Social Psychology
Dawn S. Peck
PSY 400
12/22/2014
David Brueshoff
Social Psychology
What is Social Psychology all about? Why is the study of it so important? Is there truly a purpose and benefit from the findings of the studies? Let’s look at each of these questions, break them down, and try to make sense of it all. Simply defined, Social Psychology is the scientific study of individual attitude and how it effects or influences others in a social context. It is helpful to understand the why, what, or could be, behind a behavior or reaction. Those that research this field, can provide credible insight to assist with understanding and ultimately contribute to the success of peace-keeping within society. There
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Clinical Psychology works with individuals and not the interaction while in a group setting. General Psychology is a broad term that includes all psychology. Sociology focuses on the group and external causes for reactions. It is worth noting that all branches work by observing and interpreting behavior.
Conclusion
There were three questions asked at the start of this paper. What is Social Psychology all about? Why is the study of it so important? Is there truly a purpose or benefit from the findings of the studies? Social Psychology is the study of attitude, behavior, and interactions of individuals within a group setting. You may have heard the saying "for every action, there is a reaction," Social Psychologists observe and interpret behaviors in effort to provide further explanation of cause and effect. It is thru the studies of Social Psychology we can learn how to get into the cause and begin to foresee patterns of reactions. A simple yet sophisticated theory.
References
Myers, D. G. (2010). Social psychology (10th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw
Social psychology is an empirical science that studies how people think about, influence, and relate to one another. This field focuses on how individuals view and affect one another. Social psychology also produces the idea of construals which represent how a person perceives, comprehends or interprets the environment. Construals introduce the idea that people want to make themselves look good to others and they want to be seen as right. It is also said that the social setting in which people interact impacts behavior, which brings up the idea of behaviorism. Behaviorism is the idea that behavior is a function of the person and the environment.
Psychology is one of the newest sciences. Because it is the science of the mind and behavior, it is also less concrete than some of the other sciences. Over the years, social scientists have developed theories or perspectives based off of their observations, research, and the perspectives of other scientists. Although there is some overlap, each of the major perspectives of psychology is unique. As a result, they each have strengths and weaknesses and explain psychology in a different way. One theory, the sociocultural perspective, is exactly what its name suggests. It’s the idea that the society and groups that an individual belongs to are what influences development, thoughts, and behavior. The sociocultural perspective was
Social scientists believe that gender differences are not caused by biological differences; rather, they are a product of socialization, prejudice, discrimination, and other forms of social control (Bem, 1993). Which of the following two faiths were used in this chapter as examples of gender regulation?
they relate to and are influenced by others (Feenstra, 2011). It is a broad field that covers a
Social psychology is the study of psychology that deals with social interactions and how it effects the individual. The IAT test observes social psychology effects within an individual. The IAT is a test that measures the connection between White or Black people and the idea of good or bad. The score on the test represents your preference of race. The preference can be linked to negative behavior such as discrimination in the workplace, law enforcement, and other social environments.
Chapter 12 social psychology cover how we affect one another’s behaviors. Culture, stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination attitude, and interpersonal attraction are all factors that contribute to behavior in a social setting. Understanding how we influence one another on a social level forces us to look at not only ourselves, but also look at how others affect the world we live in and why it is important to be able to identify these influences and the impact they have on our behaviors good or bad
In life people will come in contact with others, who are from a different background, culture, lifestyle or ethnicity as them, yet still every individual is equal, they’re all humans. As humans, people have the tendency to have their own unique perspectives on the world around them and everything it encounters. Psychologist Gordon Allport (1985), one of the founding fathers of personality psychology, defined social psychology as a discipline in which scientific methods are used in order “to understand and explain how the thought, feeling, and behavior of individuals are influenced by actual, imagined, or implied presence of other human beings” (Cherry).Social psychology involves
Social Psychology is amazing, because it looks at the micro-level of why each individual feels, thinks, or behaves. It gives explanations of how societies constructed the way each individual act and how each individual falls into groups or categories. Furthermore, the way people are placed into groups show the inequality in America. Thus, power is created when there are more than one person. The way to manipulate the mass or the crowd and to gather support is a fundamental to obtain power to create changes in society. Thus, social psychology teaches how groups have power. It also teaches how groups have an effect on how people behaviors and associate themselves or see themselves. People are conscious creatures who knows which class they are
Social psychology is the study of the way that social interactions affect the behavior of an individual (Spielman, 2007). Social psychology seeks to explain the ways in which the behavior of others can impact an individual’s thinking, personality, attitudes or other mental processes (Spielman, 2007). In a broad sense, social psychology is a discipline which attempts to navigate the variances between an individual’s behavior in solitude and in various social settings. Often, this discipline is used today to explain curious behaviors in humans such as the Bystander Effect (which is the tendency towards humans to push responsibility to act onto others if there are multiple who witness a situation in need of rectifying) and instances of
Social psychology is the scientific process of studying a group of people’s behaviors, thoughts, and feelings that are true and identifiable or imagined within social context (McLeod, 2007). When we use the three terms mentioned we are using words that are psychological variables that can be measured within an individual. When we discuss identifiable or imagined we do so because socially we can be influenced by society or other outlets like television or radio. When studying social psychology we would
There are many explanations for the origins of modern social psychology. It is therefore important to consider that social psychology cannot be traced back to one single source of origin (Burr, 2003). Hence, this is the reason why there are debates of what social psychology is. Allport (1985) described social psychology as the study an individual’s thoughts, feelings, and behaviours which are influenced by the actual, imagines, or implied presence of others. As seen from this definition there is a direct link between social science and the individual psychology (Sewell, 1989). Social psychology cannot be seen as a linear phenomenon. This is because social psychology has been derived from a combination of influences. The development of
Gordon Allport, who is described as one of the founding figures of modern social psychology created the definition of social psychology that we use today (Jones, 1998, p. 3). He defined social psychology as a subfield that uses the scientific methods “to understand and explain how
Why do human beings behave the way they do? How do individuals form relationships with others? What components of an individual’s physiological makeup and the surrounding atmosphere affect the formation of judgments about themselves, others’, and every day events? Does one’s membership within a particular group affect his or her thoughts, emotions, and actions towards others? Is aggression the product of biology or environment? Questions such as this form the foundation of social psychology, a field with the primary focus being the systematic study of human cognition, emotion, and actions. Social psychologists seek to understand the way human beings develop thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, as well as, the effect our environment, mainly
Social cognition studies the way people process, storage and apply information relate to other and social situations. It specifically focuses on the cognitive processes we use when in social interactions. The way we perceive others play an important role in how we feel, think and interact with our environment. For example, imagine you are going to your dream job interview. The first impression influences the way the interviewer seems you. That first impression is so powerful that it will be a key point to whether hire you or not. Social psychologies seek to understand the nature and causes of our behaviors, feelings and thoughts in social situation. Social psychologist tries to figure out the ways in which our thoughts feelings and actions are influenced by society. In general, social cognition is how we think about the social world around us. The social world around us influences our way of thinking, the manner in which we interpret, analyze, remember and use that information about the social world.
Social psychology is a subfield of Psychology and Sociology that is interested in how the thoughts, feelings and behaviour of individuals and social groups are influenced by the presence of others such as families, work groups, and organisations. Indeed, Robbins (2003) states that many theories originally developed within Social Psychology have directly influenced the concepts and theories found in organisational behaviour concerning communication processes, decision-making, conflict management and politics and in turn have led to the development of many techniques used in these areas.