The GOAL of Social Psychology is to: Understand and predict human behavior
Fundamental attribution error: the tendency to explain other people’s behavior entirely in
terms of personality traits
Example: if one kid doesn’t do well in school, we assume he is unintelligent, unmotivated and
not open to new experiences.
People are quick to judge others based on their own fault but if the same situation happens to
themselves, they blame external factors as excuses.
Social influence: the effect that words, actions, or mere presence of other people have on our
thoughts feelings attitudes or behavior
- Is hector the only Latino student in his class?
- Does Hector's professors endorse a growth mindset?
- Does hector have access to ingroup role models in his field of interest ?
Construal: the way in which people perceive, comprehend, and interpret
Motives of contrails
We have a strong motive to maintain a desirable self image and reasonably high self esteem
For ex: failing one class would prompt student to drop out if he feels like he’s a failure and to
protect his ego
Social cognition: how people think about the social world: select, interpret, remember, and use
social info to make judgements and decisions
- can over-rely on shortcuts in our reassign causing errors
- Hector can rely on stereotypes on what he believes a “real” student should look like
Compared to social psychologists, personality psychologists focus more on individual
differences
Theory-Driven hypothesis
A theory is a principle formed to explain the things already shown in data
predicts outcome based on the theory (wearing high status symbols make someone look less
threatening and reduces stereotyping)
Fundamental attribution error: the tendency to explain other people’s behavior entirely in
terms of personality traits
Example: if one kid doesn’t do well in school, we assume he is unintelligent, unmotivated and
not open to new experiences.
People are quick to judge others based on their own fault but if the same situation happens to
themselves, they blame external factors as excuses.
Social influence: the effect that words, actions, or mere presence of other people have on our
thoughts feelings attitudes or behavior
- Is hector the only Latino student in his class?
- Does Hector's professors endorse a growth mindset?
- Does hector have access to ingroup role models in his field of interest ?
Construal: the way in which people perceive, comprehend, and interpret
Motives of contrails
We have a strong motive to maintain a desirable self image and reasonably high self esteem
For ex: failing one class would prompt student to drop out if he feels like he’s a failure and to
protect his ego
Social cognition: how people think about the social world: select, interpret, remember, and use
social info to make judgements and decisions
- can over-rely on shortcuts in our reassign causing errors
- Hector can rely on stereotypes on what he believes a “real” student should look like
Compared to social psychologists, personality psychologists focus more on individual
differences
Theory-Driven hypothesis
A theory is a principle formed to explain the things already shown in data
predicts outcome based on the theory (wearing high status symbols make someone look less
threatening and reduces stereotyping)
