CHAPTER 3 – SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
Source: Social Psychology (10th Edition) by Saul Kassin (Author), Steven Fein (Author), Hazel
Rose Markus
Recommended additional study source:
Youtube – Frank M. LoSchiavo (Channel)
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6gNTMdS0oc&list=PLApmiahrmPkvmyKUMHNtC6cr2XPna
ZOhl&ab_channel=FrankM.LoSchiavo)
Chapter 3 – Social Perception
• Social perception: the process through which we seek to know and understand other
people
Nonverbal Communication
• Communication between individuals that do not involve spoken language
✓ It relies instead on facial expressions, eye contact and body language
The Basic Channels
Facial Expressions
• Five different basic emotions are represented clearly and from a very early age on the
human face:
✓ Anger, fear, happiness, sadness, disgust
✓ The number of variations on these themes is immense
• Certain facial expressions are recognised as representing basic underlying emotions in
many different cultures
• When people know each other very well, they are better at “reading” each other’s nonverbal
clues
Eye Contact
• The eyes are often described as “windows to the soul”
• Regarding staring, experts on road rage recommend that drivers avoid eye contact with
people who are disobeying traffic laws and rules of the road – they are already in a highly
excitable state and interpret anything approaching a stare from another driver as an
aggressive act and react accordingly
• Starring: A form of eye contact in which one person continues to gaze steadily at another
regardless of what the recipient does
Body Movements and Posture
• Body language often reveals others’ emotional stares
• Body language: cues provided by the position, posture, and movement of others’
bodies/body parts
• Gestures often provide more specific info about others’ feelings
✓ Emblems are body movements carrying specific meanings in a given culture
• Interpretation of gestures and touch (body language) depends on several factors, including:
✓ Context
, ✓ Culture
✓ Ind factors, e.g. like/dislike of the person – can put a negative/positive spin on the
gestures
Touching
• When touching is appropriate, e.g. in handshakes in cultures that view this as an
appropriate means of greeting others, it can induce positive reactions
• If it is viewed as inappropriate, however, it can encourage negative perceptions of the
person doing the touching
Scent
• Paralinguistic cues: Changes in the tone/inflexion of others’ voices (quite apart from the
meaning of their words)
• Olfactory cues: changes in the aromas emitted by people’s bodies
The Facial Feedback Hypothesis
• There is a close link btw the facial expressions we show and our internal feelings and this
relationship work both ways:
✓ The expressions we show, refelct our internal feelings/emotions and
✓ These expressions also feed into our brains and influence our subjective
experiences of emotion.
Emotional Stimulus→ Feelings→ Expression→ Emotion
Deception: Recognising it Through Nonverbal Cues
• Research indicates that most people tell at least 1 lie every day (“white lies”) and use
deception in almost 20% of their social interactions
• How can we recognise deception?
✓ Microexpressions: Fleeting facial expressions lasting only a few tenths of a second
- Such reactions appear on the face very quickly after an emotion-provoking event and
are challenging to suppress
✓ Interchannel discrepancies: Inconsistencies btw nonverbal cues from different primary
channels (e.g. facial expressions and body movements)
- E.g. they may manage their facial expressions well but may have difficulty looking you in
the eye
✓ Eye contact – e.g. blinking more often, pupils more dilated, unusually low/high level of eye
contact
✓ Exaggerated facial expressions – e.g. smile more/show greater sorrow than is typical in a
given situation
✓ Linguistic style – e.g. voice pitch, delay, hesitation
Attribution
• The process through which we seek to identify the causes of others’ behaviour and gain
knowledge of their traits and dispositions
Source: Social Psychology (10th Edition) by Saul Kassin (Author), Steven Fein (Author), Hazel
Rose Markus
Recommended additional study source:
Youtube – Frank M. LoSchiavo (Channel)
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6gNTMdS0oc&list=PLApmiahrmPkvmyKUMHNtC6cr2XPna
ZOhl&ab_channel=FrankM.LoSchiavo)
Chapter 3 – Social Perception
• Social perception: the process through which we seek to know and understand other
people
Nonverbal Communication
• Communication between individuals that do not involve spoken language
✓ It relies instead on facial expressions, eye contact and body language
The Basic Channels
Facial Expressions
• Five different basic emotions are represented clearly and from a very early age on the
human face:
✓ Anger, fear, happiness, sadness, disgust
✓ The number of variations on these themes is immense
• Certain facial expressions are recognised as representing basic underlying emotions in
many different cultures
• When people know each other very well, they are better at “reading” each other’s nonverbal
clues
Eye Contact
• The eyes are often described as “windows to the soul”
• Regarding staring, experts on road rage recommend that drivers avoid eye contact with
people who are disobeying traffic laws and rules of the road – they are already in a highly
excitable state and interpret anything approaching a stare from another driver as an
aggressive act and react accordingly
• Starring: A form of eye contact in which one person continues to gaze steadily at another
regardless of what the recipient does
Body Movements and Posture
• Body language often reveals others’ emotional stares
• Body language: cues provided by the position, posture, and movement of others’
bodies/body parts
• Gestures often provide more specific info about others’ feelings
✓ Emblems are body movements carrying specific meanings in a given culture
• Interpretation of gestures and touch (body language) depends on several factors, including:
✓ Context
, ✓ Culture
✓ Ind factors, e.g. like/dislike of the person – can put a negative/positive spin on the
gestures
Touching
• When touching is appropriate, e.g. in handshakes in cultures that view this as an
appropriate means of greeting others, it can induce positive reactions
• If it is viewed as inappropriate, however, it can encourage negative perceptions of the
person doing the touching
Scent
• Paralinguistic cues: Changes in the tone/inflexion of others’ voices (quite apart from the
meaning of their words)
• Olfactory cues: changes in the aromas emitted by people’s bodies
The Facial Feedback Hypothesis
• There is a close link btw the facial expressions we show and our internal feelings and this
relationship work both ways:
✓ The expressions we show, refelct our internal feelings/emotions and
✓ These expressions also feed into our brains and influence our subjective
experiences of emotion.
Emotional Stimulus→ Feelings→ Expression→ Emotion
Deception: Recognising it Through Nonverbal Cues
• Research indicates that most people tell at least 1 lie every day (“white lies”) and use
deception in almost 20% of their social interactions
• How can we recognise deception?
✓ Microexpressions: Fleeting facial expressions lasting only a few tenths of a second
- Such reactions appear on the face very quickly after an emotion-provoking event and
are challenging to suppress
✓ Interchannel discrepancies: Inconsistencies btw nonverbal cues from different primary
channels (e.g. facial expressions and body movements)
- E.g. they may manage their facial expressions well but may have difficulty looking you in
the eye
✓ Eye contact – e.g. blinking more often, pupils more dilated, unusually low/high level of eye
contact
✓ Exaggerated facial expressions – e.g. smile more/show greater sorrow than is typical in a
given situation
✓ Linguistic style – e.g. voice pitch, delay, hesitation
Attribution
• The process through which we seek to identify the causes of others’ behaviour and gain
knowledge of their traits and dispositions
