Exam 2 Review – Spring 2014
(updated 2/26 w/some removal of info indicated by strike-throughs)

Chapter 4 – Attitudes & Behaviors

  • Definition of attitude – affective, behavioral, cognitive components
  • Attitude assessment – problems with self-reports?
  • LaPiere’s research on self-reports versus behavioral observations
  • Covert measures as alternatives to self-report
  • Implicit Association Tests (IAT) – how does it work?
  • Fishbein & Ajzen’s Theory of Planned Behavior:
  • Principle of Aggregation – how could this improve self-reports?
  • Level of Specificity – how could this improve self-reports?
  • Theory of Planned Behavior (see Fig 4.2)
  • Intention is the best predictor of behavior
  • Importance of roles in determining our behaviors & influencing attitudes:
  • Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) as example
  • Details of the study – how were participants assigned to roles of ‘guard’ and ‘prisoner’?
  • How did the role play impact their behavior & attitudes?
  • How/why did the study end?
  • What are 3 main lessons from the SPE?
  • How does behavior affect attitudes?
  • Foot-in-the door – how does this work? Role of self-perception?
  • Cognitive Dissonance –another explanation for why behavior affects attitudes
  • Festinger’s original experiment
  • People are motivated by consistency (betw beh + attitude)
  • Tension/anxiety if feel inconsistent
  • How did he study cog dissonance? (boring task, $1 or $20…)
  • Results of his study? Whose attitudes changed most?
  • Self-Perception theory – alternate to cog dissonance theory
  • If difficult to interpret our feelings or when weak attitude  look to our behavior for clues
  • Self-Perception & Emotion
  • Facial feedback – how does this work?
  • Embodied cognition – what is it and how does it work?
  • Self-Perception & Motivation
  • Overjustification effect – what is it? When might motivation be reduced by rewards?
  • Example of research on kids’ motivation
  • Comparing Cog Dissonance & Self-Perception theories –
  • Difference based on whether anxiety/tension is emphasized or not
  • Which theory better explains attitude change? Attitude formation?

Chapter 7 – Persuasion

  • Persuasion
  • Central route to persuasion – how does it work? Example?
  • Peripheral route to persuasion – how does it work? Example?
  • What determines which route we use?
  • Source of Persuasion:
  • Importance of credibility – how does this work?
  • Importance of likeability – based on similarity and physical attractiveness
  • Message:
  • Primacy vs. recency effect for information & persuasion?
  • Fear-based messages – what kinds are most effective?
  • Subliminal messages – what are they?
  • Distinguish between subliminal perception & persuasion
  • Greenwald experiment – self-help tapes with self-esteem vs. memory focus; what were the results?
  • Murphy experiment – with Chinese characters – what were the results?
  • Audience
  • Do individual differences affect our ‘persuadability’?
  • Forewarning & resistance – consider counterarguments
  • Effects of age: what are the lifecycle and generational explanations for persuasion/attitude change?
  • Is there more support for lifecycle or generational?
  • Extreme Persuasion: Example of Cults
  • Jim Jones’ People’s Temple and Jonestown Massacre
  • 1978 mass suicide & Jones’ influence
  • What explanations focused on Jones?
  • What are situational explanations for the suicides?
  • The use of source, message, & audience effects in cults
  • Resisting Persuasion
  • Counterarguments – link to inoculation hypothesis
  • How does it work?
  • Possibility of reactance effect?
  • Attitude Inoculation applications –
  • Kids & toy commercials – does it work?

Chapter 6 – Conformity & Obedience (note that this material may change slightly based on class coverage, check your notes to determine what was covered in class)

  • Types of Social Influence – conformity, compliance, & obedience (definitions & how does each differ from the others?)
  • Effects of mimicking others – automatic process? Social functions of mimicking? (Chartrand’s research on gestures)
  • Classic Conformity studies (Sherif Asch)
  • Sherif’s study – autokinetic effect (pinpoint of light)
  • How was the study done? Results?
  • Asch’s study – line judgments
  • How was the study done? Results?
  • Differences between Sherif’s and Asch’s studies?
  • Why do people conform?
  • Information purposes
  • Normative purposes
  • Public vs. private conformity – what is the distinction?
  • Majority influences on conformity
  • What is the influence of group size on conformity?
  • What is the effect of seeing other nonconformists?
  • Does it matter if the other nonconformists agree or disagree with you?
  • Compliance
  • Langer’s experiment – Xerox machine & requests to cut in line; results?
  • Strategies for compliance –
  • Reciprocity norm – are there immediate or delayed responses?
  • Door-in-the-face technique – how does it work? Example?
  • Obedience
  • Milgram’s research:
  • Original experiment – what was the procedure? What was found regarding % of participants who obey?
  • Impact of the situation on obedience: how did each affect obedience?
  • Location of the experiment
  • Experimenter characteristics
  • Closeness to victim
  • Disobedient others
  • Reasons for Obedience
  • Self-justification
  • The role of culture – individualists vs. collectivists?

  • Criticisms of Milgram’s experiment
  • Deception
  • No true informed consent
  • Created distress
  • Did participants know of right to withdraw?
  • Inflicted insight
  • Burger’s replication of Milgram – how was the procedure similar to or different from Milgram?
  • Results of Burger’s replication?
  • Ethics of Milgram’s research –
  • What were the concerns here? Milgram’s response?