HPS204 Study Guide - Final Guide: Balance Theory, Physical Attractiveness, Relative Deprivation
HPS204 – Human Social Behaviour Notes
1: Introduction to Social Psychology
What is Social Psychology?
Social Psychology
-The scientific investigation of how the thoughts feelings & behaviours of individuals are
influenced by the actual, imagined or implied presence of others.
-2-way process, uses scientific methods and aims to develop general principles, has own
fundamentals just like other disciplines, can be imagined/implied, can be interdisciplinary &
often used in other sub-disciplines of psychology.
Behaviour
-As can be observed and measured is beneficial to study
-Refers to motor activities and subtle activities ex. Raising your eyebrow
Social?
-Deals with how people are affected by other people who are physically present or who are
imagined to be present
-Addresses the fundamentally social nature of our experiences as humans
Similarities?
-Between cognitive psychology, economics, individual psychology, social anthropology,
sociology, sociolinguistics, language communication
-As focuses on large range of topics such as: conformity, persuasion, power influence,
obedience, prejudice, prejudice reduction, discrimination, stereotyping, sexism, racism, crowd
behaviour, social conflict, decision making, leadership, attitudes, language, speech etc.
Scientific Method
-For studying nature, people, the things, the facts discovered and explanations
-Systematic & controlled observations are common to social psychological research, need to
scientifically uncover the processes underlying behaviour, results obtained possible counter
intuitive
Hypotheses:
-Empirically testable predictions about what co-occurs with what or what causes what
-Tests empirically by assessing performance
-Empirical tests can falsify hypothesis, but not prove them
-If supported confidence in it’s veracity increases then generate more fine tuned hypothesis
-Confirmation Bias: occurs when researchers become personally involved in own theory lose
objectivity in interpreting data
Common Methods used in Social Psychology
Experiments
-A hypothesis test in which something is done to see its effect on something else
-IV: manipulated variable to measure the effect of the treatment or (DV)
DV: variable that changes in accordance to the IV
Confounding: when 2+ IV’s vary therefore it is not know what has caused the effect.
-Random assignment: reduces chance of systematic differences between participants in the 2
conditions
-One-Factor designs: 2 levels of the IV
Two-factor design: two factors of IV’s participants randomly assigned across 4 exp conditions
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The Laboratory Experiment
-A place, usually a room which data is collected usually by experimental methods
-Able to control as many potentially confounding variables as possible
-Aim to isolate and manipulate a single aspect of a variable that would not normally occur in
isolation outside a laboratory
-Intended to create artificial conditions
-+ Allow established cause-effect relationships between variables
-- as conditions are artificial and highly controlled cannot be generalised directly
-- low on external validity but high on internal validity
External validity: similarity between circumstances surrounding an experiment and those
encountered in everyday life
Internal validity: psychological impact of the manipulations in an experiment
- - subject effects: cause participants behaviour to be an artefact of the experiment rather than
a natural response
- - demand characteristics: features of an experiment that demand a particular response,
minimise artefacts
The Field Experiment
-Conducted in a more naturalistic setting outside a lab
-Have a high external validity as participants are usually unaware the experiment is taking
place
-Less control over extraneous variables, random assignment difficult and difficult to obtain
accurate measures of subjective feelings
Non-Experimental Methods
-When experimentation is not possible or appropriate
-Involved the manipulation of IV against a background of random assignment to a condition
-Almost impossible to draw reliable causal conclusions
Archival Research
-Useful for investigating large scale, widely occurring phenomena may be remote in time
-Data collection by others
-Used to make comparisons between different cultures or nations regarding things such as
suicide, mental health, child-rearing strategies
-Not reactive, can be unreliable as researcher has no control over primary data collection which
may be biased or unreliable
Case Studies
-Allow in-depth analysis of a single case or event
-Employ an array of data collection and analysis techniques
-Well suited to the examination of unusual or rare phenomena that could be created in the lab
-Useful as a source of hypothesis, findings may suffer subjective bias and findings not easily
generalised
Survey Research
-Structured interviews, researcher asks participants a number of chosen questions and notes
response
-Questions can be open-ended or close-ended
-Used to obtain large amounts of data from a large sample of participants, generalisation not a
problem
-However method subjective to experimenter bias, subjective bias and evaluation apprehension
-Anonymous and confidential questionnaires may minimise exp bias, sub bias ans eval
apprehension
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Field Studies
-Same as a field experiment, but without an interventions or manipulations
-Involve observation, recording and coding of behaviours as it occurs
-Observer is non-intrusive
-Excellent for investigating spontaneously occurring behaviour in it’s natural context but
particularly prone to experimenter bias, lack of objectivity, poor generalisations and distortions
due to the impact of the research on the behaviour under investigation
Data analysis
Statistical significance
-The decisions about whether the difference between groups is psychologically significant
-If statistics reveal that it or a larger effect is unlikely to occur by chance more often then 1 in 20
T-test analysis
-Statistical procedure to test the stat sig of an effect in which the mean for one condition is
greater than the mean for another
Correlation
-Positive correlation: +1 is perfect positive, as one variable increases so does the other
-Uncorrelated variables: no relation between variables
-Negative Correlation: -1 is perfect negative, as one increases the other decreases
-Discourse analysis: a form of qualitative analysis, treats all data as text that is a
communicative event replete with multiple layers of meaning, to interpret what is being
communicated
Research Ethics
-APA has a code of professional conduct that provides guidelines for conducting research in
psychology
-The treatment of research participants
5 ethical principles received most attention
-Physical welfare: Unethical to expose people to physical harm, difficult to establish whether
non-trivial harm is involved and whether debriefing deals with it.
-Respect for privacy: participants can be asked intimate questions or observed without their
knowledge, entirely confidential and personal identification is removed from data rendering
participants anonymous
-Use of deception: manipulation of cognitions/feelings/behaviour in order to investigate
spontaneous IV’s, degree of deception sometimes necessary, this debriefing needed at then
end to explain
-Informed consent: way to safeguard participants rights in experiments, given full information
freely and can withdraw without penalty from research when they wish, researchers cannot lie
or withhold information to induce people to participate. Full information is difficult to define and
experiments may need to required some deception to ensure participants remain naïve.
-Debriefing: fully debriefed upon completion of an experiment, to make sure people leave the
lab with an increased respect for an understanding of social psychology, involves detailed
explanation of the experiment, broader theoretical and applied context. Any deceptions are
explained and justified.
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Document Summary
The scientific investigation of how the thoughts feelings & behaviours of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined or implied presence of others. 2-way process, uses scientific methods and aims to develop general principles, has own fundamentals just like other disciplines, can be imagined/implied, can be interdisciplinary & often used in other sub-disciplines of psychology. As can be observed and measured is beneficial to study. Refers to motor activities and subtle activities ex. Deals with how people are affected by other people who are physically present or who are imagined to be present. Addresses the fundamentally social nature of our experiences as humans. Between cognitive psychology, economics, individual psychology, social anthropology, sociology, sociolinguistics, language communication. As focuses on large range of topics such as: conformity, persuasion, power influence, obedience, prejudice, prejudice reduction, discrimination, stereotyping, sexism, racism, crowd behaviour, social conflict, decision making, leadership, attitudes, language, speech etc. For studying nature, people, the things, the facts discovered and explanations.
