WARREN STREET'S PSYCHOLOGY 346 LECTURE NOTES

These notes are plans for each week's discussion, a visual aid to topic organization, and reminders about spelling, etc. Don't substitute these notes for taking your own notes, coming to class, reading the text, or rehearsing the material we've covered.

Class material is identified by the chapter of the text it is related to, but these are not reading notes and in many places may not follow the text very closely.

CHAPTER: 1   2   3   4   5   6   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14  

Your Spring 2008 Teaching Assistant for this class can help you to study for exams and understand the text or lecture.
Liane Pereira   Office: PSY 215  Hours: TBA

I. CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION, HISTORY

A. Social psychology is the science of how individual behavior is influenced by the real or imagined presence of others.

B. Allied disciplines: Sociology, economics, and anthropology- Similarities and differences in emphasis. Closely related varieties of psychology: personality, clinical, industrial, cognitive psychology.

C. Brief history:

II. CHAPTER 2: RESEARCH METHODS

A. Goals of description, explanation, prediction, and control. All but description require identifying the causes of behavior. Assumes determinism.

B. Descriptive studies:

C. Correlational methods

D. Experimental methods

III. CHAPTER 3: SELF-PERCEPTION

A. How do we come to know about ourselves?

1. Common belief in introspection.
2. Alternative explanation: the looking-glass self. Social information, observation of our own behavior.
3. Much evidence that we have little or no ability to accurately identify our own thoughts feelings, or motives via introspection. When accurate, it's because we choose an accurate commonsense belief, not because we accurately introspect.

a. Nisbett and Wilson review of the literature: Examples of moon-ocean word list study, mother's unmarried name example, example of busing discussion group study, many other examples

B. Apparent sources of self-knowledge

1. Bem's self-perception theory and research. Knowledge through self observation.
2. Zajonc's facial feedback research. Self observation or physiological change are possible explanations for the effect. Some evidence that posture and speaking rate can also affect one's self-perception. Seems to apply to perceptions of emotional state.
3. The results of our behavior. Example: Perception of intrinsic v. extrinsic motivation and the overjustification effect. Rewards can undermine intrinsic motivation. Requires that rewards be applied, then suddenly removed. Applies to a limited range of circumstances.

a. Note that reward does enhance most everyday motivation. Best to establish intrinsic motivation by thinning the reward schedule. Parents and teachers often do this automatically.

4. Social comparisons - Information from other people

a. Tendency to choose similar others because they provide greatest information about oneself. Especially if doubtful, anxious, fearful. Not under conditions of possible embarrassment, though.
b. Tendency to want to be with others who have slightly higher social value.
c. Tendency to reject those of slightly lower social value.

5. Social context: Example: Schachter's two-factor (arousal + social context) theory of emotions.

C. Inaccuracies in self-perception via autobiographical memory

1. Recency effect, except a tendency to remember the first times things happened.
2. Egocentric bias - exaggeration of one's importance in the behavior of others
3. Hindsight bias - reconstructing memory after one knows the outcome of a situation.

D. Increasing self-esteem through self-enhancement

1. Self-serving bias - attributing successes to oneself and failures to others, environment, bad luck
2. Self-handicapping - constructing the conditions under which failure is inevitable but not one's fault.
3. BIRG -Basking in Reflected Glory - emphasizing similarity with successful people
Studies by Cialdini: Wearing university logo shirts after athletic wins,
4. CORF - Cut Off Reflected Failure and Downward Social Comparisons- emphasizing differences from less competent, less successful others. "Blasting;" Citing examples of worse failure than your own.
5. The mental health effects of unrealistic positive self-esteem - Taylor and Brown's meta-analysis of studies, showing positive relation between depression and realistic self-appraisal: matched appraisal of others, fewer self-serving attributions, less prone to internal control attributions, more likely to compare to similar others than downward.

IV. CHAPTER 4: PERCEPTION OF OTHERS

A. A reminder that these same principles apply to self-perception
B. Evidence from the person

The display of emotion

Paul Ekman ‑ cross cultural studies: similar facial expression for basic emotions across  cultures‑ surprise, joy, rage, disgust, fear, sorrow.

Emotions may or may not be accurately displayed, depending on learned "display rules."   Ways of inaccurate display:
masking ‑ attempting to hide an emotion, no display
modulation ‑ exaggerating, minimizing an emotion
simulation ‑ display of some other emotion

 Not always successful ‑‑ "leakage" occurs

Ekman showed film of burns and amputations to female nursing students, later asked  them to report that they had seen a pleasant film.  Raters could detect deception better  if they could see bodies than if face could be seen.  Body is a leaky channel. Voice is a  leaky channel. Face is more controllable.

 Behaviors related to deception:

Body: "microexpressions" in the face or body
pupil dilation
adaptors ‑ self‑grooming
swallows
fragmentary shrugs

Voice: speech errors
speech hesitations
voice gets softer
pitch (higher)
negative statements
irrelevant information 

Behaviors not strongly related to lying
gaze
postural shifts
speech rate

 Accuracy of judging lies from non‑verbal cues: Women tend to be better than men, esp  from body posture, also from facial expression.  Same gender diff across culture,  emerges in childhood.

Professional lie-detection through personal interview:  Ekman‑ Few professionals are  better than chance (overhead).  Only members of the Secret Service are better than  chance.  Ekman's theory is that people arrested by the SS appear harmful but really  won't do anything and that's what they tell the SS.  The usual person is motivated to  tell the truth.  The others have more experience with those motivated to lie. Fewer  discrimination trials.

Ekman: Some hints on practical lie detection: Trivial lies are difficult to detect.  If the liar has something to lose, lying is easier to detect.  Look for signs of lying (above) and for inconsistencies between speech, voice, face, and body.  Look for signs of thinking that shouldn't be necessary and for expression of emotions the person shouldn't feel.   When in doubt, let the person talk more: Control over their face, voice, and body should fade.

Can you spot the insincere smile?

For more about lie detection, read and listen to these selections from National Public Radio
Lies as Plain as the Nose on Your Face? -- about microexpressions
Neuroscientist Uses Brain Scan to See Lies Form -- about using functional magnetic resonance imaging
Foolproof Test for Catching Liars Still Elusive -- the history of the polygraph, the traditional "lie detector"

 Professional lie‑detection by machine (studies by David Lykken)

True positives‑negatives, False positives‑negatives. Lie detection apparatus looks for  physio differences.  Professional polygraphers use 2 types of procedures:  1. control questions test:  first elicit known truths and lies (quiz on days of week,  name, etc.) then ask questions about crime, etc. false positives 25‑50%  2. guilty knowledge test: ask about things only the guilty person will know, give a  series of yes‑no alternatives ‑ best if examiner doesn't know the "guilty" answer. false  positives 3‑4%, false negatives 10% Neither admissible as evidence. 

New frontiers: Functional Magnetic Resonanace Imaging (fMRI). Detecting the brain patterns related to lying.

On the Web:      Detecting Deception    fMRI and Lie Detection

C. Evidence from the setting: Attributions
The importance of attributed motives for determining how you behave toward others.

1. Internal, dispositional, personal attributions vs. External, situational attributions
2. What leads to internal attributions?

a. Jones - correspondent inferences theory

(1) apparent choice
(2) unexpected behavior
(3) non-common effects (an outcome or apparent cause that doesn't conform to the others appears to be a more likely cause)

b. Kelly - covariation theory

(1) low consensus (behaves differently than other people)
(2) high consistency (behaves the same across time)
(3) low distinctiveness (behaves the same in all settings)

3. Predictable errors in attribution

a. Fundamental attribution error - overattribution to the person, underattribution to the situation. My opinion: The most important practical principle in this course because of the greatest potential for doing harm. Daniel Kahnemann on biases in wartime at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6737026 (about 5 minutes).

(1) Why? Personal attribution is easy, and considering situation is difficult, requires motivation, information, concentration, time. Some evidence that personal attributions happen automatically and situational attributions happen only if there's evidence.

b. Actor-observer differences in attribution
c. Just world hypothesis - tendency to believe that a person's outcomes are somehow consistent with their actions or their character.

d. Self serving bias ‑ internal for success, external for failure
e. Overconfidence ‑ Tendency to overestimate the accuracy of our own judgments and our importance in shaping events. Overconfident people tend to be happier and find it easier to make decisions, but can be prone to making serious errors.
f. Representativeness heuristic: Assumption that when some elements of a concept are present, the rest are, too. Implicit personality theories form on the basis of a few pieces of evidence. Stereotyping. Presence of representative features can distort judgement about the whole.

Example: Linda is 31, outspoken, and very bright. She majored in philosophy in college. As a student, she was deeply concerned with discrimination and other social issues, and she participated in antiwar demonstrations. Which statement is more likely to be true?
a. Linda is a bank teller
b. Linda is a bank teller and active in the feminist movement.

Another example: Ernest is very social and interested in literature. Which is more likely?
a. Ernest majored in engineering
b. Ernest majored in engineering but took a job as a newspaper reporter

D. Other sources of error in interpersonal judgement. All of these are "heuristics:"

1. Base rate fallacy. The tendency to base judgements about the likelihood of events or personal characteristics on newsworthy events. Usually overestimation of events that are actually rare.

2. Availability heuristic: The most easily remembered concepts are more likely to be applied to events. Usually the most recent or most publicized events. Ex: my being burglarized, swimmers avoiding the water after "Jaws," buying earthquake insurance after a quake. Events "prime" categories.

3. Regression fallacy: Tendency to attribute non‑repetition of rare events to some intervening event, instead of recognizing that rare events simply don't repeat themselves very often. (Ex: low test score, so discouraging that you don't study for the next, and your score goes up.)

4. Hindsight bias -- Restructuring events, thinking that you knew a person's motives, after you know the end result.

E. Belief perseveration

1. Once formed, we tend to maintain our judgment of other people

a. We bias our interpretation of the evidence we receive about them
b. We limit our information gathering to only those settings that will confirm our beliefs about the person
c. We interact with the person in ways that cause confirmatory behavior - Rosenthal's expectancy effect. Self-fulfilling prophesies.

V. CHAPTER 5: PERCEIVING GROUPS

A. Definitions of stereotype, prejudice, discrimination.

1. Stereotypes are central to the idea of social groups: people having membership in a defined category.
2. Prejudice - Negative feeling and beliefs extended to individual members of stereotyped groups.
3. Discrimination - Harmful actions toward individual members of stereotyped groups.

B. Stereotypes. Stereotypes as social categories, reflecting normal perceptual and linguistic processes, shaped by language community.

1. Categories tend to focus on prominent, easily identified characteristics. Applied to people these may be race, age, gender, language, social status
2. Categorization leads to reduction of within-group variation and exaggeration of between-group variation.
3. Ingroup-outgroup differences in perception reflect actor-observer differences in perception. Belief that outgroups are homogeneous, internally motivated; ingroups are heterogeneous, externally motivated. Largely a matter of information availability, behavior sampling.

a. Tajfel has found that ingroup-outgroup stereotypes will develop even when people are assigned to a group by a random or arbitrary basis, such as the flip of a coin or eye color. Called the "minimal group" paradigm.

4. Illusory correlation - tendency to believe that distinctive or rare events are correlated. Also, tendency to overestimate the occurrence of expected pairings.

C. Stereotypes are difficult to change.

1. People are biased toward accepting confirmatory evidence and against accepting disconfirmatory evidence.
2. Disconfirmatory evidence often leads to creation of subcategories instead of changing the whole category.
3. Prejudicial stereotypes involve negative emotion, so factual evidence has little influence.
4. Ironic effects: Trying to suppress stereotypes has been shown to make them more prominent in one's thinking. (One of many "ironic effects" (Wenger's research)

 

Change is most likely to happen if 

disconfirming individuals are typical of the category in all other respects, 

many members of the group deviate from the stereotype, and 

the deviation is moderate, not great.

we have abundant information about individuals

we are able to focus and attend on our evaluations (reminders from others, low distraction, low time pressure, etc.)

we focus on people, not group traits, and 

we expect continued contact with the individual (motivation).

 

D. Prejudice and Discrimination

1. Causes of prejudice and discrimination

a. Personality trait explanations (authoritarianism, displaced hostility) not well supported in research
b. Realistic conflict - Perception of limited resources and zero-sum distribution. A sense of relative deprivation, not absolute deprivation.
c. Scapegoating - choosing a group to blame for bad times.
d. Social identity enhancement: self-esteem via group membership - Remember the phenomena of "basking in reflected glory" and "downward social comparisons." Strongest when one's self-esteem is threatened. Studies show self-esteem is increased by discriminatory acts in these cases.

(1) Especially if one's status in the group is marginal.

(2). Especially if the group's status in society is marginal.

(3) Especially if one strongly identifies with the group.

e. Social learning - classical and instrumental conditioning, imitation
f. Belief in a just world. Suffering is attributed to the unworthiness of the suffering person, just as success is attributed to the worthiness of the successful person.

(1) Attributions are either to one's character or one's actions.

2. Forms of discrimination:

a. Overt harmful acts - promoted by deindividuation (crowds, uniforms, night, anything promoting anonymity)
b. Covert discrimination

(1) Withholding help
(2) Tokenism - substituting the trivial for the meaningful.
(3) Reverse discrimination - helping the person to fail
(4) Attributions for success and failure.

E. Reduction of prejudice and discrimination

1. Reduction of competition through non-zero-sum resource distribution, presence of superordinate goals.
2. Mere contact - many studies after school desegregation showed that simple contact didn't reduce prejudice.
3. Meaningful contact:

a. equal status
b. personal, informal interactions
c. cooperative activities with a common goal
d. mutual interdependence
e. perception of typical representation
f. establishment of norm of cooperation
g. multiple contacts with the expectation of continued contact.

4. Aronson's jigsaw classrooms - Establishment of small racially mixed groups, each group given part of material to be learned, responsibility for teaching it to others. Resulted in higher liking, lower prejudice, greater achievement, higher self-esteem for all.

VI. CHAPTER 6: ATTITUDES AND ATTITUDE CHANGE

A. Attitudes: Classical view:

1. Attitudes as internal motivators of behavior.
2. Three-aspect model: Affect, Behavior, Cognition. Single-aspect model: Affect only. Like-Dislike dimension.
3. Acquired by classical conditioning, instrumental conditioning, modeling.
4. Often measured by paper-and-pencil surveys or interviews.

B. Large body of studies showing low attitude-behavior consistency Classic study of Richard LaPiere: cross country trip with Chinese friends in the 1930s. More recent examples: D.A.R.E. program assessment: Questionnaire answers change, but drug behavior doesn't.

1. Attitudes are responses to situation, just like any other behavior. Expressed attitudes don't reflect an inner motivational state, they are verbal behavior that, like any other behavior, is a learned response to the present setting. They aren't motivators of behavior until the person becomes aware of them. "Honesty" really isn't the issue in improving attitude measurement.
2. Improvement of attitude-behavior consistency:

Improving attitude-behavior consistency:

a. Fishbein and Ajzen's model of "planned behavior:" use situational prompting, specificity in attitude measures.
b. Use of the "bogus pipeline"
c. "Thoughtfulness" prompts that focus the person on their attitudes before they behave. 

C. Attitude change through persuasion. Much research originating in WW II research at Yale.

1. Central route: logic and reason as persuaders

a. More effective with informed audiences, important issues, intelligent audiences, highly motivated audiences.

2. Peripheral route: emotional appeals, situational factors

a. Better for uninformed, less intelligent, unmotivated audiences, unimportant issues.

3. Characteristics of the source. (peripheral factor)

a. credibility (expertise, competence, trustworthiness)
b. likeability, attractiveness, referent power
c. fast delivery
d. disguised intent, indirect delivery
e. non-self-serving
f. initial agreement with audience

4. Source effects decay with time: The sleeper effect
.

Content of the message

a. discrepancy with existing attitudes ( ∩-shaped relation)
b. fear arousal (strong arguments and instructions for fear reduction)
c. distraction (but subliminal persuasion appears not to work)
d. two-sided message
e. length of message (unless some arguments weak, repetitive)
f. Order effects:

(1) Primacy effect: A, B, delay, test = A
(2) Recency effect: A, delay, B, test = B
(3) No order effect: A, delay, B, delay, test
(4) No order effect: A, B, test

g. message delivered in a setting where positive emotions are aroused -- food, music, good news.

6. Characteristics of the audience

a. age (younger more persuasible)
b. intelligence ∩-shaped relation)
c. self-esteem
d. approval motive
e. high self monitors more affected by image appeals

7. Factors that produce resistance to persuasion.

a. Refuting arguments (knowing counterarguments)
b. Rejecting arguments (emotional rejection regardless of facts)
c. Derogating source (imputing unreliability, motives, etc)

8. Techniques for inducing resistance

a. Forewarning of persuasive intent
b. Inoculation: prior exposure to opposition arguments, in context of desired beliefs.

D. Attitude change through awareness of one's own actions: Cognitive dissonance

1. A definition of dissonance: an aversive motivational state caused by simultaneously holding two incompatible bits of knowledge, usually incompatible beliefs and actions.
 

2. Ways of resolving dissonance

a. change either the incompatible belief or the behavior
b. add more compatible beliefs or behaviors (rationalize)
c. reduce perceived importance

3. Everyday events that arouse dissonance and dissonance-reducing measures.

a. Choice and its consequences

(1) Difficult choices cause more dissonance
(2) Usually resolved by enhancement of the chosen alternative, derogation of the unchosen alternative

b. Insufficient justification for effort

(1) $1-$20 experiment example
(2) Usually resolved by increased liking for task. We come to love the worthless things we have suffered for.
(3) Insufficient deterrence: the mirror image of insufficient justification. We lose interest in the attractive things we didn't do.

4. Alternate explanations for these phenomena: attitude change results from seeing your own behavior (self-perception theory), from wanting to appear rational to others (impression management theory), or to repair one's self-concept (self-affirmation theory).

VII. CHAPTER 7: CONFORMITY, COMPLIANCE, AND OBEDIENCE

A. Conformity: Change in behavior due to group influence.

1. Two reasons for conformity: normative and informational needs
2. The classic experiments of Solomon Asch - simple task revealed conformity to maintain appearance of normalcy.

a. Line judgments - 32% conformity to group's wrong answers.
b. Effects of non-unanimous majority

(1) 10% conformity if another naive subject is present
(2) Characteristics of dissenting ally.
(3) 6% conformity if a dissenter is present and always correct
(4) Conformity will be reduced even if dissenter gives wrong answers, if dissenter is incompetent, or if dissenter is a member of disliked group (Maloff & Lott study of prejudiced subjects)

c. Group size. Effects often peak at n=3, but peak point varies with type of behavior required

4. More recent findings; can be divided into informational and normative influences.

a. Ambiguity of judgment (number, difficulty, complexity, unfamiliarity): positive relation (maybe ∩-shaped)
b. Group cohesiveness and history of past agreement. positive relation
c. Acceptance of person by the group: ∩-shaped.
d. Discrepancy with existing beliefs: ∩-shaped.
e. Importance of the issue. negative relation.
f. Public commitment enhances conformity
g. Gender differences on traditionally gender-specific tasks, females higher in public settings, but not in private settings
h. Cultural differences: higher in collective cultures, lower in individualistic cultures.
i. Personal differences: negative relation with intelligence, higher in those with high needs for approval and those with low self-esteem. Higher in early adolescents.

5. Being an effective minority: conditions favoring minority "crusaders"

a. Consistent opposition to majority
b. Appearance of understanding other views
c. Should be a member of the majority in other ways
d. Idiosyncrasy credits through past conformity
e. Presence of minority dissenter will reduce conformity pressures in others.

B. Compliance: Change in behavior due to a direct request from another person.

1. Surprise, unusual, requests with reasons are more successful. Example: Asking for 37 cents yields more compliance than asking for a quarter.
2. The compliance two-step: Sequential strategies for obtaining compliance. All of these are more effective if the target person is unprepared for the request and if the request sounds reasonable.

a. The reciprocity method
b. The foot-in-the-door method (first request can't be too trivial)
d. The low-ball method
c. The door-in-the-face method
e. The that's-not-all method (some studies indicate this is the most effective)
f. The guilt arousal method

3. Forewarning, awareness of manipulative intent, increases resistance.

C. Obedience: Change in behavior due to a command from an authority figure.

1. Stanley Milgram's studies of obedience. Participants were told to give increasing levels of shock to another person, as part of a learning experiment. Special qualities: gradually increasing demands, responsibility assumed by authority figure. Recently replicated for ABC Primetime Live

a. Different amounts of obedience, depending on how close the victim was: Remote feedback: 66% complied completely; Voice contact: 62.5%; Visual contact: 40%; Touch contact: 30%.
b. Effects of the setting: Non-university office building:48%
c. Effects of change of authority: Peers gave orders: 17.5%; Orders by telephone: 21%
d. Non-compliant group members: 10%
e. No differences due to gender, prior military service, occupation. Less educated participants were more obedient, as were Roman Catholic participants.
f. See the movie Obedience in the Brooks Library. (45 minutes).

2.  Philip Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment

a. See the movie Quiet Rage online (45 minutes)

VIII. CHAPTER 8: GROUP PROCESSES

A. Effects of the presence of others on task performance

1. Social facilitation: enhancement of dominant responses, impairment of poorly-learned, complex, or novel behavior.

a. Mere presence (drive-arousal) explanation
b. Evaluation apprehension explanation
c. Distraction-conflict explanation

2. Social Loafing

a. Strongest with undesirable, unimportant tasks, pooled results
b. Reduced with individual records, punishment for poor performance, low expectations for co-worker performance, valued group, small group, collective cultural norms, female workers.

B. Polarization shifts -Groups appear to adopt more extreme positions than individuals. Beginnings in "risky shift" research. In later studies, conservative shifts were observed. Explanations:

1. Enhancement of ingroup-outgroup differences
2. The desire to be more right than the others (social comparison)
3. Persuasive arguments possible in a group

C. Groupthink: An analysis of group mistakes

1. Marked by

a. Overestimation of the group (invulnerability, group infallibility persistence in the face of evidence of failure
b. Close-mindedness (discrediting contradictory information, "mindguards"
c. Increased conformity pressures (conformity, outgroup hostility, outgroup stereotypes)

d. Defective decisions (incomplete consideration of alternatives, incomplete survey of goals, discounting of risks, failure to reappraise rejected alternatives, poor information search, selective bias in evaluating information, failure to work out contingency plans)

2. Produced by high cohesiveness, isolation, charismatic leader-centered groups, external threats, informal procedures, homogeneous members.
 

3. Prevention:

a. Consult with and include outsiders
b. Encourage criticism
c. Group norm of critical review of all decisions, don't promote consensus.

D. Group creativity: Brainstorming: express all ideas; emphasize quantity, not quality; combine, improve ideas.

1. Research on group v. individual productivity.
2. Evaluation apprehension, production blocking, and performance matching explanations.
3. Convergent and divergent problem-solving. Brainstorming groups best with convergent problems, worse with creativity problems requiring divergent solutions.

E. Cooperation, competition, and independence

1. Prisoner's dilemma game: trust and cooperation vs. suspicion and competition. Similar to many social dilemmas where pursuing the common good involves risk to personal gain. Commons dilemmas (individual overconsumption) and public goods dilemmas (not doing your share)
2. Factors producing cooperation:

a. Communication
b. Reversibility of concessions
c. Reciprocal strategy
d. Personal similarity
e. Favorable attribution, expectation of other's behavior
f. Small numbers of parties: individuals more cooperative than groups, small groups more than large groups
g. Long range thinking, continued interaction
h. Superordinate external threat

F. Bargaining: Determining what each shall give and take, or perform and receive, in a transaction.

1. Threats to successful conflict resolution

a. Use of threat early in process.
b. Mirror image perceptions
c. Double standards
d. conflict-maintaining attributions for the other's behavior.

2. Successful Negotiation:

a. GRIT strategy - Graduated and Reciprocated Initiatives in Tension-Reduction: stated intention to reduce conflict, begin with some concessions, reciprocate other's concessions, retaliate without escalation.
b. Flexibility, seek mutually beneficial outcomes beyond 50-50 splits.
c. Concession matching, retrievability, disclosing information
d. Negotiator experience, power, realistic expectations

IX. CHAPTER 9: ATTRACTION, FRIENDSHIP, AND LOVE

A. In general, attraction and the formation of friendship is based on rewarding experiences. The amount of reward is not as important as the degree of balance between costs and rewards.

1. The analysis of social relationships on the basis of costs and benefits is called social exchange theory or equity theory. Stable relationships when positive and negative costs equal positive and negative benefits..

B. Characteristics of others that determine attraction

1. Physical attractiveness.

a. Self ratings of attractiveness correlate highly with other people's ratings
b. People are more attracted to physically attractive people for friendship choice, but more attracted to others of similar attractiveness for possible romantic relationships. Wisconsin computer dating studies.
c. Possible reasons for choosing physically attractive people:

(1) Mood elevation
(2) People respond more favorably to attractive people.
(3) What-is-beautiful-is-good stereotype. Stereotype tends to be true. Self-fulfilling prophesy
(4) Attractive people tend to be more socially skillful.
(5) Basking in reflected glory.

d. Undesirable effects of attractiveness:

(1) Derogation, discounting praise for other favorable attributes
(2) In women, ideal of thinness promotes body dissatisfaction, eating disorders,

2. Moderate self-disclosure
3. Occasional appropriate touch. Men touch women more than women touch men. May be an expression of social dominance.
4. Moderately hard-to-get

 

On the Web: Shyness and how to overcome it.

D. Characteristics of the setting that determine attraction

1. Propinquity - frequency of exposure
2. Good mood
3. Cheerful setting
4. Stressful situation if the other person can reduce the stress either through social comparison or social support, especially in first-borns and females

a. But not for unmanageable fear or embarrassment

5. Social barriers can increase attraction for "forbidden" people

E. Characteristics of the pair of people that determine attraction

1. Similarity: demographic, personality, mood, physical attractiveness, attitudes
2. Marketing of self: Studies of resources offered and desired in romance. Studies of "personals" ads:

a. Jones, Collins, & Chulef -- survey of 7 periodicals. M&F both offer physical fitness and personality (creative, fun-loving) more than other attributes. M&F both ask for physical fitness, personality. M>F offer physical health, status; ask for physical attractiveness. F>M offer social, emotional skills, ask for social, emotional qualities.
b. Harrison & Said -- personals in major papers. M seek attractiveness, offer financial security; F seek financial security, offer attractiveness. Financial security theme increases with age.

3. Equitable resource exchange.

F. The application of equity theory to romantic love. Relations depend on "fair" exchange of costs and benefits. Both are relative to other relationships and person's need.

1. What gets exchanged? Physical attractiveness, money, sex, nurturance, and companionship.

2. Equity is determined by one's own benefits/costs vs. other person's benefits/costs.

3. Definition of fair, underbenefitted, and overbenefitted relationships.

a. Fair: Dating, marriage more likely, more satisfying; Reports of more common sexual component, greater intensity, not more "satisfying."
b. Underbenefitted: more anger, tend to be worried about relationship from the start.
c. Overbenefitted: guilt, worry about stability of relationship after 1 year, less disturbing than underbenefitted relationship.
d. Disruption of equity often causes relationship crises: loss of job, attractiveness, unemployed spouse gaining employment, children leaving home, etc.
e. Some possibility that satisfying partner's needs degrades an equitable relationship.

4. In real-world research, equity theory predicts happiness in many settings, but simple amount of benefits is a better predictor in some settings.
5. Results of inequitable relationship

a. Withdrawal/Increase in costs or attitude change toward costs.
b. Enhancing/reducing benefits or changing attitude toward benefits
c. Withdraw from or terminate relation
d. Just world - enhance or derogate own or other's behavior or character

6. Staying or leaving a relationship: Comparison Level (CL) and Comparison level for alternatives (CL_alt). CL is current ratio of benefits/costs. CL_alt is benefits/costs in another relationship.

a. When CL_alt exceeds CL, temptation to leave. Low CL is unpleasant, but person will stay in relationship if no better CL_alt is available.
b. In a relationship, the person closest to their CL_alt has the most power, but often doesn't understand this. Called the "principle of least interest."
c. Important to understand that the simple level of CL is not as important as the difference between CL and CL_alt

H. Signs of trouble: Communication problems

1. Negative affect reciprocity - Responding to negative statements with negative statements of one's own. Research shows this is especially damaging in heterosexual couples if it increases in the woman and decreases in the man.
2. Demand-withdrawal pattern - One partner introduces discussion of problem issue, pursues discussion, demands; other withdraws, becomes defensive. Research shows women more likely to initiate/demand, men more likely to withdraw.
3. Gottman - expressions of disgust, eye-rolling, derogation, sarcasm are especially critical indicators of trouble. Expressions of support, agreement indicate satisfaction.

I. Signs of trouble: Attributions

1. Happy couples attribute pleasant events to stable, internal, global factors and unpleasant events to unstable, external, specific factors.
2. Unhappy couples attribute unpleasant events to stable, internal, global factors and pleasant events to unstable, external, specific factors.

J. When a relationship ends

1. More distress when close relationships end unexpectedly. Closeness depends on frequency of contacts, diversity of shared activities, and strength of influence on each other.
2. People may not accurately anticipate the amount of distress they actually experience. Bersheid's research combining amount of unexpected benefits and amount of total benefits, related to expected and experienced distress.

K. Varieties of liking and love

1. Rubin -

a. liking is typified by positive objective appraisal,
b. love by affiliative and dependent need; predisposition to help; exclusiveness and absorption
c. Women discriminate less between friends and partners, men discriminate more.

2. Sternberg's triangular theory of love. Factors: Intimacy, Passion, Commitment.

a. Combinations:

(1) Nonlove - no factors present;
(2) Liking - I;
(3) Infatuated Love - P;
(4) Empty Love - C;
(5) Romantic Love - I,P;
(6) Companionate Love - I,C;
(7) Fatuous Love - P, C;
(8) Consummate Love - I, P, C

b. Commitment is the strongest predictor of satisfying and long-lasting relationships.

X. CHAPTER 10: HELPING OTHERS

A. Why don't people help more? Many examples in text. Early research on bystander intervention. The incident that inspired the first studies: the Kitty Genovese murder of March 13, 1964. NY tavern owner closed tavern at 2 a.m., did the day's books, walked home to apartment at 3:20. Assailant drives up, stabs her, she cries out, attacker drives away, returns, attacks again, Genovese cries out "I'm dying!" Lights go on, attacker leaves. Genovese crawls to apartment door, attacker returns, kills her. First call to police at 3:50, they arrive in 2 minutes. 38 people saw the murder and did nothing. Why?

B. Altruism: Acts that help another without benefiting the helper. Is true altruism (vs. egoism) ever really possible?

C. Sources of prosocial behavior

1. Sociobiological view: Maintaining one's own characteristics in the gene pool. The "selfish gene."

a. Predicts helping of those genetically similar to oneself, helping women, helping children.

2. Reciprocity norm - Cultural learning of helping when the norm will require reciprocity in the future.
3. Learning of cultural norms by direct reinforcement, imitation. Collectivist v. individualist societies.

D. Emotional factors influencing helping:

1. Good mood enhances helping, perhaps because you are more aware of your values and less aware of self-concerns. Values usually dictate altruistic behavior.
2. Guilt may enhance helping.
3. Empathy -altruism hypotheses. Batson. Altruism depends on assuming the distressed person's perspective. We can help to the extent that distress in others causes our own distress (egoistic motive, can be reduced by helping or escape) and sympathy for others (altruistic motive, can only be reduced by helping).
4. So true altruism is possible? Others say no, that empathy just heightens one's own distress, making "egotistic" helping more likely.

E. Doing the right thing: Situational factors affecting helping

1. Properties of emergencies might discourage helpers

a. High risk, low rewards
b. Emergencies are rare, so we tend to interpret as something other than an emergency.
c. Wide variation, little practice
d. Unforeseen, so nearly always unprepared to act.
e. Instant action needed

2. An incremental model of factors influencing helpful behavior. Latané and Darley. Five hurdles need to be crossed before one acts to help a person in distress.

a. Attention to a noticeable stimulus (Hurdles: distractions, self-concerns)
b. Perceiving distress, eliminating other attributions (Hurdles: ambiguity, attacker-victim relationship, pluralistic ignorance.)
c. Feeling responsible. (Hurdles: diffusion of responsibility, bystander effect - number of witnesses)
d. Deciding what to do. (Hurdles: feelings of incompetence, lack of training)
e. Action decision. (Hurdles: Costs vs rewards, possibility of looking foolish.)

3. Everyday helping.

a. Observing helpful models, especially happy models. Examples of sidewalk Santa studies, observing parental models
b. Apparent need
c. Attractive victims receive more help than unattractive victims
d. Attributed victim responsibility
e. Feelings of coercion reduce helping
f. Gender roles - males help females more in times of physical danger, women more helpful in ordinary circumstances, emotional support.
g. External rewards for helpful behavior can undermine later voluntary helpfulness.
h. Good mood increases helping - pleasant environment (sunny v. cloudy days, pleasant v. unpleasant odors, task success, listening to comedy, etc.)
i. Reciprocity norm. Weakened by

(1) apparent manipulative motives of the other,
(2) forced, not voluntary, obligation,
(3) large resources of the other, and
(4) expectation of the original favor.

F. Personal characteristics of helpers

1. stage of moral development: effects of past learning, yes; naturally occurring moral stages, no.
2. similarity to victim (situation-specific)
3. appropriate training (situation specific)
4. need for approval, with witnesses.
5. rural upbringing
6. Knowing about the bystander effect increases helping when bystanders are present.

XI. CHAPTER 11: AGGRESSION AND VIOLENCE

A. Aggression: Behavior intended to harm someone who does not want to be harmed.

1. Distinction between instrumental aggression and emotional aggression.
2. Cultural, sub-cultural, and gender differences

B. The potential for aggression: Speculations about the source of aggressive behavior

1. Freud: Sex and aggression are innate, increase unless released. Catharsis and displacement reduce aggression (also seen in early frustration-aggression theories).
2. Lorenz: Innate potential, released through triggering stimulus -- crowding, threat, or attack. Individual survival.
3. Sociobiology: aggression is directed at genetic survival, reproductive advantage
4. Neurological correlates: high testosterone, low serotonin, XYY and low impulse control (?)
5. Bandura, Skinner: Social learning: modeling, vicarious and direct reinforcement.
6. Social learning: aggression to preserve social status, "culture of honor." Shapes perceptions of social interactions.
. Berkowitz: Reformulated frustration-aggression hypothesis: Negative affect from attack, annoyance, heat, odors, etc., plus aggressive cues.

C. Situational causes, supported by research

1. Physical attack or verbal insult

a. Escalation results from efforts to match perceived attack, combined with self-serving misperception of severity of attack and retaliation..
b. Perceived intentionality of attack affects aggression.
c. Displacement: Facilitating and inhibiting factors.

2. Frustration: preventing or threatening access to a valued goal.

    a. Especially if the frustrator appears to have bad intentions.
    b. Especially if the frustration is unexpected.
    c. Especially if the frustration occurs when goal is near
    d. Especially if the frustration is illegitimate or arbitrary.
3. Relative deprivation.
4. Presence of aggressive cues, such as weapons
5. Presence of aggressive models, especially highly valued or successful models

a. The effects of violence in movies, TV: Cultural and gender differences, but child preference for violent TV is a strong predictor of later aggression

(1) Causes: Weakened inhibitions, new techniques, primed perceptions, desensitization.

6. Deindividuation in the aggressor
7. Dehumanization of the victim
8. Environmental factors: heat, noise, crowding.

D. The effects of these factors can be amplified by alcohol and physiological arousal

1. Dose response curve in alcohol, special interaction for high amounts of alcohol in inexperienced drinkers.
2. Physiological arousal can derive from a number of sources.

E. Personality differences: People with "Type A" personality tend to be more angry and impatient. Type A is hard-driving, achievement-oriented, personality.

F. Prevention of aggression:

1. Punishment and threats of punishment

a. Prevention needs to come before, not after the act.
b. Swift, severe, and certain punishment reduces aggression. Is this practical?
c. Catharsis.....or practice?
d. Modeling non-aggression, reinforcement of non-aggression. First Steps program.
e. Incompatible response cueing

G. Public policy and prevention

1. Restrictions on media violence
2. Improved education to promote better jobs, reduce relative deprivation
3. School programs in anger management
4. Job training
5. Culturally matched community action groups
6. Increased police personnel, patrols
7. Youth curfews
8. Reduced availability of concealed weapons
9. Little evidence that strict sentencing guidelines, "three strikes," or juvenile offender laws are effective in reducing violent crime.

XII. CHAPTER 12: PSYCHOLOGY IN THE COURTROOM

A. The social psychology of jury selection

1. Selection process (called "voir dire," from the Old French, meaning "to speak the truth") is an adversarial process, allows dismissal, by peremptory challenges, of those who may vote unfavorably. Lawyer need not give his or reason for dismissal. Typical reasons for dismissal.

a. Intuitive hunches of lawyers. These have been augmented and replaced by scientific studies.
b. Direct selection for legal reasons: e.g. death qualified juries

(1) Death qualified juries more concerned about crime, more trustful of police, more cynical about defense lawyers, more likely to convict. Death qualification process may suggest defendant's guilt. Supreme Court has upheld the death qualification process.

c. Indirect selection, also called "scientific jury selection": personal correlates with favorable attitudes form the basis for dismissal. First began when sociologist Jay Schulman helped to choose the jury for the trial of the Harrisburg Seven, a group of Vietnam War protestors, on the basis of demographic survey. Protestors were acquitted. Legal, but of questionable effectiveness.

B. The (In)accuracy of eyewitness testimony. Belief in validity of eyewitness testimony, even when testimony seems implausible. Sources of errors are the same as those affecting any memory: Acquisition, Storage, Retrieval

1. Acquisition --Influences by existing attitudes and qualities of the incident.

a. Examples of racial bias - classic studies by Bartlett and Allport & Postman. Reports of picture of interracial confrontation on streetcar.
b. "Levelling" -- Poor lighting, fast movement degrades acquisition
c. "Sharpening" - Weapon-focus effect. Less attention to other details.
d. Cross-race identification bias - relative inability to identify members of races other than your own.

2. Storage -- Reconstructive memory. Events are remembered as you think they must have been or should have been, given a few remembered details. Real events in crimes are often too confused, dimly lit, involve strangers, uncommon for accurate recall.

a. Loftus's studies where memory affected by post-event information:

(1) knowing extent of injuries,
(2) damage to cars,
(3) wording of question (smashed = 40.8 mph, hit = 34 mph, contacted = 30.8 mph)

b. Leading questions by examiners, especially of young children. Potential for error demonstrated in studies where mistaken information introduced in earlier questions. Many studies by Elizabeth Loftus.

(1) Loftus study of asking car speed on country road (past white barn). Later memory for barn: 3% v. 17%. Follow-up study: Saw film, asked if there was a barn, 1 week later, asked again and an increased % reported a barn.
(2) Loftus, Miller, & Burns - Stop sign/Yield sign in accident pictures. Questions included correct/incorrect sign. After 20 minutes, asked to pick correct picture. Correct earlier query: 75% correct. Incorrect earlier query: 41% correct.
(3) Leichtman & Ceci's "Sam Stone" study. Children told about a man who was clumsy and broke things. Later, a man visited the classroom. The next day the children were shown a damaged book and teddy bear. For 10 weeks, children were asked suggestive questions about Sam Stone and the damage. 72% of the children blamed the visitor for the damage, 45% said they saw him do it, some gave elaborated stories.

c. Loftus and others: Recovered memories v. false memories.

3. Retrieval 

a. Lineup identification studies:

(1) Preference for outside pictures
(2) Preference for anyone you've seen before
3) Preference for distinctive people
(4) Assumption that someone in the lineup is criminal
(5) Bias can be reduced by absolute judgment of individual cases ("showup" process) v. relative judgments of choosing the most likely person from a group ("lineup").

b. Courtroom testimony:

(1) Tendency to believe eyewitnesses, studies show inability to discriminate accurate from inaccurate eyewitnesses.
(2) Witness confidence: unrelated to accuracy but positive effect for adult witnesses, negative for child witnesses
(3) Paul Ekman - Studies showing that most people have only a random ability to detect deception in others. Most of us focus on the face, when the voice and body are more revealing.

C. Jury Deliberations

1. Bias in selection of foreman: Higher social class, males, people who speak first, occupy prominent seats at the table.
2. The initial majority opinion is usually likely to also be the jury's final verdict, but there is some bias toward leniency when the initial vote is tied.
3. Studies of 6 and 12 person juries. Small juries reduce the likelihood of hung juries, take less time, include fewer minorities.
4. Similarity to defendant.
5. Effects of physical attractiveness of the defendant. Attractive more likely to be acquitted, unless attractiveness was used in the commission of the crime.

D. After the trial: Studies of the prison setting.

1. The Stanford Prison experiment by Phil Zimbardo. Male Stanford student volunteers randomly assigned to role of prisoner or guard. Basement of psych building converted into mock prison. Participants conformed to social roles too well, two week experiment terminated after 6 days. Videotape "Quiet Rage" in library.

E. Trust in the system:

1. Procedural justice: Depends on decision control (ability to accept, reject, or influence an outcome) and process control (ability to present evidence, have impartial decision-makers, ability to question the other side). Legal system tries to enhance process control.
2. Comparisons of adversarial and inquisitorial models show experimental evidence for greater satisfaction with adversarial model, which increases process control.

XIII. CHAPTER 13: BUSINESS SETTINGS

A. History

1. Time-and-motion studies:

a. Began with Taylor's work in 1910s, at Yale and Towne Lock Co. Showed increased productivity through managed work and rest cycles
b. Frank and Lillian Gilbreth. Identified smallest functional units of motion (the "therblig"). 1910s and 20s. Analysis of efficient motion on manual jobs.
c. Studies by George Elton Mayo at the Hawthorne (Chicago) plant of Western Electric Corp, a division of ATT. Importance of social and motivational variables. Reanalysis of data showed that timing of rest periods and the great depression had great effect on productivity.

2. Occupational Placement Testing

a. Guidance counselors in Boston school system, 1908.
b. Viteles's screening for Milwaukee streetcar motormen, 1920
c. WWI Army Alpha and Beta Tests: Robert M. Yerkes

B. Hiring and the job interview:

1. Fairness is related to reliance on job-relevant qualities, avoidance of influence by irrelevant qualities. Evidence shows gender, attractiveness, racial influences. Strongest in inexperienced reviewers in the absence of personal interviews.
2. Live interviews tend to reduce effect of stereotypes, but preconceptions formed by reading applications can result in biased data-gathering in the interview.

a. Overall, interviews have mediocre predictive validity
b. Attempts to make interviews more objective: Structured interviews.
c. Standardized tests have also been found to have predictive validity.

3. Affirmative Action

a. Beneficial effects

(1) enhanced procedural fairness, equal opportunity
(2) diversity of workplace

b. Drawbacks

(1) perceived as unjust by those not members of protected groups
(2) appointees devalue their contributions, especially women
(3) recipients may suffer lower self-esteem if they define affirmative action as assistance.

c. Text has several suggestions for effective affirmative action programs.

C. Performance ratings:

1. Supervisor ratings: Affected by the halo effect, contrast effects, and restriction of range of ratings to high, mid, or low end
2. Self-ratings : self-serving bias makes them high and less reliable than peer evaluations. Men tend to rate self higher than women do.
3. Improvements in ratings: Rate right after the performance, use multiple raters, training to focus on performance

D. Leadership: Moving a group toward its goals

1. Stated goals vs. real goals
2. Leadership is a function of each member, since each person affects movement toward goals.
3. Early research on personal leadership styles:

a. Control and guidance model (authoritarian, task-oriented
b. Facilitative model (democratic, relationship-oriented)
c. Mixed results in research on effectiveness. No single personality style seemed best in all situations.

4. Fiedler's contingency model: situation interacts with style

a. Situational variables: leader-member relations, task structure, leader power
b. Leader style: LPC measure based on favorability ratings of Least-Preferred Co-Worker

(1). High LPC leaders are relationship-oriented, Low LPC leaders are task-oriented.
(2). Interaction: Low LPC is best if all situational factors favor the leader (high situational control) or all are unfavorable (low situational control). High LPC is best if situational factors are mixed.
(3). Importance of leader qualities may decrease with stress.

5. Women and leadership

a. Women's leadership style more relationship-centered than men's. Effectiveness may vary with situation, according to Fiedler's model.
b. Women and men appear to be equally effective leaders, using group performance measures. Women's skills seem to be devalued when they adopt direct, task-oriented leadership styles.
c. Recent research on women who have broken through the "glass ceiling:" success attributed to very hard work, long hours, sacrifice of outside life, adoption of male interests (sports, golf).

E. Job satisfaction: The issue of equity, "fairness"

1. Fairness is satisfactory exchange, determined by one of several rules.

a. Contributions rule: distributive justice, equity
b. Needs rule
c. Equality rule

2. Which rule seems "fair?" Determined by:

a. Self-interest
b. Conformity to status quo, often accompanied by a "philosophy" that favors those in power.
c. Availability of reliable information
d. Specific factors:

(1) Needs: liking, responsibility, good mood, success, low demand
(2) Contributions: task setting, encourage performance
(3) Equality: prevents conflict, complex situations

3. Results of unfair, inequitable treatment

a. Withdrawal/Increase in contributions
b. Enhancing/reducing perceived rewards
c. Leave job if alternative exists
d. Attitude change toward self or others:

(1) Self or other enhancement/derogation
(2) Deservingness
(3) Just world

4. Procedural Justice: The perception of fair treatment depends on

a. Control and participation in the process (Quality Circle approach)
b. Adequate information
c. Legitimate information
d. Avoid unsuitable information

XIV. CHAPTER 14: HEALTH

Several points of contact between social psychology and health: Stress effects, Personality dispositions, Coping and social support, Seeking and following treatment

A. Stress

1. General definition of stress: An unpleasant state of arousal that arises when we perceive that the demands of a situation threaten our ability to cope effectively.

2. Stressful events in humans

a. Crises and catastrophes: Examples: natural disasters, violence, viewing violence. Results include anxieties, phobias, depression, PTSD: recurring anxiety, depression, sleep disorders, flashbacks, social withdrawal, intrusive thoughts, attentional problems. 8% to 10% affected at some time in life.
b. Major life events scales: more points for major life changes, both positive and negative. Holmes & Rahe examples: death of a spouse = 100; divorce = 73; loss of job=47; death of close friend=37; child leaving home=29; Christmas=12

(1) Not a simple sum of points
(2) Recent research shows that positive events don't appear to cause health consequences of stress.

c. Microstressors: recent research shows that everyday hassles may be better predictors of anxiety, illness, especially among young people. Examples: traffic, paperwork, school workload, extracurricular commitments, waiting in line, unwanted noise, inconsiderate behavior of others. DeLongis's Daily Hassles Scale.

3. Hans Selye's General Adaptation Syndrome - early animal research, applied to humans. Borrowed term "stress" from metallurgy. Three phases of reaction to nonspecific, unpredictable, uncontrollable threatening or alarming events.

a. Alarm

(1) Secretion of cortisol, adrenaline
(2) Heightened physical activity
(3) Suppressed immune response
(4) Reduced injury recovery
(5) Reduced sex drive

b. Resistance: Continued arousal, alertness. Affects humans more because our brains maintain arousal. We experience this as thought, worry, planning, etc.
c. Exhaustion: Overuse of anti-stress mechanisms causes other physiological systems to break down.

4. Example in humans: Coronary heart disease: Lifestyle factors (obesity, smoking, etc.) account for about half of risk, the other half attributable to stress reactions. Type A behavior: precursor of heart attacks and achievement-oriented success. Marital difficulties with Type B spouses. 

To measure, structured interview is best assessment, paper-and-pencil self-report tests are invalid.

a. Characteristics:

Primary characteristic: Hostility: anger, cynicism, distrust of others, suspicion.
Secondary characteristics: competition, irritable, impatient with others and with delays, wants to control, responsible, work quickly, social insecurity, high standards for self and others, sleep disturbances, nervous mannerisms, punctuality, gesturing while talking, playing to win, eyeblinks and eyebrows for emphasis, finishing sentences for others, focus on task, works without deadlines

b. Origins: situational pressures of job and family may promote Type A. Higher in those who were children in standard-setting, success oriented families. Tends to affect first-born, only children more.

B. Appraisal: Stress effects are moderated by one's perception

1. Three stages

a. Primary appraisal: what's at stake
b. Secondary appraisal: perceived ability to cope
c. Reappraisal: addition of new information

2. Perceived ability to cope may not be accurate. Original learned helplessness studies showed that a history of inescapable punishment resulted in helpless behavior in new situations. Possible influence of past success and attribution for past success or failure.

a. Reformulated learned helplessness model of inability to cope: learned helplessness comes from past failure plus internal, stable, global attributions.
b. Depressive explanatory style is similar to learned helplessness, but not linked to settings or situations. Helplessness becomes hopelessness. More global.

(1) Optimistic style attributes successes to internal, stable, global; failures to external, temporary, specific. Depressive style is opposite.

c. Some evidence that unrealistic optimism and self-esteem may be correlated with good mental and physical health, and that realistic people are less healthy. Controversial research, more studies continuing.

3. Some personal factors which mediate the health effects of stress

a. Hardiness

(1) belief that one is in control of ones outcomes
2) belief that change is normal
(3) sense of meaning and mastery in one's life

b. Perceived self-efficacy (the belief that one's efforts will accomplish a goal). Why self-efficacy works:

(1) expectation that preventive health efforts will pay off (e.g. seat belts, mammograms
(2) expectation that treatment procedures will be effective (e.g. confidence in doctor's diagnosis, taking medication, attending treatment sessions)
(3) Bandura's research that low self-efficacy related to stress hormones, reduced as person gained mastery.

C. Coping: Reducing the effects of stress

1. Problem-focused coping (confront, recognize, reduce stressor).

a. Some research shows this to be more a male-oriented pattern.
b. Self-blame, either blaming behavior or character (maladaptive)

2. Emotion-focused coping (leave stressor alone, attempt to change ones emotional reaction to it.)

a. Shutting down: Denial, relaxation, distraction
b. Opening up: Confrontation: describing problem, sharing with others,
c. Self-focusing: Rumination, worry, pondering; can lead to depression, substance abuse.
d. Negative avoidance: risk taking, argument, reckless behavior

3. In the short term, avoidance works as well as approach methods. Long term, avoidance is not as effective.

4. Proactive Coping: Lifestyle that builds stress-reducing resources. For example: multiple roles and social support.

a. Social support:

(1) Physical and psychological illness more prevalent in areas of disrupted social ties.
(2) The Alameda county study: In 7000 people, lower mortality rates associated with social support and health habits. Commonly replicated result, even with animal companions.
(3) Once ill, social support promotes recovery
(4) Possible reasons why social support is important: it may enhance self-esteem, a sense of control, positive mood