Social Psychology Essays

Social psychology is a scientific–based study which is used to examine and explain how an individual's thoughts and feelings affect their behaviour within a society; how the members socially interact, including their motives; and what influences these members have on each other. This essay will endeavour to introduce the key psychologists, their theories and the idiographic research they conducted. In particular, it will focus on the features and definition of conformity and the investigations into the views on conformity. Furthermore, it aims to critically analyse and reveal a correlation in the results and conclusions in respect to the current comprehension of human social behaviour. Conformity is a form of social influence and is...show more content...

It is when a smaller portion of a group takes an unpopular stance and they manage to persuade the mass over to their way of thinking. This is usually a tactical and consistent influence performed over a longer period of time, with the minority being stubborn in their views, never compromising and always giving passionate arguments to every dispute or indifference. Christopher Columbus was in the minority in his belief that the earth was spherical. "Columbus had to fight these foolish beliefs in order to get men to sail with him. He felt sure the earth was round." It is a normative social influence when people conform to ideas which bring acceptance and approval from others. One real account of this is an experience publicised by a lady known as 'Mary–Anne,' whilst socialising with three friends. She displayed an instance of public compliance, through concurring with a group norm, even though it conflicted with her inner principles. Mary–Anne explains how she later regretted this moment of weakness. This particular type of conformity can be defined as a person allowing an influence from (an)other person(s) to determine their decisions and behaviour, thus rejecting or ignoring their own true needs and impulses and often going against a better judgement. Crutchfield (1962) proposed that it is (individuals) "...yielding to group pressures." A

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Signing up for this general psychology class I didn't expect to learn and inspect my life actions as much as I have. Before taking this course my attention had always been pulled regarding psychology as a whole, what I later pinned as social psychology. The way people think and relate to other in the terms of emotion and relationships pulled my attention. The different experiments and how everyday actions and decisions can be viewed under a microscope and understood in completely unique manners, excited my neurons. Having a best friend who was interested in the same subject as me, we spent many hours discussing different terms and theories. He took online general psychology in high school and therefore knew much more than me. Now, we both have psychology as our majors and he has become someone who I can count on if I don't understand terms or theories completely. Not being this connected from the beginning, our friendship has grown which lead me to analyze just how I've ended up with my friend. Many may say that things just happen randomly and this connection is pure luck. Well, through this course I have developed a few understandings. There are many factors that lead to strong friendship, it's not just pure luck or correct timing. There's work and unknown tests that we do before we can count on people. I attended all four years of high school with this guy but it wasn't until senior year that we actually grew close. Freshman through junior year we knew of each other

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Social Psychology, The Social Identity

Within social psychology, the social identity tradition (Tajfel, Billig, Bundy, & Flament, 1971) argues that individuals possess more than their characteristic personal identities, which are activated during interpersonal contact with others; in addition, people can engage in intergroup behavior as informed by their social identities (Gudykunst & Bond, 1980). Such social identities comprise memberships in any psychologically relevant grouping with which an individual identifies, including kin, peers, profession, nation, and cultural identity (Galang, QuiГ±ones, Adriano, Portillo, & Carvajal, 2015). The ingroup identification afforded by social identities then allows individuals to distinguish between people belonging to and excluded from the ingroup (Brewer & Yuki, 2007), and to bolster one's self–concept through affiliation with high–status groups and individuals (Gudykunst & Bond, 1980). In addition, these social identities are created and manifested in different ways across cultures as a function of the values endorsed by society, the ways in which society's members construe themselves, and the manners in which their interpersonal relationships are structured (Feitosa, Salas, & Salazar, 2012). Moreover, social identity theory (SIT) has been invoked as an explanation for a social psychological phenomenon introduced in Robert Cialdini and his colleagues' (1976) research: basking in reflected glory (BIRG). As reflected in the opening quote, individuals are able to emphasize

Social Psychology Social psychology is the study of the individual and the way they behave according to those around them. Social psychology affects nearly every aspect of our everyday lives such as the way in which we form, develop and maintain our relationships with people ranging from our parents to our friends, family and co workers. There has been much research into social psychology, Such as the factors that contribute to the formation of a relationship. According to Rubin (1973) one of these factors is proximity. Rubin stated that the closer we are to somebody physically the more likely we are to form a relationship with him or her. This relates to situations where we are often in...show more content...

According to Newcomb another key aid to the formation of relationships is similarity because it becomes easier to form a relationship with someone we have something in common with even if it is just the way we look. There are also theories of why we form relationships. The first of these is the social–biological approach, which states that our primary motivation in forming a relationship is to ensure the ongoing survival of our genes by promoting them to others. Basically this approach suggests that any behaviour we carry out I selfish because the main reason it is being carried out is to protect and promote our genes. This theory of why we form a relationship relates to Charles Darwin's theory of evolution that states that creatures will adapt their behaviour in a way that will best protect and promote their genes. This is known as Adaptive Behaviour. A criticism of the socio–biological approach is that it does not explain homosexual behaviour because such behaviour will not enable an individual to spread their genes. An alternative to the socio–biological approach is the Reinforcement and need satisfaction theory, which was introduced by Byrne (1971) who based it on Thorndikes Law of Effect, which states "any act that is rewarded is likely to be repeated" This means

Strengths And Weaknesses Of Social Psychology

Social Psychology Assignment 1 There are 3 basic research methods that social psychologists use to describe behaviors. Each of these have both strengths and weaknesses. The observational method is done by observing and collecting data which is then used to describe the behavior. The researcher observes the events in a natural setting so none of the variables are manipulated. There must be interjudge reliability, meaning that when different researchers administer the same test to the same subject they each must obtain the same measurement. The advantages in this method is that it is the simplest method, it has greater accuracy, and it is useful for setting up hypothesis. The weaknesses are that this method is hard to observe because of privacy and secrecy. It is great for explanation but not as good for prediction and description. The observer might also be biased being that he has his own opinion on what is right and wrong. The correlation method focuses on prediction. It is a statistical measure of two or more variables and the relation between them are assessed. The Correlation coefficient assesses how well you can predict one variable from another. A positive correlation is when the value of one variable increases it is associated with the increase of the other variable. For example height and weight, the more one grows the more he will weigh. A negative correlation is when the value of one variable increases it is associated with the decrease of the other

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Term Paper: Social Cognition

Table of Contents:

Social Cognition: A science

The psychological definitions

Breakdown of social psychology

Relations to other corresponding theories

The theory of social cognition

Incorporating stereotypes

Schemata

Cultural social cognition

Holistic thinking

Social cognitive neuroscience

A personality in jeopardy

Social Cognition

Social cognition is the encoding, storage, retrieval, and processing, of information in the brain. It is a process that is generalized within a species, and relates to members of the same species. At one time social cognition referred specifically to an approach to socialpsychology in which these processes were studied according to the methods of cognitive...show more content...

An example would be a student who believes all teachers are intimidating and bossy from past experiences, but after having a shy and timid teacher, their view may change their internal schema and stereotype of all teachers being individual. Scientists may want to study the reactions of the student and how he or she will integrate the new schema. Social cognition researchers are also interested to study the regulation of activated schemas. It is widely perceived that the situational activation of schemata is automatic, outside of conscious control. However, the regulation and

activation of social schemas is self–regulatory and independently motivated.

To understand social cognition, a reaction based on internal and automatic thought processes, you must first understand the deeper function behind the reaction. This practice is called social psychology. In this field, psychologists typically explain human behavior as being a result of mental interferences, mental states, and immediate social situations. Human behavior is certainly less complex than the general population may believe. There are only so many reactions that a human will typically choose in response to activities and situations, and almost all do. To discover what these reactions are and what they have been, a scientist or psychologist needs to put the test subject under existential experiments. In

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Social Psychology And Social Influence

In social psychology, social influence is a process where someone's beliefs, thoughts and behaviour change by being exposed to beliefs, thoughts and opinions of others. It manifests in several forms, such as obedience, compliance and conformity. All these types of social influence have been studied by numerous researchers who investigated the reasons why people conform to social norms and obey to authorities, such as Milgram's classic studies on obedience. His experiments support the popular idea of 'banality of evil' –Hannah Arendt (1963)'s famous phrase referring to the capability to accomplish dreadful things out of banal reasons–, revealing that people conform submissively and thoughtlessly to the orders that authorities deliver, no...show more content...

Accordingly, Rotter proposed that people with an internal locus of control, having a confident personality, are more likely to resist to social influence. There are different studies supporting this idea. For instance, in their experiment consisting in interviewing the subjects, Oliner and Oliner (1988) suggested that the 406–non–Jewish participants who lived during the Holocaust in Germany and protected Jewish people were more inclined to have a higher internal locus of control in contrast to the 126 individuals who obeyed to commands. This outcome supports Rotter's theory that internals are not as likely to follow commands in contrast to externals who may be more easily persuaded, although there may be other aspects that have to be considered in view of the circumstances people lived in WWII. Additionally, Spector (1983) utilised Rotter's scale on 157 students to evaluate whether conformity is linked with locus of control. He discovered that participants with a higher internal locus of control weren't as likely to conform only in circumstances of normative social influence, where people adapt in order to be accepted, whereas there was no significant difference between the two groups in situations of informational social influence, where people conform for their need to be right. (Deutsch & Gerard, 1955) This finding proposes that normative social influence

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Sexism And Social Psychology

Sexism in Relation to Social Psychology

People, on many occasions, have preconceived opinions that are not based on any reason or actual experience, this is known as prejudice. Whereas sexism is a discrimination or prejudice based on an individual's sex; a preconceived belief that one sex is superior and more valuable than another sex. In Personality and Social Psychology Factors Explaining Sexism the authors state, "The personality approach holds factors within the individual as the major causes of prejudice, the social psychology approach links prejudice to factors like people's social group membership and social identity, and situational factors" (Akrami, N., et al. 2011).

Within the first study written by Akrami, the participants were non psychology university students, 194 women and 185 men; with the mean age being twenty–four and a half years. Responding to the Swedish translation of the Big Five Inventory (BFI; 44 items divided among the five personality dimensions) and the Swedish version of the 16–item Social Dominance Orientation Scale (SDO; a 15–item Right–Wing Authoritarianism Scale (RWA) and the 8–item Modern Sexism Scale, the participants completed the questionnaire on their own and anonymously. Ultimately, the results revealed notable positive connections of sexism with SDO and RWA (Akrami, N., et al. 2011).

Two studies were conducted to investigate the harm and ubiquity of benevolent sexism and modern sexist beliefs. The first study consisted of a group

Essay Title: Social Psychology

Social psychology is a broad concept which has underlying elements of studying on how we behave, foresee and feel. Myers (2011) agrees that social psychologist investigates these connections by studying on how we persuade others and how we relate to other humans. Miller (2004) stated that majority of social psychologist would acknowledge that the perspective of social psychology is one that emphasises the social changes in the environment from the influence of individual. Kassin, Fein and Markus (2013) argues that humans are really fascinated about social interaction and personal relationships, which the social context can have an immense influence on our lives.

Furthermore, social psychology...show more content...

Slee, Campbell, Spears(2012) stated that Charles Darwin developed a significant evidence of observing the connections between animals and human species; by investigating and analysing children, therefore he got an better understanding on social impact of human behaviour.

Naturalistic observation is valuable technique utilised as research method which are commonly employed by psychologist and social scientist. Naturalistic observations were used by Charles Darwin during his research on chimpanzee; nonetheless, Charles Darwin was so fascinated by observing how primates and humans are acting in similar ways and having influence to another. Gomez( 2006)argues naturalistic observations of primates show that how certain objects is intrinsic part of primate lives, from simple food collecting process as taking certain organic fruits.

Naturalistic observations can be very useful to observe on why people engage in extreme sports in few different settings, which is all about social psychology, because people that engage in different extreme sports have been influenced by others or want to be perceived in certain way in a society; which can stem from peer pressure and wanting to preoccupy their leisure times to enjoy themselves through adrenaline and risk taking sports.

Some people would prearrange to

Introduction

Social Psychology is one of the younger sub disciplines within the field of Psychology. In the short span in which social psychology has existed, began with the work of the Norman Triplett in the late 1890s. Triplett's work at Indiana University was primarily experimentation with people in competitive settings. Gordon Allport followed Triplett's experimentation with his observations the attitudes of individuals and the study of the self. While these contributions to the history of social psychology were important, the question still remains of what the most significant event in the history of psychology was. The argument will be given in this paper if a murder was the most significant event in the history of social...show more content...

Allport's experimentation dealt with observing people's attitudes and were considered to be" the most useful and important concept of social psychology" (Baumeister and Bushman, 2007 p.6). In addition to observing people's attitudes, Allport also considered the study of the self to be influential to the direction social psychology was moving.

Kirk Lewin was a key figure in early social psychology due to developing a formula that behavior is a function of the person in the situation (Baumeister and Bushman, 2007). In order to know if a person will complete a task or not, questions about who the person is need to be answered. The next set of questions to be answered is what type of task the person is completing.

As social psychology moved through the 1950s, two thoughts of social psychology formed. The first thought was behaviorism which wanted to explain the whole field of psychology in terms of reward and punishment (Baumeister and Bushman, 2007). Behaviorists relied heavily on using scientific method and refrained from making inferences about the human mind, thoughts, emotions, or other thought processes (Baumeister and Bushman, 2007). The second thought was Freudian psychoanalysis, which were in favor of using elaborate interpretations of an individual's experiences versus systematic studies that counted behaviors of individuals. Through the 1990s social psychology created evolutionary psychology which used the field of biology to study behavior.

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Social psychology is a young science, barely a century old (Myers, 2010). Yet already its scientific explorations have shed light on love and hate, conformity and independence – social behaviors that we encounter each day (Myers, 2010). Social psychology is the scientific study of how people think about, influence, and relate to one another. (Myers, 2010). As we mature in life, our social world molds us as we interact in social thinking, social influences, and social relations. Social psychology had the potential to illuminate our lives, making it visible to the subtle influences that guide our thinking and acting. (Myers, 2010). Social psychology has open many avenues for psychologist of the present to understand how our...show more content...

Kurt Lewin pioneered the use of theory, using experimentation to test hypothesis, which left an everlasting significance on an entire discipline group dynamics and action research (Harvey, OJ., 1989). Lewin's group dynamics has been utilized in such areas as educational facilities, industrial settings, and communities (Harvey, OJ., 1989). With all the different aspects of Lewin's group dynamics, he has opened many avenues for social psychologist in the field today. Studying the behavior of groups is one of the largest research areas in social psychology (Cherry, 2005). Group dynamics expert Marvin Shaw states that all groups have one thing in common: their members interact (Myers, David G., 2010). Through interaction in group dynamics, social orders and social norms co–exist. Social orders exist only as a product of human activity (Berger, P., Luckmann, T., 1966).

Social Psychology4

Nevertheless, just like in the physical world, in order to at in the social world, we need some order (Boeree, 1999). The social order is based on shared expectations (beliefs, rule, values) known as social norms (Boeree, 1999). Social norms are used as standards with which we measure the appropriateness of Get

Social Psychology

The principles and theories of Social Psychology are important and useful in assessing behaviors in situations. These social psychological principles and their applications can be seen in fictional films which can also be attributed to everyday life. One such film that holds certain social psychological perspectives is Will Gluck's 2010 production of Easy A. A film about high school student Olive Penderghast and how a sudden change in popularity and financial status, after an unintentional rumor about how she supposedly lost her virginity to a college guy spread through the entire her school. The film draws on the behavioral connections of pronounced hussy Olive Penderghast and her English class's assigned reading of The Scarlet Letter....show more content...

The forces that led Anson to wrongfully attribute Olive's floozy behavior as her true nature are due to the social psychological perspective known as the Self–Fulfilling Prophecy. As stated in lecture the Self–Fulfilling Prophecy can be defined as the expectations people have about another person, which influences how they act towards that person and thus causing that person to fulfill these expectations. This prophecy is evident in the film when Olive's reputation is first brought to her attention by her best friend stating that "everyone and I do mean everyone is calling her a dirty skank." Once she realizes that others hold a certain expectation of how she should behave in accordance to her assumed persona. She begins to notice how differently the people act around her. The expectations which fostered different attitudes towards her are presented through the glares and the gossip that force Olive to oblige people's expectations. In the scene Olive declares that if "people thought [she was] a dirty skank [she] would be the dirtiest skank they'd ever seen," confirming and concluding the last prerequisite in defining the Self–Fulfilling Prophecy, which is changing oneself to fit expectations. Rosenthal and Jacobson's 1968 experiment is a fine example that helps explains how Olive fits the Self–Fulfilling Prophecy. This is because in the film and the teacher and presumed student "bloomers," both evoked

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Response to the Class Social psychology is a combination of psychology and some aspects of sociology to study the effects on people. This class, as well as the field of psychology in general, is very interesting. There is something about learning how behaviors and thoughts of all natures can affect everyday life; also, it is amazing how those thoughts and behaviors come from our minds as they process things throughout the day. By taking this upper levelpsychology class, I learned a lot about myself in the mental sense as well as about what I am supposed to do as I go forth in life. I was a psychology major up until a few weeks ago when I decided that this kind of class, while intriguing, was not really my plan in life. Last semester, I took General Psychology with you, Dr. Pivik. I loved it even though it was one of my more difficult to grasp prerequisite classes. There is nothing about this class that I would change. I just now know that my heart is in theatre and it always will be. Anytime someone asks who to take for general psychology, I always recommend you. The classes are always so relatable because you do things like show us memes or silly commercials instead of dry lecture to us every day. I encourage other people who want to possibly major in psychology to give it a chance because you will never know the things that you might miss out on if you decide it is not for you without a clue of how the classes go. We talked once about what I should take next after

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Social psychology is a study which seeks to study and understand social behavior. It tells us more about the group behavior, how we interact and how it impacts our decision. According to scientist Gordon Alliport, Social psychology is a discipline that uses scientific method to understand and explain how the thought, feeling and behavior of individuals are influenced by the actual, implied or imagined presence of other human beings. Social psychology is not limited to any social topics but looks at a wide range of social topics such as group behavior, social perception, leadership, non verbal behavior, conformity, aggression and prejudice. In short social psychology aims at understanding each and every aspect of the social behavior of the...show more content...

Very few people have the will power or the determination to preserve their originality even in changing social environments. Among the various factors that affect human behavior, culture and society are the 2 main factors. The society is composed of a full range of learned behavioral patterns. These patterns have great influence on an individual as it shapes their personality from the day they are born. Let us take an example of situation. Mr. X is a fresher in Orlando Institute of Technology and he is very happy to have earned a seat in one of the most reputed institutes of Michigan. Mr. X is a very good student but his problem is that he has a very weak moral character. During his college years he was not exposed to any kinds of bad habits hence his behavior wasn't affected much but suddenly he enters into an environment where he is exposed to students who have acquired all kinds of bad habits such as smoking and drinking. From day 1 he sees students doing all the things he hadn't seen before, this has a very deep impact in his thinking and his behavior. His parents witness a sudden behavioral change in him and are astonished to see their little boy smoking tobacco in the local pub. These kinds of situations are quite normal in the society. Generally youngsters are highly vulnerable to all kinds of sudden and astonishing behavioral changes. This is seen in

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There are many explanations for the origins of modern social psychology. It is therefore important to consider that social psychology cannot be traced back to one single source of origin (Burr, 2003). Hence, this is the reason why there are debates of what social psychology is. Allport (1985) described social psychology as the study an individual's thoughts, feelings, and behaviours which are influenced by the actual, imagines, or implied presence of others. As seen from this definition there is a direct link between social science and the individual psychology (Sewell, 1989). Social psychology cannot be seen as a linear phenomenon. This is because social psychology has been derived from a combination of influences. The development of...show more content...

Both critical and experimental social psychology form the modern social psychology, due to their important historical context.

Experimental–social psychology is argued to have been derived from the American tradition, and a critical–social psychology is argued to have been derived from the European tradition. Although this has formed two distinct approaches in the use of methodology within psychology, there are still on–going debates over psychology as a science or not.

An important contribution that has made a great impact on the modern social psychology was from William McDougall. McDougall proposed for an evolutionary psychology, which was influenced by Darwin's theory. Especially with the dominant fields ofsociology and anthropology, McDougall was able to link science, sociology and psychology (McDougall, 1919). However, McDougall's research in social evolution was also interpreted as radical due to the racism involved in the concept of behaviour gene inheritance. This shows that even though McDougall's work had been a start point to the origins of social psychology, it also led to misconcepts especially in the Western society. Another person who contributed to the origins of social psychology was William James which introduced the theory of 'stream of consciousness'. The reason why James made an influence in social

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Social psychology is the scientific attempt to explain how the thoughts, feelings and behaviors of individuals are influenced with the presence or implied presence of others. This classic definition of social psychology expresses that people are influenced by other people to do things they would not normally do if alone. For example, a person may be more encouraged to do strange things if others are doing it as well. Stage hypnotism is a form of entertainment found in parties and other social events. In stage hypnotism, a group of people are allegedly under the control of a hypnotist who has put them in an alleged trance. In this "trance–like" state, this group of people are more suggestible to perform for the audience. This is due in part of the gradual increase of the requests, peer pressure, and compliance. During the final weeks of my senior year in High School, my class was heavily encouraged to participate in a show. This show was going to feature a stage hypnotist as well as a group of volunteers from the audience who would be influenced by the hypnotist to behave in an embarrassing manner in front of a large audience of peers and friends. Upon arriving at the show, the stage hypnotist introduced himself and began to build his credibility by boasting at the amount of people he has had under his control at one time. The stage hypnotist joked that he would make the students to incredibly embarrassing things such as tell their deepest and darkest secrets, but

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Social Psychology Reflection

This semester has been filled with informative information when speaking about our own social skill, but also other people's social psychology as well, thus is why it will be very useful in future. Throughout the semester we studied everything from the introduction of social psychology, social influences, aggression in psychology, and interpersonal attraction and close relationships. A lot of the knowledge that I gained was not only from the "Social Psychology" textbook, but also in the videos and the reactions that we needed to come up with on a weekly basis. I like the idea of being able to watch the video to see if the experiment was successful or unsuccessful and commenting on it by giving my opinion if I agreed or not. For me,...show more content...

That is why I thought the video on this topic was an excellent example of how we act in our society. The experiment was to see how people will help another person out in a time of need, but was done with to different characters, one a business man and the other a homeless man. The guy that was dressed in business attire was immediately helped up by people passing by, however, when they switched the experiment to a homeless person everyone stood around and watched, except for a follow homeless person. This was a great example to show us that we not to stop judging people by their appearance, rather treat everyone the same because everyone is in need one point in their life. In chapter eight we learned about social influences and a part I found appealing was the section on the power of social norms, which is the "unspoken but shared rules of conduct in a formal or informal group." Basically, it means that the social world can impact our lives by peer pressuring us into acting out in a behavior that is out of our character. However, falling into that group norm would be a characteristic of conformity. An example would be someone that is peer pressured into taking drugs, but after time becomes adapted to that behavior and continues to

Social Psychology Essay

Running Head: Social Psychology1

Social Psychology

Rebecca Freeman

PSY 301

Dr. Katrina Hilton

Running Head: Social Psychology2 There are many important components of social psychology, and they all fit together. For psychology students, social psychology is probably one of the most important areas in their field of study, because it is the study of human thoughts, feelings, and behavior as they relate to and are influenced by others (Feenstra, 2011). We learnsocial psychology so that we can better understand people and why they act the way they do. This is very important, especially in the counseling and social work fields. One of the focuses of social psychology is on discovering who we are....show more content...

Attributions are our explanations of the behavior of ourselves and others. When you make an internal attribution you blame personality, attitudes, or some other dispositional factor for the action. For example, if you're waiting for a bus, and the bus passes you by, and you blame it on the possibility that the bus driver doesn't like you, you're making an internal attribution. When you make an external attribution, you attribute situational factors for the action. Maybe the bus driver passed you up because he has to go to the gas station to fill up the gas tank of the bus (Feenstra, 2011). Explanatory style consists of three dimensions. They are internal/external, stable/unstable, and global/specific. Internal/external refers to whether or not a person believes that they have control over events. Stable/unstable represents whether a repeated event will stay the same or be subject to change. Global/specific refers to whether or not a person's explanation generalizes the event to others beyond the specific event in hand. If a person has an explanatory style that tends to consider bad events as internal, they are said to have a pessimistic explanatory style because they see the bad experience or event as one that was their fault, will not change in the future, and is generally problematic rather than specific to that particular event. A person with an optimistic explanatory style explains the causes of negative events as external,

Sociological Aspects Of Social Psychology

Social Psychology

According to Gordon Allport , "social psychology is an attempt to understand and explain how the thought, feeling, and behavior of individuals is influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others." (Allport, 1954)

There are two differing branches when referring to social psychology:

1. The sociological aspect of social psychology, which was mainly developed in Europe as a subdivision ofsociology.

2. The psychological aspect of social psychology, which was developed in the US

The differences between the two divisions are, that the sociological way of viewing social psychology focusses more on group interaction, group processes, while the psychological aspects of social psychology focusses more on the individual and how the individual is influenced and/or behaves in social settings.

Sociological social psychology is very theory intensive and constructs itself out of "geisteswissenschaften" (sciences of the spirit) and social sciences. Corresponding approaches are i.e. critical theories, which also include psychoanalytical ideas. Some of the more notable sociological psychologists include Sigmund Freud, Erich Fromm and Wilhelm Reich.

Coming back to the psychological branch of social psychology, we see its intentions lies in "an attempt to understand and explain how the thought, feelings and behavior of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others" (Allport, The Person in Psychology, 1968) Quantitative

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Social psychology is a science that study social thinking (how we perceive ourselves and others, judgement we make and our attitudes); social influence (such as pressure to conform, group of people) and social relations such as aggression and helping (David G. Myers, 2008). Social psychological research methods vary by location: in the laboratory or in the field. Also, it varies by method: correlational or experimental (David G. Myers, 2008). A field research method is everyday situations, for example, Piliavin et al. (1969) Good Samaritanism. Laboratory research method is a controlled situation; for example, Zimbardo (1973) Stanford Prison Experiment. A correlational method measure relationship between two or more variables:...show more content...

Their finding was that this uncaring deed was caused by diffusion of responsibility. Piliavin et al. recognised that Lantene and Darley 1970 experiment lacked ecological validity: it did not related to or reflects everyday, real life (Mark Holah, 2008). As a result, Piliavin et al. (1969) took the study from the laboratory into the field; a field experiment set up on a subway train in New York. Their hypothesis was that there must be factors that influence helping behaviour (Class Handouts). The factors they were interested included Independent variables such as the type of victim (blind or drunk); the race of the victim (black or white); and the Dependable variable such as the speed of helping; the frequency of helping and the race of the helper. Piliavin et al. used the participant observation method (Richard Gross, 2012). It is where researcher, in this case, a member of the study team is part of the activity being studied (Malim and Birch, 1998). The participants were the unsuspecting passengers that travelled on the train. The average racial composition of the passengers was 45% black and 55% white. The average number of people in the train carriage was 43 (Mark Holah, 2008). They did six to eight trials between 11a.m and 3p.m for forty–two days. Each trial had a different team of students: two males and two females (Mark Holah, 2008). The males (three white and one black) aged between 26 and 35, Get more content