Social Psychology

Social Psychology

Part 1 of 5 — Attitudes & Cognitive Dissonance

An attitude is a learned evaluation (favorable/unfavorable) of a person, object, or idea, with three components (the ABC model):

When Do Attitudes Predict Behavior?

Attitudes best predict behavior when they are: specific to the behavior, strong/stable, accessible (easily recalled), and formed by direct experience, and when situational pressures are weak.

Routes to Persuasion — Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM)

Motivation + ability to think → central route. Distraction or low involvement → peripheral route.

Cognitive Dissonance (Festinger)

$\text{Conflicting cognitions} \to \text{psychological discomfort} \to \text{drive to reduce it}$

People resolve dissonance by: changing the attitude, changing the behavior, or adding a justification (rationalization).

Counterintuitive finding: SMALLER incentives produce MORE attitude change. With a small reward, there's no external justification for the behavior, so people change their internal attitude to reduce dissonance (Festinger & Carlsmith $1 vs. $20 study).

Attitudes & Dissonance 🎯

Worked Examples — Attitudes & Dissonance

Question: Two groups argue a position they privately disagree with. Group A is paid $50; Group B is paid $2. Which group shifts its private attitude MORE toward the argued position, and why?

Solution:

1. Counterattitudinal behavior creates dissonance.
2. Group A has ample external justification ("I did it for $50") → little dissonance → little attitude change.
3. Group B lacks sufficient justification → strong dissonance → resolves it by shifting their PRIVATE attitude toward the position. ✓

MCAT key: Insufficient justification → greater internal attitude change. This is the signature dissonance result.

Question: An ad for a drug shows a famous doctor but gives no data; viewers are distracted by background music. A second ad lists clinical trial results to an attentive audience. Which route does each target, and which produces more lasting attitudes?

Solution:

1. Ad 1: celebrity cue + distraction (low ability to process) → peripheral route → temporary, easily reversed attitudes. ✓
2. Ad 2: substantive evidence + attentive audience → central route → durable, resistant attitudes. ✓

Why it matters: Distraction and low involvement push people to peripheral cues; motivation and ability enable central processing.

Question: A smoker who knows smoking causes cancer keeps smoking but says, "My grandfather smoked and lived to 90." Which dissonance-reduction strategy is this?

Solution:

1. The conflicting cognitions are "smoking is harmful" and "I smoke."
2. The smoker neither quits (behavior change) nor accepts the risk (attitude change).
3. Instead they ADD a consonant cognition to justify the behavior → rationalization / adding justification. ✓

Connection: Adding a justifying belief is the third classic route (besides changing attitude or behavior) to relieve dissonance.

Key Takeaways — Part 1

• Attitudes = affective + behavioral + cognitive (ABC); best predict behavior when specific, strong, direct-experience, weak situation.
• ELM: central route = argument quality, durable; peripheral route = surface cues, temporary.
• Cognitive dissonance: conflicting cognitions → discomfort → change attitude, change behavior, or add justification.
• Insufficient external justification (small incentive) → GREATER internal attitude change (Festinger & Carlsmith).

Social Psychology

Part 2 of 5 — Attribution Theory (Explaining Behavior)

Attribution is the process of inferring the causes of behavior — either dispositional (internal: personality, traits) or situational (external: circumstances).

Kelley's Covariation Model

We weigh three kinds of information to decide internal vs. external:

• High consistency + high distinctiveness + high consensus → situational attribution.
• High consistency + low distinctiveness + low consensus → dispositional attribution.

Major Attribution Biases

Cultural Modulation

• Individualist cultures (e.g., US) show STRONGER FAE — they emphasize personal agency.
• Collectivist cultures attend more to situational/contextual causes, weakening the FAE.

Attribution Theory 🎯

Worked Examples — Attribution

Question: Maria laughs at a particular comedian (consistency high). Almost everyone laughs at this comedian (consensus high), but Maria rarely laughs at other comedians (distinctiveness high). Internal or external attribution?

Solution:

1. High consistency → the response is stable, so an attribution is warranted.
2. High consensus (others laugh too) → points to the stimulus, not Maria.
3. High distinctiveness (only this comedian) → points to the stimulus.
4. Conclusion: situational/external — the comedian is funny, not "Maria laughs at everything." ✓

MCAT pattern: High-high-high → external; high consistency with low consensus & low distinctiveness → internal.

Question: Tom trips on a sidewalk. An onlooker thinks "He's clumsy." Tom thinks "That sidewalk is uneven." Name each attribution and the combined bias.

Solution:

1. Onlooker attributes Tom's trip to DISPOSITION (clumsy) → fundamental attribution error. ✓
2. Tom attributes his own trip to the SITUATION (bad sidewalk).
3. The mismatch — observer blames disposition, actor blames situation — is the actor–observer bias. ✓

Key: We have access to our own situational pressures but see others mainly as actors, so we over-attribute their behavior internally.

Question: Some people assume a patient with lung disease "must have smoked and brought it on themselves," even without evidence. What bias is this, and why is it relevant to medicine?

Solution:

1. Assuming people get the outcomes they deserve → just-world hypothesis → victim blaming. ✓
2. In medicine this fuels stigma (e.g., toward patients with addiction, obesity, or HIV), worsening care and adherence.

Connection: The MCAT links attribution biases to health disparities and the patient–provider relationship.

Key Takeaways — Part 2

• Attribution = inferring causes: dispositional (internal) vs. situational (external).
• Kelley's covariation: high consensus + high distinctiveness + high consistency → situational; low consensus + low distinctiveness → dispositional.
• FAE: overattribute OTHERS' behavior to disposition. Actor–observer: situation for self, disposition for others. Self-serving: success internal, failure external.
• Just-world hypothesis → victim blaming; individualist cultures show stronger FAE.

Social Psychology

Part 3 of 5 — Conformity, Compliance & Obedience

These three are distinguished by the SOURCE of social influence.

Two Motives for Conformity

Asch findings: a substantial share of responses conformed to an obviously wrong unanimous majority; conformity DROPS sharply with even ONE dissenting ally and rises with group size (plateauing at about 3–4 confederates).

• The exact figure: conformity on about a third of critical trials (roughly 37%), and about 75% of participants conformed at least once.

Milgram's Obedience Study

• A majority of ordinary participants continued to the maximum "shock" when the experimenter insisted.

• The exact figure: 65% in the baseline study went all the way to the 450-volt maximum.

• Obedience FELL when: the authority was remote/absent, the victim was closer/visible, the experiment lacked institutional prestige, or peers rebelled.
• Lesson: obedience is situational, not merely a personality flaw.

Compliance Techniques (Cialdini)

Conformity & Obedience 🎯

Worked Examples — Social Influence

Question: (a) A nurse gives a drug because the attending ordered it. (b) A teen starts vaping because their friend group does. (c) A shopper buys an upgrade after a small "yes" earlier. Classify each.

Solution:

• (a) Explicit command from an AUTHORITY → obedience. ✓
• (b) Matching the GROUP's behavior (implicit norm) → conformity. ✓
• (c) Yielding to escalating REQUESTS → compliance (foot-in-the-door). ✓

MCAT key: Identify the source — authority (obedience), peer norm (conformity), or a request (compliance).

Question: In Milgram's baseline condition, most participants obeyed to the maximum shock. Predict the effect of (a) moving the experimenter to another room giving orders by phone and (b) placing the participant's hand on the victim's "shock plate."

Solution:

1. (a) Remote authority weakens the legitimacy/pressure of the command → obedience DROPS markedly. ✓
2. (b) Increasing the victim's proximity and the participant's direct involvement → obedience DROPS. ✓

Why it matters: Both manipulations change the SITUATION, not the person — reinforcing that obedience is largely situationally driven.

Question: In a clear, easy judgment task, a participant still goes along with a wrong unanimous group but privately knows the right answer. In an ambiguous task, a participant adopts the group's answer and believes it. Which is normative and which informational?

Solution:

1. Clear task, public agreement but private disagreement → normative (wants to fit in). ✓
2. Ambiguous task, genuine private acceptance → informational (wants to be correct). ✓

Connection: Ambiguity and importance of accuracy push toward informational influence; desire for acceptance pushes toward normative influence.

Key Takeaways — Part 3

• Conformity = group norms (Asch); compliance = direct request; obedience = authority (Milgram).
• Normative conformity = to be liked (public); informational = to be correct (private acceptance).
• Asch: many conform even on an obvious task; one ally collapses conformity. Milgram: a majority obeyed to the maximum shock; obedience is situational.
• Compliance tricks: foot-in-the-door (small→large), door-in-the-face (large→small), lowball, that's-not-all.

• Low-yield extras: the exact Asch and Milgram percentages (conformity on about a third of critical trials, about 75% conforming at least once; 65% to the 450-volt maximum)

Social Psychology

Part 4 of 5 — Prejudice, Stereotypes & Discrimination

Distinguish the three carefully — a classic MCAT trap:

You can hold a stereotype without prejudice, or feel prejudice without acting (no discrimination), though they often co-occur.

Mechanisms That Sustain Bias

Stereotype Threat (Steele & Aronson)

$\text{Salient negative stereotype} \to \text{anxiety / extra cognitive load} \to \downarrow \text{performance}$

The mere awareness that one's group is stereotyped as worse at a task can depress performance — even among capable, motivated individuals.

Reducing Prejudice — Contact Hypothesis (Allport)

Intergroup contact reduces prejudice ONLY under conditions:

1. Equal status between groups
2. Common goals
3. Intergroup cooperation (not competition)
4. Support of authorities/institutions

The jigsaw classroom is the canonical application (interdependent cooperation reduces bias).

Prejudice & Discrimination 🎯

Worked Examples — Prejudice & Discrimination

Question: A landlord (a) believes a certain ethnic group is "loud," (b) feels dislike toward them, and (c) refuses to rent to them. Label each part.

Solution:

• (a) Generalized belief → stereotype (cognitive). ✓
• (b) Negative feeling/attitude → prejudice (affective). ✓
• (c) Differential treatment (refusing to rent) → discrimination (behavioral). ✓

MCAT key: Cognition = stereotype, affect = prejudice, behavior = discrimination. Match the verb to the component.

Question: A hospital wants to reduce friction between two staff groups that distrust each other. Using the contact hypothesis, propose an intervention and predict why simple "mixer" events might fail.

Solution:

1. Effective design: assign mixed teams to a SHARED clinical goal requiring COOPERATION, with equal status and explicit leadership support (a jigsaw-style structure). ✓
2. A casual mixer may fail or backfire because it lacks interdependence and common goals; contact without those conditions can reinforce stereotypes (especially if competitive). ✓

Connection: Contact alone is insufficient — the Allport conditions are what make contact work.

Question: A teacher expects students from a stereotyped group to do poorly, gives them less attention, and they indeed score lower. Trace the mechanism and name it.

Solution:

1. The stereotype-based EXPECTATION changes the teacher's BEHAVIOR (less attention/encouragement).
2. The altered treatment depresses the students' performance, "confirming" the expectation.
3. The false belief produced its own confirmation → self-fulfilling prophecy. ✓

Why it matters: Self-fulfilling prophecies make stereotypes self-perpetuating, independent of any real group difference.

Key Takeaways — Part 4

• Stereotype = belief (cognitive); prejudice = attitude/feeling (affective); discrimination = action (behavioral).
• In-group bias, out-group homogeneity, ethnocentrism, and just-world beliefs sustain prejudice.
• Stereotype threat: fear of confirming a stereotype lowers performance in capable individuals.
• Contact hypothesis reduces prejudice only with equal status, common goals, cooperation, and institutional support (jigsaw classroom).

Social Psychology

Part 5 of 5 — Group Dynamics, Aggression & Prosocial Behavior

Group Process Phenomena

Group Decision-Making Cautions (Groupthink Symptoms)

Illusion of invulnerability, self-censorship, pressure on dissenters, illusion of unanimity. Remedies: assign a devil's advocate, invite outside experts, encourage open dissent.

Bystander Effect & Helping (Latané & Darley)

$\uparrow \text{Number of bystanders} \to \uparrow \text{diffusion of responsibility} \to \downarrow \text{probability any individual helps}$

The 5-step decision model: notice → interpret as emergency → assume responsibility → know how to help → decide to help. Failure at any step stops helping. Pluralistic ignorance (everyone looks calm, so each assumes it's not an emergency) blocks step 2.

Prosocial Behavior & Altruism

Aggression — Key Frameworks

• Frustration–aggression hypothesis: blocked goals → frustration → aggression (later: frustration creates readiness, cues trigger it).
• Social learning (Bandura, Bobo doll): aggression is learned by observation and modeling.

Group Dynamics & Helping 🎯

Worked Examples — Group Behavior & Helping

Question: (a) An expert sprinter runs faster with a crowd watching. (b) Workers on an anonymous group task each slack off. (c) A masked crowd at night vandalizes property. Classify each.

Solution:

• (a) Arousal from the watching crowd (presence of others) boosts a well-learned task → social facilitation. ✓
• (b) Reduced effort when contributions are pooled/anonymous → social loafing. ✓
• (c) Anonymity + arousal → loss of self-awareness and restraint → deindividuation. ✓

MCAT key: Facilitation requires the presence of others (an audience or co-actors; evaluation strengthens it); loafing requires anonymity in a SHARED product; deindividuation is loss of individual identity in a group.

Question: At a party, someone slumps over. Others glance, see no one reacting, and continue. Identify where the helping process broke down.

Solution:

1. Step 1 (notice): people DID notice.
2. Step 2 (interpret as emergency): because everyone else looked calm, each assumed it was not serious → pluralistic ignorance blocked this step. ✓
3. Without interpreting it as an emergency, no one assumes responsibility or helps.

Why it matters: The 5-step model shows helping can fail at any stage; pluralistic ignorance commonly stalls it at interpretation.

Question: An animal will sacrifice itself if doing so saves enough relatives. Qualitatively, when does kin-selected altruism pay off, and why does it favor siblings over cousins?

Solution:

1. Hamilton's rule: altruism is favored when (relatedness × benefit to recipient) > (cost to actor). ✓
2. Siblings share ~50% of genes; cousins ~12.5%. The higher relatedness of siblings means fewer of them are needed for the inequality to hold.
3. Thus self-sacrifice is "worth it" for fewer siblings than cousins. ✓

Connection: Inclusive fitness reframes altruism as gene propagation, complementing reciprocal altruism (expecting return) and empathy-driven helping.

Key Takeaways — Part 5 (and Suite Review)

• Social facilitation (others present: simple task ↑, complex task ↓), social loafing (anonymous pooled effort ↓), deindividuation (anonymity → impulsivity).
• Group polarization amplifies the initial leaning; groupthink sacrifices good decisions for harmony (use a devil's advocate).
• Bystander effect = diffusion of responsibility; helping requires notice → interpret → take responsibility → know how → act.
• Altruism explained by kin selection (Hamilton's rule), reciprocal altruism, empathy–altruism, and social exchange; aggression by frustration–aggression and social learning (Bandura).