Behavior in Groups: Joining With Others Bystander Effect, Group Productivity & Social Loafing; Decision Making in Groups

Transcription

1 Behavior in Groups: Joining With Others Bystander Effect, Group Productivity & Social Loafing; Decision Making in Groups How does being part of a group influences the way individuals behave? Why people cooperate with & help others? What factors contribute to aggressive behavior & violence?

2 Group: 2 or more individuals who interact & are interdependent. Typically face to face, but the nature of groups is changing because of technology & the internet. A Group: Creates a social organism w/unique characteristics & dynamics that can take on a life of its own. One of social psychology s enduring insights: You may behave quite differently when you re in a group than when you re alone.

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5 Vancouver Riots June 15 th, 2011

6 AGGRESSION: Behavior that is intended to inflict harm on others. We are typically aggressive because of frustration or anger. Typically, aggression takes place when the aggressive act does not have an immediate negative consequence. That is, we are aggressive when it appears that we can get away with it. Aggression can occur due to what psychologists call... Deindividuation: Tendency for people to lose individuality, often because one is a member of a group or because the situation warrants it.

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8 YouTube Video: The Vancouver "Kissing Couple" - viral video of emotional reaction in a very aggressive and dangerous situation. Human emotions can sometimes be unpredictable, in both good and bad ways. CBC - The Psychology of a Riot. CBC's Aaron Saltzman looks into why riots happen after big sporting events.

9 The Bystander Effect: People are not likely to help others unless they are alone with that person. (Research s & 1970s) If someone needs help & there are many people around, diffusion of responsibility occurs. Bystander effect: probability of someone helping another in distress decreases as # of people available to help increases. **Interestingly, people today are slightly more likely to help because of the well-publicized research on the bystander effect.

10 YouTube Video: NBC News - Bystander Effect Video: What will people do when they watch a girl being abducted? (6 min)

11 But, should the New York Post have even published this photo? Is that ethical? Or just cruel and inhumane journalism? NYC Subway Death & The Bystander Effect A man was pushed onto the tracks of an oncoming subway train. No one reached out a hand to help the man get back onto the platform. Not only that, but a photographer snapped a picture of the man as he desperately tried to get back onto the platform. Diffusion of responsibility: all the onlookers are shocked, but they re thinking that someone else perhaps a police office will jump in to help. When we read about a story like this we often think we would not just stand by we would help, right? But when things like this happen the chaos and confusion of the situation often make people behave quite differently than they might like. Do you believe the photographer was immoral or selfish? Fundamental Attribution Error: Most attributing his actions to an internal cause his personality. The photographer, however, attributes his behavior to an external cause despite what the picture shows, he was actually too far away to help the man. *Adapted from the writing of: Michael Britt The Psych Files site.

12 Cognitive-Confirmation Bias & Self-Fulfilling Prophecy Cognitive-confirmation bias: Participants are more likely to search for information that confirms a previously learned bias than to seek information that contradicts the bias. Suppose you want to buy a particular car. You will actively seek out information that supports the good aspects of that car & will overlook information that does not support that choice. Self-fulfilling prophecy: If you hear something good or bad about a person, you will perceive that skill in the person more than if you had not previously heard that information.

13 ATTRIBUTION THEORY: Make guesses, or attributions, about the causes of their behavior. We often make mistakes because of the bias. 1. Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE): Suggests that we tend to make attributions about causes of behavior being internal & not external. Personal - not environmental. We often believe that someone does something because of who he is, not because of the situation.

14 ATTRIBUTION THEORY: 2. Actor-Perceiver Bias or Actor-Observer Bias: If we are doing something, we believe our behavior is due to external causes; If we are watching someone else, we believe their behavior is internally motivated.

15 ATTRIBUTION THEORY: 3. Self-Serving Bias: We attribute causes of behavior to external causes if we fail & internal causes if we succeed. Our Behavior - it s US (internal) if we SUCCEED. Our Behavior - it s EXTERNAL if we FAIL.

16 Youtube Video Link: John McEnroe's Famous Outburst. Classic Example of "Self-Serving Bias." We attribute our success to our own performance. We attribute our failure to the failure of others.