PSY403 Final Term Past Papers

Describe experimental design or experimental method? 3

Experimental methods are research designs to examine cause-effect relationships. The variable that is manipulated is called the independent variable, while the variable whose changes are considered to be the effect of the manipulated changes in the independent variable is called the dependent variable (e.g., varying lighting conditions and performance of students) Experimental and control groups are two main groups used in experimental methods.

Experimental Method: Description because correlational studies cannot definitively tell us why variables are related to one another, social psychologists use experimental methods to examine cause effect relationships. In an experiment, the scientist manipulates one variable by exposing research participants to it at contrasting levels (for example, high, medium, low, no exposure), and then observes what effect this manipulation has on the other variable that has not been manipulated.

How mimicry effect the impression formation? 3

In a follow-up experiment to their face rubbing/foot-shaking study, Chartrand and Bargh (1999) found evidence that mimicry increases liking for the imitator. The researchers instructed confederates to subtly imitate the mannerisms of people they were interacting with in a "get acquainted" session (for example, rubbing their face or tapping their foot when their partner did so). Their findings indicated that people whose gestures had been mimicked liked the confederates more than those who had not been mimicked. Prosocial behavior these studies suggest that mimicry triggers _ positive reactions in people that lead to benefits to those who are present.

Define attribution? And write its dispositional attributions? 3

Attribution: Attribution is the process by which people use information to make inferences about the causes of behavior and events.

Dispositional attribution: We are especially likely to make dispositional attributions when events are negative or unexpected and this usually happens under following three conditions: Social desirability: an internal, dispositional attribution more likely when socially undesirable behaviors are observed Choice: an internal, dispositional attribution is more likely when the actor has freely chosen the given behavior(Jones & Harris, 1967) Non-common effects: an internal, dispositional attribution is more likely when the outcome of a behavior has a unique (or non-common) effect.

What is social cognition? Also tell social cognition strategy? 2+3

Social cognition:

Researchers who are working on social cognition can ask the following question in their investigation: “How does jury decide guilt or innocence”.

Social cognition is the way we analyses, remember, and use information about the social world (Berkowitz & Devine, 1995)

Social cognition strategy:

Dual-Process models of social cognition: strategies Explicit cognition: Deliberate judgments or decisions of which we are consciously aware Implicit cognition: Judgments or decisions that are under the control of automatically activated evaluations.

What are prons and crons? Write details in the just-world hypothesis? 2+5

The Just-World Hypothesis (Lerner, 1980)

A belief system in which the world is perceived to be a fair and equitable place, with people getting what they deserve provides an illusion of control ‘if we are good people good things will happen to us’.

Advantages: Related to good psychological adjustment (Ormel & Schaufeli, 1991), improves relationships (Lipkus & Bissonnette), 1996 and reduces stress (Lipkus et al., 1996). Disadvantages Defensive attribution (Shaver, 1970) Blame victims for their own misfortune to retain the belief that bad things only happen to bad people (and so a similar tragedy will not befall us!) qualified by similarity (Burger, 1981) What happens when people believing in a JW encounter contradictory outcomes? Like Earthquakes or 9/11. If the event was truly without personal fault, people with BJW often respond with revenge (Kaiser et al., 2004).

How do expectations shape our social thinking? 3

False consensus

Confirmation bias

Self-fulfilling prophecy

Just world belief

Learned helplessness

Ali tested himself on TOTE, analyses the results and found himself not meeting the standard of selftest. What will be the emotional consequences Ali can face as a result? 3

think we should be (ought self);

What is meant by impression formation? How do you make impression in your life?

Ickes, 2003).

Impression formation is often based on rapid assessments of salient and observable qualities and behaviors in others. These judgments are obtained by attending to nonverbal cues, such as facial expressions and body posture, as well as incorporating more detailed and descriptive characteristics, such as traits, into an overall impression. If you talk to anyone who was there at the same time as him, I don't think you'll find anyone at the paper who questioned his ethics at all. Impression formation is usually just the first step of person perception. Often, we also want to understand what causes people to act in a particular manner. This attribution process goes beyond discerning people's current moods and feelings and attempts instead to use their past actions to predict future behavior

The tendency to develop more positive feelings towards objects and individuals; the more we are exposed to them is known as mere exposure, which play an important role in attitude formation. Explain with the help of researches?

A positive or negative evaluation of an object (Schuman, 1995), where an attitude object is a person, thing, event, or issue Earliest use of the term attitude came from theatre, described it as a body posture; dates back to the 1800s; later referred to as a “posture of mind” than of body. According to Allport, attitude is the most indispensable concept of social psychology. He maintained that “Attitudes determine for each individual what he will see and hear, what he will think and what he will do. To borrow a phrase from Willliam James, “they engender meaning upon the world” (Allport, 1935, p.

806. .

Attitude formation: In the following, different theories about how attitudes are formed have been explained. 1) Mere exposure (Robert Zajonc, 1968) the tendency to develop more positive feelings toward objects and individuals the more we are exposed to them No action or beliefs about the object required Familiarity does not breed contempt!

How would you operationally define the term Reinforcement and punishment?

Reinforcement: the model being given candy and soft drinks along with words of praise for a superb performance.

Punishment: Another adult shaking a menacing finger at the aggressive model and saying, " Hey, you big bully. You quit picking on that clown. I won't tolerate it." Relationship between concept, hypothesis, and operational definition Table 1 illustrates the relationship between theory, hypothesis and operational How punishment can be used to reduce aggression, what do you think is punishment truly effective?

Describe various methods to reduce aggression: punishment, inducing incompatible responses, reducing frustration, and teaching of non-aggressive responses.

Is punishment truly effective?

Aggressor punisher may serve as an aggressive model according to social learning theory That is exactly the process underlying the continuing cycle of family violence (Hanson et al., 1997) Although punishment may reduce aggressive behavior, it does not teach the aggressor new prosocial forms of behavior Fear of punishment or retaliation reduces aggression only in the immediate situation. Generates anger, sparks counter-aggression: Cognitive neo-associationist model would suggest that it may even provoke intense anger in the aggressor-turned-victim (if aggressors are extremely angry, threats of punishment will not work) Even if they worked, this is too expensive to be a wide-spread solution.

Differentiate between classical and statistical prediction?

Clinical versus statistical prediction Given these hindsightand diagnosis-confirming tendencies, it will come as no surprise that most clinicians and interviewers express more confidence in their intuitive assessments than in statistical data (such as using past grades and aptitude scores to predict success in graduate or professional college). Yet when researchers pit statistical prediction against intuitive prediction, the statistics usually win. Statistical predictions are indeed unreliable, but human intuition— even expert intuition— is even more unreliable. Three decades after demonstrating the superiority of statistical over intuitive prediction, Paul Meehl (1986) found the evidence stronger than ever.

What is heat hypothesis? Write a brief note on it.

Laboratory experiments demonstrate that hot temperatures increase hostile thoughts and feelings Archival studies suggest that the urban riots that erupted in many American cities in the 1960s were most likely to occur on hot days and then to diminish in intensity as the weather cooled (Carlsmith & Anderson, 1979). This effect also occurs for such aggressive behaviors as murder, assault, rape, and spousal abuse (Anderson & Anderson, 1984, 1996); Pakistan: general observation that people are impatient and irritable during hot summer days.

Practical implications Frequency of hostile outbursts could be reduced in temperature-controlled environments Second, the heat hypothesis has obvious implications for global warming By the middle of the twenty-first century, we can expect global temperatures to increase by two to eight degrees, which means there will be many more hot days in the summer months (U.S. House of Representatives, 1994). Craig Anderson (2001) estimates that such temperature increases could increase annual serious and deadly assaults by more than 24,000 incidents in the US.

What is social psychology and write its main questions of interest?

people and how individual’s thoughts, feelings, & behaviors are affected by other people (Brehm,

The main questions/ topics of interest in social psychology are as given below: Thinking about the self and others Evaluating persons and relationships interacting with others.

What are the symptoms of group think? Enlist any three symptoms and explain.

Overestimation of the competence of the in group: Illusion of invulnerability and an unquestioned belief in the in-group’s own morality. American president and his colleagues thought that USA will crush armed oppositions and will win the hearts and minds of Iraqi. Same is true for USA’s observation for Afghanistan.

Close-mindedness: •Bush and his administration did not examine the evidence that would have confirmed the existence of weapons. Members of close-minded group rationalize the correctness of their decisions.