Behavior in a social and cultural context

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Watch the Screen and Follow these Instructions:

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Stand Up

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Put your right hand on the shoulder of the person to your right

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Put your left foot on your chair

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Say ‘Hello” to the person on your left

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Give Professor Reyes the Finger

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Say ‘Fuck You’Professor Reyes

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What does this experience mean? 8

It’s based on shared Social Knowledge

Professor Reyes is an authority figure. Be respectful. DO what is asked. (Also why it was hard to say”fuck you” to me.)

We follow norms for our roles. We

defer to authority. NormsRules that regulate human life, including social conventions, explicit laws, and implicit cultural standards

RoleA given social position that is governed by a set of norms for proper behavior. Student and Teacher.

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Diffusion of ResponsibilityWe see everyone else giving the finger so we figure it’s okay. If everyone else is doing it then no single person can be held accountable.

Situations are AmbiguousWe look to others to help define situations but we often don’t realize we are doing this; it’s a social process.

Social and Cultural Context How we affect others and how they affect us. Shared rules that govern our behavior, values, beliefs, and attitudes a lot of the time.

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The “ I made you look” study Stanley Milgram and coworkers (1969)

Milgram had a confederate stare as the sky pretending to be looking something. -> When one person is looking up 40% of passerby looked up->When two people looking up 60% of passerby looked up->When three people looking up 65% of passerby looked up->When four people looking up 80% of passerby looked up

Two ways to think about this finding:

Consciously: “Maybe these folks are looking because there is something interesting up there. I think I’ll look too!

Automatically: Where others look automatically directs our gaze to the same place. Did we evolve to do this? It’s hard NOT to look up.

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The Obedience StudyVERY FAMOUS. Also Stanley Milgram et al (1969)

Subjects asked to shock a fellow subject (who was really a confederate of the research team) whenever he made a mistake in a learning task. As the learner made more mistakes, voltage of the shock increased. And the learner screamed from the next room. When subjects looked to the experimenter, he just said “the experiment must continue”.

Most people were far more obedient than anyone expected.Every single participant complied with at least some orders to shock another person.Two-thirds (26/38) shocked the learner to the full extent or all the way to XXX and had to be stopped. NO ONE demanded that the experiment stop at moderate, strong, or very strong. 5 stopped at intense and 1 at danger.

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What do we think of these people?They have no mind of their own? No conscience? They’re not thinking of long-term consequences? They’re abnormal?

But the definition of normal is what MOST people do. So the normal people are the one’s who had to e stopped at XXX. So the way we think about the people in this study is actually backwards….

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What should we think of these people?Those who went all the way to XXX are not psychopaths but normal people. It’s those who stopped who are different. Those are the people you’d want on your side if the chips were down…

Milgram was originally interested in showing the character defects of Germans after WWII. HE wanted to show that Americans would never commit atrocities because an authority figure ordered them to.

Oops.

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Factors that reduce obedience

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When the experimenter left the room

When the “learner” was in the same room

When subjects could see the “learner” suffering

When the experimenter issued conflicting orders

When the person ordering them to continue was an ordinary man

When the subject worked with peers who refused to go on

The prison study8

Subjects were physically and mentally healthy young men who volunteered to participate for money.

They were randomly assigned to be prisoners or guards.

Those assigned the role of prisoner became distressed, helpless, and panicky.

Those assigned the role of guards became either nice, “tough but fair,” or tyrannical.

Study had to be ended after six days.

Factors in obedience8

Allocating responsibility to the authority,(That’s his problem, “I’m just following orders”

Routine tasks (this is how governments typically get people to aid and abet genocide. Keep them busy with records etc, routine task)

Wanting to be polite

Becoming entrappedEntrapment: a process in which individuals escalate their commitment to a course of action to justify their investment of time, money, or effort.Dating someone? The war in Iraq?

Attributions8

Attribution theoryTheory that people are motivated to explain own and others’ behavior by attributing causes of behavior to situation or disposition

Fundamental attribution errorTendency to overestimate personality factors and underestimate situational influence

Attributions8

Self-serving biasTendency to take credit for one’s good actions but to rationalize one’s mistakes

Just-world hypothesisMany people need to believe that the world is fair and that justice is served.

Bad people are punished and good people rewarded.

Attitudes

A relatively stable opinion containing beliefs and emotional feelings about a topic.Explicit: we are aware of them, they shape conscious decisions

Implicit: we are unaware of them, they influence our behavior in ways we do not recognize

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Factors influencing attitude changeChange in social environment

Change in behaviors

Need for consistencyCognitive dissonance: a state of tension that develops when a person simultaneously holds two contradictory cognitions or when a person’s belief is incongruent with his/her behavior

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Influencing attitudes

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Conformity8

Subjects in group asked to match line lengths.

Confederates picked wrong line.

Subjects went with wrong answer in 37% of trials.

Conformity has decreased since 1950, possibly due to changing norms.Individualistic vs. collectivist cultures

Groupthink

In close-knit groups, the tendency for all members to think alike and suppress disagreement for the sake of harmony.

SymptomsIllusion of invincibilitySelf-censorshipPressure on dissenters to conformIllusion of unanimity

Counteracted byCreating conditions that reward dissentBasing decision on majority rule

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The anonymous crowd

Diffusion of responsibilityThe tendency of group members to avoid taking responsibility for actions or decisions because they assume others will do so.

Bystander apathyPeople fail to call for help when others are near.

Social loafingWhen people work less in the presence of others, forcing others to work harder

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Deindividuation8

In groups or crowds, the loss of awareness of one’s own individuality.

FactorsSize of city, group

Uniforms or masks

Can influence either unlawful or prosocial behaviorsDepends on norms of specific situation

Disobedience and dissent

Situational factors in nonconformityYou perceive the need for intervention or help.

Situation makes it more likely you will take responsibility.

Cultural norms encourage you to take action.

Cost-benefit ration supports decision to get involved.

You have an ally.

You become entrapped.

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Group identity

Social identityThe part of a person’s self-concept based on identification with a nation, culture, or group, or with gender or other social roles

Us vs. them social identities strengthened when groups compete.Robber’s cave studies

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Ethnocentrism8

The belief that one’s own ethnic group, nation, or religion is superior to all others.

Aids survival by making people feel attached to their own group and willing to work on group’s behalf.

Robber’s cave

Boys randomly separated into two groupsRattlers and Eagles

Competitions fostered hostility between groups.

Experimenters contrived situations requiring cooperation for success.Result: cross-group friendships increased.

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Stereotypes

Cognitive schemas of a group, in which a person believes that all members of a group share common traitsTraits may be positive, negative, or neutral.

Allow us to process quickly new information and retrieve memories

Distort realityExaggerate differences between groupsProduce selective perceptionUnderestimate differences within groups

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Origins of prejudice8

Psychological functionsPeople inflate own self-worth by disliking groups they see as inferior

Social and cultural functionsBy disliking others we feel closer to others who are like us.

Economic functionsLegitimizes unequal economic treatment

Measuring prejudice8

Not all people are prejudiced in the same way.

People know they shouldn’t be prejudiced so measures of prejudice have declined.

Explicit vs. implicit prejudice

Measures of explicit prejudice

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Defining and measuring prejudiceMeasuring implicit prejudiceMeasures of symbolic racism

Measures of behaviors rather than attitudes Measures of unconscious associations with a target group

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Reducing prejudice

Groups must have equal legal status, economic opportunities, and power.

Authorities and institutions must endorse egalitarian norms and provide moral support for all groups.

Groups must have opportunities to work and socialize together, both formally and informally.

Groups must work together for common goal.(Elliot Aronson’s JIGSAW Method in some California schools”.

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