social psychology

effects of our enviroment on our behaviour and how actions are influenced by individuals, groups and culture.

surveys and field experiments are good because they are carried out in real-life settings and cen be universally applied by studying individuals, groups and culture.

Is a form of social influence where an individual acts in responce to a direct order from another individual (usually an authority figure) assuming that without the order, they would not have acted in that way.

involves  hierachy of power/status - the perosn giving the order has higher power.

Obedience is necessary for society and that we are socialised into obeying from childhood.

the autonomous state: acting from our own free will. the agentic shift occurs when we believe the order is given by a legitimate authority figure who will accept responcibility for what happens.

the agentic state: working to benefit society at the expense of our own wishes. we are socialised into it from a young ageas children learn to obery teachers and parents, when we grow old employers and recognised authority figures. we have to give up some of our free will to follow certain rules, if not there would be disobedience.

an individual may carry out orders even when they don't want too, known as moral strain.

Milgrams agency theory states that the agentic shift moving into the agentic state is why people obey. this is supported by Milgrams obedience study where he found 65% participants shocked to the highest level.

Factors stated in the theory such as the concept of moral strain can be applied to real life, such as soldiers following orders that they may not want too. 

The theory only states how people enter the agentic state, not why some people do and why some people do not so the theory is incomplete.

There are alternative theories such as that of personality e.g. Adorno's F-scale and social impact theory, so this suggests that obedience is more complex than this theory suggests.

presence/actions of others. social impact = any change in behaviour as a result of another individual.

social force: 

strength - measure of how much power the individual percieves the source to have.

immediacy - how recent the event was/any intervining events

number - the number of people exerting the pressure on the individual (the greater, the greater th social force) highest impact is from 0-1 source, as the amount increases the impact lessens.

social impact at its highest when the source has higher status, when the stetement is more immediate and when there are a higher number of people saying it.

ignores individual differences  and the theory is incomplete, it does not state what the 'target' brings to the situation, only what the source does.

the theory is more descriptive than explanatory - it states why obediecnce is created, by strength/immediacy/number, not how.

Milgrams electric shock experiment variation where he changed the uniform of his confederate (Mr Wallace) from a lab coat to normal clothes, obedience dropped to 20%.

the theory doesn't explain what happens if equal groups meet. or explain obedience itself, only social influence. 

the theory also doesnt explain why change of setting affects oedience, so is not a complete explanation.

the theory has useful applications to real life. there was a maths equation formulated which means it can be generalised to all cultures.

Aim: to see how obedient participants would be when following orders that would mean harming another person and breaking their moral code.

Procedure: $4 insentive for any male volunteer to take part in a memory experiment. P's met by researcher in grey lab coat and Mr Wallace (confederate) both drew rigged lotts and all participants chose 'teacher'. shock generator increased in 15v's which the participant wasd told to do when given a wrong answer. p's could not seee but could hear the learner, at 300v he pounded on the wall then from 330v was silent. given a standardised sequence of verbal prods such as "the experiment requires you to continue".

results: 65% went to 450v, all went to 300v. p's were all debriefed and told full aims/nature of experiment.

conclusions: shows the power of authority over behaviour as p's showed no alternative ecept to obey. 

the study was well controlled, with standardised procedure suh as the sequence of verbal prods this means the study could easily be replicated to test for reliability.

the experiment was a laboratory experiment and involved an artificial task, meaning it lacked ecological validity.

his research can help explain atrocities such as the holocaust and why people obeyed orders against suffered moral strain. 

the study cannot be generalised to other ages, genders or cultures as only men from a certain place were participants, so this may be dfferent for younger boys, or women, or people of different cultures. although, Milgram did complete another experiment with woman and found no difference between genders. 

there were many issues with ethics within Milgrams experiment, such as decieving p's with advertisement stating 'memory experiment' and the nature of the experiment being false.

7 - telephonic instructions

aim: to see if having the experimentor in the room affected the level of obedience.

procedure: he experimentor was out of sight and gave instructions over the phone.

results: 22.5% obeyed, p's lied about giving the shock increases and gave lower ones instead.

conclusions: when p not face-to-face with with experimenter, easier not to obey, physical presencce = importnt force.

10 - rundown office block

aim: to see if results similar in rundown office block (resulting from follow-up interviews)

procedures: was in office blocks (not Yale university) same procedure followed.

results: p's had more doubts. 47.5% shocked to 450v.

conclusion: people will obey no mater what setting is, but having a legitimante setting is backd by evidence.

13 - ordinary man giving orders 

aim: to see whether an order given by someone without authority is followed. 

procedure: experimentor gives instructions then is called away, accomplice makes suggestion of increasing volts one at a time when learner makes mista.

results: exeri enter leaving = awkward atmosphere, undermined credibility. 20% went to 450v. experiment changed and ordinary man swapped roles where 16/20 watched him shock to 450v.

conclusions: obedience fell with ordinary man who had no percieved authority, didn't like seeing ordinary man giving shocks but couldn't prevent it.

- personal responcibility - Milgram suggested obedience would be higher if personal responcibility given to authority figure

- slippery slope - generator has small increments (15v) so p's found it easy to obey as wrong answer was only small increase.

- power/status of authority - obedience only shown if authority figure percieved as legitimate.

- locus of control - extent to which individuals believe they can control events affecting them. internal = believe they have some control,  external = believe life is determined by enviromental influences.

- authoritarin personality - Adorno devised F-scale to measure authoritariamism. high = obedient

gender:

- no real differences which goes against traditional beliefs that females are more obedient. Milgram did experiment with women and found no differences. 

culture:

- individualistic = stress needs of ondividual over group as whole (indipendant).

- collectivist = emphisis needs of group as whole over the individual (cooperative)

to prejudge. when attitudes lead to actions = discrimination. 

prejudice = attitude = 1) how you feel about something 2) what you do about it 3) what you know about it a) feelings of dislike, hostility, fear b) insult, avoidance, physical contact c) knowledge based on stereotypes.

participants want to promote members of the in-group over the out-group because it enhances their own status and self-esteem. prejudice is by mere creation of groups, not by realistic conflict. three cognitive process' involved when evaluating others as the in-group or out-group.

1) social categorisation - categorise orselves as members of particular social groups.

2) social identification - adopt the identity of the group we have categorised ourself too.

3) social comparison - we compare the group with others.

our self-esteem is maintianed by our group comparing well against others.

research into it was based on a series of lab experiments called 'minimal group studies' where participants would see themselves as belonging to one group or another were minimal, they found that with no competiton between groups, p's displayed prejudice.

it ignores individual differences such as personality e.g. Adorno's F-scle and individualistic/collectivist cultures.

the theory can help explain things such as football hooliganism.

there are conflicting theories which state other ways prejudice arises such as realistic conflict theory which suggests prejudice comes from a fight over lmited resources.

Sherif's stidy supports this theory becasue it found that prejudice/conflict arose when there was no competition, merely two serperate groups.

whenever there are two or more groups seeking the same limited resources, this will lead to conflict. hostility is from direct competition for resourcess and this can cause an ongoing feud. if outcomes are competitively inderpendant (gains for one group depend on loss' for another) hostility is maximised. if groups cooperatively inderpendant (superordinate goal - mutual goal) then hostility reduced.

Sherif did a study which both supported and went against his theory, he aimed to show that fighting for limited resources caused prejudice but actually showed that the mere creation of groups caused conflict (supporting social identity theory) 

the theory has applications to real llife, in classrooms it can be used as the theory suggeste that having superordinate goals reduced prejudice and hostility.

therre are other explanations for prejudice such as social identity theory which suggests that the mere creation of groups is enough to cause conflict.

Adorno proposed the idea of an authoritarian personality based on freudian theory. he argues prejudiced people had a harsh upbringing (parenting and discipline) making them obedient and hostility that couldn't be drected at parents due to fear. so is displayed on those weaker than them as they follow people above them.

changes in social norms can increase prejudice especially any threat from a group that are directly linked toa situation.

SIT suggests whenever a situation airises where there's an in-group and out-group, prejudice will occur.

RCT suggests when there's competition over resources, conflict will occur.

cultures may demonstrate prejudices about others including stereotypes they apply and the way they make sense of the actions of others, and frequently open aggression towards members not of their culture. all cultures have an 'us' and 'them' which appears to be universal and they favour 'us' over 'them'. all cultures show a bias that could be prejudiced. 

undesireable charactoristics are attributed to the out-group, negative stereotypes may cause people to avoid members of other cultures and influence the behaviour of out-group members.

individual differences:

Adorno et al - F-scale (facist) to measure authoritarianism. high scorers would show these charactoristics in his personality: obedience ot those in authority, rigid views of right/wrong, intolerance of weak/different, hostility to those of lower status, rigid and conventional views. these individual differences may influence how prejudiced we are. 

milgrams participants demonstrated locus of control when choosing to obey the experimenter or not. the 35% that didn't shock to 450v were showing indipendant behaviour, and had more of an internal locus of control.

developmental psychology:

as culture is developed from social norms and values within society this will impact how prejudiced we will be. our upbringing in an individualistic culture will have a different influence on our development from being brought up in a collectivist one. obedience is found across all cultures so is developed universally as opposed to from the enviroment.

self-reports used to collect data e.g. questionaires or interviews. gather information by asking questions to a large number of people.