a certain way (Lofus) because a
certain schema is actvated
Schemas are persistent to change and can let us see the world incorrectly. They can be self-fulilling.
Automatc & Uncontrolled processing in social though
Cootrolled processiog = social thought occurring in a systematcn logical and highly efforrul manner
Automatc processiog = social thought occurring in a fastn relatvely effortless and intuitve manner
The two have different neural systemsn but sometmes occur at the same tme/followed by each
other (automatcn then controlled)
Potental sources of error in social cogniton
Some errors in social cogniton: our tendency to be overly optmistc (overconidence biasn past is
bad future is goldenn tme optmism)n couoterfactual thiokiog (imagining what might have
been=regret)n magical thinking (irratonal but compelling thoughts)n terror management (efforts to
come to terms with death). We do however more ofen weigh negatve informaton heavier! We
ofen think negatve happens to others and positve to me.
Immuoe oeglect = people are unaware of their tendency to adapt and copen they think they will feel
worse at failure (same with happinessn beter)
Affect and Cogniton: How feelings shape thought and thought shapes feelings
There is a relatonship between (interplay) affect (emoton) and cogniton.
Mood coogrueoce efects = the fact that current moods strongly determine which informaton in a
given situaton is notced and then entered into memory
Mood-depeodeot memory = what speciic informaton is retrieved form memory based on our
current moodn if we’re happy we remember happy things
Our thoughts can affect our feelingsn e.g. if we are aroused we look around us and decide/conclude
what it is that arouse usn or if a schema is actvatedn e.g. someone belonging to my group getng hurt
,Afectve forecasts = predictons of how we would feel about an event we have not experiencedn and
they are ofen inaccurate
There seems to be different brain systems for emoton (affects) and reasoning/cogniton
B&B Chapter 3 – Social Perception
Social percepton = The process through which we seek to know other people. This process involves
understanding the ways we gather and analyse informaton about people.
We are aware of far less of our world than we think. E.g. change blindnessn inatentonal blindnessn
obvious blindness. Can have consequences for eye witness testmonies.
Nonverbal communicaton
Temporary factors or causes (moodn fatguen illnessn drugs) can affect social actonsn our own and
others. It is not always easy to know these factors or causesn since people do not always tell us or
even try to hide how they feel. We can use oooverbal cues (facial expressionsn eye contactn posturen
ofen hard to hide) to tell how others are feeling.
Five basic channels of nonverbal communicaton:
1. Facial expressions
From a very early agen ive different emotons are clearly represented on the human face:
angern fearn happinessn sadness and disgustn (surprise). Emotons occur in many
combinatons. Happiness is a very universal expressionn sadness and disgust also kindan fear
not as much. There are some cultural differences.
We recognise facial expressions relatvely welln but individual differences in the task exist.
2. Eye contact
E.g. we interpret high levels of gazing from another person as a sign of liking or friendliness. If
others avoid eye contact with usn we may conclude they are unfriendlyn they don’t like usn or
they are shy. Staring is however ofen interpreted as a sign of anger or hostlity.
3. Body movements
Our current emotons are ofen refected in the positonsn posturesn and movements of our
bodies. Large numbers of movements – especially ones in which one part of the body does
something to another part (touchingn rubbingn scratching) – suggest emotonal
arousal/nervousness. “Fidgetng” is interpreted as a sign of lying. There might be cultural
differences to gestures and their meanings.
4. Posture
5. Touching
The meaning of a touch depends on various factors: who does the touching (friend or
strangern male or female)n the nature of the physical contact (brief or prolongedn gentle or
roughn area of the body touched)n and the context in which the touching takes place
(business or social setngn doctor’s ofce). Depending on the combinaton of these factorsn
touch can suggest friendlinessn affectonn sexual interestn dominancen caring or aggression.
The hand shake is usually globally acceptedn but in Asian countries for examplen bowing is
ofen used as a greetng.
Paralanguage = How we speakn tonen pitchn volume. Can tell us if someone is angryn or sadn or happy.
Our actons – and especiallyn perhapsn our nonverbal behaviours – infuence our feelings. Not only do
our emotons infuence our nonverbal cuesn the cues themselves infuence our internal feelings. This
is the facial feedback hypothesisn the view that facial expressions can actually trigger emotons.
, People ofen lien but we have a hard tme recognizing when someone lies or is deceiving. This is
because we tend to perceive others as truthful and so we don’t search for clues of decepton.
Another reason is our desire to be polite. People also differ in how they deine lyingn so some report
not lying much because they just don’t think they do (e.g. their intenton was not to mislead others)n
even if some would beg to differ.
People in a sad mood are beter at recognizing decepton that people in a happy mood. When
atemptng to detect decepton people usually focus on the wrong thingsn not indicatng anything
about lies. The cues that does indicate decepton are microexpressioos – feetng facial expressions
lastng only a few tenths of a second. Alson interchannel discrepancies – e.g. discrepancies between
people’s facial expression and body language. Alson exaggerated facial expressions. The pitch of the
voice ofen rises when lying. Slower responsesn startng over sentences – aka elements of linguistc
style.
Atributon: Understanding the causes of behaviour
We have a basic desire to understand cause-and-effect relatonships in the social world. We don’t
simply want to know how others have acted – that’s something we can readily observe. We also
want to know whyn because that knowledge can help us understand them beter and also help us
predict their future actons.
Atributoo = the process through which we seek informaton and draw inferences about our own and
other people’s behaviour.
The theory of correspoodeoce ioterfereoce asks how we use
informaton about other’s behaviour as a basis for inferring their
traits. The theory is concerned with how we deciden on the basis of
others’ overt actonsn whether they possess speciic traits or
dispositons likely to be fairly stable over tme. The task is
complicated by the following fact: individuals ofen act in certain
ways not because doing so refects their own preferences or traitsn
but rather because external factors leave them litle choice. We
tend to focus on the types of actons that are most likely to prove
informatve. We are likely to consider behaviour as corresponding to a person’s traits when the
behaviour seems freely chosen. We pay careful atenton to actons that show noncommon effects –
conditons that can be caused by one speciic factorn but not by others. These actons rule out other
possible causes and allow us to zero-in on a speciicn distnctve reason for another’s behaviour. (e.g.
marrying someone for looksn p. 104). We pay more atenton to actons that are low in social
desirabilityn aka actons out of the ordinary. Expectatons can affect the inferences we draw about
another person’s behaviour.
Covariatoo theory - The potental number of causes behind other’s behaviour can be very large. To
make the task more manageablen we ofen begin with a preliminary queston: Did others’ behaviour
stem from ioteroal causes (their own traitsn motvesn intentons)n mainly from exteroal causes
(aspects of the social or physical world) or from a combinaton of the two? To answer this queston
we focus on three major types of informaton: cooseosus (the extent to which other people react to a
given stmulus or event in the same manner as the person we are evaluatng)n coosisteocy (the extent
to which the person in queston reacts to the stmulus or event in the same way on other occasionsn
over tme)n and distoctveoess (the extent to which the person reacts in the same manner to othern
different stmulus or events). According to this theory we are most likely to atribute another’s
behaviour to internal causes in which consensus and distnctveness are lown but consistency is high.
B&B Chapter 1 – Social Psychology
Social psychology = the scientic ield that seeks to understand the nature and causes of individual
thought and behaviour in social situatons
We have implicit (nonconscious) processes
Different research methods are systematc observatoo (naturalistc observatonn survey method)n
correlatoo studies (correlaton ≠ causaton) and experimeots. For experiments you alter an
independent variable and measure a dependant variable. Two requirements for experiments are
random assignment of partcipants to experimental conditonsn and control of confounding variables.
Mediatog variables = variables that intervene between an independent variable and changes in
social behaviour (e.g. your dad hitng you being the reason playing violent video games makes you
aggressive)
Ethics: You need informed consentn as litle decepton as possiblen and debrieing.
B&B Chapter 2 – Social Cognition
Social cogoitoo = how we think about other persons and the social world
Heuristcs: How We Employ Simple Rules in Social Cogniton
Heuristcs = simple rules for making complex decisions or drawing inferences in a rapid and efcient
manner
When you meet someone new you compare them with a prototype = a list of atributes commonly
possessed by members of a group – if you make a judgement about someone like this you used the
represeotatveoess heuristc = you made judgement on the basis of a simple rulen the more an
individual seems to resemble or match a given groupn the more likely she or he is to belong to that
group. – we don’t consider the ‘base rate’ when doing this
You can also use representatveness heuristc to conclude if something that ofen leads to something
will cause similar things? P. 60
Availability heuristc = the easier it is to bring informaton to mindn the greater the impact of
subsequent judgements or decisions (leads to overestmatng etc. news for example).
People prefer what is already there as it is easily accessible.
Aochoriog aod adjustmeot = the tendency to deal with uncertainty in many situatons by using
something we do know as a startng point (the “anchor”) and then making adjustments to it (e.g.
lawyers setng punishment afer reading a suggested punishment).
Portoo size efect = e.g. the tendency to eat more when a larger porton is presented (inadequate
adjustment)
Schemas: Mental frameworks for organizing social informaton
Schemas = mental frameworks that help is organize social informatonn guide our actons and process
informaton relevant to partcular context. Schemas infuence three basis processes of social
cogniton. Ateotoo refers to the informaton we notce. Eocodiog refers to the process we use to
,store notced informaton in memory. Retrieval refers to how we recover informaton from memory
in order to use it in some manner.
We can have personal schemasn role schemasn scripts (event schemas) and self-schemas.
Informaton more consistent with schemas are more likely to be notced and entered into our
consciousness. Especially when info overload. During encoding what we focus on is more likely to be
well stored in long-term memory. Inconsistent informaton can however surprise us and also be
coded. People tend to remember (retrieve) informaton more consistent with our schemas more
ofenn but that’s just cuz we come in contact with it more ofen.
Stronger and beter-developed schemas are more likely to infuence us. Schemas can be temporarily
actvated by primiog which are temporarily increases in the accessibility of speciic schemas. E.g.
seeing a hello kity (schema=fun) and deciding to have an ice cream instead of a salad.
Uoprimiog = a process by which thoughts or actons primed by a recent experience dissipate once
they ind expression. E.g. answering a queston right irst lets you answer wrong second
Framiog = e.g. asking a queston in a way that makes you answer a certain way (Lofus) because a
certain schema is actvated
Schemas are persistent to change and can let us see the world incorrectly. They can be self-fulilling.
Automatc & Uncontrolled processing in social though
Cootrolled processiog = social thought occurring in a systematcn logical and highly efforrul manner
Automatc processiog = social thought occurring in a fastn relatvely effortless and intuitve manner
The two have different neural systemsn but sometmes occur at the same tme/followed by each
other (automatcn then controlled)
Potental sources of error in social cogniton
Some errors in social cogniton: our tendency to be overly optmistc (overconidence biasn past is
bad future is goldenn tme optmism)n couoterfactual thiokiog (imagining what might have
been=regret)n magical thinking (irratonal but compelling thoughts)n terror management (efforts to
come to terms with death). We do however more ofen weigh negatve informaton heavier! We
ofen think negatve happens to others and positve to me.
Immuoe oeglect = people are unaware of their tendency to adapt and copen they think they will feel
worse at failure (same with happinessn beter)
Affect and Cogniton: How feelings shape thought and thought shapes feelings
There is a relatonship between (interplay) affect (emoton) and cogniton.
Mood coogrueoce efects = the fact that current moods strongly determine which informaton in a
given situaton is notced and then entered into memory
Mood-depeodeot memory = what speciic informaton is retrieved form memory based on our
current moodn if we’re happy we remember happy things
Our thoughts can affect our feelingsn e.g. if we are aroused we look around us and decide/conclude
what it is that arouse usn or if a schema is actvatedn e.g. someone belonging to my group getng hurt
,Afectve forecasts = predictons of how we would feel about an event we have not experiencedn and
they are ofen inaccurate
There seems to be different brain systems for emoton (affects) and reasoning/cogniton
B&B Chapter 3 – Social Perception
Social percepton = The process through which we seek to know other people. This process involves
understanding the ways we gather and analyse informaton about people.
We are aware of far less of our world than we think. E.g. change blindnessn inatentonal blindnessn
obvious blindness. Can have consequences for eye witness testmonies.
Nonverbal communicaton
Temporary factors or causes (moodn fatguen illnessn drugs) can affect social actonsn our own and
others. It is not always easy to know these factors or causesn since people do not always tell us or
even try to hide how they feel. We can use oooverbal cues (facial expressionsn eye contactn posturen
ofen hard to hide) to tell how others are feeling.
Five basic channels of nonverbal communicaton:
1. Facial expressions
From a very early agen ive different emotons are clearly represented on the human face:
angern fearn happinessn sadness and disgustn (surprise). Emotons occur in many
combinatons. Happiness is a very universal expressionn sadness and disgust also kindan fear
not as much. There are some cultural differences.
We recognise facial expressions relatvely welln but individual differences in the task exist.
2. Eye contact
E.g. we interpret high levels of gazing from another person as a sign of liking or friendliness. If
others avoid eye contact with usn we may conclude they are unfriendlyn they don’t like usn or
they are shy. Staring is however ofen interpreted as a sign of anger or hostlity.
3. Body movements
Our current emotons are ofen refected in the positonsn posturesn and movements of our
bodies. Large numbers of movements – especially ones in which one part of the body does
something to another part (touchingn rubbingn scratching) – suggest emotonal
arousal/nervousness. “Fidgetng” is interpreted as a sign of lying. There might be cultural
differences to gestures and their meanings.
4. Posture
5. Touching
The meaning of a touch depends on various factors: who does the touching (friend or
strangern male or female)n the nature of the physical contact (brief or prolongedn gentle or
roughn area of the body touched)n and the context in which the touching takes place
(business or social setngn doctor’s ofce). Depending on the combinaton of these factorsn
touch can suggest friendlinessn affectonn sexual interestn dominancen caring or aggression.
The hand shake is usually globally acceptedn but in Asian countries for examplen bowing is
ofen used as a greetng.
Paralanguage = How we speakn tonen pitchn volume. Can tell us if someone is angryn or sadn or happy.
Our actons – and especiallyn perhapsn our nonverbal behaviours – infuence our feelings. Not only do
our emotons infuence our nonverbal cuesn the cues themselves infuence our internal feelings. This
is the facial feedback hypothesisn the view that facial expressions can actually trigger emotons.
, People ofen lien but we have a hard tme recognizing when someone lies or is deceiving. This is
because we tend to perceive others as truthful and so we don’t search for clues of decepton.
Another reason is our desire to be polite. People also differ in how they deine lyingn so some report
not lying much because they just don’t think they do (e.g. their intenton was not to mislead others)n
even if some would beg to differ.
People in a sad mood are beter at recognizing decepton that people in a happy mood. When
atemptng to detect decepton people usually focus on the wrong thingsn not indicatng anything
about lies. The cues that does indicate decepton are microexpressioos – feetng facial expressions
lastng only a few tenths of a second. Alson interchannel discrepancies – e.g. discrepancies between
people’s facial expression and body language. Alson exaggerated facial expressions. The pitch of the
voice ofen rises when lying. Slower responsesn startng over sentences – aka elements of linguistc
style.
Atributon: Understanding the causes of behaviour
We have a basic desire to understand cause-and-effect relatonships in the social world. We don’t
simply want to know how others have acted – that’s something we can readily observe. We also
want to know whyn because that knowledge can help us understand them beter and also help us
predict their future actons.
Atributoo = the process through which we seek informaton and draw inferences about our own and
other people’s behaviour.
The theory of correspoodeoce ioterfereoce asks how we use
informaton about other’s behaviour as a basis for inferring their
traits. The theory is concerned with how we deciden on the basis of
others’ overt actonsn whether they possess speciic traits or
dispositons likely to be fairly stable over tme. The task is
complicated by the following fact: individuals ofen act in certain
ways not because doing so refects their own preferences or traitsn
but rather because external factors leave them litle choice. We
tend to focus on the types of actons that are most likely to prove
informatve. We are likely to consider behaviour as corresponding to a person’s traits when the
behaviour seems freely chosen. We pay careful atenton to actons that show noncommon effects –
conditons that can be caused by one speciic factorn but not by others. These actons rule out other
possible causes and allow us to zero-in on a speciicn distnctve reason for another’s behaviour. (e.g.
marrying someone for looksn p. 104). We pay more atenton to actons that are low in social
desirabilityn aka actons out of the ordinary. Expectatons can affect the inferences we draw about
another person’s behaviour.
Covariatoo theory - The potental number of causes behind other’s behaviour can be very large. To
make the task more manageablen we ofen begin with a preliminary queston: Did others’ behaviour
stem from ioteroal causes (their own traitsn motvesn intentons)n mainly from exteroal causes
(aspects of the social or physical world) or from a combinaton of the two? To answer this queston
we focus on three major types of informaton: cooseosus (the extent to which other people react to a
given stmulus or event in the same manner as the person we are evaluatng)n coosisteocy (the extent
to which the person in queston reacts to the stmulus or event in the same way on other occasionsn
over tme)n and distoctveoess (the extent to which the person reacts in the same manner to othern
different stmulus or events). According to this theory we are most likely to atribute another’s
behaviour to internal causes in which consensus and distnctveness are lown but consistency is high.
