M.SC I - Course3 - Psychopathology

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Chakrapani Srinivas
SOCIAL
PSYCHOLOGY
M.Sc (Pyschology) – I year – BRAOU - Course 2 Material
Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

M.Sc(Maths),Master in IT,MBA,LLB., LLM, ( M.Sc(Psychology)) BR Ambedkar Open University, Hyderabad
System Administrator, LIC of India, Khammam Branch 9505360659 Admission No.0721352932
Trainer and Tutor for Arithmetic, Reasoning
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M.Sc. Psychology I Year

Course-III: Psychopathology
Block-I: Introduction to Psychopathology
1. Definition-Nature and Scope of Psychopathology: Nature, Scope, Preventive Measures,
Curative measures, Classification, Importance of Psychopathology
2. Popular view and Misconceptions of Abnormal Behavior: Misconceptions, Popular Views,
Adaptive and Maladaptive Behaviour, The Biological, Psychodynamic, Behavioural, Cognitive,
Humanistic, Existential and Socio cultural view point.
3. Criteria of Abnormality and Models of Abnormal Behavior:Concept of Normality and
Anormality, Criteria for Normality and Abnormality, Eclectic Criteria, Models of Abnormal
Behaviour.
4. Historical Perspectives of Abnormal behavior: Early Age era, Period of Middle age – era of
Naturalism and era of superstitions, Reappearance of Scientific approach, Reform movement,
Emergence of Modern thought, Beginning of Psychoanalysis, Evolution of Research, Behavioural
Perspective, Contemporary and Current Trends.
Block-II: Causes of Abnormal Behavior

5. Causes of Abnormal Behavior: Understanding Abnormal Behaviour, – Biological Causes;
Psychosocial; and Cultural Factors, Interaction of Bio, Psycho, and Socio-Cultural Factors and
other causes.
6. Stress, Coping Strategies: Stress Meaning and Definition, Nature, Sources of Stress- Types of
Adjustive demands; Factors influencing severity of Stress; Coping Strategies and coping styles,
Reactions to Stress.
7. Anxiety disorders: Meaning and Definition, Symptoms, Types of Anxiety Disorders.
8. Somatoform disorders: Meaning and Definition, Symptoms, Types of Somatoform Disorders,
Etiology, Treatment.
9. Dissociative Disorders: Meaning and Definition, Symptoms, Types of Dissociative Disorders
and Etiology.
Block-III: Psycho-physiological Disorder and Health Psychology

10. Introduction to Developmental Disorders: -Autism, Symptoms of autism, Mental Retardation-
Causes and Symptoms of Mental Retardation, Recognition and Treatment of Psychological
problems, Dealing with Mentally challenged.
11. Cardiovascular Disorders-Hyper Tension- Asthma- Therapies: Cardiovascular Disorders;
Types, Risk Factors, Role of Psychologist, Hypertension, Symptoms Risk Factors, Asthama; Risk
factors, Impact of quality of Life.
12. Eating Disorders and Sleeping Disorders: - Eating Disorders; Prevalence, Types, Causes and
risk factors of Anorexia Nervosa, Bulimia, and Sleeping Disorders.
13. Ageing and Psychological Disorders: Elder people in India, Aging and mental health,
Possible factors, Psychological Disorders related to aging, Growing needs for older adults in
India, Role of Psychologist.
14. Developmental Disorders in Adolescent and Childhood: ADHD, Conduct Disorder,
Communication Disorders, Learning Disability.
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Block-IV: Psychological Disorders

15. Schizophrenia: Prevalence, Clinical Picture, Causes, Treatment.
16. Substance Related Disorders: - Alcohol use disorders, sedative, Hypnotic, Use disorders,
Stimulants, Opiods, Hallucinogens, Other drug abuse, Causes and Treatment of substance related
disorders, Prevention.
17. Personality disorders: Cluster A Personality Disorders;–Paranoid, Schizoid, Cluster B
Personality Disorders; Antisocial,Boarderline, Histrionic, Cluster C Personality Disorders;
Avoident, Dependent, Obsessive-disorders.
18. Sexual and Gender identity Disorders: - Gender Identity Disorders; SDD, SAD, OD, SPD,
Symptoms of sexual dysfunction, Paraphilia.
Block-V: Therapies
19. Biological Therapies: What is theraphy, Biological Therapies; Chemotherapy, Electro
Convulsive therapy (ECT), Psycho Surgery, Non-Biological Therapies;, Brainwave therapy,
Cognitive therapy.
20. Behavioral Therapies-I: Behavioural Modification, Counter - conditioning, Systematic
desensitization, Reinforcement-Responsive Steps.
21. Behavioral Therapies-II: Modeling, Token economy, Assertive training..
22. Society’s Response to Maladaptive Behaviors: Causes of maladaptive behavior, Causes of
Delinquency, Levels of Prevention, Prevention Perspectives, sites of prevention, The Diverse
Paths to Prevention, Community Psychology.
23. The Challenges of Preventions: Supportive Housing, Problems with Community Programs,
Treatment in the Community, Legal aspects of Treatmen

Course-2: Social Psychology
Block -1: Introduction
Unit - I
1. Social Psychology: Definitions of Social Psychology: Historical

origin, Scope of Social Psychology, Social Psychology and other Social
Sciences

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What Is Social Psychology? Definition and Examples
What shapes our attitudes? Why are some people such great leaders? How
does prejudice develop, and how can we overcome it? These are just a few of
the big questions of interest in social psychology. Social psychologists tackle
issues that can have a significant impact on individual health and well-
being, from understanding bullying behavior to analyzing why people
sometimes fail to help individuals in need.
What Is Social Psychology?

According to psychologist Gordon Allport, social psychology uses scientific
methods "to understand and explain how the thoughts, feelings, and
behavior of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied
the presence of other human beings."1 Essentially, social psychology is
about understanding how each person's individual behavior is influenced by
the social environment in which that behavior takes place.
You probably already realize that other people can have a dramatic influence
on the way you act and the choices you make. Consider how you might
behave in a situation if you were all alone versus if there were other people
in the room.
The decisions you make and the behaviors you exhibit might depend on not
only how many people are present but exactly who you are around. For
example, you are likely to behave much differently when you are around a
group of close friends than you would around a group of colleagues or
supervisors from work.
Social psychology encompasses a wide range of social topics, including:

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 Group behavior
 Social perception
 Leadership
 Nonverbal behavior
 Conformity
 Aggression
 Prejudice
It is important to note that social psychology is not just about looking at

social influences. Social perception and social interaction are also vital to
understanding social behavior.
The way that we see other people (and the way we think they see us) can
play a powerful role in a wide variety of actions and decisions. Just think for
a moment about how you sometimes act differently in a public setting than
you might if you were at home by yourself. At home, you might be loud and
rambunctious, while in public you might be much more subdued and
reserved.
Why is this? Because the people around us shape our thoughts, feelings,
moods, attitudes, and perceptions. The presence of other people can make a
difference in the choices we make and the actions we take.
While social psychology tends to be an academic field, the research that
social psychologists perform has a powerful influence on our understanding
of mental health and well-being. For example, research on conformity helps
explain why teenagers sometimes go to such great lengths to fit in with their
social group—sometimes to the detriment of their own health and wellness.2
Understanding this helps psychologists develop public health programs and
treatment approaches for adolescents. These can help teenagers resist
potentially harmful behaviors such as smoking, drinking, and substance
use.
Psychology as a field of scientific exploration remains relatively new; the first
formal psychology course in the United States was initiated at Harvard
University by William James in 1875.
Yet its importance as a discipline is clear from the well-known names and
concepts of early 20th century research into human behavior: Pavlov and
his salivating dog, Maslow‘s hierarchy of needs, Jung‘s archetypes of the
unconscious.
These and other researchers wanted to uncover how human perceptions —

of themselves, of others, and of the world at large — influence behavior.
As the field of psychology matured, researchers began to focus on

specialized aspects of the mind and behavior. This gave rise to subcategories
of psychology, including social psychology.
Today, researchers and academics examine nearly every aspect of human

existence through a psychological lens. The American Psychological

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Association (APA) lists 15 subfields of psychology, including clinical

psychology, brain and cognitive psychology, developmental psychology,
quantitative psychology, and more.
Social psychology is one of the broadest and most complex subcategories

because it is concerned with self-perception and the behavioral interplay
among the individuals who make up society. What follows is an overview of
social psychology as a science, including a definition, its origins, and topics
related to the field.
History of Social Psychology

Plato referred to the idea of the "crowd mind," and concepts such as social
loafing and social facilitation were introduced in the late 1800s. But it
wasn't until after World War II that research on social psychology began in
earnest.
The horrors of the Holocaust led researchers to study social
influence, conformity, and obedience. What could explain why people
participated in such evil actions? Were people following orders and bowing
to social pressure, or were there some other forces at work? By investigating
these questions, social psychologists were able to gain a greater
understanding of the power of societal forces such as authority, compliance,
and obedience.3
Social psychologist Stanley Milgram, for example, was able to demonstrate
just how far people are willing to go to obey authority figures. In a series of
now infamous experiments, Milgram and his colleagues ordered study
participants to deliver what they believed was a potentially dangerous shock
to another person.
In reality, the shocks were not real and the other individual was only
pretending to be hurt by the electrical pulses. But 65% of those who took
part in the study delivered the maximum level of shock simply because an
authority figure told them to do so.4
Social psychology has continued to grow throughout the twentieth century,
inspiring research that has contributed to our understanding of social
experience and behavior. Our social world makes up such a tremendous
part of our lives, so it is no wonder that this topic is so fascinating to many.
How Social Psychology Differs From Other Disciplines
Social psychology is often confused with folk wisdom, personality
psychology, and sociology. Unlike folk wisdom, which relies on anecdotal
observations and subjective interpretation, social psychology employs
scientific methods and empirical study. Researchers do not make
assumptions about how people behave; they devise and carry out
experiments that help point out relationships between different variables.
Personality psychology focuses on individual traits, characteristics, and
thoughts. Social psychology is focused on situations. Social psychologists
are interested in the impact that the social environment and group
interactions have on attitudes and behaviors.

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Finally, it is important to distinguish between social psychology and

sociology. While there are many similarities between the two, sociology tends
to look at social behavior and influences at a very broad-based level.
Sociologists are interested in the institutions and cultures that influence
how people behave.
Psychologists instead focus on situational variables that affect social
behavior. While psychology and sociology both study similar topics, they are
looking at these questions from different perspectives.
Social Psychology Definition
Social psychology is the study of how individual or group behavior is

influenced by the presence and behavior of others.
The major question social psychologists ponder is this: How and why are
people‘s perceptions and actions influenced by environmental factors, such
as social interaction?
In seeking the answer to that basic question, researchers conduct empirical

studies to answer specific questions such as:
 How do individuals alter their thoughts and decisions based on social

interactions?
 Is human behavior an accurate indication of personality?
 How goal oriented is social behavior?
 How does social perception influence behavior?
 How do potentially destructive social attitudes, such as prejudice, form?
For example, have you ever noticed you act and think differently among
people you know than you do among strangers? Have you ever wondered
why that is? Social psychologists spend their careers trying to determine the
answers to questions like these and what they might mean.
Social psychology has been a formal discipline since the turn of the 20th
century. An early study in 1898 of ―social facilitation‖ by Indiana University
psychology researcher Norman Triplett sought to explain why bicycle racers
seemed to exceed their solo performances when they competed directly
against others.
Later experiments sought to explain how and why certain artists and
performers seemed to shine in front of an audience, while others faltered.
During World War II, researchers conducted studies into the effect of
propaganda on the behavior of entire populations.
Social Psychology vs. Sociology

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The fields of social psychology and sociology are sometimes confused. This is
understandable, because both fields of study are broadly concerned with the
way human behavior shapes and is shaped by society.
The primary difference between the two is this: Social psychologists study
individuals within a group; sociologists study groups of people.
As early as 1924, when both fields of study were just beginning to reach
academic maturity, University of Missouri researcher Charles A. Ellwood
sought to simplify the difference between the two. Sociology, Ellwood wrote,
is ―the science of the origin, development, structure, and functioning of
groups.‖
Social psychology, according to Ellwood, is ―the study of the [individual

psychological] origins involved in the development, structure, and
functioning of social groups.‖
Different Ways of Looking at Similar Issues

Naturally, the work done by both types of social scientists occasionally
overlaps. A sociologist focuses on how the interplay among different groups
of people — those with religious beliefs or ethnicity in common — affects the
course of civilization.
This information could be considered a starting point for research by a

social psychologist, who might use it to formulate a hypothesis about how
an individual is affected by the group dynamic over the course of a lifetime.
For example, a sociologist might focus on the potential far-reaching effects

on society of a new law, whereas a social psychologist might focus on how
the new law might affect a specific person in the short term and long term.
Another way to think about the differences between social psychology and
sociology is to consider the perception of the group dynamic.
For instance, a sociologist might conduct research into how a group of

people acts as a unit, while a social psychologist might want to investigate
how and why groups of people influence individuals — and why individual
behaviors can influence groups of people.
What Is Social Identity Theory?
Polish psychologist Henri Tajfel along with his British colleague John Turner
studied the effects of group membership on self-perception.
They formulated social identity theory, which seeks to explain the

relationship between group membership and the reinforcement of individual
qualities such as pride and self-esteem.
According to Tajfel and Turner, individuals gravitate toward groups that are
composed of people they admire or with whom they agree on important

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matters. Group members perceive themselves, at least in part, through the

lens of their membership; they see themselves reflected by other members.
People who belong to groups are linked and governed by similarities. Group
members‘ self-identity is based on the shared attitudes, beliefs, and moral
standards of the group.
This explains why individuals in a group might act differently than they
would act if they did not belong to the group. They behave as they believe a
member of the group should behave, rather than acting out of personal
motivation.
Another aspect of social identity theory is the tendency toward tribalism, or

embracing ―in-groups‖ while rejecting ―out-groups.‖ The group socialization
of an individual takes place in stages, according to Tajfel and Turner:
 Categorization — Separating individuals based on characteristics such as

ethnicity, occupation, or belief system
 Social identification — Adopting the characteristics of a particular group
 Social comparison — Seeking to draw favorable contrasts with other
groups
Once individuals have thoroughly established their self-perception based on
membership in an ―in-group,‖ their mindset and behavior begin to reflect the
expectations of the group.
In this way, individual social identity is sublimated to the group. Personal

identity is exchanged for a sense of belonging, safety, and well-being.
The History of Social Psychology
The science of social psychology began when scientists first started to

systematically and formally measure the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of
human beings (Kruglanski & Stroebe, 2011). The earliest social psychology
experiments on group behavior were conducted before 1900 (Triplett, 1898),
and the first social psychology textbooks were published in 1908
(McDougall, 1908/2003; Ross, 1908/1974). During the 1940s and 1950s,
the social psychologists Kurt Lewin and Leon Festinger refined the
experimental approach to studying behavior, creating social psychology as a
rigorous scientific discipline. Lewin is sometimes known as ―the father of
social psychology‖ because he initially developed many of the important
ideas of the discipline, including a focus on the dynamic interactions among

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people. In 1954, Festinger edited an influential book called Research

Methods in the Behavioral Sciences, in which he and other social
psychologists stressed the need to measure variables and to use laboratory
experiments to systematically test research hypotheses about social
behavior. He also noted that it might be necessary in these experiments to
deceive the participants about the true nature of the research.
Social psychology was energized by researchers who attempted to

understand how the German dictator Adolf Hitler could have produced such
extreme obedience and horrendous behaviors in his followers during the
World War II. The studies on conformity conducted by Muzafir Sherif
(1936) and Solomon Asch (1952), as well as those on obedience by Stanley
Milgram (1974), showed the importance of conformity pressures in social
groups and how people in authority could create obedience, even to the
extent of leading people to cause severe harm to others. Philip Zimbardo, in
his well-known ―prison study‖ (Haney, Banks, & Zimbardo, 1973), found
that the interactions of male college students who were recruited to play the
roles of guards and prisoners in a simulated prison became so violent that
the study had to be terminated early.
Social psychology quickly expanded to study other topics. John Darley and
Bibb Latané (1968) developed a model that helped explain when people do
and do not help others in need, and Leonard Berkowitz (1974) pioneered the
study of human aggression. Meanwhile, other social psychologists, including
Irving Janis (1972), focused on group behavior, studying why intelligent
people sometimes made decisions that led to disastrous results when they
worked together. Still other social psychologists, including Gordon Allport
and Muzafir Sherif, focused on intergroup relations, with the goal of
understanding and potentially reducing the occurrence of stereotyping,
prejudice, and discrimination. Social psychologists gave their opinions in the
1954 Brown v. Board of Education U.S. Supreme Court case that helped end
racial segregation in American public schools, and social psychologists still

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frequently serve as expert witnesses on these and other topics (Fiske,

Bersoff, Borgida, Deaux, & Heilman, 1991). In recent years insights from
social psychology have even been used to design anti-violence programs in
societies that have experienced genocide (Staub, Pearlman, & Bilali, 2010).
The latter part of the 20th century saw an expansion of social psychology
into the field of attitudes, with a particular emphasis on cognitive processes.
During this time, social psychologists developed the first formal models of
persuasion, with the goal of understanding how advertisers and other people
could present their messages to make them most effective (Eagly & Chaiken,
1993; Hovland, Janis, & Kelley, 1963). These approaches to attitudes
focused on the cognitive processes that people use when evaluating
messages and on the relationship between attitudes and behavior. Leon
Festinger‘s important cognitive dissonance theory was developed during this
time and became a model for later research (Festinger, 1957).
In the 1970s and 1980s, social psychology became even more cognitive in
orientation as social psychologists used advances in cognitive psychology,
which were themselves based largely on advances in computer technology,
to inform the field (Fiske & Taylor, 2008). The focus of these researchers,
including Alice Eagly, Susan Fiske, E. Tory Higgins, Richard Nisbett, Lee
Ross, Shelley Taylor, and many others, was on social cognition—an
understanding of how our knowledge about our social worlds develops
through experience and the influence of these knowledge structures on
memory, information processing, attitudes, and judgment. Furthermore, the
extent to which humans‘ decision making could be flawed due to both
cognitive and motivational processes was documented (Kahneman, Slovic, &
Tversky, 1982).
In the 21st century, the field of social psychology has been expanding into
still other areas. Examples that we consider in this book include an interest
in how social situations influence our health and happiness, the important
roles of evolutionary experiences and cultures on our behavior, and the field

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of social neuroscience—the study of how our social behavior both influences

and is influenced by the activities of our brain (Lieberman, 2010). Social
psychologists continue to seek new ways to measure and understand social
behavior, and the field continues to evolve. We cannot predict where social
psychology will be directed in the future, but we have no doubt that it will
still be alive and vibrant.
Social Psychology
Definition-
―Social psychology is a discipline that attempts to understand and explain

how the thought, feeling and behaviour of an individual are influenced by
the actual, imagined or implied presence of others.‖ Gordon W. Allport
(1968)
Baron, Byrne and Suls (1989) define social psychology as the scientific field
that seeks to understand the nature and causes of individual behavior in
social situations.
Scope of Social Psychology

Social psychology tries to understand the relationship between minds,
groups, and behaviors in three general ways:
1) First, it tries to understand how the thoughts, feelings and behaviours

of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of
other(s).
This includes social perception, social interaction, and the many kinds of
social influence (like trust, power, and persuasion).
It deals with questions like: How do small group dynamics impact cognition
and emotional states?
How do social groups control or contribute to behaviour, emotion,
or attitudes of the individual members?
How does the group impact the individual?
How does the individual operate within the social group?
It tries to understand the influence that individual perceptions and
behaviours have upon the behaviour of groups. How does persuasion work
to change group behaviour, emotion or attitudes?

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2) Second, it tries to understand the influence of individual

perceptions and behaviours have upon the behaviour of groups. This
includes looking at things like group productivity in the workplace
and group decision making.
It looks at questions like: What are the reasons behind conformity,
diversity, and deviance?
3) Third, and finally, social psychology tries to understand groups

themselves as behavioural entities and the relationships and influences
that one group has upon another group.
It enquires questions like:
What makes some groups hostile to one another, and others neutral or civil?
Do groups behave in a different way than an individual outside the group?
Relationship between Social Psychology and Other Sciences

Social psychology is a branch of psychology that studies the relationship
between humans and groups or the environment that surrounds them.
Usually people who are experts in the field of social psychology are
psychologists or sociologists, because they have very close relationships in
social psychology.
But is social psychology really only related to sociology? Are there other
sciences that have a relationship with social psychology? To find out the
answer, continue to listen to this article, yes!
Humans are indeed created as social creatures. Every day in carrying out
human activities, it is inseparable from socialization or interaction, either
with other people, other groups, or other environmental components.
From this we can know that it means that social psychology is always
involved in human life. That is, this science must have a relationship with

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many other sciences which are also widely used in everyday life. What are
some of them? The following will discuss 12 relationships of social
psychology with other sciences:
1. Relationship between social psychology and sociology

It was mentioned at a glance above that the experts in the field of social
psychology are usually psychologists or sociologists.
This means that there is a very close relationship between these two
sciences. Sociology itself is a field of science that deals with the behavior of
relationships between individuals and other individuals, between individuals
and groups, or between groups and other groups in their social
behavior. Sociology focuses more attention on social behavior, while
psychology makes the subject of the perpetrator as its concern. However,
these two sciences are complementary to each other.
2. Relationship between social psychology and anthropology

The sciences that can influence social psychology are sociology and
anthropology (Bonner, 1953). Anthropology is the study of social behavior in
a specific cultural superstructure. Instead of focusing on the behavior,
anthropology focuses more on the culture.
Meanwhile, individual behavior in that culture can be explained by

psychology which understands that individual behavior cannot be separated
from the culture or social stimuli around him. (Also read: The Application of
Psychological Anthropology in Real Life )
3. The relationship between social psychology and political science

Politics often connotes bad science and many don‘t like it. In fact, political
science is never separated from our daily lives. Gathering, voicing opinions,
and many other activities without our knowing it are forms of political
activity.

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Also read:
 Application of Social Psychology in Politics

 Benefits of Studying Social Psychology in Government
In politics we cannot avoid interactions with other people. Furthermore,
often in political activities we expect to be able to get approval from the
interlocutor or support in any form.
In this case, social psychology plays a very important role because it can
help us understand how the attitudes and expectations of the interlocutor
can produce certain behaviors. by understanding this, we can determine
how our attitude should be and how the communication style is appropriate
to get the expected goals.
4. The relationship between social psychology and communication

science
There are a lot of sciences involved in the science of communication,
including social psychology. The relationship between social psychology and
communication science in this case is to provide direction on how to
communicate properly by considering various psychological factors that
exist.
By understanding social psychology in communication science, it is hoped

that we can be more flexible and can control ongoing communication. (Also
read: Communication Styles in Psychology )
5. Relationship between social psychology and natural sciences

The natural sciences had a profound influence on psychological research in
the early 19th century. Psychology is created by compiling the results of the
experiments conducted, in which many experiments are carried out under
the direction of natural science.

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The thing that distinguishes between these two sciences is the object of
research that is owned by these two sciences, where the object of
psychological research is humans with their behavior that are always
dynamic and developing, while natural sciences have a fixed object of
research.
6. The relationship between social psychology and philosophy

Perhaps there are still many of us who do not understand what philosophy
studies and what psychology has to do with philosophy .
Philosophy is a science that is the result of the human mind which is always
looking and thinking to find the truth as deep as possible.
Philosophy will begin its ‗investigation‘ of what is experienced by humans. In

order to draw conclusions from investigation, philosophy requires
psychology so that the results obtained can be closer to the truth. (Also
read: Contribution of Philosophy in Psychology )
7. The relationship between social psychology and education

Every human being definitely needs education. Education will provide
knowledge to humans in living their lives from birth to death.
To be able to provide a good education, social psychology is needed so that

education can be right on target and absorbed as effectively as
possible. (Also read: Psychodiagnostic Applications in the Field of
Education )
8. The relationship between social psychology and biology

Biology is the study of the life of all living things, including humans. Similar
to psychology, biology also makes humans its focus object. Although these
two sciences look at humans from different points of view, they can meet at
several points of discussion.

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For example, in biology it is discussed about the human psyche or

heredity. If biology discusses this heredity in terms of the inheritance of
human physical traits to offspring, social psychology discusses heredity of
passing on intelligence, talents, interests and so on, regardless of the
influence of the environment in which humans are born and raised.
9. Relationship between social psychology and international

relations
In social psychology, it is studied about the interactions that occur between
groups. In this case, the interaction between countries can also be
discussed in social psychology. Thus, social psychology has a close
relationship with the science of international relations in order to better
understand how the interaction occurs between two or more countries.
10. The relationship between social psychology and leadership

science
A little related to the discussion above, where social psychology also studies
the interactions that occur between groups, social psychology also discusses
the science of leadership.
If we talk about groups, it will not be separated from those related to

leadership. In a group there is definitely one leader who will provide
direction, motivation, role models and other roles to be able to bring the
group to its shared goals.
11. Relationship between social psychology and health sciences

Talking about health is not only about physical health. In fact, often
diseases that attack physical health are also influenced by mental
health. This is what social psychology also discusses, because even human
mental health will not be free from the influence of the surrounding
environment. (Also read: Causes of Mental Health Problems From Socio-
Cultural Factors )

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12. The relationship between social psychology and other

psychological sciences
Apart from having links with other sciences, social psychology also has links
with other psychology sciences. For example, with developmental
psychology, clinical psychology, and educational psychology. This is again
due to humans who are never separated from social life so that the social
environment must have an influence on these humans.
Unit - 2
Experimental and Quasi Experimental Methods in Social Psychology:

Experimentation, The role of Mediating Variables, Ethics of

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Experimentation, Generalizing from laboratory to life, Field

experiments.
Experimental and Quasi-Experimental Research
You approach a stainless-steel wall, separated vertically along its middle

where two halves meet. After looking to the left, you see two buttons on the
wall to the right. You press the top button and it lights up. A soft tone
sounds and the two halves of the wall slide apart to reveal a small room. You
step into the room. Looking to the left, then to the right, you see a panel of
more buttons. You know that you seek a room marked with the numbers 1-
0-1-2, so you press the button marked "10." The halves slide shut and
enclose you within the cubicle, which jolts upward. Soon, the soft tone
sounds again. The door opens again. On the far wall, a sign silently
proclaims, "10th floor."
You have engaged in a series of experiments. A ride in an elevator may not

seem like an experiment, but it, and each step taken towards its ultimate
outcome, are common examples of a search for a causal relationship-which
is what experimentation is all about.
You started with the hypothesis that this is in fact an elevator. You proved
that you were correct. You then hypothesized that the button to summon
the elevator was on the left, which was incorrect, so then you hypothesized
it was on the right, and you were correct. You hypothesized that pressing
the button marked with the up arrow would not only bring an elevator to
you, but that it would be an elevator heading in the up direction. You were
right.
As this guide explains, the deliberate process of testing hypotheses and

reaching conclusions is an extension of commonplace testing of cause and
effect relationships.

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Basic Concepts of Experimental and Quasi-Experimental Research

Discovering causal relationships is the key to experimental research. In
abstract terms, this means the relationship between a certain action, X,
which alone creates the effect Y. For example, turning the volume knob on
your stereo clockwise causes the sound to get louder. In addition, you could
observe that turning the knob clockwise alone, and nothing else, caused the
sound level to increase. You could further conclude that a causal
relationship exists between turning the knob clockwise and an increase in
volume; not simply because one caused the other, but because you are
certain that nothing else caused the effect.
Independent and Dependent Variables
Beyond discovering causal relationships, experimental research further

seeks out how much cause will produce how much effect; in technical terms,
how the independent variable will affect the dependent variable. You know
that turning the knob clockwise will produce a louder noise, but by varying
how much you turn it, you see how much sound is produced. On the other
hand, you might find that although you turn the knob a great deal, sound
doesn't increase dramatically. Or, you might find that turning the knob just
a little adds more sound than expected. The amount that you turned the
knob is the independent variable, the variable that the researcher controls,
and the amount of sound that resulted from turning it is the dependent
variable, the change that is caused by the independent variable.
Experimental research also looks into the effects of removing something. For
example, if you remove a loud noise from the room, will the person next to
you be able to hear you? Or how much noise needs to be removed before
that person can hear you?
Treatment and Hypothesis

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The term treatment refers to either removing or adding a stimulus in order

to measure an effect (such as turning the knob a little or a lot, or reducing
the noise level a little or a lot). Experimental researchers want to know how
varying levels of treatment will affect what they are studying. As such,
researchers often have an idea, or hypothesis, about what effect will occur
when they cause something. Few experiments are performed where there is
no idea of what will happen. From past experiences in life or from the
knowledge we possess in our specific field of study, we know how some
actions cause other reactions. Experiments confirm or reconfirm this fact.
Causality
Experimentation becomes more complex when the causal relationships they

seek aren't as clear as in the stereo knob-turning examples. Questions like
"Will olestra cause cancer?" or "Will this new fertilizer help this plant grow
better?" present more to consider. For example, any number of things could
affect the growth rate of a plant-the temperature, how much water or sun it
receives, or how much carbon dioxide is in the air. These variables can affect
an experiment's results. An experimenter who wants to show that adding a
certain fertilizer will help a plant grow better must ensure that it is the
fertilizer, and nothing else, affecting the growth patterns of the plant. To do
this, as many of these variables as possible must be controlled.
Matching and Randomization
In the example used in this guide (you'll find the example below), we discuss
an experiment that focuses on three groups of plants -- one that is treated
with a fertilizer named MegaGro, another group treated with a fertilizer
named Plant!, and yet another that is not treated with fetilizer (this latter
group serves as a "control" group). In this example, even though the
designers of the experiment have tried to remove all extraneous variables,
results may appear merely coincidental. Since the goal of the experiment is
to prove a causal relationship in which a single variable is responsible for

23
the effect produced, the experiment would produce stronger proof if the
results were replicated in larger treatment and control groups.
Selecting groups entails assigning subjects in the groups of an experiment

in such a way that treatment and control groups are comparable in all
respects except the application of the treatment. Groups can be created in
two ways: matching and randomization. In the MegaGro experiment
discussed below, the plants might be matched according to characteristics
such as age, weight and whether they are blooming. This involves
distributing these plants so that each plant in one group exactly matches
characteristics of plants in the other groups. Matching may be problematic,
though, because it "can promote a false sense of security by leading [the
experimenter] to believe that [the] experimental and control groups were
really equated at the outset, when in fact they were not equated on a host of
variables" (Jones, 291). In other words, you may have flowers for your
MegaGro experiment that you matched and distributed among groups, but
other variables are unaccounted for. It would be difficult to have equal
groupings.
Randomization, then, is preferred to matching. This method is based on the

statistical principle of normal distribution. Theoretically, any arbitrarily
selected group of adequate size will reflect normal distribution. Differences
between groups will average out and become more comparable. The
principle of normal distribution states that in a population most individuals
will fall within the middle range of values for a given characteristic, with
increasingly fewer toward either extreme (graphically represented as the
ubiquitous "bell curve").
Differences between Quasi-Experimental and Experimental Research
Thus far, we have explained that for experimental research we need:
 a hypothesis for a causal relationship;

24
 a control group and a treatment group;

 to eliminate confounding variables that might mess up the experiment
and prevent displaying the causal relationship; and
 to have larger groups with a carefully sorted constituency; preferably
randomized, in order to keep accidental differences from fouling things
up.
But what if we don't have all of those? Do we still have an experiment? Not a
true experiment in the strictest scientific sense of the term, but we can have
a quasi-experiment, an attempt to uncover a causal relationship, even
though the researcher cannot control all the factors that might affect the
outcome.
A quasi-experimenter treats a given situation as an experiment even though

it is not wholly by design. The independent variable may not be manipulated
by the researcher, treatment and control groups may not be randomized or
matched, or there may be no control group. The researcher is limited in
what he or she can say conclusively.
The significant element of both experiments and quasi-experiments is the

measure of the dependent variable, which it allows for comparison. Some
data is quite straightforward, but other measures, such as level of self-
confidence in writing ability, increase in creativity or in reading
comprehension are inescapably subjective. In such cases, quasi-
experimentation often involves a number of strategies to compare
subjectivity, such as rating data, testing, surveying, and content analysis.
Rating essentially is developing a rating scale to evaluate data. In testing,

experimenters and quasi-experimenters use ANOVA (Analysis of Variance)
and ANCOVA (Analysis of Co-Variance) tests to measure differences between
control and experimental groups, as well as different correlations between
groups.

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Since we're mentioning the subject of statistics, note that experimental or

quasi-experimental research cannot state beyond a shadow of a doubt that a
single cause will always produce any one effect. They can do no more than
show a probability that one thing causes another. The probability that a
result is the due to random chance is an important measure of statistical
analysis and in experimental research.
Example: Causality
Let's say you want to determine that your new fertilizer, MegaGro, will
increase the growth rate of plants. You begin by getting a plant to go with
your fertilizer. Since the experiment is concerned with proving that MegaGro
works, you need another plant, using no fertilizer at all on it, to compare
how much change your fertilized plant displays. This is what is known as a
control group.
Set up with a control group, which will receive no treatment, and an

experimental group, which will get MegaGro, you must then address those
variables that could invalidate your experiment. This can be an extensive
and exhaustive process. You must ensure that you use the same plant; that
both groups are put in the same kind of soil; that they receive equal
amounts of water and sun; that they receive the same amount of exposure
to carbon-dioxide-exhaling researchers, and so on. In short, any other
variable that might affect the growth of those plants, other than the
fertilizer, must be the same for both plants. Otherwise, you can't prove
absolutely that MegaGro is the only explanation for the increased growth of
one of those plants.
Such an experiment can be done on more than two groups. You may not
only want to show that MegaGro is an effective fertilizer, but that it is better
than its competitor brand of fertilizer, Plant! All you need to do, then, is have
one experimental group receiving MegaGro, one receiving Plant! and the
other (the control group) receiving no fertilizer. Those are the only variables

26
that can be different between the three groups; all other variables must be
the same for the experiment to be valid.
Controlling variables allows the researcher to identify conditions that may

affect the experiment's outcome. This may lead to alternative explanations
that the researcher is willing to entertain in order to isolate only variables
judged significant. In the MegaGro experiment, you may be concerned with
how fertile the soil is, but not with the plants'; relative position in the
window, as you don't think that the amount of shade they get will affect
their growth rate. But what if it did? You would have to go about eliminating
variables in order to determine which is the key factor. What if one receives
more shade than the other and the MegaGro plant, which received more
shade, died? This might prompt you to formulate a plausible alternative
explanation, which is a way of accounting for a result that differs from what
you expected. You would then want to redo the study with equal amounts of
sunlight.
Methods: Five Steps

Experimental research can be roughly divided into five phases:
Identifying a research problem
The process starts by clearly identifying the problem you want to study and
considering what possible methods will affect a solution. Then you choose
the method you want to test, and formulate a hypothesis to predict the
outcome of the test.
For example, you may want to improve student essays, but you don't believe
that teacher feedback is enough. You hypothesize that some possible
methods for writing improvement include peer workshopping, or reading
more example essays. Favoring the former, your experiment would try to
determine if peer workshopping improves writing in high school seniors. You

27
state your hypothesis: peer workshopping prior to turning in a final draft

will improve the quality of the student's essay.
Planning an experimental research study
The next step is to devise an experiment to test your hypothesis. In doing so,
you must consider several factors. For example, how generalizable do you
want your end results to be? Do you want to generalize about the entire
population of high school seniors everywhere, or just the particular
population of seniors at your specific school? This will determine how simple
or complex the experiment will be. The amount of time funding you have will
also determine the size of your experiment.
Continuing the example from step one, you may want a small study at one
school involving three teachers, each teaching two sections of the same
course. The treatment in this experiment is peer workshopping. Each of the
three teachers will assign the same essay assignment to both classes; the
treatment group will participate in peer workshopping, while the control
group will receive only teacher comments on their drafts.
Conducting the experiment
At the start of an experiment, the control and treatment groups must be

selected. Whereas the "hard" sciences have the luxury of attempting to
create truly equal groups, educators often find themselves forced to conduct
their experiments based on self-selected groups, rather than on
randomization. As was highlighted in the Basic Concepts section, this
makes the study a quasi-experiment, since the researchers cannot control
all of the variables.
For the peer workshopping experiment, let's say that it involves six classes
and three teachers with a sample of students randomly selected from all the
classes. Each teacher will have a class for a control group and a class for a

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treatment group. The essay assignment is given and the teachers are briefed
not to change any of their teaching methods other than the use of peer
workshopping. You may see here that this is an effort to control a possible
variable: teaching style variance.
Analyzing the data
The fourth step is to collect and analyze the data. This is not solely a step
where you collect the papers, read them, and say your methods were a
success. You must show how successful. You must devise a scale by which
you will evaluate the data you receive, therefore you must decide what
indicators will be, and will not be, important.
Continuing our example, the teachers' grades are first recorded, then the
essays are evaluated for a change in sentence complexity, syntactical and
grammatical errors, and overall length. Any statistical analysis is done at
this time if you choose to do any. Notice here that the researcher has made
judgments on what signals improved writing. It is not simply a matter of
improved teacher grades, but a matter of what the researcher believes
constitutes improved use of the language.
Writing the paper/presentation describing the findings
Once you have completed the experiment, you will want to share findings by
publishing academic paper (or presentations). These papers usually have the
following format, but it is not necessary to follow it strictly. Sections can be
combined or not included, depending on the structure of the experiment,
and the journal to which you submit your paper.
 Abstract: Summarize the project: its aims, participants, basic

methodology, results, and a brief interpretation.
 Introduction: Set the context of the experiment.

29
 Review of Literature: Provide a review of the literature in the specific

area of study to show what work has been done. Should lead directly
to the author's purpose for the study.
 Statement of Purpose: Present the problem to be studied.
 Participants: Describe in detail participants involved in the study;
e.g., how many, etc. Provide as much information as possible.
 Materials and Procedures: Clearly describe materials and
procedures. Provide enough information so that the experiment can be
replicated, but not so much information that it becomes unreadable.
Include how participants were chosen, the tasks assigned them, how
they were conducted, how data were evaluated, etc.
 Results: Present the data in an organized fashion. If it is quantifiable,
it is analyzed through statistical means. Avoid interpretation at this
time.
 Discussion: After presenting the results, interpret what has happened
in the experiment. Base the discussion only on the data collected and
as objective an interpretation as possible. Hypothesizing is possible
here.
 Limitations: Discuss factors that affect the results. Here, you can
speculate how much generalization, or more likely, transferability, is
possible based on results. This section is important for quasi-
experimentation, since a quasi-experiment cannot control all of the
variables that might affect the outcome of a study. You would discuss
what variables you could not control.
 Conclusion: Synthesize all of the above sections.
 References: Document works cited in the correct format for the field.
Experimental and Quasi-Experimental Research: Issues and Commentary

Several issues are addressed in this section, including the use of
experimental and quasi-experimental research in educational settings, the
relevance of the methods to English studies, and ethical concerns regarding
the methods.

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Using Experimental and Quasi-Experimental Research in Educational

Settings
Charting Causal Relationships in Human Settings
Any time a human population is involved, prediction of casual relationships

becomes cloudy and, some say, impossible. Many reasons exist for this; for
example,
 researchers in classrooms add a disturbing presence, causing

students to act abnormally, consciously or unconsciously;
 subjects try to please the researcher, just because of an apparent
interest in them (known as the Hawthorne Effect); or, perhaps
 the teacher as researcher is restricted by bias and time pressures.
But such confounding variables don't stop researchers from trying to

identify causal relationships in education. Educators naturally experiment
anyway, comparing groups, assessing the attributes of each, and making
predictions based on an evaluation of alternatives. They look to research to
support their intuitive practices, experimenting whenever they try to decide
which instruction method will best encourage student improvement.
Mediating and Moderating Variables Explained
What is the difference between a mediator and a moderator? One of my

former academic advisors used to always say ―be a walking laboratory‖. I
think it‘s a very poetic way of describing a core feature of psychological
research—to come up with theories or explanations for various
phenomena we observe. Sometimes there isn‘t a clear-cut relation between
a dependent and independent variable. In those cases, a mediating
variable or a moderating variable can provide a more illustrative account
of how dependent (criterion) variables are related to independent
(predictor) variables.

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A mediating variable explains the relation between the independent

(predictor) and the dependent (criterion) variable. It explains how or why
there is a relation between two variables. A mediator can be a potential
mechanism by which an independent variable can produce changes on a
dependent variable. When you fully account for the effect of the mediator,
the relation between independent and dependent variables may go away.
For instance, imagine that you find a positive association between note-
taking and performance on an exam. This association may be explained by
number of hours studying, which would be the mediating variable.
A moderator is a variable that affects the strength of the relation between

the predictor and criterion variable. Moderators specify when a relation
will hold. It can be qualitative (e.g., sex, race, class…) or quantitative (e.g.,
drug dosage or level of reward). Moderating variable are typically an
interaction term in statistical models. For instance, imagine researchers
are evaluating the effects of a new cholesterol drug. The researchers vary
the participants in minutes of daily exercise (predictor/independent
variable) and measure their cholesterol levels after 30 days
(criterion/dependent variable). They find that at low drug doses, there is a
small association between exercise and cholesterol levels, but at high drug
doses, there is a huge association between exercise and cholesterol levels.
Drug dosage moderates the association between exercise and cholesterol
levels.
Let‘s look at some examples in psychological research.
A recent paper by Frank, Amso, & Johnson (2014) examined the

developmental relationship between early perceptual abilities and face
perception in infancy. In the study, the authors tested visual search
abilities of 3-, 6-, and 9-month-old infants. Infants were shown panels of
red rods against a black background. One of the rods was either slanted at
a diagonal or moved back and forth. Accuracy at looking at the slanted or

32
moving rod was calculated as ―visual search accuracy‖. Infants also viewed
excerpts from Charlie Brown and Sesame Street and relative amount of
time spent viewing faces was measured. They found that infants looked
more at faces and were more accurate at identifying a moving target with
age. This effect was fully mediated by visual search accuracy for moving
rods. That is, developmental improvements in visual search accuracy fully
accounted for the amount of time infants looked at faces.
A great example of a moderator comes from Cohen and Willis, 1985. In

that study, the authors proposed a stress-buffering hypothesis. Prior
research had suggested a main effect of social support on quality of life.
However, Cohen and Willis demonstrated that the relation between social
support and quality of life depends on an individual‘s stress level.
Someone who experiences a lot of stress, but has good social support, will
show better outcomes (fewer symptoms of depression, anxiety, fatigue...)
than someone with low social support. Social support is the moderating
variable.

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These examples should clarify the difference between mediating and

moderating variables. Both types of variables provide interesting
explanatory means to describe psychological phenomena.
Combining Theory, Research, and Practice
The goal of educational research lies in combining theory, research, and

practice. Educational researchers attempt to establish models of teaching
practice, learning styles, curriculum development, and countless other
educational issues. The aim is to "try to improve our understanding of
education and to strive to find ways to have understanding contribute to the
improvement of practice," one writer asserts (Floden 1996, p. 197).
In quasi-experimentation, researchers try to develop models by involving

teachers as researchers, employing observational research techniques.
Although results of this kind of research are context-dependent and difficult
to generalize, they can act as a starting point for further study. The
"educational researcher . . . provides guidelines and interpretive material
intended to liberate the teacher's intelligence so that whatever artistry in
teaching the teacher can achieve will be employed" (Eisner 1992, p. 8).
Bias and Rigor
Critics contend that the educational researcher is inherently biased, sample

selection is arbitrary, and replication is impossible. The key to combating
such criticism has to do with rigor. Rigor is established through close,
proper attention to randomizing groups, time spent on a study, and
questioning techniques. This allows more effective application of standards
of quantitative research to qualitative research.
Often, teachers cannot wait to for piles of experimentation data to be

analyzed before using the teaching methods (Lauer and Asher 1988). They

34
ultimately must assess whether the results of a study in a distant classroom

are applicable in their own classrooms. And they must continuously test the
effectiveness of their methods by using experimental and qualitative
research simultaneously. In addition to statistics (quantitative), researchers
may perform case studies or observational research (qualitative) in
conjunction with, or prior to, experimentation.
Relevance to English Studies
Situations in English Studies that Might Encourage use of Experimental

Methods
Whenever a researcher would like to see if a causal relationship exists

between groups, experimental and quasi-experimental research can be a
viable research tool. Researchers in English Studies might use
experimentation when they believe a relationship exists between two
variables, and they want to show that these two variables have a significant
correlation (or causal relationship).
A benefit of experimentation is the ability to control variables, such as the

amount of treatment, when it is given, to whom and so forth. Controlling
variables allows researchers to gain insight into the relationships they
believe exist. For example, a researcher has an idea that writing under
pseudonyms encourages student participation in newsgroups. Researchers
can control which students write under pseudonyms and which do not, then
measure the outcomes. Researchers can then analyze results and determine
if this particular variable alone causes increased participation.
Transferability-Applying Results
Experimentation and quasi-experimentation allow for generating

transferable results and accepting those results as being dependent upon
experimental rigor. It is an effective alternative to generalizability, which is

35
difficult to rely upon in educational research. English scholars, reading

results of experiments with a critical eye, ultimately decide if results will be
implemented and how. They may even extend that existing research by
replicating experiments in the interest of generating new results and
benefiting from multiple perspectives. These results will strengthen the
study or discredit findings.
Concerns English Scholars Express about Experiments
Researchers should carefully consider if a particular method is feasible in

humanities studies, and whether it will yield the desired information. Some
researchers recommend addressing pertinent issues combining several
research methods, such as survey, interview, ethnography, case study,
content analysis, and experimentation (Lauer and Asher, 1988).
Advantages and Disadvantages of Experimental Research: Discussion
In educational research, experimentation is a way to gain insight into

methods of instruction. Although teaching is context specific, results can
provide a starting point for further study. Often, a teacher/researcher will
have a "gut" feeling about an issue which can be explored through
experimentation and looking at causal relationships. Through research
intuition can shape practice.
A preconception exists that information obtained through scientific method

is free of human inconsistencies. But, since scientific method is a matter of
human construction, it is subject to human error. The researcher's personal
bias may intrude upon the experiment, as well. For example, certain
preconceptions may dictate the course of the research and affect the
behavior of the subjects. The issue may be compounded when, although
many researchers are aware of the affect that their personal bias exerts on
their own research, they are pressured to produce research that is accepted
in their field of study as "legitimate" experimental research.

36
The researcher does bring bias to experimentation, but bias does not limit an
ability to be reflective. An ethical researcher thinks critically about results
and reports those results after careful reflection. Concerns over bias can be
leveled against any research method.
Often, the sample may not be representative of a population, because the

researcher does not have an opportunity to ensure a representative sample.
For example, subjects could be limited to one location, limited in number,
studied under constrained conditions and for too short a time.
Despite such inconsistencies in educational research, the researcher has

control over the variables, increasing the possibility of more precisely
determining individual effects of each variable. Also, determining interaction
between variables is more possible.
Even so, artificial results may result. It can be argued that variables are
manipulated so the experiment measures what researchers want to
examine; therefore, the results are merely contrived products and have no
bearing in material reality. Artificial results are difficult to apply in practical
situations, making generalizing from the results of a controlled study
questionable. Experimental research essentially first decontextualizes a
single question from a "real world" scenario, studies it under controlled
conditions, and then tries to recontextualize the results back on the "real
world" scenario. Results may be difficult to replicate.
Perhaps, groups in an experiment may not be comparable. Quasi-

experimentation in educational research is widespread because not only are
many researchers also teachers, but many subjects are also students. With
the classroom as laboratory, it is difficult to implement randomizing or
matching strategies. Often, students self-select into certain sections of a
course on the basis of their own agendas and scheduling needs. Thus when,
as often happens, one class is treated and the other used for a control, the
groups may not actually be comparable. As one might imagine, people who

37
register for a class which meets three times a week at eleven o'clock in the
morning (young, no full-time job, night people) differ significantly from those
who register for one on Monday evenings from seven to ten p.m. (older, full-
time job, possibly more highly motivated). Each situation presents different
variables and your group might be completely different from that in the
study. Long-term studies are expensive and hard to reproduce. And
although often the same hypotheses are tested by different researchers,
various factors complicate attempts to compare or synthesize them. It is
nearly impossible to be as rigorous as the natural sciences model dictates.
Even when randomization of students is possible, problems arise. First,

depending on the class size and the number of classes, the sample may be
too small for the extraneous variables to cancel out. Second, the study
population is not strictly a sample, because the population of students
registered for a given class at a particular university is obviously not
representative of the population of all students at large. For example,
students at a suburban private liberal-arts college are typically young,
white, and upper-middle class. In contrast, students at an urban
community college tend to be older, poorer, and members of a racial
minority. The differences can be construed as confounding variables: the
first group may have fewer demands on its time, have less self-discipline,
and benefit from superior secondary education. The second may have more
demands, including a job and/or children, have more self-discipline, but an
inferior secondary education. Selecting a population of subjects which is
representative of the average of all post-secondary students is also a flawed
solution, because the outcome of a treatment involving this group is not
necessarily transferable to either the students at a community college or the
students at the private college, nor are they universally generalizable.
When a human population is involved, experimental research becomes

concerned if behavior can be predicted or studied with validity. Human
response can be difficult to measure. Human behavior is dependent on

38
individual responses. Rationalizing behavior through experimentation does

not account for the process of thought, making outcomes of that process
fallible (Eisenberg, 1996).
Nevertheless, we perform experiments daily anyway. When we brush our

teeth every morning, we are experimenting to see if this behavior will result
in fewer cavities. We are relying on previous experimentation and we are
transferring the experimentation to our daily lives.
Moreover, experimentation can be combined with other research methods to

ensure rigor. Other qualitative methods such as case study, ethnography,
observational research and interviews can function as preconditions for
experimentation or conducted simultaneously to add validity to a study.
We have few alternatives to experimentation. Mere anecdotal research, for

example is unscientific, unreplicatable, and easily manipulated. Should we
rely on Ed walking into a faculty meeting and telling the story of Sally? Sally
screamed, "I love writing!" ten times before she wrote her essay and
produced a quality paper. Therefore, all the other faculty members should
hear this anecdote and know that all other students should employ this
similar technique.
On final disadvantage: frequently, political pressure drives experimentation

and forces unreliable results. Specific funding and support may drive the
outcomes of experimentation and cause the results to be skewed. The reader
of these results may not be aware of these biases and should approach
experimentation with a critical eye.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Experimental Research: Quick Reference

List

39
Experimental and quasi-experimental research can be summarized in terms

of their advantages and disadvantages. This section combines and
elaborates upon many points mentioned previously in this guide.
Advantages Disadvantages
gain insight into methods of subject to human error
instruction
intuitive practice shaped by personal bias of researcher may intrude
research
teachers have bias but can be sample may not be representative
reflective
researcher can have control over can produce artificial results
variables
humans perform experiments results may only apply to one situation
anyway and may be difficult to replicate
can be combined with other groups may not be comparable
research methods for rigor
use to determine what is best for human response can be difficult to
population measure
provides for greater transferability political pressure may skew results
than anecdotal research
Ethical Concerns
Experimental research may be manipulated on both ends of the spectrum:

by researcher and by reader. Researchers who report on experimental
research, faced with naive readers of experimental research, encounter
ethical concerns. While they are creating an experiment, certain objectives
and intended uses of the results might drive and skew it. Looking for
specific results, they may ask questions and look at data that support only
desired conclusions. Conflicting research findings are ignored as a result.

40
Similarly, researchers, seeking support for a particular plan, look only at

findings which support that goal, dismissing conflicting research.
Editors and journals do not publish only trouble-free material. As readers of

experiments members of the press might report selected and isolated parts
of a study to the public, essentially transferring that data to the general
population which may not have been intended by the researcher. Take, for
example, oat bran. A few years ago, the press reported how oat bran reduces
high blood pressure by reducing cholesterol. But that bit of information was
taken out of context. The actual study found that when people ate more oat
bran, they reduced their intake of saturated fats high in cholesterol. People
started eating oat bran muffins by the ton, assuming a causal relationship
when in actuality a number of confounding variables might influence the
causal link.
Ultimately, ethical use and reportage of experimentation should be

addressed by researchers, reporters and readers alike.
Reporters of experimental research often seek to recognize their audience's

level of knowledge and try not to mislead readers. And readers must rely on
the author's skill and integrity to point out errors and limitations. The
relationship between researcher and reader may not sound like a problem,
but after spending months or years on a project to produce no significant
results, it may be tempting to manipulate the data to show significant
results in order to jockey for grants and tenure.
Meanwhile, the reader may uncritically accept results that receive validity by
being published in a journal. However, research that lacks credibility often
is not published; consequentially, researchers who fail to publish run the
risk of being denied grants, promotions, jobs, and tenure. While few
researchers are anything but earnest in their attempts to conduct well-
designed experiments and present the results in good faith, rhetorical
considerations often dictate a certain minimization of methodological flaws.

41
Concerns arise if researchers do not report all, or otherwise alter, results.

This phenomenon is counterbalanced, however, in that professionals are
also rewarded for publishing critiques of others' work. Because the author of
an experimental study is in essence making an argument for the existence of
a causal relationship, he or she must be concerned not only with its
integrity, but also with its presentation. Achieving persuasiveness in any
kind of writing involves several elements: choosing a topic of interest,
providing convincing evidence for one's argument, using tone and voice to
project credibility, and organizing the material in a way that meets
expectations for a logical sequence. Of course, what is regarded as pertinent,
accepted as evidence, required for credibility, and understood as logical
varies according to context. If the experimental researcher hopes to make an
impact on the community of professionals in their field, she must attend to
the standards and orthodoxy's of that audience.

42
Unit - 3
Survey Methods, Opinion Poll and Observation Method: - Basic Steps in

, Guiding Public Opinion Poll- Observation Methods, Survey Method-
Advantages and Requirements.
7 Different Types of Survey Methods
There are many reasons why surveys are important. Surveys help
researchers find solutions, create discussions, and make decisions. They
can also get to the bottom of the really important stuff, like, coffee or tea?
Dogs or cats? Elvis or The Beatles? When it comes to finding the answers to
these questions, there are 7 different types of survey methods to use.
Seven Different Types of Survey Methods

Different surveys serve different purposes, which is why there are a number
of them to choose from. ―What are the types of surveys I should use,‖ you
ask? Here‘s a look at the top seven types of survey methods researchers use
today.
1. Interviews
Also known as in-person surveys or household surveys, this used to be one
of the most popular types of survey to conduct. Researchers like them
because they involve getting face-to-face with individuals. Of course, this

43
method of surveying may seem antiquated when today we have online

surveying at our fingertips. However, interviews still serve a purpose.
Researchers conduct interviews when they want to discuss something
personal with people. For example, they may have questions that may
require extensive probing to uncover the truth. Sure, some interviewees may
be more comfortable answering questions confidentially behind a keyboard.
However, a skilled interviewer is able to put them at ease and get genuine
responses. They can often go deeper than you may be able to using other
surveying methods.
Often, in-person interviews are recorded on camera. This way, an expert can
review them afterward. They do this to determine if the answers given may
be false based on an interviewee‘s change in tone. A change in facial
expressions and body movements may also be a signal they pick up on.
2. Focus Groups
These types of surveys are conducted in-person as well. However, focus
groups involve a number of people rather than just one individual. The
group is generally small but demographically diverse and led by a
moderator. The focus group may be sampling new products, or to have a
discussion around a particular topic, often a hot-button one.
The purpose of a focus group survey is often to gauge people‘s reaction to a
product in a group setting, or to get people talking, interacting—and yes,
arguing—with the moderator taking notes on the group‘s behavior and
attitudes. This is often the most expensive survey method as a trained
moderator must be paid. In addition, locations must be secured, often in
various cities, and participants must be heavily incentivized to show up. Gift
cards in the $75-100 range for each survey participant are the norm.
3. Panel Sampling
Recruiting survey-takers from a panel maintained by a research company is
a surefire way to get respondents. Why? Because people have specifically
signed up to take them. The benefit of these types of surveys for research, of
course, is there you can be assured responses. In addition, you can filter
respondents by a variety of criteria to be sure you‘re speaking with your
target audience.
The downside is data quality. These individuals get survey offers frequently.
So, they may rush through them to get their inventive and move on to the
next one. In addition, if you‘re constantly tapping into the same people from
the same panel, are you truly getting a representative sample?
4. Telephone Surveys
Most telephone survey research types are conducted through random digit
dialing (RDD). RDD can reach both listed and unlisted numbers, improving

44
sampling accuracy. Surveys are conducted by interviewers through

computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) software. CATI displays the
questionnaire to the interviewer with a rotation of questions.
Telephone surveys started in the 1940s. In fact, in a recent blog, we
recounted how the predictions for the 1948 presidential election were
completely botched because of sampling bias in telephone surveys. Rising in
popularity in the late 50s and early 60s when the telephone became
common in most American households, telephone surveys are no longer a
very popular method of conducting a survey. Why? Because many people
refuse to take telephone surveys or simply are not answering calls from a
number they don‘t recognize. If a telephone survey is going to be conducted,
today‘s it‘s done through IVR, or interactive voice response. IVR means there
is no interviewer involved. Instead, customers record answers to pre-
recorded questions using numbers on their touch-tone keypads.
If a question is open-ended, the interviewee can respond by speaking and
the system records the answer. IVR surveys are often deployed to measure
how a customer feels about a service they just received. For example, after
calling your bank, you may be asked to stay on the line to answer a series of
questions about your experience.
5. Mail-in Surveys
These are delivered right to respondents‘ doorsteps! Mail surveys were
frequently used before the advent of the internet when respondents were
spread out geographically and budgets were modest. After all, mail-in
surveys didn‘t require much cost other than the postage.
So are mail-in surveys going the way of the dinosaur? Not necessarily. They
are still occasionally more valuable compared to different methods of
surveying. Because they are going to a specific name and home address,
they often feel more personalized. This personalization can prompt the
recipient to complete the survey.
They‘re also good for surveys of significant length. Most people have short
attention spans, and won‘t spend more than a few minutes on the phone or
filling out an online survey. At least, not without an incentive! However, with
a mail-in survey, the person can complete it at their leisure. They can fill out
some of it, set it aside, and then come back to it later. This gives mail-in
surveys a relatively high response rate.
6. Kiosk Surveys
These surveys happen on a computer screen at a physical location. You‘ve
probably seen them popping up in stores, hotel lobbies, hospitals, and office
spaces. These days, they‘re just about anywhere a researcher or marketer
wants to collect data from customers or passers-by. Kiosk surveys provide
immediate feedback following a purchase or an interaction. They collect

45
responses while the experience is still fresh in the respondent‘s mind. This
makes their judgment is more trustworthy.
7. Online Surveys
Online surveys are one of the most effective surveying methods. They can be
used by anyone for just about anything, and are easily customized for a
particular audience. There are many types of online surveys. You can email
them directly to people, house them on a website, or even advertise them
through Google Search.
The internet also makes it very easy to reach a very broad audience. It also
makes it just as easy to reach only a handful of people. That‘s been very
beneficial for companies that also want international responses.
Online Survey Usage

At one time, there was concern that online surveys had an age bias.
However, today there is a much better balance between age groups using the
internet. According to Statista, the share of adults in the United States
using the internet in 2019 are as follows:
 18-29 years old 100%
 30-49 years old 97%
 50-60 years old 88%
That‘s not all. People can take online surveys just about anywhere thanks to
mobile devices. The use of these devices across age groups is balancing out
as well. Data shows that in 2018, the use of a smartphone by age group was
as follows:
 18-29 years old 96%
 30-49 years old 92%
 50-60 years old 79%
With more and more people accessing the internet through their mobile
devices, now you can reach teens while they‘re between classes and adults
during their subway commute to work. Can‘t say that for those other types
of surveys!
Online surveys are also extremely cost-efficient. You don‘t have to spend
money on paper, printing, postage, or an interviewer. This significantly
reduces set-up and administration costs. This also allows researchers and
companies to send out a survey very expeditiously. Additionally, many
online survey tools provide in-depth analysis of survey data. This saves you
from having to spend money on further research once the survey is
complete.
!
What are the different types of survey methods?
The 7 most common survey methods are online surveys, in-person
interviews, focus groups, panel sampling, telephone surveys, mail-in
surveys, and kiosk surveys.
What are the benefits of an online survey?

46
Benefits of online surveys include their ability to reach a broad audience

and that they are relatively inexpensive.
What is a kiosk survey?
Kiosk surveys are surveys on a computer screen at the point of sale.
What is a focus group?
A focus group is an in-person interview or survey involving a group of people
rather than just one individual. The group is generally small but
demographically diverse, and led by a moderator.
Opinion Poll Method
Definition: The Opinion Poll Methods are used to collect opinions of those
who possess the knowledge about the market, such as sales representatives,
professional marketing experts, sales executives and marketing consultants.
The Opinion poll methods include the following survey methods:
1. Expert-Opinion Method: Companies with an adequate network of sales

representatives can capitalize on them in assessing the demand for a
target product in a particular region or locality that they represent. Since
sales representatives are in direct touch with the customer, are supposed to
know the future purchase plans of their customers, their preference for the
product, their reaction to the introduction of a new product, their reactions
to the market changes and the demand for rival products.

47
Thus, sales representatives are likely to provide an approximate, if not

accurate, estimation of demand for a target product in their respective
regions or areas. In the case of firms, which lack in sales representatives
can collect information regarding the demand for a product
through professional market experts or consultants, who can predict the
future demand on the basis of their expertise and experience.
Although the expert opinion method is too simple and inexpensive, it

suffers from serious limitations. First, The extent to which the estimates
provided by the sales representatives or professionals are reliable depends
on their skill and expertise to analyze the market and their
experience. Secondly, There are chances of over or under-estimation of
demand due to the subjective judgment of the assessor. Thirdly, the
evaluation of market demand is often based on inadequate information
available to the sales representatives since they have a narrow view of the
market.
2. Delphi Method: The Delphi method is the extension of the expert opinion
method wherein the divergent expert opinions are consolidated to
estimate a future demand. The process of the Delphi technique is very
simple. Under this method, the experts are provided with the information
related to estimates of forecasts of other experts along with the underlying
assumptions. The experts can revise their estimates in the light of demand
forecasts made by the other group of experts. The consensus of experts
regarding the forecast results in a final forecast.
3. Market Studies and Experiments: Another alternative method to collect
information regarding the current as well as future demand for a product is
to conduct market studies and experiments on the consumer behavior
under actual, but controlled market conditions. This method is commonly
known as Market Experiment Method.
Under this method, a firm select some areas of representative markets, such
as three or four cities having the similar characteristics in terms of the
population income levels, social and cultural background, choices and
preferences of consumers and occupational distribution. Then the market
experiments are carried out by changing the prices, advertisement
expenditure and all other controllable factors under demand function, other
things remaining the same. Once these changes are introduced in the
market, the consequent changes in the demand for a product are recorded.
On the basis of these recorded estimates, the elasticity coefficients are
calculated. These computed coefficients along with the demand function
variables are used to assess the future demand for a product.
The alternative method to market experiments is the Consumer Clinics or

Controlled Laboratory Method wherein the consumers are given some
money to make purchases in stipulated store goods with different prices,

48
packages, displays, etc. This experiment displays the responsiveness

towards the changes made in the prices, packaging and a display of the
product.One of the major limitations of market experiment method is that
it is too expensive and cannot be afforded by small firms. Also, this method
is based on short-term controlled conditions which might not exist in the
uncontrolled market. Therefore, the results may not be applicable in the
long term uncontrolled conditions.
Thus, these are some of the opinion poll methods that are used to gather
expert opinions of those who are closely related to the market with an aim to
estimate a future demand for the product.
Observation Methods
Observation (watching what people do) would seem to be an obvious method
of carrying out research in psychology. However, there are different types of
observational methods and distinctions need to be made between:
1. Controlled Observations
2. Naturalistic Observations
3. Participant Observations
In addition to the above categories observations can also be either
overt/disclosed (the participants know they are being studied) or
covert/undisclosed (the research keeps their real identity a secret from the
research subjects, acting as a genuine member of the group).
In general,
are
consuming
neededobservations
and
by longitudinal.
the researcher.
are relatively
However,
cheap they
to carry
canout
often
and be
few very
resources
time
Controlled Observation
Controlled observations (usually a structured observation) are likely to be
carried out in a psychology laboratory.
The researcher decides where the observation will take place, at what time,
with which participants, in what circumstances and uses a standardized
procedure. Participants are randomly allocated to each independent variable
group.
Rather than writing a detailed description of all behavior observed, it is often
easier to code behavior according to a previously agreed scale using a
behavior schedule (i.e. conducting a structured observation).
The researcher systematically classifies the behavior they observe into
distinct categories. Coding might involve numbers or letters to describe a
characteristic, or use of a scale to measure behavior intensity.
The categories on the schedule are coded so that the data collected can be
easily counted and turned into statistics.

49
For example, Mary Ainsworth used a behavior schedule to study how infants
responded to brief periods of separation from their mothers. During the
Strange Situation procedure infant's interaction behaviors directed toward
the mother were measured, e.g.
1. Proximity and contacting seeking

2. Contact maintaining
3. Avoidance of proximity and contact
4. Resistance to contact and comforting
The observer noted down the behavior displayed during 15-second intervals
and scored the behavior for intensity on a scale of 1 to 7.
Sometimes the behavior of participants is observed through a two-way

mirror or they are secretly filmed. This method was used by Albert Bandura
to study aggression in children (the Bobo doll studies).
A lot of research has been carried out in sleep laboratories as well. Here
electrodes are attached to the scalp of participants and what is observed are
the changes in electrical activity in the brain during sleep (the machine is
called an electroencephalogram – an EEG).
Controlled observations are usually overt as the researcher explains the
research aim to the group, so the participants know they are being observed.
Controlled observations are also usually non-participant as the researcher
avoids any direct contact with the group, keeping a distance (e.g. observing
behind a two-way mirror).
Strengths
1. Controlled observations can be easily replicated by other
researchers by using the same observation schedule. This means it is
easy to test for reliability.
2. The data obtained from structured observations is easier and
quicker to analyze as it is quantitative (i.e. numerical) - making this a
less time-consuming method compared to naturalistic observations.
3. Controlled observations are fairly quick to conduct which means
that many observations can take place within a short amount of time.
This means a large sample can be obtained resulting in the findings
being representative and having the ability to be generalized to a large
population.
Limitations

50
1. Controlled observations can lack validity due to the Hawthorne

effect/demand characteristics. When participants know they are being
watched they may act differently.
Naturalistic Observation
Naturalistic observation is a research method commonly used by
psychologists and other social scientists.
This technique involves observing involves studying the spontaneous
behavior of participants in natural surroundings. The researcher simply
records what they see in whatever way they can.
In unstructured observations, the researcher records all relevant behavior
without system. There may be too much to record and the behaviors
recorded may not necessarily be the most important so the approach is
usually used as a pilot study to see what type of behaviors would be
recorded.
Compared with controlled observations it is like the difference between
studying wild animals in a zoo and studying them in their natural habitat.
With regard to human subjects, Margaret Mead used this method to
research the way of life of different tribes living on islands in the South
Pacific. Kathy Sylva used it to study children at play by observing their
behavior in a playgroup in Oxfordshire.
Strengths
1 By being able to observe the flow of behavior in its own setting
studies have greater ecological validity.
2. Like case studies, naturalistic observation is often used to generate
new ideas. Because it gives the researcher the opportunity to study
the total situation it often suggests avenues of inquiry not thought of
before.
Limitations
1. These observations are often conducted on a micro (small) scale
and may lack a representative sample (biased in relation to age,
gender, social class or ethnicity). This may result in the findings
lacking the ability to be generalized to wider society.
2. Natural observations are less reliable as other variables cannot be
controlled. This makes it difficult for another researcher to repeat the
study in exactly the same way.
3. A further disadvantage is that the researcher needs to be trained to
be able to recognize aspects of a situation that are psychologically
significant and worth further attention.

51
4. With observations, we do not have manipulations of variables (or

control over extraneous variables) which means cause and effect
relationships cannot be established.
Participant Observation
Participant observation is a variant of the above (natural observations) but
here the researcher joins in and becomes part of the group they are studying
to get a deeper insight into their lives.
If it were research on animals we would now not only be studying them in
their natural habitat but be living alongside them as well!
This approach was used by Leon Festinger in a famous study into a religious
cult who believed that the end of the world was about to occur. He joined
the cult and studied how they reacted when the prophecy did not come true.
Participant observations can be either cover or overt. Covert is where the
study is carried out 'undercover'. The researcher's real identity and purpose
are kept concealed from the group being studied.
The researcher takes a false identity and role, usually posing as a genuine
member of the group.
On the other hand, overt is where the researcher reveals his or her true
identity and purpose to the group and asks permission to observe.
Limitations
1. It can be difficult to get time / privacy for recording. For example,
with covert observations researchers can‘t take notes openly as this
would blow their cover. This means they have to wait until they are
alone and rely on their memory. This is a problem as they may forget
details and are unlikely to remember direct quotations.
2. If the researcher becomes too involved they may lose objectivity and
become bias. There is always the danger that we will ―see‖ what we
expect (or want) to see. This is a problem as they could selectively
report information instead of noting everything they observe. Thus
reducing the validity of their data.
Recording of Data
With controlled / structured observation studies an important decision the
researcher has to make is how to classify and record the data. Usually this
will involve a method of sampling. The three main sampling methods are:
1. Event sampling. The observer decides in advance what types of

behavior (events) she is interested in and records all occurrences. All
other types of behavior are ignored.

52
2. Time sampling. The observer decides in advance that observation will

take place only during specified time periods (e.g. 10 minutes every
hour, 1 hour per day) and records the occurrence of the specified
behavior during that period only.
3. Instantaneous (target time) sampling. The observer decides in
advance the pre-selected moments when observation will take place
and records what is happening at that instant. Everything happening
before or after is ignored.

53

Course-2: Social Psychology
Unit - 4
4. Person Perceptions, Object Perception, and Social Interaction: Person Perceptions-
Impression Formation, Trait Centrality, Effect of First Impression, Stereotypes,
Analysis of person perception, prediction, Object Perception; Features of Perception,
Effect of experience, motivation and expectation on Perception, Social Perception and
Social Interaction.
What Is Person Perception?

Person Perception
Person perception refers to a general tendency to form impressions of other

people. Some forms of person perception occur indirectly and require
inferring information about a person based on observations of behaviors or
based on second-hand information. Other forms of person perception occur
more directly and require little more than seeing another person. Both of
these types of person perception provide a foundation from which
subsequent judgments are formed and subsequent interactions are shaped.
How Do We Form Impressions of Other People?
In social psychology, the term person perception refers to the different

mental processes that we use to form impressions of other people. This

54
includes not just how we form these impressions, but the different
conclusions we make about other people based upon our impressions.
Consider how often you make these kinds of judgments every day. When
you meet with a new co-worker, you immediately begin to develop an initial
impression of this person.
When you visit the grocery store after work, you might draw conclusions
about the cashier who checks you out, even though you know very little
about this person.
This allows us to make snap judgments and decisions, but it can also lead
to biased or stereotyped perceptions of other people. Let's take a closer look
at how person perception works and the impact it has on our day-to-day
interactions with other people.
What Information Do We Use to Form Impressions of Others?
Obviously, person perception can be a very subjective process that can be

impacted by many variables. Factors that can influence the impressions you
form of other people include the characteristics of the person you are
observing, the context of the situation, your own personal traits and your
past experiences.
People often form impressions of others very quickly with only minimal
information. We frequently base our impressions on the roles and social
norms we expect from people.
Healthy Mind
Learn the right way and the wrong way to manage stress and negativity in
your life.
For example, you might form an impression of a city bus driver based on
how you would anticipate that a person in that role to behave, considering
individual personality characteristics only after you have formed this initial
impression.
Physical cues can also play an important role. If you see a woman dressed
in a professional-looking suit, you might immediately assume that she
works in a formal setting, perhaps at a law firm or bank.
Salience of the information we perceive is also important. Generally, we

tend to focus on the most obvious points rather than noting background
information. The more novel or obvious a factor is, the more likely we are to
focus on it. If you see a woman dressed in a tailored suit and her hair styled

55
in a bright pink mohawk, you are likely to pay more attention to her
unusual hairstyle than her sensible business attire.
Social Categorization
One of the mental shortcuts that we use in person perception is known as

social categorization. In the social categorization process, we mentally
categorize people into different groups based on common characteristics.
Sometimes this process occurs consciously, but for the most part social
categorizations happens automatically and unconsciously. Some of the most
common grouping people use include age, gender, occupation and race.
As with many mental shortcuts, social categorization has both positive and
negative aspects. One of the strengths of social categorization is that it
allows people to make judgments very quickly.
Realistically, you simply do not have time to get to know each person you
meet on an individual, personal basis. Using social categorization allows you
to make decisions and establish expectations of how people will behave in
certain situations very quickly, which allows you to focus on other things.
The problems with this technique include the fact that it can lead to errors
and as well as stereotyping or even prejudice.
Consider this example:
Imagine that you are getting on a bus but there are only two seats available.
One seat is next to a petite, silver-haired, elderly woman, the other seat is
next to a burly, grim-faced man. Based on your immediate impression, you
sit next to the elderly woman, who unfortunately turns out to be quite
skilled at picking pockets. Because of social categorization, you immediately
judged the woman as harmless and the man as threatening, leading to the
loss of your wallet. While social categorization can be useful at times, it can
also lead to these kinds of misjudgments.
Implicit Personality Theories
An implicit personality theory is a collection of beliefs and assumptions

that we have about how certain traits are linked to other characteristics and
behaviors. Once we know something about a cardinal trait, we assume that
the person also exhibits other traits that are commonly linked to that key
characteristic.
For example, if you learn that a new co-worker is very happy, you might
immediately assume that she is also friendly, kind and generous. As with
social categorization, implicit personality theories help people make
judgments quickly, but they can also contribute to stereotyping and errors.

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trait centrality
A tendency of certain personality traits to have an overwhelming effect in
impression formation, even influencing the interpretation of other traits
associated with the person being judged . The phenomenon was discovered
in 1946 by the Polish-born US psychologist Solomon E(lliott) Asch (1907–
96), who presented one group of judges with a description of a target person
who was described as intelligent, skilful, industrious, warm, determined,
practical, and cautious and another group of judges with a description that
was identical apart from the replacement of warm with cold.
The warm/cold trait turned out to be central in the sense of profoundly
affecting the overall impression of the target person. When the list of traits
contained warm, 91 per cent of judges guessed that the target person was
also generous, compared with only 8 per cent when the list contained cold.
When the stimulus list included warm, the target person tended to be
perceived as also being happy, humorous, sociable, and popular, but when
the stimulus list included cold, most judges thought the stimulus person
would not have those traits but would be persistent, serious, and restrained.
Other traits, such as reliable, were not significantly affected by
the warm/cold trait. Other trait pairs, such as polite/blunt, do not produce
the same centrality effect. Central traits are believed to have the property of
centrality by virtue of being highly correlated with other traits in the judges'

57
implicit personality theories. The phenomenon illustrates the property of a
Gestalt in which the whole is more than the mere sum of its parts.
First Impressions and its affects
First impressions are long-lasting. This familiar phrase indicates one of the
many reasons that studying people‘s first impressions is critical for social
psychologists. Any information about a person, from her physical properties
to her nonverbal and verbal behaviors, and even the environment she
inhabits, influences our impressions and judgments about her (e.g., Ambady
& Rosenthal, 1993; Gosling, Ko, Mannarell, & Morris, 2002). First
impressions have been shown to last for months (Gunaydin, Selcuk, &
Zayas, 2017) and affect personal judgments even in the presence of
contradictory evidence about the individual (e.g., Rydell & McConnell, 2006).
This article will briefly discuss some critical aspects of first impressions
based on existing social psychological research, including my own.
Types of First Impressions
What are our first impressions about? Social cognition literature
conceptualizes impressions via a number of constructs. The most studied
form of impression in social cognition is traits; people tend to form split-
second impressions with regard to others‘ presumably stable characteristics,
such as trustworthiness and competence. They do this from others‘ facial
appearances (e.g., Willis & Todorov, 2006) and simple behaviors — for
example, having observed a person taking an elevator up one flight, people

58
may infer that she is lazy (Uleman, Blader, & Todorov, 2005). The goals,
values, and beliefs of others also have been shown to influence first
impressions (Moskowitz & Olcaysoy Okten, 2016).
Recent research from our lab has demonstrated the effect of behavior
characteristics on first impressions; when initially observed behaviors of
others are known or believed to be consistent over time, formation of trait
inferences has been observed to be more likely (Olcaysoy Okten &
Moskowitz, 2017). Considering the elevator example, having observed the
same person taking an elevator up one flight on several occasions, people
become more confident in their assessment of this person as lazy. However,
when a person takes an elevator up one flight only on a specific occasion,
people may believe he wants to be quick in this specific situation.
Measuring Impressions: Explicit or Implicit?
First impressions are manifested not only in perceivers‘ explicit reactions
but also in their spontaneous inferences. Implicit measures aim to capture
the spontaneous impressions that are typically invisible to the perceivers —
impressions they have formed without any awareness or intention. While
explicit measures of impressions include self-report tests such as ratings of
evaluations or inferences, implicit measures include memory tests that
measure the extent to which the target person is associated with a construct
(such as a trait) in memory. The exact relationship between implicit and
explicit forms of impressions has been a controversial question in the field of
social cognition (Payne, Burkley, & Stokes, 2008).

59
Research from many labs has also consistently shown that implicit
impressions are resistant to change. When changes in impressions do occur,
it is typically explicit, but not implicit, trait inferences that are altered. For
example, after learning that the person who took the elevator up one flight
on several occasions actually works out regularly, perceivers update their
initial explicit judgment of her being lazy. However, they still tend to classify
the person as lazy in an implicit memory task. Thus, implicit biases can
persist and affect interpersonal interactions in significant ways, even when
perceivers are convinced that they have changed their impressions in light of
new information.
Why does someone form an impression of another person? Research has
shown that the answer to this question is critical to determining the way in
which people process information about others. Adopting the mindset of a
―reporter‖ whose goal is merely to discover the facts about a person might
leave one with a completely different impression than adopting the mindset
of a person on a blind date. In the former case, perceivers engage in
systematic (comprehensive) processing, whereas in the latter case, they tend
to rely on heuristics that are consistent with their goal to affiliate with the
given person (Chen, Shechter, & Chaiken, 1996). Such motivated processing
can trigger a positivity bias in evaluating others.
Impressions also are affected by environmental cues: For example, people
perceive an ambiguous behavior differently after being primed to see a trait
as ―bold‖ versus ―reckless‖ (Higgins, Rholes, & Jones, 1977). Perceivers‘
long-term goals also affect their interpretations of others‘ actions during first

60
encounters. For example, those who have a higher need to reduce
uncertainty in their interpersonal interactions are more likely to infer stable
traits from mundane behaviors of others (Moskowitz, 1993) and less likely to
change their first impressions even after learning that those impressions
were inaccurate (Wyer, 2016).
Behavioral Implications of First Impressions
Despite the large literature on the formation of and change in first
impressions, less is known about their behavioral consequences. Much of
the existing research has focused on behavioral consequences of first
impressions related to an existing stigma. In these studies, perceivers‘
stigma-related impressions resulted in discriminatory practices, such as
avoidance of interaction and experience of physiological threat during such
interactions
Other research has focused on the outcomes in the domain of job
recruitment. First impressions significantly predict employers‘ behavioral
tendencies during job interviews as well as their ultimate recruitment
decisions . Specifically, employers tend to ask questions that confirm their
first impressions about the candidates and treat them in ways that are
consistent with such impressions. If their initial impressions of the
candidates are positive, employers show a higher tendency to ―sell‖ the job
by providing information to the candidates about the job rather than
gathering information from them. In turn, employers‘ warmer behaviors
typically elicit warmer behaviors from the candidates, and thus the

61
employers‘ initial positive impressions about the candidates are validated.
Importantly, however, even in cases when a job candidate performs in ways
that disconfirm employers‘ first impressions, employers may fail to assess
the candidate‘s performance accurately, preventing them from changing
their first impressions accordingly. Research has shown that this might be
due to high levels of self-regulation on behalf of the interviewers. Therefore,
reducing cognitive demands in an interview context by using scripted
questions or having third-party observers evaluate the interview process
might be effective in fostering accurate impressions and judgments of a job
candidate.
When forming first impressions, people typically have to rely on
limited and potentially misleading information about others. Drawing big
conclusions from such limited information can lead to poor decisions with
broader implications. Understanding the origins and consequences of first
impressions is the first step to addressing biases in those impressions. The
points discussed above aim to provide a brief guide to the students of
psychological science who are interested in taking part in this scientific
journey.
Stereotypes and the role of Stereotypes in Perception
The term stereotype means something fixed, without variations. In a

psychological sense it means a fixed way of responding to or perceiving or
judging the qualities of a group of people who shared some common
characteristics.

62
For example, if we believe that every person who is able to communicate

fluently in the English language should be very intelligent, then this is an
example of stereotyping. Now what is happening here is that certain fixed
ways of perceiving which have been learnt and acquired earlier in different
contexts come to control and determine ‗person perception‘ irrespective of
the particular situation and object-specific characteristics.
Thus, there are several examples of stereotyping. When the senior author
was young ‗he used to be told that people who are very short cannot be
trusted‘. Similarly in some cities in the north, house owners prefer South
Indian tenants, because people from the south are generally perceived as
cleanliness-oriented, less aggressive, and pay the rent regularly.
Now we can see that impressions acquired earlier based on one‘s own
limited experience or impressions transmitted by others and not based on
one‘s Stereotypes lead us to attribute certain qualities to others. Very often,
this results in wrong perception and judgement, making us insensitive to
individual differences. But occasionally stereotypes do provide a helpful base
for perceiving and judging others. Stereotypes can be positive or negative.
Similarly, they may influence not only our perception of other persons but
also sometimes of even physical objects. Thus, brand loyalty is an example
of a stereotype. Many people come to believe that a certain branded tea is
good and go on hunting for it. This is also an example of stereotypes.
Some of the earliest studies on stereotypes were carried out at the University
of Michigan (Katz, Rice and others). In a very interesting experiment, a set of
photographs of people dressed in different styles was given. The reader were
told that one photo was that of a senator, one that of a politician, one that of
a bootlegger etc.
They were asked to identify which photographs represented whom. Actually,
there was no other clue and the reader should have pleaded their inability to
do what they were asked to do, but this did not happen. Very quietly and
silently they went on identifying and matching the various photographs with
various occupations and of course most of their judgements were wrong.
Subsequently when they were asked as to what cues they have employed,

63
they were rather vague and referred to the dress, the type of hat a person
was wearing etc.
Here we have an example of stereotypes influencing perception.
In our everyday life our perceptions are very much influenced by past
learning or experience to a large extent. No doubt, all perceptions are
influenced to some extent by past experience. But in the case of stereotyped
perception, past experience completely determines the perception, the
present cues being totally overlooked.
We thus have in our social vocabulary a lot of stereotypes. We have

stereotypes about people, communities, institutions and nationalities. For
example, if I am told that a particular young person has a degree from one of
the reputed institutions, immediately I conclude that he must be very
intelligent, very competent and must be hailing from a very cultured
background; my imagination may run riot.
Stereotypes very often lead us to misperception and wrong judgement.

Sometimes, they are partially true but rarely totally true. What is happening
here is that several characteristics are attributed to a person or persons,
based simply on past knowledge or information. Stereotypes involve a
considerable amount of stimulus generalization.
Introduction to special issue on “Prediction in Perception and Action”
The wide diversity of articles in this issue reveals an explosion of evidence
for the mechanisms of prediction in the visual system. When thought of as
visual priors, predictive mechanisms can be seen as tightly interwoven with
incoming sensory data. Prediction is thus a fundamental and essential
aspect not only of visual perception but of the actions that are guided by
perception.
Introduction

64
Prediction has long been recognized as an important feature of human
behavior, and predictive mechanisms are found at many different levels of
processing. Significant sensory-motor delays present a problem in a
dynamically changing environment, and it is therefore necessary to predict
the future state of the environment based on past experience of how it is
likely to change over time. Predictive mechanisms help us to anticipate how
our environment will change and to adjust our behavior accordingly. They
also allow us to take account of the time required both to process sensory
information and to move the body when interacting with our environment.
Besides anticipating changes in the outside world, predictive mechanisms
allow us to anticipate the future consequences of our own actions, making it
easier to distinguish between external and self-generated sensory events. In
general, prediction is important from basic levels of sensory-motor control,
such as making an eye movement toward a moving object, to the most
abstract levels of processing, such as predicting social behavior.
Some of the clearest examples of prediction come from motor control. Babies
learn to predict a moving object's future position within the first year of life.
This is more advanced in adult observers, who even appear to be able to
predict the trajectory of bouncing balls based on inferences about a ball's
physical properties . In the somatosensory system, it is commonly accepted
that the proprioceptive consequences of a planned movement are predicted
ahead of time using stored internal models of the body's dynamics, and the
comparison of actual and predicted somatosensory feedback is a critical
component of the control of movement. Indeed, when somatosensory

65
feedback is severely compromised by somatosensory loss, the consequences
for movement can be devastating.
Prediction plays a role at many different levels in motor control. For
example, in eye movements, efference-copy mechanisms serve as a very
basic form of prediction for differentiating self-induced from external visual
motion patterns. Accurate motor control for more complex actions is based
on processes ranging from simple sensory predictions to internal
simulations of complete action sequences. Despite the importance of
somatosensory predictions, evidence for predictive visual representations
has been less clear. The current issue of Journal of Vision provides a wealth
of evidence for the importance of visual prediction at all levels of visual
representation.
A number of aspects to prediction are considered in this special issue and
need to be distinguished. The most obvious is predicting future visual states
of the world, such as the future location of a moving target. Another issue is
the need to predict the visual consequences of self-motion. This is essential
for separating externally from internally generated retinal motion. This is
important for analysis of sensory information at all levels of abstraction,
from using retinal motion signals to control pursuit eye movements to using
cognitive information to make strategic decisions. Because prediction is
based on past experience, the encoding of scene statistics is also important,
both in terms of how such encoding is achieved and maintained and in
terms of how they are encoded within the nervous system. Articles in this
special issue cover all these aspects of prediction. This Introduction to the

66
Special Issue provides an overview of the articles published in this issue in
the context of the different ways in which visual predictions are important. It
starts with predictions that allow one to anticipate changes in the world on
the basis of visual information. Next are predictions that allow one to
understand the sensory consequences of one's own motion, including eye
and arm movements. It ends with studies that combine predictive
mechanisms of self-motion and motion in the environment.
Predicting sensory changes in the world
In its purest manifestation, the visual system should be able to compute
perceptual representations that correspond to a predicted future state. This
is perhaps easiest to understand in the case of object motion. Assad and
Maunsell showed that neurons in the parietal cortex responded to a moving
target throughout a period of stimulus occlusion. That is, the neurons
responded as if they were able to extrapolate the response to the currently
invisible target from previous exposure. A variety of perceptual phenomena
might be related to a predictive representation of motion. Such mechanisms
could lead to static stimuli being mislocalized relative to moving stimuli. One
such phenomenon is called the ―flash-grab‖ effect. Two articles in this issue
by Hogendoorn and provide support for extrapolation using motion signals.
They explore the mechanisms involved, suggesting that a predictive signal is
active in monocular parts of the human visual pathway.
When moving to more complex predictions, one must consider how such
predictions arise. The statistics of the visual environment shape the visual
system, and this in turn shapes visual perception to allow one to make

67
perceptual inferences about the state of the world. Vullings and Madelain
test the idea that predictive mechanisms control learning of temporal and
spatial properties of the environment. They use a visual search task in
which targets are presented contingent on saccadic reaction times,
essentially reinforcing either short- or long-latency saccades by presenting
the visual target at a specific time. Their results show that saccade latencies
are finely tuned to prediction-driven reinforcement contingencies. Notaro et
al. also provide a demonstration of the process of learning environmental
statistics. They monitor such learning by examining small anticipatory drifts
and saccades in the direction of the most likely upcoming target. show that
such learning can be very specific. They show that somatosensory
experience with hard or soft objects modifies the force observers use when
interacting with the object. Interestingly, visual or semantic information
does not, indicating that the predictions are purely somatosensory.
Several articles in this Special Issue are concerned with the neural
mechanisms underlying prediction. In a now-classic article, Rao and Ballard
introduced the idea of predictive coding. In their model of object
recognition, high-level object representations are propagated to early visual
areas, where they are subtracted from the incoming visual signals. The
mismatch, or residual, reflects the unexplained sensory input that may need
a revised model. At all stages of processing, sensory information is compared
against predictions of expected sensory events made by higher-level
perceptual areas, and the residuals, or prediction errors, are propagated
upward to update perceptual models of the environment. This model is the

68
percept. This idea naturally allows prediction in time, although Rao and
Ballard (1999) did not explicitly address that issue, and the stored memory
representations can be thought of as Bayesian priors.
A number of recent articles have provided compelling evidence for low-level
visual activity prior to stimulus presentation, consistent with the predictive
coding hypothesis Two articles in the Special Issue provide evidence for
high-level predictive representations using EEG. Oxner show that
prediction errors in surface segmentation are associated with visual
mismatch negativity and with the P2 wave in the event-related potential.
Based on amplitude differences in the error-related negativity, Maurer
suggest that the brain generates error predictions that can dissociate
relevant from irrelevant errors and that relevant errors lead to larger
behavioral adjustments than irrelevant ones. Krala show the involvement of
high-level cortical regions in prediction, irrespective of the sensory modality
involved. These articles highlight the ubiquitous comparison of sensory
information with predicted outcome across low-level and high-level cortical
areas.
Predicting the consequences of one's own actions
Perhaps the most fundamental aspect of prediction is the need to take
account of the visual consequences of self-motion—in particular, the image
displacement on the retina that accompanies an eye movement. There has
been a substantial body of work demonstrating remapping of visual
receptive fields before a saccade . Predictive remapping occurs not only in
lateral intraparietal cortex but also in superior colliculus, frontal eye fields,

69
and area V3. Evidence from neuro physiological studies indicates that
predictive remapping is mediated by a corollary discharge signal originating
in the superior colliculus and mediodorsal nucleus of the thalamus . This
predictive remapping might be part of a mechanism for visual stability that
relates the pre- and postsaccadic images of a stimulus . In the current
issue, Murdison demonstrate that predictive remapping not only takes
account of vertical and horizontal displacements caused by saccadic eye
movements but also extends to the torsional change that occurs during an
oblique saccade to a new location. This suggests that observers have finely
calibrated expectations resulting from their own movements and are able to
learn the complex image remappings that result from self-movements.
Recent studies have shown that predictive remapping shifts the focus of
attention prior to saccade onset and leads to lingering attention after the
saccade . A novel computational model accounts for both types of
attentional updating and shows that these phenomena rely on the same
neural circuit . Predictive remapping allows constancy of visual direction,
but other aspects of integrating information across saccades need to be
considered, such as relating the appearance of visual stimuli in peripheral
and central vision, given that the spatial filtering in the retina provides such
disparate signals. We do not typically perceive an object as entirely different
when we look at it. Valsecchi used a novel method of manipulating images
to show that peripheral stimuli appear to have sharper edges than would be
expected on the basis of peripheral acuity losses. That is, they appear as
they would when viewed foveally. Thus, humans appear to learn the relation

70
between peripheral and central images in order to maintain constancy of
appearance as well as constancy of direction.
One interesting development revealed in this issue is the multisensory
nature of predictive mechanisms that take account of self-motion. It has
been demonstrated that when participants reach to grasp an object,
somatosensory sensitivity is suppressed at movement-relevant locations
shortly before and during the movement. Voudouris, Broda, and Fiehler
(2019) had participants reach to grasp an object whose distribution of mass
was either predictable from its visual appearance or unpredictable. They
found that somatosensory sensitivity was suppressed more when
participants could predict the mass distribution from visual features. Thus,
visual information can be used to generate somatosensory predictions for
the control of reaching and grasping.
Arikan et al. (2019) also demonstrate the multisensory nature of
suppression during self-generated movements. They found reduced blood
oxygenation level dependent (BOLD) activity in somatosensory, visual, and
auditory regions during self-generated movements (vs. passive, externally
generated movements). Moreover, they found stronger suppression for
multisensory than unisensory movements and confirmed the role of the
cerebellum in detecting delays between the action and its visual
consequences. Such predictive mechanisms seem to be enhanced in older
age when sensory input becomes increasingly noisy. Klever et al.
(2019) found stronger suppression of somatosensory sensitivity in a group of
older compared to younger participants in a visually guided reaching task.

71
Interestingly, the strength of suppression correlated negatively with
individual executive capacities, highlighting the interaction between sensory,
motor, and predictive processes modulated by cognitive resources.
Krugwasser (2019) investigated how predictions of sensory action
consequences are processed. Participants saw a virtual hand moving either
in the same manner as their own or with a temporal, spatial, or anatomical
alteration. They had to attribute an action to the self or an external source.
There were similarities in the sense of agency across temporal, spatial, and
anatomical manipulations, indicating joint processing of the sense of agency
across different sensorimotor aspects. The review by Fiehler, Brenner, and
Spering (2019) further discusses the implications of sensory attenuations of
predicted movement consequences, how they are linked to task demands,
and the processing of such signals.
Combining predictions of eye, arm, and object movements
Prediction plays an important role in the oculomotor system. Both smooth
pursuit and saccadic eye movements reveal predictions of the future visual
stimulus in both laboratory and real-world contexts. In this issue, Fiehler et
al. (2019) review the role of prediction in goal-directed movements. This
review covers classic paradigms and novel approaches investigating
predictions in the planning of eye and hand movements and touches on
many of the other aspects of visual prediction introduced here.
Combining predictions of eye, arm, and object movements is challenging, as
they differ in latencies and dynamics. For example, a predictive component
is necessary for the smooth coordination of pursuit and saccades. Goettker

72
show that the pursuit and saccadic system share a common internal
representation of the target movement and interact closely to improve
tracking responses rapidly. Congruently, Kwon show that the integration of
position and motion information extends to the ocular following
response. Rothwell et al. (in press) compared the role of different cues in
driving anticipatory smooth pursuit and anticipatory ocular torsion and
found that the predictive drive for these two types of eye movements might
be partly decoupled. Delle Monache demonstrate a role of an internal model
of gravity for oculomotor control, tailored to the requirements of the visual
context, for both predictive saccades and pursuit. Eye movements scaled
with gravity accelerations, but only when observers tracked a ball in the
context of a pictorial scene, not when faced with a uniform background.
These results emphasize that predictive eye movements are tuned to
realistic scene properties.
Another important aspect of the predictive component of pursuit is that it
allows better performance in intercepting moving targets. Binaee and Diaz
(2019) show that predictive saccades and hand movements share a
representation that is presumably important for interceptions. In their
experiment, participants intercepted virtual balls with a racquet while the
ball was occluded for varying periods. When occlusion increased the
spatiotemporal demands of the task, some participants demonstrated a
strong correlation between saccade prediction accuracy and the accuracy of
hand placement. Fooken and Spering (2019) used a go/no-go manual
interception paradigm to show that predictive eye and hand movements

73
jointly signal the upcoming decision about a future target. Similar predictive
behavioral responses are shown in a manual tracking task, where different
cursor speeds were related to different perceptual decisions. Mann used a
virtual tennis environment to show how a combination of tracking and
predictive eye and head movements helps keep gaze close to the ball despite
the ball bouncing as it approaches. These studies focus on tracking and
intercepting moving objects, but prediction is similarly important in other
real-world tasks such as driving. It should be noted that the mechanisms
underlying predictive eye movements or body movements are not entirely
clear. Zhao and Warren (2015) argue that interception depends on some
visual parameter that is monitored continuously and controlled by the
interceptive action, such as maintaining a constant bearing angle, and that
the role of spatial memory or prediction is very modest. In cases where the
action precedes the moving object in time, it can be argued that the
prediction is based purely on recent sensory data and that a visual
representation mediating prediction is unnecessary. The most likely
resolution of this issue is that the domains where these different
mechanisms operate depend on factors such as internal and external noise
and the time available for the response. Aguilar-Lleyda et al. (2018) used a
timing coincidence task and presented a Kalman filter model that samples
and updates the position of a moving target by optimally combining spatial
and temporal information. The authors suggest that a single mechanism
based on position tracking can account for both spatial and temporal
relations between physical target and response. Finally, insights into the

74
relation between manual actions and prediction abilities can be gained from
developmental studies. In this issue, Gehb and colleagues (2019) show that
object experiences gathered by specific manual exploratory actions might
facilitate infants‘ predictive abilities when reaching and grasping.
Conclusions
The wide diversity of articles in this issue provides a broad overview of the
role and mechanisms of prediction in the visual system. This includes
predicting ongoing motion as well as building visual priors about the world
with which to anticipate future events. In all cases, predictive mechanisms
are tightly interwoven with incoming sensory data. The articles in this issue
show that prediction is a fundamental and essential aspect of visual
perception, as well as of the actions that are guided by perception.


M.SC I - Course3 - Psychopathology

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Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

M.Sc. Psychology I Year

Block-II: Causes of Abnormal Behavior

Block-III: Psycho-physiological Disorder and Health Psychology

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

Block-IV: Psychological Disorders

M.Sc. Psychology I Year

1. Social Psychology: Definitions of Social Psychology: Historical

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

What Is Social Psychology? Definition and Examples

What Is Social Psychology?

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

It is important to note that social psychology is not just about looking at

These and other researchers wanted to uncover how human perceptions —

As the field of psychology matured, researchers began to focus on

Today, researchers and academics examine nearly every aspect of human

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

Association (APA) lists 15 subfields of psychology, including clinical

Social psychology is one of the broadest and most complex subcategories

History of Social Psychology

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

Finally, it is important to distinguish between social psychology and

Social Psychology Definition

Social psychology is the study of how individual or group behavior is

In seeking the answer to that basic question, researchers conduct empirical

 How do individuals alter their thoughts and decisions based on social

Social Psychology vs. Sociology

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

Social psychology, according to Ellwood, is ―the study of the [individual

Different Ways of Looking at Similar Issues

This information could be considered a starting point for research by a

For example, a sociologist might focus on the potential far-reaching effects

For instance, a sociologist might conduct research into how a group of

They formulated social identity theory, which seeks to explain the

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

matters. Group members perceive themselves, at least in part, through the

Another aspect of social identity theory is the tendency toward tribalism, or

 Categorization — Separating individuals based on characteristics such as

In this way, individual social identity is sublimated to the group. Personal

The History of Social Psychology

The science of social psychology began when scientists first started to

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

people. In 1954, Festinger edited an influential book called Research

Social psychology was energized by researchers who attempted to

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

frequently serve as expert witnesses on these and other topics (Fiske,

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

of social neuroscience—the study of how our social behavior both influences

―Social psychology is a discipline that attempts to understand and explain

Scope of Social Psychology

1) First, it tries to understand how the thoughts, feelings and behaviours

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

2) Second, it tries to understand the influence of individual

3) Third, and finally, social psychology tries to understand groups

It enquires questions like:

Do groups behave in a different way than an individual outside the group?

Relationship between Social Psychology and Other Sciences

Prepared by Ch.S.Chakrapani, M.Sc(Psychology) Ist Year – Course III – Pathopsychology

1. Relationship between social psychology and sociology

2. Relationship between social psychology and anthropology