Exploring Social Cognition: Integrating Cognitive Psychology for Understanding Social Behavior

1. Social Cognition Seminar 2

2. What is social cognition? Social psychology + cognitive psychology? Yes, but not quite. A liberal definition Using concepts and methods of cognitive psychology to understand social behavior

3. Concepts & methods of cognitive psychology • Concepts • Memory • Construals • Information processing • Etc… • Methods • Reaction time • Signal detection • Etc… Example How are these involved in stereotypes? Example What do reaction times to in/outgroup faces tell us about the nature of stereotypes?

4. Two modes of social cognition Automatic Controlled Relatively slow Often guided by logical, propositional thought Effortful Reason-based • Fast—rapid processing of information • Relatively effortless • Unintentional • Difficult to “stop” • Slow to change • Often reflects associative connections • Doesn’t necessarily conform to logical, rational thinking

5. Part 1 The automatic pilot

6. Mental representations (schemas) Cognitive psychology Social psychology Help organize knowledge about the world Makes the world predictable Guides behavior

7. My schema-lessLas Vegas Experience…

8. My Las Vegas Experience…

9. Riddle • A finger goes in me. You fiddle with me when you're bored. The best man always has me first. What am I? • I go in hard. I come out soft. You blow me hard. What am I? • Wedding ring • Chewing gum Do you think seeing the bikini girls influenced your answers above?

10. Accessibility and Priming Schemas and categories can become more accessible if they have been recently “primed” (“used” or “triggered”) Especially when the situation is ambiguous

11. Who committed the crime? A laptop was stolen Student Farmer Beggar Driver

12. The famous “Donald” study Participants memorized either negative (reckless) or positive (adventurous) trait words An ambiguous description of “Donald” was given: “Crave excitement…” “Sailed across Atlantic…” The logic behind the experiment The same description was given to all participants! Any differences between groups must be due to _____________

13. Bargh, Chen, & Burrows (1996) But even without social information, behaviors can be affected by primes The “walking” study • Participants unscrambled words relating to the elderly (losw = slow) or neutral (hairc) • Experiment “ended”  participants walked down hallway

14. Priming even affects your intelligence! Dijksterhuis & van Knippenberg (1998): The trivial pursuit study Describe the daily life of a…

15. Implications for social psychology “Direct” priming • E.g. prime “hostility”  consequences for your behavior Violent computer games and real violence? “Indirect” priming • E.g. Black  stereotypical trait of hostility  consequences for your behavior

16. Why automatic priming effects are important • Lack of awareness. • Dissociation between intention and behavior. • Difficult to correct for “bias.”

17. People fill in schemas too And sometimes this affects how we treat others

18. Self-fulfilling prohecy Students were described as… Bloomers Non-bloomers IQ was assessed at the end of the year. Guess which group had higher IQ?

19. Part 2 Heuristics (mental shortcuts)

20. Classic 1970’s heuristics • Availability Heuristic • Representativeness • Anchoring and adjustment

21. Availability heuristic • Basing judgments on how easy things “come to mind” (how “available” they are)

22. Demonstration Which is more common? Words with the letter "r" as the first letter                             vs. Words with the letter "r" as the third letter 

23. Demonstration First Letter Third Letter Dare Hire Dark Merry Rare Round Rage Read Red Rise Raise Rich  In reality, there are more words with "r" as the third letter

24. Representative heuristic • Mental shortcut where people classify something according to how similar it seems to a typical case 

25. Example “Tom is of high intelligence, although lacking in true creativity. He has a need for order and clarity, and for neat and tidy systems in which every detail finds its appropriate place. His writing is rather dull and mechanical, occasionally enlivened by somewhat corny puns and by flashes of imagination of the sci-fi type. He has a strong drive for competence. He seems to feel little sympathy for other people and does not enjoy interacting with others. Self-centered, he nonetheless has a deep moral sense.” How likely is Tom an engineering major? Note: In the university this study was conducted, there were few engineering majors!

26. Anchoring and adjustment heuristic Task: Estimate the length of the Ganges river. Condition A: (Fill in the blanks) Condition B: Is it more or less than 800 km? (Fill in the blanks) Condition C: Is it more or less than 200 km? (Fill in the blanks) Can you think of situations where you have used this on someone or vice versa?

27. “Modern” heuristics • What-is-beautiful-is-good • Familiarity heuristics

28. N = normative model (what people should do, if they were flawless) D = descriptive model(what people actually do) Assumed rationality position—dominant in social psychology through early 1970’s D N Less good reasoning good reasoning The “prone to errors” position: (e.g., Kahneman & Tversky)—1970’s through mid-1990s. D N Modern: 1990’s to present D N The ideal? Is it achievable? D N

29. Automaticity vs. Controlled processing An old idea in new clothes?

30. Why this distinction is important Explains several interesting aspects of social behavior We often think that we are rational beings • We can control our behavior • We are aware of why we did what we did • We can correct our behaviors Our legal system is built around conscious behavior • Free will? Intent? Automaticity plays a large role when the available information is scarce and/or ambiguous • Schemas • Heuristics

31. Can you give me a personal example? Stimulus Automatic process triggered Perceiver Aware of automatic process? If no… Automatic processing likely to dominate If yes… If no… Motivated to “correct”? If yes… If no… Ability to “correct”? If yes… Potential for controlled processing

32. Part 3 The Controlled pilot

33. Mental Undoing:Counterfactual thinking • Generating alternative accounts of reality • If X hadn’t happened, then….. • If X had happened, then…. • Implications for emotional reactions • Near-misses elicit more extreme reactions • E.g. grades • Medvec, Madey, and Gilovich (1995)

34. Controlled processing is necessary! Surely you need consciousness to make good decisions? Dijksterhuis. (2006). A theory of unconscious thought. Perspective in Psychological Science.

35. Controlled processing is necessary? Participants were divided into two groups Which apartment would you rent? Dijksterhuis. (2006). A theory of unconscious thought. Perspective in Psychological Science.

36. Controlled processing is necessary? Dijksterhuis. (2006). A theory of unconscious thought. Perspective in Psychological Science.

37. Controlled processing is necessary! Mathematics & reading are extraordinary human achievements They rely on the manipulation of abstract symbols

38. Take home messages • Automaticity plays a large role when the available information is scarce and/or ambiguous • Schemas often work quite well for us, but sometimes they lead us astray, leading to various biases • Conscious processing is important, but how important is it?

39. For Friday’s reading • Understand the theory • Understand the logic of each experiments – don’t neglect the details • Understand how each experiment is related to the other • Use the graphs to help you; don’t be overwhelmed by the statistics • Identify any weak points in the article.