Developmental psychology.pdf

512 Psychology and Society
Summary
Attitudes and Stereotypes
1. Attitudes, often defined as a predisposition to respond in a certain way, are
considered to have three components: thinking, feeling, and acting. They
are acquired through direct instruction, classical conditioning, operant
conditioning, and modeling, and the same processes are involved in
changing attitudes. Attitude change can be exceedingly difficult when the
attitude is an important aspect of the individual's personality structure.
2. Several theories of attitude formation and change are based on the principle
that human beings try to a'void or'elithinate inconsistencies. These
approaches include: balance theory, which deals with harmony among
attitudes in one or more individuals; congruity theory, concerned with the
degree and focus of attitude shifts; and cognitive-dissonance theory, which
stresses that individuals can dispel inconsistency not only by attitude change
but also through rationalization, selective perception, and the acquisition of
new information.
3. Stereotypes sometimes may facilitate first impressions, but it is extremely
difficult to determine the accuracy of such generalizations. Many
stereotypes are negative or ethnocentric, and they ignore individual
differences. On these bases, stereotypes may be extremely harmful.
Interpersonal Attraction
4. Person perception is more complex than object perception, and one
approach to this issue, called attribution theory, is concerned with how
people explain the behavior of others. Many people make the fundamental
attribution error, overemphasizing the individual's presumed disposition and
ignoring situational factors. In forming impressions of people, the
warm-cold dimension often outweighs all other traits.
5. Several factors seem influential in interpersonal attraction. These include
similarity of interests, intelligence, and even physical appearance, as well as
the amount of contact with the other person. Interpersonal attractions are
sometimes assessed by obtaining confidential preferences and reporting
them in a diagram called a sociogram.
Patterns of Interaction
6. Conformity to group pressure has been demonstrated in various laboratory
studies of agreement and obedience. Individuals conform to group norms
even when confronted with contradictory evidence and with the demands of
a leader requesting highly inappropriate behavior.
7. Altruism seems attributable not so much to a particular type of personality
as to the individual's personal state, such as haste and mood, and to
characteristics of the situation, especially the number of bystanders and
degree of personal risk.
8. When people work in the presence of others, they often accomplish more
than when working alone, an outcome called social facilitation. Two factors
that seem important in inducing cooperation in natural settings are early
childhood training and the existence of superordinate goals, which benefit
ail group members. According to a meta-analysis, cooperation is more
effective than competition in promoting achievement and productivity.