Psychology Notes

Research Methods 1
-scientific method is seven steps
-tries to minimize biases and oversights
-study pre existing information first
-then construct a theory
-guides creation of hypothesis
-makes a specific prediction abt relationship between variables involved in theory
-create steps
-use experiments
-analyze and collect data
-will accept or reject original hypothesis at end
-make formal presentations at scientific meetings
-goal is publish articles in scholarly journals
-each submission under goes so much review by experts
-will revise specific theories to redefine how we look at the world
-theories are always being revised to account for new ways of thinking
-paradigm shift
-copernicus challenges the dogma that the earth was a the centre of the universe
-eric story
-watching infomercial about energy drink
-enhances memory
-he buys it and puts by ab cruncher thing
-wants to evaluate claim that the drink improves memory and test scores
-conducting an experiment
-general theory is test performance can be affected by external factors that occur while
studying for a test
-theory suggests a hypothesis
-if you consume you should get a higher test score
-look first for anecdotal evidence
-hear stories about ppl who have taken it or taken similar drinks
-he can take the drink and test it himself
-problems with trying it on just one occasion
-can’t be sure that your single experience is good enough
-can’t assume your experience is the same for everyone
-can’t be sure change in test scores was solely due to the drink
-test could’ve been easy
-experiment
-scientist manipulates the independent variable and examines the dependant variable
-experimenter directly controls the level of the independent variable and measures the
effect on the chosen or dependant variable
-eric’s experiment doesn’t have independent variables or dependent variable
-anecdotes are not good for scientific research
-now he takes energy drink before test and roommate takes test without drink
-successfully manipulating the independent variable of the drink and measuring the
dependant variable of the test scores
-two groups of ppl
-experimental group receives manipulation of the variable
-control group doesn’t
-compare dependant variable for both
-eric should find another student who performs same as him with same study
techniques and same classes to have good controls
-within-participant experimental design
-manipulating the independent variable within each participant to minimize the effect of
participant differences on the dependant measure
-eric takes several tests over the semester
-takes drinks before some tests and nothing before others
-eric is acting as his own control group
-problems
-time consuming and costly to have one participant complete everything
-participant could change throughout the experiment
-difficulty of tests throughout semester could change a lot
-practice effect
-an improvement in performance over the course of an experiment as a result of
experience, separate from the effect of the independent variable
-between participants experiments
-one group receives experiment other group is control
-want participants to be same in every single way except for the independent variable
-confounding variable
-a variable that systematically varies with an independent variable, making it
difficult to isolate the effect of the independent variable
-results from very specific groups of participant can’t be generalized to other groups
-population
-general group we’re trying to learn about
-sample
-selected members of the group we collect data from
-random sampling
-a subset people selected at random to avoid systematic differences between our
sample and the larger population
-random assignment
-assigning participants to either the experimental or control group at random to avoid any
biases that may create systematic differences between the groups of participants
-placebo effect
-the situation when an individual exhibits a response to a treatment that has no real
therapeutic actions
-if they know in advanced the drink makes them smarter, students may be
motivated just cuz they want the drinks to be effective
 -give all participants a drink regardless of whether they’re in the control group or
experimental group
-just give the control group water or summon
-this way neither group knows which is the energy drink
-both are affected by placebo effect in same way
-binding
-when participants do not know whether they belong to the experimental group or control
group, or which treatment they are receiving
-experimenter bias
-researcher can influence the results of the experiment (whether or not it’s intentional)
-actions made by the experimenter, intentionally or unintentionally, that promote the
result they hope to achieve
-reduce experimenter bias by not telling the experimenter which group is the control group and
which is the experimental group
-double blind studies
-experiments in which neither the experimenter nor the participants know which group
each participant belong to

Research Methods 2
-descriptive stats
-presents information about data at a glance
-gives overall idea of the result of the experiment
-mean, median, mode
-pi graphs, bar graphs and venn diagrams used
-histogram
-type of graph used to report the number of times groups of values
appear in a data set
-bin is the x-axis
-y-axis is organizing the different bins
-frequency distribution
-type of graph illustrating the distribution of how frequently values appear
in the data set
-normal distribution
-a distribution with a characteristic smooth, symmetrical, bell-shaped curve containing a
single peak
-inferential statistics
-allow us to use results from samples to make inferences about overall, underlying
populations
-control group belongs in the general population
-experimental group belong to energy drink enhanced performance population
-all for eric’s experiment
-sample data he collects is being drawn from two different distributions
-if it’s wrong all of his data are being drawn from one distribution
-that of the general population
 -he needs to compare all data from both groups to see if they come from the
same or different populations
-t-test
-statistical test that considers each data point from both groups to calculate the
probability that two samples were drawn from the same population
-p-value
-a probability (0-100%) indicating how likely this difference would be observed
even if no ‘real’ difference exists
-he’s asking if the difference between the two groups large enough to say
energy drinks improved test scores
-scientists need strong evidence to say that there is a difference
-if it’s greater than 0.05 the results are probably not statistically significant
-statistically significant
-when the difference between 2 groups is due to some true difference between
the properties of the 2 groups and not simply due to random variation
-look for p-value less than 0.05
-type one error
-believing a difference when a difference doesn’t exist
-a false alarm
-type 2 error
-failing to see a difference when a difference does exist
-a miss
-what is the strength and direction of the variable X and Y
-correlation
-measure of the strength of the relationship between two variables
-correlation coefficient ‘r’
-a number between -1 and +1, denoted by “r”, indicating both the strength and direction
of the correlation
-r =+1 is perfect positive correlation
-linear line increasing upwards
-r = -1 is perfectly negative correlation
-linear line decreasing downwards
-r = 0
-no relationship between the two variables
-closer it gets to +1 or -1 means a stronger relationship
-correlation is not causation!!!!!!
-failing to include a critical control group in the experiment may produce meaningless
results that fail to answer the question

Classical Conditioning
-learning
-unconscious reflexive learning is good
-need to touch a stove once to know to avoid hot things
-nicole and her headaches
-throbs at sight of a cloudy sky
-medication that’s a red pill she takes daily
-side effects; sweaty palms and nausea
-classical conditioning
-associate two related events
-foundation was by Ivan Pavlok
-AKA pavlovian conditioning
-stages of digestion
-observation
-dogs salvated before food reached their mouth
-sound of metronome signaled to dog that food was about to be delivered
-prior to training no effect
-after training dogs salviated
-conditional reflex
-conditional cuz it relied on training
-studying a contingent relationship
-presence of one stimulus leads to another
-flash of lightening before crash of thunder
-when you learn the association between a signal and event a contingent
relationship has been formed
-the learning of a contingency between a particular signal and a later even that are
paired in time and/or space
-components of classical conditioning
-unconditional stimulus (US)
-any stimulus or event
-occurs naturally, prior to learning
-slice of lemon placed in your own mouth
-unconditional response (UR)
-the response that occurs after the US
-occurs naturally, prior to learning
-food elicits salivation in our mouth
-conditional stimulus
-paired with the US to produce a learned contingency
-dogs example, pavlov paired a CS sound of metronome with the US of
placing food in the dog's mouth
-CS= lemon US= lemon juice in mouth
-conditional stimulus appears before US
-conditioned response CR
-the response that occurs once the contingency between the CS and US are
learned
-dogs sound of metronome will come to elicit a CR of salvation
-acquisition
-the process by which a contingency between a CS and US is learned
 -a negatively accelerating curve
-contingencies are learned slowly
-most of the learning happens during the early trials
-takes several tries
-once try is enough
-rats developed special learning methods to find food
-rats avoid unfamiliar foods
-dietary neophobia
-will consume new foods in really small quantities at a time
-can learn the contingency between food and sickness in one try
-does the response occur due to prior experience?
-Unconditioned if it doesn't
-conditioned if it does
-are you labelling the triggering event of its outcome?
-if it’s the triggering event then we label it the stimulus
-if it’s the outcome then it’s the response
-how long does a contingency last?
-as long as the conditional stimulus continues to be a reliable cue for the US the
contingency will be maintain
-if conditional change and its no longer a reliable cue, the contingency will fade
-extinction
-the loss of the CR when the CS no longer predicts the US
-presenting the CS without the US
-first the CS will elicit a CR but after several trials the response will become
weaker
-is it unlearned or erased?
-or is it competing with the new inhibitory response?
-hypothesis one
-extinction = unlearning the CS
-expect following extinction retraining between the Conditional and unconditional stimuli
would lead to acquisition of the conditional response at the same rate of original training
-hypothesis two
-extinction = learning to inhibit the CS
-suggest exists two learned processes that sit side by dies
-original and inhibitory
-expect that retraining between the conditioned and unconditioned stimuli would occur at
a faster rate compared to the original training
-spontaneous recovery
-the sudden recovery of a conditional response following a rest period after extinction
-after extinction procedure, the conditional response gradually fades
-ater rest period CS presented once more it elicits a conditioned response
-original learned association isn’t unlearned
-extinction promotes a learned inhibitory response
-ppl developed a conditioning response to the whistle before a bomb was dropped during war
time
-didn’t matter that the whistling sound was different for each bomb
-produced a fear response
-stimulus generalization
-the process by which stimuli similar to the CS will also elicit a CR
-during training one specific conditional stimulus may be paired with one unconditional
stimulus to produce a contingency
-will also elicit a response
-adds flexibility to conditioning
-bitten by a dog as a child
-as an adult seeing dogs will still elicit a fear response
-even though you haven’t been bitten by other dogs
-galvanic skin response measure for humans
-freezing behaviour for animals
-this is for fear etc
-contingency between the 500hz tone and shock are formed can test for stimulus
generalization
-present various tones and measure fear response
-stimuli similar to the tone will elicit the fear response at similar levels as the
original tone
-if a stimulus is harmful you will avoid other stimuli you think will cause harm too
-how does extinction affect a generalized stimulus
-bitten by a dog as a child
-to eliminate fear response undergo extinction
-go to therapy
-show dog that bit you repeatedly and you sit and relax
-can see success by exposing you to many stimuli
-if it went well the graph will be flattened and you’ll feel better
-using extinction to cause stimulus discrimination?
-restricts the range of conditional stimuli that can elicit a response
-500hz tone was paired with electric shock
-using discrimination we can eliminate the subjects fear of 600hz tone
-present 600hz tone in the absence of a shock
-conditional fear response to 600hz shock will diminish
-alternate between 600hz without shock and 500hz with shock
-create very precise discrimination
-CS + and CS- variables
-CS+ is 500hz tone predicts the presence of an US
-CS- 600hz tone predicts the absence of an US (shock)
-important to learn the presence of both of this stimuli
-What happens when they’re presented at the samet time?
-participant shows intermediate response
-generalization and discrimination are opposite sides on a coin
 -very important for adaptation
-how can classical conditioning explain phobias?
-can understand how a phobia may develop
-person can have a traumatic experience with a snake which can last forever
-CS doesn’t have to be an experience to elicit a CR
-disturbing story about a snake bite can elicit a fear response
-two therapies
-implosive therapy
-encouraged to confront the CS that invokes their anxiety
-presented in the absence of the CR
-systematic desensitization
-gradual exposure to the feared stimulus
-can help us understand physiological regulation within the body
-homeostasis
-when you drink a sugary beverage
-internal blood glucose levels surge after u drink
-insulin is then released
-blood glucose levels can be regulated and homeostasis is maintained
-release of insulin is a compensatory response
-US= increase in blood sugar
-UR is insulin release
-CS is the sweet taste
-CR Insulin release
-chemical changes administered with drug association is also signaled by cues
-classical conditioning is an adaptive, dynamic and complex process
-associations between taking drugs for headaches and our response to them are established
-bears learned the contingency between metal sticks and harm or injury

-Tutorial
-CR and UR are always the same
-generalization
-things that look similar produce same effect or UR

Instrumental Conditioning
-involves explicit training between voluntary behaviours and their consequences
-touch a hot stove you’ll be burned
-specific behaviour leads a specific consequence
-learning of a contingency between behaviour and their consequence
-Mike is a TA
-students begin arrive very late
-he then says anyone who shows up late draws a card from the deck
-student who can create the best poker hand wins a $10 gift card
-puzzle box is a chamber with a door that could be opened with food on the outside of the door
-cats were placed inside and escape time was recorded
 -hungry animal would engage in random behaviour
-would pull on rope by accident
-then on trials following this discovery they would escape immediately
-this wasn’t what happened
-frequency in range of behaviour decreased in time
-animals followed a stimulus response process
-there was never an ‘ah ha’ moment
-long trail and error process of discovery
-stamping in and stamping out
-determined whether behaviours were maintained or thrown out
-rope pulling was ‘stamped in’ behaviour
-followed by favourable consequence of getting food
-random behaviours like turning in a circle are ‘stamped out’
-learns the contingency between rope pulling and consequence of food reward
-law of effect
-behaviours with positive consequences are stamped in
-behaviours with negative consequences are stamped out
-performed less frequently
-considering overt behaviours that are operated by an actor leading to a reinforcer
-refer to the reinforcer
-any stimulus which is presented after a response leads to a change in the rate of that
response
-are changed by both positive and negative reinforcers
-each can be presented or removed
-leads to four different types
-presenting or removing a positive reinforcer
-presenting or removing a negative reinforcer
-reward changing
-presentation of a positive reinforcer following a response
-increases the frequency of the behaviour
-giving a puppy a treat every time he sits on command
-punishment training
-presentation of a negative reinforcer following a response
-leads to the decrease in a behaviour
-being spanked for teasing your younger sister
-can be a controversial issue
-consider the ethics of considering fear or pain the recipient
-when punishment is used the authority figure may become a signal for pain and
stress through classical conditioning
-remove a reinforcer
-omission training
-positive reinforcer is removed
-leads to a decrease in behaviour being enforced
-want to avoid this situation
 -billy is watching his favourite tv show and teasing his sister
-mother turns of TV for 30seconds every time he teases sally
-access to the TV show is a positive reinforcer and removing it will cause him to
stop his teasing behaviour
-time outs are used too
-punishment vs omission are very different
-escape training
-removal of a negative reinforcer
-constant negative reinforcer being presented that the learner is motivated to have removed
-by performing a specific response the negative reinforcer can be removed leading to an
increase in that response behaviour
-rat experiment
-floor in one part of the cage gives an electric shock
-rat can stop the shock by moving to the other side of the cage
-proceeds best when the consequence proceeds right after the stimulus
-choosing the right tool for the job is also very important too
-process of acquisition leads to learning the contingency between a response and its
consequence
-response rate can be visualized using an accumulative recorder
-paper goes through machine with the pen moving
-modern studies replaced this with automated computer system
-flat line is no response
-each upward slope=response made
-pigeon placed in cage
-if it pecks the keyhole it gets a grain of food
-overtime it will learn the contingency between the behaviour and the consequence
-graph shows when each peck occurred and the rate of responding
-can be learned without the careful guidance of the researcher
-called autoshaping!!
-not all behaviours can be autoshaped
-I can set up a contingency such that if a dolphin does a backflip they get a reward
-can’t walk away and expect the dolphin to learn this over night
-can turn to shaping by successive by approximation
-organized into smaller steps
-gradually build to the fuller response we wanna get
-oer time the successive approximations lead to the wanted outcome
-two pigeons playing ping pong with each other
-skinner used shaping by successive by approximation
-first learned how to peck at the ping pong table, then a ball, then a moving ball
-reward after each success
-discriminative stimulus ‘D’ or SD
-SD signals when a contingency between a particular response and reinforcement is on
-child, environment of their home becomes an SD for response of vegetable eating
behaviour
 -with reward being dessert
-S delta, or S minus, cue indicates when the contingent relationship isn’t valid
-environment of the grandparents home becomes an S delta for vegetable eating
-they know eating vegetables here doesn’t mean they get dessert
-controlled experiment with pidgin
-green light = food when pecking (SD)
-clicking sound = no food when pecking (S delta)
-discriminative stimulus can be generalized for a varied response rate
-bird will respond to green light, but will also peck with light similar to the wavelength of
the SD
-experimenters can manipulate the SD, s delta and the presentation of a reinforcer
-by implementing these manipulations they can train participants to better discriminate
between different stimuli
-association between a behaviour and instrumentally conditioned outcome can be lost
through extinction
-take same pigeon who learned pecking a hole in the presence of green light
leads food presentation
-then can teach the pigeon that pecking the hole in the presence of a red light
leads to the absence of food
-green light acts as the SD and the red light is an S delta
-then show the pigeon a yellow light
-similarity to S delt will interfere with the response we expect due to how
similar it is to the SD
-weak cue that creates minimal responding
-CS vs SD
-CS is paired with a us and elicits a response reflexively
-response is involuntary and automatic
-SD is paired with a response reinforcer outcome but the SD itself doesn’t reflexively
elicit the response
-SD sets the occasion for a response by signalling when the response reinforcer
outcome relationship is valid
-response is voluntary
-continuous reinforcement
-always getting a response
-reinforcement doesn’t always follow a consistent schedule
-partial reinforcement schedules
-ratio response
-number of responses made by subject which determines when reinforcement is
given
-interval schedule
-based on the time since the last response was reinforced
-pidgeon on a FI-10 schedule is rewarded with food for the first pecking response after a
ten minute period
-over an hour the pigeon can earn just six food pellets
 -can be fixed or variable
-fixed
-constant (above examples)
-conditions are help constant over trials
-variable
-random
-rewards are provided falling variable amount of work or length of time
-VR-10 schedule
-pidgeon must peck average of 10 times to get food reward
-exact number of pecks hat yields a reward differs

-fixed ratio
-pidgeon must peck 3 times to receive a food reward
-can be elicited up to having 100 pecks in order to receive a reward
-there is a limit to how stingy it can be
-too stingy= ratio strain and subject stops responding
-piece work pay scales
-if the ratio is too big ppl will wanna stop doing i
-pause and run pattern
-after reinforcement they will pause in activity before following the next run in
activity
-if pigeon isn’t hungry it won’t be super motivated to peck
-also, pigeon will pause before stating the next 20 rounds of food pecks
-procrastinating
-variable ratio
-reinforcement is delivered after some random number of responses around a
characteristic need
-reinforcement players receive from a slot machine at a casino
-slot machine is set to have a low number of winning rounds
-ppl will play for hours and be reinforcement randomly at different
intervals
-it’s enough to keep them playing
-high response rates
-can look like a diagonal line with no pauses in between
-even tho the payouts are random they know they can only get reward by
continuing to play
-slope reps the average number of responses required before
reinforcement is delivered
-fixed interval
-reinforcement is delivered after the first response after a set period of time
-course with weekly quizzes
-studying will ramp up before the quiz then studying pauses for a bit after before
starting again
-variable interval
-receive reinforcement at any time, but do have an idea of how often it’ll come up
-steady rate of responding
-straight line with gaps in between
-learning is more robust on a partial rather than a continuous reinforcement schedule
-partial is better
-child who is reinforced with every single behaviour will likely stop when reinforcing ends
compared to a child who is reinforced frequently but not all the time

-Tutorial
-classical = involuntary action
-instrumental = voluntary
-voluntary behaviour leading to a response
-continuous and partial reinforcement schedules
-continuous = reinforcer is given after every response
-not as resistant to extinction
-partial = reinforcer is given sometimes after response
-resistant to extinction
-when you have both schedules it leads to even more reinforcement

Problem Solving and Intelligence

-different kinds of intelligence
-book smart, street smarts, social smarts
-edward boring
-intelligence
 -the cognitive ability of an individual to learn from experience, reason well,
remember important information, and cope with the demands of daily living
-not everyone can agree on a definition
-if we were to define it as ability to excel at strategy board games many
ppl might be considered “dumb”
-problem solving
-interpreting social situation, solving a math problem are all problem
solving
-want to know what strategies you use to solve problems to gain insight into
human intelligence
-deductive reasoning
-when a person works from ideas and generalizations to specific
conclusions
-used to generate a hypothesis
-inductive reasoning
-specific facts and observations to general ideas
-moving from data to theory
-both reasoning are at the heart of scientific method
-top of arch are theories, and bottom of arch is the facts
-deductive is moving from top to bottom
-inductive is moving from bottom to top
-eric and his energy drink
-watched a module about deductive and inductive
reasoning
-he starts with general theory abt drinks
-then designed an experiment to test this hypothesis that
energy drinks help you test better
-the experiment produced facts and from this he used his
facts to prove his theory
-box of tacks, candle and bulletin board
-attach candles to board so you can light it without lighting the board
-task is an insight problem
-test your ability to think outside the box
-functional fixedness
-our difficulty seeing alternative uses for common objects
-we may not have realized that the box containing the tacs can be used
too
-pin box to board and then stand the candle up
-good problem solvers are good noticers
-history of intelligence testing
-reliability of a test
-reliability test produces the same result if one person takes it
-course with weekly quizzes
 -if you’re tested with random questions drawn from large test bank, it’s
reliable if a student scores consistently the same result
-scientists assume intelligence is a static internal quality
-validity
-a valid test actually measures the trait it is supposed to be measuring
-are university courses testing your understanding of the material or your
ability to memorize?
-galton’s study
-came up with a solution
-recorded how quickly ppl rescinded to sensory motor test by their reaction time
-fast reactions time = higher intelligence?
-valid measure is questionable?
-Binet
-developed a tool to identify public school children who needed special education
-30 short tasks related to everyday life
-name parts of the body, name objects in a picture, define words, lengths and weight
-different questions for different ages
-Turnman further adapted the scale
-stanford-binet intelligence test
-idea of a single type of intelligence
-those that did well in classical intelligence tasks performed well in
all kinds of tasks
-cuz there’s one generalized intelligence (g)
-reasoned that only those with minimum of g should vote and
reproduce
-Gardner argued for 8 different types of intelligence
-verbal (linguistic)
-mathematical (logical)
-musical (rhythm)
-spatial (visual)
-kinesthetic (bodily)
-interpersonal
-intrapersonal
-naturalistic
-gained popularity in mainstream media
-everyone can excel somewhere
-intelligence has been applied (often without evidence) to many domains
-standardized testing
-results should be viewed as part of a complete application to evaluate the
complete potential of a candidate
-intelligence tests are still used today
-wechsler scales of intelligence
-wechsler adult intelligence scale
Weschler intelligence scale for children
 -standardized to produce an intelligence quotient for each individual
-IQ based on results taken by many individuals
-surrounding the mean are normal distribution
-your specific IQ is relative to the performance to the rest of the pop.
-does a person’s intelligence result from genes or environment?
-false dichotomy with nature vs. nurture
-better question
-is the differences between groups have more to do with genes or environment?
-do the individual differences in human IQ result from more genetic or
environmental differences
-use correlational studies
-compare fraternal twins to identical twins
-IQ correlation between identical twins was a +0.8
-IQ correlation between fraternal twins was a +0.6
-environmental factors play a vital role
-genes vs. environment
-study identical twins raised in different environment
-mean correlation is still high +0.73
-can’t consider all the environmental similarities and differences
-both genetics and environment play a role
-haven’t determined the whole relevance between each yet
-The flynn effect
-the observation that raw IQ scores have been on the rise since 1932
-mean IQ for the pop is always 100, but the raw score that corresponds to an IQ of 100
has been on the rise
-raw IQ test scores are rising 9-15 points every year
-increased schooling is a contributor
-increased access to information and ideas through books, tv etc
-increase in health too
-piaget
-psychologist
-children are active learners
-by manipulating and exploring their environments they can learn so much
-schema
-a mental framework for interpreting the world around us
-if someone frowns you use this to know they’re unhappy
-Assimilation
-incorporation new information into existing schemas
-accomodation
Modifying existing schemas to fit incompatible information
-cognitive development exits in four stages
-sensorimotor
-lasts until the second birthday
-begins to recognize he can affect change on his environment
 -acts with intention
-pull a string to move a mobile, cry to get attention
-at end is object permanence
-realizes that objects can continue to exist even when he can’t see them
anymore
-parents leave the room they still exist
-preoperational
-ages 2-7
-mastered object permanence
-has cognitive limitations
-egocentrism
-has difficulty understanding the world from a perspective other
than his own
-three mountains task
-what would it look like from a different POV
-seriation
-ability to logically order a series of objects
-place five stacks from shortest to tallest
-reversible relationships
-ask a kid if they have a brother and they will say yes his name is
matthew, but if you ask if matthew has a sister she will say no
-conservation
-fluid conservation
-child would see two glasses of milk with same amount of
fluid
-if you pour one glass into a taller skinner glass and then
ask the child if the glasses have the same amount of milk,
they would say no.
-even though they saw you pour the liquid from one glass
into this tall skinner glass
-they would want the taller skinner glass
-concrete operational
-ages 7-12
-can perform all the things they couldn’t in the preparations stage
-unable to think in abstract terms or reason based on hypothesis
-why abstract concepts are taught after the age of 12
-formal operational
-can think in abstract terms and think in hypothesis
-many children develop interest in games, books, and shows that are involved in
fantasy etc
-can think in many different ways
-although children can progress at different rates, they have to progress through this order
without skipping any stage
-piaget’s theories have flaws
 -decollage
-some children develop things out of order
-rely heavily on the child’s language abilities
-terms more and less can be confusing from a language perspective
-his theories are still highly influential though
-use quick and easy rules to make common decisions quickly and accurately, but you’re prone
to occasional errors
-confirmation bias
-our tendency to seek out information that supports our hypothesis
-collecting this data feels good which biases us to this strategy
-best way to show you were right is to look for evidence that you were wrong
-look for disconfirming evidence
-physician making a diagnosis
-listen to description of symptoms then makes a diagnosis
-then asks questions to see and follow up with whether or not they think their diagnosis
is right
-can fall victim to the confirmation bias though
-more than twice as many deaths worldwide are due to respiratory diseases than car crashes
-availability heuristic
-our tendency to make decisions based on the information that is most quickly available
to us
-reduce effort and simplify decision making
-tendency to make decisions based on info that is easily available can lead to
wrong choices
-why do we create labels based on brief descriptions
-steve who is quiet and likes to read and listens to classical music
-statistically he’s more likely to be a farmer than an english professor because
there are more farmers
-we still use these biases to claim he’s an english professor tho
-representativeness heuristic
-our tendency to assume that what we are seeing is representative of the
larger category we have in our mind
-brief description of steve fits with our preexisting descriptions of a prof
-we arrive at a decision quickly without considering baseline rates
-flip a coin and get heads, then predict we’ll flip heads again
-casinos have spiked interest
-a board is used where ppl are given an illusion that the next bet they’re gonna
place will be a winner
-how to provide and accurately measure an operational definition is important!
-how reliable is a test?
-most ppl think fingerprint ID is completely reliable, but there’s a lot more noise in
a seemingly reliable measure
-measuring more abstract concept of intelligence
Language
-most complex form of communication
-how are words different
-is it combination of sentences
-true languages
-it’s regular governed by rules of grammar
-language is arbitrary
-arbitrarily represent what they mean
-no correlation between word itself and the object
-language is productive
-almost limitless ways to combine words to describe objects, situations, and
actions
-how do humans develop language?
-child can master native language before knowing how to tie shoes
-whorf-sapir hypothesis
-language influences our thoughts and the way we perceive an experience the world
-use language to communicate with others but also to form your thoughts
-thinking to yourself is having a private conversation with yourself
-evidence from brazil
-hunter gathers
-native languages has only three counting words corresponding to one, two and
many
-this tribe should have difficulty understanding fine numerical concepts
-experiment where the members had to match a number of objects and
then the tribe members had to lay out the same number on their mats
-they did fine when there was only one or two object
-didn’t do well when there was more than two objects
-when ppl use the same word to refer to family members
-i.e referring to all men as your ‘brother’ or one specific word
-these ppl can still discriminate between their family members and know
who is who
-so sort of disproves this hypothesis
-korean language
-specific names for each member of the family
-english is in between
-uncle is for both your mom’s brother and dad’s brother
-morphemes
-the smallest unit of sound that contains information
-in sign language or a manuel, morphemes are identified in units of signs not the
sound
-often a word, but some words contain multiple morphemes
-world table
-one morpheme
-tablecloth
 -single word with two morphemes
-can also stand alone as an individual word
-not all morphemes can be used as an individual word
-some need to be added to another morpheme
-word tables is two morphemes
-morpheme table identifies the object
-s morpheme indicates there are multiple
-some indicate the occurrence of another morpheme
-cleaning
-split into morpheme clean, the action
-morpheme ‘ing’ indicates the action is taking place in the present
-can replace with morpheme ‘ed’ for past tense
-phonemes
-smallest unit of sounds in a word
-word dog has three phonemes
-d o g
-syntax
-the rules that govern how words in a sentence are put together
-aka grammar
-in french you assign gender to objects
-english don’t assign grammatical gender to all nouns
-only biological gender
-sometimes hard to describe the syntactic rules in your native language
-semantics
-meaning of a word
-the colourless green ideas sleep furiously beside the kujibo
-violates no syntactic rules but has no semantic meaning
-infants can’t express their needs without language
-why they cry
-language production develops systematically
-babbling
-characterized by drawn-out sounds made up of a variety of combinations of
vowels and consonants
-may sound like a real sentence or question because of the use of inflection and
rhythm in the production of the babble
-combinations progress to become real words
-at about 1 and a half to six years of age vocabulary develops quickly
-the explosion phase
-mastered much
-syntax improves quickly
-segmenting individual words is difficult in the speech of a foreign language
-we think ppl speaking in other languages are talking really quickly
-can early impairment in speech segmentation predict language proficiency in later life?
-research began by familiraing young infants with a word, like dog
 -when reading stories they watched to see if the child could recognize this word in a
story
-when they turned to parents completed a checklist of expressive vocabulary
-total number of words produced by a child
-early speech segmentation skills showed a positive correlation with expressive
vocabulary at two years of age
-those who had poor speech segmentation skills now had smaller expressive vocabulary
-young infants can discriminate more phonemes than adults
-different languages have different phonemes
-i.e korean’s can’t distinguish between certain sounds used in english
-ra or la phonemes
-how do adults end up with different phonemes than infants?
-universal phoneme sensitivity
-ability of infants to discriminate between any sounds they’re tested on
-includes sounds from non-native languages
-indicates there’s some developmental basis for phoneme discrimnation that
developed in early life
-rely on the head turn procedure
-training phase they discriminate between two different phonemes
-turning they’re head towards a stereo
-become habituated to one phoneme
-then new phoneme is played and if they turn their head we know they
can discriminate
-experiment they compared three groups of phonemes present in hindi and english
-adults and kids
-adult english speakers did terribly
-using head turning procedure infants performed as well as hindi speaking adults
-when does this ability disappear?
-end of first year of life they’d lost most of their ability to discriminate between non-native
phonemes
-adults need more time than infants to discriminate between different phonemes
-children learn language through imitation and operant conditioning
-jeannie
-removed from abusive situation at age 13
-was locked in small room
-no interactions with other ppl
-when rescued she had no language skills
-why exposure to other ppl is so important
-children’s language development is too complex to be driven by imitation and operant alone
-young children make interesting langgae errors that wouldn’t be heard in adult speech
-over-extensions
-when children apply a rule too broadly
-for meaning or syntax
 -learn their pets name is doggie and they start calling all four legged
animals doggie
-under-extensions
-when children apply a rule to a specific object only
-child uses the word doggie to refer only to her specific pet dog and no others
-language develops rapidly due to language acquisition device
-an innate mechanism, present only in humans, that helps language develop rapidly
according to universal rules
-all languages follow underlying fundamental rules
-evidence
-work with deaf children who have been taught lip reading instead of sign
language
-kids in states and china use signs to communicate
-deaf children weren’t taught these rules but sign in a manner that follows
rules
-spontaneous signing
-doesn’t follow rules from their parents native language
-used rules that were innate and automatic
-young infants show neurophysiological responses to the first language they’re exposed to
-prefer listening to speech rather than non speech sounds
-suggests that infants brains are prewired to adapt to the sounds and their associative
meanings in the environment
-can animal communication be considered langage ?
-honey bees waggle dance
-social insects
-when forager finds food and performs waggle dance in hive when returning
-consists of two phases
-waggle phase and return phase
-waggle phase bee moves forward in line with where the food is
-food in line with direction of sun is a waggle in a straight upward direction
-waggle in a angle is angle away from where the sun is towards the food
-duration of waggle indicated distance the food is from the hive
-then it returns to its starting position in a loop to the left or right like a figure eight
-can consist of as many as 100 reps
-other forms of animal communication can be complex
-birds use complex sounds for mating etc
-experiments
-try to teach non human animals to use human language
-classical conditioning techniques
-Washoe the ape
-did learn to use signs to communicate simple request
-and combine them to form more complex requests
-say it’s not language cuz there was no use of systemic grammar
-sarah the chimp
 -taught to use symbols to communicate
-used a large vocabulary, was able to answer questions
-developed ability to use complex symbols to communicate
-couldn’t generate new sentences
-couldn’t combine the symbols for more complex stuff
-Kanzi
-taught to use lexigrams to communicate
-trainers didn’t use classical conditioning techniques
-utilized full immersion instead
-to learn language by observation
-seemed to use all lexi grams correctly
-could communicate some novel requests
-grammar was still limited
-didn’t get nouns, verbs, or plurals
-limited ability to create novel combinations of words to express new ideas he
wasn’t taught
-his understanding was very limited
-true language requires ability to combine words to express new ideas
-this is what critics or skeptics argue
-language is a special ability central to the human experience
-allows us to learn, teach, and share our experiences

-Tutorial
-three criteria
-it’s regular, arbitrary and productive
-Social learning theory
-children learn language through imitation and operant conditioning
-innate mechanism
-people are born with the ability to learn language
-we have something inside of us that allows us to make language
-need both of these theories to explain language development

Science of Learning
-Ava who crammed night before test
-would come out of room at 4am looking terrible
-roommates envied her cuz she got high grades
-everything changed third year
-she had to go back and review content from prior courses
-cuz of all the catching up she was short on time
-her grades and social life suffered
-many courses promote this kind of learning
-especially for memorization oriented courses
-could spend 50 hours cramming or 10 hours of efficient studying and do just as well
-getting the most bang for your buck by getting the most information in the least amount of time
is the best
-discuss where when and how to study
-where
-why you should be mindful of distractions in your environment and proactively suppress
them
-when
-why it’s more efficient to distribute your studying over time and across multiple sessions
-how
-why practice testing and self-explanation are better than rereading, highlight, or copying
notes verbatim
-desirable difficulties
-why strategies that initially slow down learning can actually be most efficient
-because of bustling environments, ppl claim to be good multi-taskers
-multitasking refers to the simultaneous completion of two or more tasks
-psychologists say our brains aren’t wired to do this
-instead we quickly switch between tasks and perceive it to be efficient
-analogy
-ppl draw two horizontal lines, one above the other
-two goals are to write task switching is wassy on top line and numbers 1-20 on bottom
line
-one group does entire top line first then bottom
-second task is told to write a letter on top line then one number on the bottom line
-first group does better
-it’s less efficient to complete a challenging task when you’re switching between it
and something else
-realistic scenario
-three groups of people were put into a driving simulator
-one were normal, one while drunk, and one while talking on a cellphone
-cell phone users were just as dangerous as the drunk drivers
-more risky driving
-handheld and hand off devices led to similar impairments
-suggests it was the conversation and not holding the phone that was to blame
-reminder that switching between any two tasks can drastically impair task performance
-pomodoro technique
-helps prevent task switching
-set timer for 25 mins
-goal is to completely zone in
-block out all distractions and focus on task on hand
-when timer is up take a break
-use media, meditate etc
-then go back to another 25 mins of focus
-after repeating three to four times take a longer break
 -true goal is to have sustained periods of work without task switching with longer breaks
every now and then to prevent burning out
-task switching will reduce your studying efficiency
-find a quiet location to study
-explicitly set aside time for when you should be studying interspersed with regular
breaks
-silence your phone
-scientist memorized random lists of random syllables
-when he crammed on one day it took 68 attempts to recite it
-when he distributed it over three days he only required 38 attempts
-learned the same amount in less time
-this is called the spacing effect^^
-participants were asked to study flashcards
-on front was a rare word and back was a common synonym
-in cramming the whole stack was studied eight times in one day
-for spacing each stack was reviewed twice a day for four days
-those in spacing condition retained 20% more than those in cramming
-and cramming had advantage of studying the day before
-spacing isn’t restricted to studying or memorizing just for a test
-holds true if you’re studying complex concepts for s seminar course
-studying scholarly articles and looking for common themes
-better off reading one article and thinking about it and then leading the
second article a day or two later after you have thought about the themes
in the first article
-spacing effect is already kind of intuitive
-practicing a sport is spacing
-you get better slowly over years of practicing
-planning ahead really helps in the long run
-cramming strategy is indirectly harmful cuz it leaves little time to clarify weak spots
-directly harmful too cuz you would learn a lot more per unit of study time if you had
planned ahead and spaced out your studying
-plan ahead and distribute your study sessions
-many students study a lot and still receive a poor grade
-poor study strategies may feel effective in the moment but are harmful
-repeated exposure
-persistent rereading, highlighting and copying of notes
-learner is exposed to material in its raw form over and over till they feel confident they
remember it
-these are ineffective
-consider what the brain is doing
-it’s a one way street
-lots of input but very little output
-this is a popular study strategy among students
-84% undergrads listed rereading study notes or textbook as a method of study
 -55% said this was their #1 method
-leads to rapid short term learning
-can result in a good grade if they cram night before and if test is based on
memory
-it’s intuitive and endorsed
-students are led to believe this is a good strategy if it leads to good marks and
teachers endorse it
-effect of fluency
-makes us feel like we;re learning when we’re continuously exposing us to the
same informations
-we say it sounds so familiar when we’re reading it over
-what researchers call fluency
-feel fluency because the material is right in front of us
-most efficient studying strategy is when out is combined with input
-outputting the material helps to organize it based on prior knowledge
-makes it more memorable
-practice testing is most reliable form of studying
-two methods of studying
-one by reading the review sheet and another by doing practice tests
-six months later both took the test
-they remembered more from the portions they did practice tests on
-called retrieval practice effect
-people are practicing retrieving some information from memory
-entails a combination of output that’s retrieval information from memory
and input
-other output focus method can be used too
-selfexplantion
-periodically stopping to explain information out loud
-ie teaching yourself
-can enhance your retrieval practice by mirroring it with the spacing effect
-consider study where they had intro psych students learn course content via retrieval
practice
-goal was to find a schedule that lead to most learning in least amount of study time
-conclusion was a three by three rule of thumb
-when initially studying don’t stop till you can successfully recall the info from
memory at least three times during your study session
-continue this but space out the time between recalling this by memory
-can further enhance retrieval practice by doing something counterintuitive
-mixing up the topics you test yourself on
-study where students are learning about ECG
-blocked practice tutorial was where the prof explained one diagnosis and gave
four relevant problems related to that diagnosis, explained a second diagnosis
and gave problems etc
 -in mixed practice tutorial the same instructor gave all diagnosis up front then
gave students the problems in random order
-mixed practice tutorial outperformed the blocked practice tutorial by
about 20%
-when studying for an exam mix up questions from all units so you have to not only answer the
question but figure out what unit they’re coming from too
-repeated exposure is good place to start but shouldn’t be your end game
-retrieval practice is good or other means that match output with input
-examples are flashcards, forming groups and quizzing each other or explaining
the material out loud to yourself
-good for achieving efficient long lasting learning
-desirable difficulties
-slow down your studying a lot at first but eventually pay off
-think of the tortoise and the hare
-you learn more efficiently for the long term

Categories and Concepts

-putting things into categories helps to efficiently process the incoming data stream and make
appropriate adjustments
-see man has walking poles on bus
-you decide he’s young and you don’t need to give up you seat
-decision was made efficiently by categorizing it into simpler stimuli
-if you can’t categorize making the simple decision about whether you should give up your seat
or not becomes overwhelming
-how do you classify something as being a sandwich?
-easy for us to do but not easy for a machine
-three basic function of categorization
-classification
-ability to classify dissimilar objects together in the same group
-classifying the variation between different coloured apples
-even though they’re all different colours we classify them all as apples
-understanding
-ability to evaluate a situation and act appropriately based on prior experiences
-two ppl shouting we categorize them as having a fight
-we can use our prior understanding that they don’t need our opinion on
their arguments
-communication
-ability to describe complex ideas or objects using a single label
-many words in our language refer to a category or concept
-sport, furniture, classroom etc
-categorization seems to happen automatically outside our conscious awareness
-we then assume categorization is a simple process
-illusion of the expert
-the feeling that a task must be simple for everyone because it’s simple for yourself
 -tying your shoes is easy for you but hard for a child
-categorization is a very complex field
-lee brooks
-simple, rather than complex categories, leave us susceptible to the illusion of the expert
-complex categories are harder to find a simple categorization rule
-we can understand beauty freedom and justice
-hard to think of category rules for each of these though
-example was defining rules for a bachelor
-might say an unmarried man
-this would include a baby boy and the pope
-not right
-humans have an internal representation of categories that is independent of the rules
we use to try and define them
-prototype theory
-we categorize objects by comparing them to an internal “best” representation of a given
category
-average or best member of the category
-picture a fruit
-apple or orange came to mind
-we all have a prototype for all objects that we picture
-formed through experience
-can be very personal
-according to prototype theory you categorize new objects by comparing them to your
prototypes
-study participants were asked to verify is various statements were true
-when asked if a robin was a bird they responded quickly
-when asked if a penguin was a bird they responded slower
-suggests that more typical category members are categorized more quickly and
easily than atypical categories
-criticisms of prototype theory
-if asked to write down your prototypical fruit, bird chair etc and asked the same question
a week later there’s a good chance you’ll give different answers
-we would expect it to stay stable over time though
-the more prior cases of a category you experience the less likely one new case is to
shift your prototype
-exemplar theory
-we categorize objects by comparing them to every previously stored experience
(exemplar) in a given category
-instead of creating a prototype for a dog you remember every dog you’ve ever
seen
-you quickly sort through your library of exemplars to compare to the current object
-once you find an exemplar closest to an object you categorize it as that
-experiment
 -researchers found that the statement a robin was a bird was verified faster than
the statement a penguin is a bird
-maybe cuz a robin is similar to your bird prototype
-according to exemplar theory it’s just a numbers game
-you have many more robin exemplars in memory than you do for atypical
exemplars like a penguin
-evidence supporting comes from research on medical diagnosis
-they note symptoms to correctly categorize disease to determine a proper
treatment
-diagnosing skin disorders
-one series of slides
-came back again for a second set of slides
-some of the slides were the same disease
-would they identify these quicker thus supporting exemplar theory
-on second series experiments were 20% more accurate if they were
exposed to a single exemplar two weeks before
-criticisms
-prototypes explain categorization explains simple objects better than the
exemplar theory

-development of categorization
-children as young as 3 can understand general categories
-if you teach a child a fact about her dog she can generalize it to other dogs
-evidence that children understand something about category membership
-members of the same category share similar characteristics
-children have deeper understanding of categories
 -if you plugged all holes in a toaster and added a spout and something to hold
water could you turn it into a teapot?
-they could answer yes to this
-if you take a racoon and paint it all black with one white stripe and a spray bottle
that sprays a smelly liquid could you turn it into a skunk?
-they would say of course you can’t
-why is there a difference between machines and animals??
-they understand you can change the nature of a machine but noth the
nature of an animal
-animal categorization
-is categorization a uniquely human trait?
-using instrumental conditioning they taught baboons to categorize objects as
being food or not food
-learned this quickly and could sort new objects with 90% accuracy
-moved on to a difficult category
-if objects are the same
-two food objects are presented they should be categorized as the same
category
-baboons could reach 90% accuracy with much practice
-there are mixed results
-a true demonstration of language has yet to be shown though
-they can categorize concepts
-basic categorization systems exist in animals
-categorization allow you to rest members of the same category similarity and make prediction
about what will happen
-there are costs
-can understand the social phenomenon of stereotypes
-we use categorization incorrectly

Tutorial
-exemplar theory is similar to the availability heuristic
-prototype theory is like the representative heuristic

Attention
-allows you to navigate through a crowded world brimming with distractions
-crossing the street in a place in tokyo
-need ability to focus attention more than just crossing an intersection
-defining attention is a challenging task
-william james
-defined attention as “everyone knows what attention is. It’s the taking
possession by the mind in clear and vivid form, of one out of what seem several
simultaneously possible objects or trains of thought… It implies withdrawal from
some things in order to deal effectively with others, and is a condition which has
a real opposite in the confused, dazed, scatterbrained state.”
 -selection
-the act of attending to an object to select it apart from the unattended objects
-when you put on clothes you feel the fabric on your skin, but then you
don’t pay attention to this feeling as your day goes on
-attention refers to our conscious ability to attend to information that’s relative to our goals
-you can actively select where you focus your attention
-we are adept at distinguishing relevant and irrelevant information in the environment
-but sometimes you’ll get distracted
-drive through busy traffic becomes more difficult as you engage with a
person on a phone call
-automatic processes
-triggered involuntarily
-involuntary “capture”
-assumed to operate in a fast, efficient obligatory manner
-controlled processes
-conscious attention
-operate slowly because they require more cognitive effort
-driving a car through busy traffic
-you consciously pay attention to traffic on the road
-you choose when to make lane changes, speed up etc
-why do you turn down the radio when looking for a new address?
-difficult to attend to many different things at once
-listening to the radio consumes some resources
-as demand for attention increases you have to compensate
-you need to limit unnecessary distractions
-automatic processes while driving a car now
-some cues are more noticeable and lead to stronger and quicker association
-this is salience
-information that naturally pops out to you
-loud sound of someone honking at you
-captures your attention if you intended for it to or not
-first learning to drive
-learned motor skill involving many steps
-each step needs to be performed correctly
-at first it took awhile to learn, but after practice it becomes extremely
easy
-some people can now act on autopilot after awhile
-going to the theatre
-a spotlight will illuminate where you should focus your attention
-visual attention is similar
-your attentional spotlight focuses on only part of the environment at a time
-can be hijacked by unconscious processes too
-objects within the spotlight are processed preferentially
-you have a faster reaction time
 -you also have higher accuracy
-when an object is fixed in our attentional spotlight tasks related to that object will have
increased accuracy and decreased reaction time
-cueing paradigms
-try to determine whether manipulating attention can influence behaviour
-look at a computer and determine if a star appears
-the box that flashes is random and may or may not contain the star
-the flashing box automatically attracts our attention
-even if the star isn’t there
-appears attention can shift faster than the eye
-attention doesn’t immediately rely on sight
-auditory attention
-cocktail party effect
-listen to two different messages played from loudspeakers
-use the shadowing task
-ability to separate target sounds from background sounds depends on gender,
pitch, speed
-filter and spotlight models propose very different mechanisms for attention
-identifying a particular flower in a field of grass
-spotlight would be enhancing the process of visual information of the single
flower relative to the grass
-filter model suggests attention helps us to ignore or block information from the
glass so that the flower stands out in this way
-bradman
-used data from behavioural experiments to infer the functional stages of cognitive
processing
-the attentional filter selections important information on the basis of physical
characteristics and allows that information to continue on for further processing
-info that doesn’t pass through the early physical filter is essentially unimportant
-he used the dichotic listening paradigm
-put on headphones and listen to two different messages
-repeat the message in the intended ear
-what about the message in the unintended ear
-processed no information from the unintended ear
-subjects remember nothing about the unattended information
-this isn’t surprising because the attentional spotlight filter allows only
information arriving from the intended ear to go for deeper processing
-there’s no additional processing of unintentional information
-there’s experiments that illustrate there is some processing in the unattended ear
-subjects show a response to unattended information
-a classical conditioning paradigm was used to associate a word with a shock
-then had a dichotic experiment
-when they heard the word in the attended ear they responded as if being shocked
-this happened when the word was said in the unattended ear too
-breakthrough
-participants remembered unattended information
-when the information is highly relevant
-if you’re conversing with someone in a crowded room and someone from across
the room shouts out your name, this will breakthrough and you will process it
-treisman's model proposes two filters
-physical and semantic
-information goes through the physical filter first
-cues are used to find the most relevant information
-importance of incoming stimuli is determined by these cues
-then goes to the semantic filter
-it’s evaluated for meaning here
-considers the deeper meaning and relevance of the stimuli
-everything else is discarded
-explains all sorts of phenomena
-semantic filter can override the early filtering decisions based on physical traits by considering
the meaning of information
-broadbents single filter model explains the cocktail effect
-assumes that sensory info is filtered based on physical characteristic
-can focus on your friends voice at a loud party by filtering out everything else going on
around you
-doesn’t account for the breakthrough effect though
-treisman's model accounts for the breakthrough effect because it assumes the early filter only
weights the incoming sensory information based on physical characteristics, and then later the
filter processes the resulting information based on meaning to determine what ultimately gets
chosen to be processed
-dual filter model
-the stroop task
-pushes our attention skills to the limit
-produces an effect that’s almost impossible to avoid
-presented with a word on the screen
-asked to say out loud what colour the font of the word is
-congruent
-word red displayed in red font
-incongruent
-word blue in a green font
-examine how long it takes to say the font colour
-faster at congruent than incongruent
-this is the stroop effect
-difference in performance is an empirical measure on processes for selective attention
-in incongruent word reading proceeds automatically, this interferes with naming the
colour of the font
-proportion congruent manipulation
-change the ratio of congruent to incongruent trials
 -75% congruent is increased stroop effect
-25% incongruent is decreased stroop effect
-in congruent trials we adopt a strategy
-word reading facilitates colour naming
-incongruent challenges, you focus on naming
-strategy you adopted lead to an increased stroop effect
-what if few trials are congruent
-you notice they colours don’t match the word
-you adopt a strategy to ignore the word itself
-this is a slower stroop free route
-you promote the processing of font colour
-leads to a smaller stroop effect
-stroope task shows the automatic processes can be consciously controlled
-what would happen to your performance if you did it in a language you didn’t know
-it would be easier
-you’re not worried about reading the words
-automatic
-evidence: word reading influences performance even when the word is to be ignored
-visual search tests model everyday tasks
-analogous to tasks performed everyday
-finding your keys
-finding T among I’s
-this was easy
-make it difficult by increasing the number of items you have to search through
-set size
-the number of items you’re required to search through
-set size effect
-increase in difficulty as set size increases
-single feature search task
-looking for one feature that makes it different from everything else
-colour is easy to search for
-pop-out effect
-when the object of a visual search is easily found regardless of size
-easily indicated by colour
-conjunction searches use two or more feature to create a more difficult search
-the graph with red T’s and green I’s and you have to find the green T
-if conjunction search is difficult to complete how do we do visual search tasks in our everyday
lives?
-we’re good at day to day visual search
-thanks to contextual viewing
-easier to find the green T if there is a box around a smaller portion of it
-context is gained from knowing something about our world
-if you know you put your keys on the right side of the desk, you’ll start by looking
there
 -you begin your search in one location
-easy to take attention for granted

Memory
-explains impressive decision making ability of experts
-the scope and complexity of memory are often overlooked
-many ppl say they saw spider in the original list
-why memory is very fascinating
-because spider wasn;t in the original list
-memory is like recording, like saving a file in a computer
-this is wrong
-imply a memory is a single discrete entity stored in the brain with high fidelity and can
be later retrieved in its original undestroyed form
-it’s more reconstructive
-every time you remember something it’s not necessarily being retrieved as it
was originally sorted
-it’s an inference or reconstruction of previously stored information
-encoding
-when information is first being learned
-storage
-what info is being stored in the brain and how
-retrieval
-how we access prior experiences to make use of them in the present
-these terms are closely linked to how experiments are conducted
-people are shown a list of words or pictures and are asked to princess them in a
different way
-one group creates pictures in their mind to remember the words, another group just
silently reads them
-after a retention interval, when the stuff has been memorized, participants undergo a
test phase
-asked to remember something about what they saw when they memorized
-using the bizarre imagery in the first group, some theory might hypothesis bizarre
imagery enhances memory
-gets complicated, there are many different ways you can test someone's memory
though
-retrieval cue
-any piece of information that can be used to access other information stored in memory
-it’s amazing how easy this is
-this happens in conversations
-we take natural tangents
-conversations spark many memories
-memory test will reveal different things depending on what retrieval cues are provided
by the tester
-in a recall test few retrieval cues are provided
 -participant is just asked to remember as much as they can from encoding phase
-during recognition test participant is shown several old and new items
-they’re asked whether the words are old or new
-the old items are presented as you originally saw them in the encoding
phase
-memory cues provided are pretty strong
-much of what we know come from studies on ppl who have memory deficits
-one patient in particular has forever changed how we think about human memory
-patient H.M
-plagued by chronic seizures they underwent a large surgery at 27
-removed large portions of the hippocampus from both sides of the brain
-this brain area is linked to formation of new memories
-surgery was a success because there were less seizures
-but he developed severe amnesia
-he had difficulty committing new information to memory
-every experience from that day forward felt new to him
-everything new that happened to him quickly faded from memory
-couldn’t tell you how old he was, or where he lived
-some parts of his memory remained in tact
-had a normal iq, could learn new complex motor skills, could hold
small conversations
-this led researchers to divide memory into short and long term memory
-this is the multi-store model
-assumes incoming sensory information is first stored in the short term memory buffer
-information held temporarily is available for the near future but not stored forever
-information held in short term memory can be transferred to long term if it’s sufficiently
rehearsed
-people can remember 7 plus or minus two items
-beyond this it can become restrained
-information can quickly fade from being stored
-can be further organized into chunks of meaningful packets
-two lists of letters
-list two are easier
-can be chunked into five bits of information that are easier to remember
-you may be only able to remember 7 random letters from the alphabet, but you
can remember 7 animals that contain 30 letters from the alphabet
-study asked chess experts to study the placement of pieces on a board
-when placed randomly novices and experts had same accuracy of
memorizing them
-when they were put into their proper places not chess experts were
better at storing more of the information in their short term memory than
the novices
-the multi store model was successful in explaining common findings
-does the position of the word in the list affect how well you remember it?
 -memory performance is best for items presented earlier or later in the list for just recall
tests
-worse for the items in the middle of the graph
-this is a serial position graph
-memory performance is good for items encoded early in the list
-primacy effect
-the items at the beginning will be the first to enter short term memory and have
the most opportunity to be rehearsed
-items in the middle of the list have less opportunity for rehearsal
-why the middle items aren’t remembered as well
-last 7 items on the list
-the recency effect
-encoded information is first held in the short term memory buffer
that has the capacity to hold 7 items
-because of this the newest items replace the oldest items
-then at the end of the list, the last 7 items are held there in your
short term memory since nothing replaces them
-we should be able to find variables that affect one but not the other for the multi store test
-we can manipulate the time between presenting items
-we would assume this would increase the time you have to encode and rehearse and
increase your ability to memorize
-this is exactly what was found
-increasing time between item presentations increases
-amount of times each item can be repeated
-probability of item being stored in the long term memory
-performance recalling first few of items on the list
-recency effect should be affected by a manipulation right before the test period
-group 1 recalls after performing different task for 30s
-requires short term memory resources
-should eliminate anything that was in your short term memory before
-group 2 recalls after 30s silent interval
-group 3 right after
-recency effect disappears for group 1
-group 2’s recency effect is left completely intact
-performed the same as people from group1
-at no point were the items wiped from their short term memory
-could keep repeating the items up until they had to recall
-experienced no gap at all
-the multi store model was foundational and is still actively discussed today
-shallow level
-encoding physical characteristics
-encoding requires little effort
-poor memory performance
-deeper level
 -encode semantic characteristics
-encoding requires significant effort
-better memory performance
-in influential experiment, levels of processing was tests
-those in shallow group made judged whether the word was in upper or lower case
-in moderate group they decided whether the word rhymed or not
-in deeper group they made semantic judgements about whether the words were related
-after recall, participants were given surprise recall test
-best for deeper, ok for moderate, not great for shallow
-level of processing principle
-the more we try to organize and under the material, the better we remember it
-what does it mean to study deeply in terms of meaning?
-notion of deep encoding becomes ambiguous
-logic becomes circular
-whatever study method that leads to better performance becomes deep
and vice versa
-we don’t ask why though
-however, always testing yourself and other study methods are thought of
as deep because they require effort and lead to better performance
-some environmental cues are incorporated into memory
-think about your first kiss
-you can remember more than the feeling on your lips
-think about when you took the first quiz in this course
-can remember the material that was being tested, the room you were in and the
final good feeling of getting a good grade
-this principle suggests that your encoding the specific aspects of the experience, the
chair you were sitting in, the font the test was in etc alongside the encoding of the
specific item or thing itself
-this specific aspects of the experience can act as memory triggers for the future by
acting as cues
-some environmental cues can act as retrieval cues in the future
-when the cues are closer to their experience they’ll remember it better
-encoding context matters a lot
-participants could remember items on the list better when they were in
the environment that they encoded in
-internal and mental state matters too
-some memorized after smoking weed and a placebo
-they remember more if they were under the influence during the
recall too
-the particular manner of encoding also acts as a form of context
-memorizing strings of nonsense words
-minimizes prior experience being a factor
-each word connected to the word before and after it
-the order words are presented in help influence your ability to recall
 -if you’re told tol dah cah you’ll probably remember dah better if presented with
the tol cue
-forgetting
-clear we can’t remember everything
-can remembering too much be detrimental?
-the nervous system also doesn’t know what information will be relevant in the future
-think about memorizing nonsense words
-was also interested in seeing how long memories could be maintained
-ability to remember was best right after and remembered fewer and fewer as time
passed
-rate of forgetting started high and then began to decrease
-this is a negatively accelerating forgetting curve
-there’s an increasing rate in of memory failure with time
-serial position curve
-this is the recency and primacy effect
-information is stored but then gradually fades as a function of time
-decay process is very relevant for short term memory stuff
-interference
-inability to access information from memory due to other similar information competing
for retrieval
-studying animal and cell physiology close together
-will you be able to remember animal physiology well?
-information from this other topic may compete for retrieval
-this can affect your performance
-helps explain forgetting in long term memory
-experiment testing memory of rugby players
-the number of similar experiences, or intervening games that should predict how well
players remember details about prior games
-some players had to sit out during games
-this test supported interference model and not the decay model
-forgetting may be more about the inability to retrieve something stored in memory than
passive decay
-the faintest of memories might still be stored in the brain in some way
-they’re just inaccessible
-unless very specific retrieval cues are presented, these stored memories may be
functionally lost
-forgetting isn’t always an enemy
-could be counterproductive to remember everything from the past
-this is adaptive in some circumstances
-sometimes memories can be more faulty
-can have vivid memories of events that never occurred
-one study, participants were asked to remember a list of childhood experiences
gathered from their parents
-three were real one was fake
 -getting lost in the mall, crying receiving comfort from an elderly
women and then the happy reunion
-wanted to see if the fake experience was identified as being a
real experience
-at first everyone remembered it then 20% believed this
memory to be 100% real
-illustrates memory is truly a constructive process
-getting lost in the mall is a plausible memory though
-this is why the participant thinks it’s real
-consider an implausible scenario
-would the same results occur
-repeatedly imagining an event can lead to a false
memory, even if it’s bizarre
-everytime ppl saw a vending machine they were told to
imagine proposing
-later participants would equate that with a real
experience even though it was imagined at first
-false memories provide support for the idea that memory is a reconstructive process
-recalling a memory is open to interpretation and suggestion
-stories we tell change over the years and from person to person
-imagine you’re on the bus and sitting across from you is someone who looks familiar
-you can’t place from where though
-fluency
-the ease with which an experience is processes, some experience are easier
(more fluent) than others
-we must know this person from somewhere
-attribution
-judgment tying together causes with effects
-feeling of familiarity with the stranger on the bus
-or maybe they stand out because they look different
-becoming famous overnight
-processing fluency in action
-asked to read out a list of people’s names in a task phase on
-gave a pronunciation reading task
-phase two they viewed a second list that had celebrities and common names
-gave a fame rating task
-some of the made up names were new and some were drawn from the first list
-agreed on the fame readings of the celebrities
-time delay between phase 1 and 2 was important
-those who did phase 2 right away appropriately rated the names as
being famous and generic names as being generic
-24 hour delayed group said the generic names accounted from the day
before as being more famous than the first group
 -fluency is made by making the attribution that because you’ve seen the
name already so you make the misattribution that this name must be
famous
-fluency of name in question is attributed to the fact that they had just
seen the name from the previous task for the first group of people
-active remembering is an inherent reconstructive process
-prone to failure
-memory is more unreliable than you realize
-individual memories may not exist in the mind in any traditional sense
-beginning of the module our brain probably falsely inferred that spider was part of the list
because of all the words that related or had to do with the general topic of spiders

Forming impressions
-vast experience allows you make automatic judgements to make assumptions about others
-this controls how you react or interpret your behaviour amongst others
-why does jack buy a drink for jill
-is he returning a favour?
-trying to make a new friend?
-just being nice because jill forgot her wallet
-difficult to attribute intentions to observed actions
-denise was walking home after class, when a stranger bumped into her and said hey watch
where you’re going
-denise was annoyed that she felt threatened by this stranger
-she was so upset she spent the night at a friend’s house
-gain a lot of info about a person by observing their behaviour
-how you interpret their behaviour may lead you to form an impression that may or may
not accurately reflect the circumstances
-was the observed behaviour a fixed personality trait?
-was it just due to the situation they were in?
-covariation theory
-how a person’s behaviour can be attributed to either personal dispositional or situational
circumstances
-three variables are consider to determine whether is dispositional or situational
-consistency, distinctiveness, consensus
-chris is having trouble getting his computer to work
-consistency
-does the individual usually behave this way in this situation?
-is chris usually unable to get his computer to work?
-if yes, then it is consistent
-if no, he gets angry and it’s disposition
-distinctiveness
-does the individual behave differently in different situations
-if yes then the given behavior is driven by the situation
-if no, then the given behaviour is driven dispositionally
 -does chris have trouble with other computers or just this particular one?
-if it’s every computer, the problem could be chris himself
-consensus
-do others behave similarly in this situation
-if yes, it’s situational factors
-if no, then the different behaviours observed are likely due to each
person’s individual dispositions
-do other people have trouble with chris’s computer or is it just him?
-covariation theory allows us to attribute a behaviour to a person’s inherent qualities or the
situation they were put in
-ask if they usually behave in this situation
-if yes then ask if it’s dispositional thing
-if no it’s probably a situational thing
-several theories on how you decide to attribute a behaviour
-correspondent inference theory
-you actively analyze a person’s behaviour to make inferences based on 3
variables
-degree of choice
-expectation
-intended consequences
-degree of choice
-the amount of freedom the actor had in choosing their opinion or behaviour
-class where you’re debating the death penalty
-if you knew people chose the side they wanted to argue for you can
assume that a person arguing the pro side is actually pro death penalty
-if you know people were randomly assigned, it’s now harder to make that
assumption
-may have difficulty appreciating the role of degree of choice
-you may actually start thinking actors who portray villains are villains irl
-expectation
-the occurrence of a particular behaviour for a specific actor
-uncommon behaviour gives more information than a common behaviour
-intended consequence
-goals and motivations of an actor underlying their behaviour
-if you watched a commercial that advocate lower smoking levels which you
knew was sponsored by tobacco companies, you may assume there was an
alternate goal in mind
-you may not be as suspicious if you heard your sister making this same scenario
-we make automatic judgements about people which influence how we speak and interact with
people later
-understanding these attribution theories then becomes vital
-predicts how we may react
-we often overestimate the role of dispositional factors and underestimate the situational factors
-if you get cut off by a car what do you think?
 -usually we think they’re a terrible driver
-we don’t think “he’s probably in a rush to get to an appointment”
-fundamental attribution error
-tendence to over-value dispositional factors for the observed behaviours of others while
under-valuing situational factors
-more vulnerable to making this error when determining the causes of the
behaviours in others rather than your own
-when thinking about your own behaviour, you’re much more aware of the
situation you’re in
-actor observer effect
-you as the actor are better aware of the many situational factors contributing to your
behavior, but when you're observing other you only have the current situation at hand,
so you assume the individual behaviour is representative of what would be typically
observed
-teens would attribute their dangerous driving to situational factors
-attributed their friend risky driving to personal factors
-influenced by culture
-studied how likely american and indian subjects were to attribute
negative behaviour to situational and dispositional factors
-american 8-11year olds attributed behaviour to personal and
situational causes about equally
-american adults attributed behaviours to personal factors more
often than situational
-both indian 11 year olds and adults have a tendency to make
more situational than personal attributions
-comparisons with other cultures showed similar results
-american students increased probability of making fundamental attribution error
-decreased probability of making fundamental attribution error in collectivist societies
-less focus on individual behaviour and more focus on relationships within the
society
-special case of misattribution is self serving bias
-tendency to perceive yourself favourably
-above average effect
-causes you to address disposition factors for your successes
-situational factors for why you lose
-you’re above average for everything
-most ppl assume their IQ is higher than 100
-essentially saying they’re above average
-we have built in mechanisms to view ourselves favourably
-bias in your perception may lead you to think you’re above average in many things that
mean a lot to you
-university students may think they’re better at making friends than others
-not possible for everyone to be above average
-some of these concepts are highly related
 -fundamental attribution error, starting with idea that we interpret the behaviour of
others based on dispositional factors
-actor observer effect suggest we’re more conginscent of situational factors for
our own behaviours
-self serving bias, how we attribute success to disposition factors and failure to
situational factors
-the above average effect, describing how we tend to view ourselves favourably
-science relies on hypothetical constructs
-dark matter is a hypothetical construct in physics that hasn't been
observed directly
-processing speeds of social perceptions are shaped by heuristics to automatically make quick
decisions based on the environment
-representative heuristic
-classify people by how well their behavior fits with a certain prototype
-jennifer
-choosing second option, you are falling victim to the heuristic
-there isn’t a huge proablity that she is both a bank teller and feminist
-this is super specific
-availability heuristic
-rating professors
-you attended every lecture in the first semester, had a great time
-didn’t attend many classes in second semester
-you might rate the first prof higher just because you have better
memories
-even though both professors may be really great teachers
-experiment
-university students were asked to rate the quality of a course on a seven point scale
-the surveys contained the same questions with one exception
-one asked to list 2 ways to improve the course, the second asked for 10 ways
-easier to recall 2 problems which gives you the impression that there are many more
problems with the course
-leads to lower ratings
-harder to recall 10 problems, might not even get ten, so you think there may not be any
problems at all
-this leads to higher ratings
-every day contains opportunity for social activity
-without short cuts, processing is really overwhelming
-these can lead to biases tho
-perceptions don’t necessarily reflect reality
-attraction
-doesn’t refer exclusively to sexual attractions
-several factors that make it more likely for you to be attracted to a person
-proximity, familiarity, physical attractiveness, peer opinions
-physical proximity
 -more likely to be attracted to or become friends with those you live or
work closely with
-importance of proximity, lies not just in physical distance but in functional
distance
-how often do individuals get to interact
-two students in a lecture hall may be close but not interact at all
-people tend to like those that they anticipate interacting with
-mere exposure effect
-a tendency to perceive previous stimuli as more favourable
-english speaking participants were exposed to turkish
words that were shown in high or low frequency
-they were then shown words again and were asked if the
word was a positive or negative one
-participants were more likely to guess that a given
word was positive if they were exposed to it
previously with a high frequency
-i.e shown it multiple times
-familiarity
-explains why you tend to rate the faces of people you’ve seen before as
being more attractive
-this is why we naturally say a celebrity is attractive, just because we’ve
seen their face often
-happens with your own face too
-you’ll rate the mirror image of your face as being more attractive
than a non mirror image version of your face
-this is because you see your mirror image more than the
other version of yourself
-family will, however, say the non mirror image is more
attractive
-physical attractiveness is an important factor
-assumption that what is beautiful is also good
-physically attractive people are judged as kinder, warmer, sensitive,
more outgoing etc
-study
-grade 5 teachers were given a student description of a child
-also shown a photo of an attractive and unattractive kid
-even though the descriptions were the same, the
teachers rated the attractive child as being more
intelligent
-halo effect
-tendency to attribute more positive characteristics to individual
that make a positive impression
-representativeness heuristic in action here
 -we assume well dressed people are going to be
professional and nice to interact with them
-self esteem also plays a role
-study
-women were given either positive or negative feedback to boost
or lower their self esteem
-as participants waited in hallway, they were approached by a
friends candidate who would ask them to go on a date
-the participant was then asked back into the testing room to rate
the attractiveness of different random faces, including the face of
the person who asked them out
-those with lowered self esteem rated the attractiveness of
the confederate as being higher than those who had higher
self esteem and those who underwent no manipulation
-having someone like you when your self esteem is low
has a lasting impression
-peer opinions
-important about how a person has previously thought about you
-study
-participants read evaluations about people who had known them for a
long time
-evaluations could start positive then end negative
-start negative, end positive
-start negative end negative
-saart positive, end positive
-then rated how much they liked the people who rated them
-highest ratings went to neg/pos
-second highest positive/positive
-third was neg/neg
-worst was pos/neg
-so it’s better if you start with a negative impression that
changes to a positive impression
-next time you say you dislike someone try and think about why you dislike them

Tutorial
-expectation vs. consistency
-if someone does something consistently and it seems normal this is a disposition thing
-something can defy expectations but it can still be consistent
-correspondant inference
-motivation behind what they do
-how much of the intentions are really situational things
-is the situation affecting the motives behind the action more than the
person
-but we’ll be asked degree of choice, consequences, or consensus
Influence of others 1
-thoughts and behaviours are influenced by those around you
-look for cues
-you act differently with different people
-each year, the world’s top cyclists compete in the tour de france
-how does the presence of fellow riders in a race effect effort for each competitor?
-norman triplett performed first formal study of social psych
-cyclists raced faster when competing against each other in a group
-slower when racing against a clock with individual time trial
-these effects can be observed in children
-children performed task of winding string on fishing rod as fast as
they could
-would wind faster when other children were present
-slower when alone
-co-actor
-another individual performing the same task
-audience
-a group of ppl watching an individual perform a task
-social facilitation
-the increased performance that occurs in the presence of co-actors
-exceptions
-presence of co actors and audience didn’t produce an increase effect
-could sometimes hinder performers
-completing a difficult maze, solving complex math problems etc
-why does the presence of others sometimes lead to improved or hindered performance?
-zajonc
-suggests that the important factor to consider is the presence of others increases
arousal
-how this affects performance depends on the task being performed
-presence of others increases arousal to improve performance on well practiced
tasks
-ppl completing puzzles, or well trained cyclists
-because the task has been practiced or is easy
-presence of others decreases performance on complex tasks
-haven’t had time to practice yet
-social learning theory
-to explain how social behaviours are shaped
-suggests that you learn appropriate behaviors by modelling and imitating the behaviors
of others
-can be differentiated from basic conditioning
-don’t always need explicit behaviour to develop
-bo bo doll experiment
-aggressive behaviour by children was spontaneous
 -no explicit encouragement
-learning of a behaviour doesn’t necessarily occur with explicit reinforcement
-what if a real person dressed up as a clown was used?
-children still attacked the real person with kicks etc
-why videogames are no bueno
-conformity
-experiments
-auto kinetic effect
-stare at dot in black room
-think the dot moves
-this is mistaking motion for it actually moving across your retina
-but as a participant you don’t have this knowledge
-so you actually believe the light moves
-so you’re always tracking the way the light is moving
-as you listen to other participants answers, your answers slightly
shift
-your responses gradually converge with the other responses
-example of norm formation
-powerful effect
-can be further manipulated by the experimenter
-had confederate sit in with the participants
-made them say large movements
-then people conform to this large statement
-i.e dot moving very far
-asch
-people seated in room with other ppl
-told they were gonna complete a simple experiment
-one sample line and three example lines
-group had to report which experiment line was identical to the sample
-out of 7 ppl, only 1 is a real participant
-they’re always 6th to respond
-at first all participants agree on obvious line judgements
-one by one confederates agree on incorrect answers
-the participant usually manage to make a correct report
-75% conformed to an incorrect answer on at least one trial
-37% conformed to completely wrong answers
-normative function
-the role of others in setting standards for our conduct based on a fear of rejection
-explains fashion trends in pop culture
-normative function of group sets the standards
-guides you to dress similarly to the rest of society
-social conventions and common sense can guide you when the facts of a social situation are
clear
-when it becomes ambiguous though the first thing you do is observe others and see how
they’re reacting
-comparative function
-the role of others in providing information about an ambiguous situation
-controlled lab setting for asch’s study
-each participant was seated in a separate cubicle
-couldn’t see or hear anyone
-made judgement after seeing a set of lines
-made an anonymous decision though
-you saw the anonymous answer before answering though
-even with anonymity, ppl still went along with wrong answers on a number of
trials
-can conform because they thought the others were right and they doubted their
perceptions
-conformity is maintained through the normative function because of social pressure and fear of
rejection and through comparative function by provind group info in an uncertain situation
-comparative
-describes when we conform cuz we don’t know how to act
-we gain info
-normative
-conforming due to fear of rejection
-avoiding ridicule
-working in groups
-james stoner studied risky shift effect
-at the time the belief was groups were more cautious than individuals
-girl is a writer who has talent, but has been earning a comfortable living writing
cheap romance novels. She has a good idea though. If it’s accepted she could
become a well known author. If the novel is a flop though she will have wasted so
much time
-you’re her agent
-what is the lowest probability of success that you would consider
acceptable for her to write the novel
-you would first make a personal judgement than one tgt as a group to
decide
-the group decision was riskier than the mean decision of
individual before the discussion
-not every experiment produced a risky shift
-sometimes the group’s decision was more cautious than
the mean of the individual’s decision
-group polarization
-group decision making strengthens the original inclinations of the individual group
members
-builds on the previous idea of a risky shift
-becomes riskier or cautious based on the group
 -helen’s case the individuals had risker choices, leading to the group
decision being more riskier
-for rodger, individuals probably had more cautious choices, which lead to
the group decision being even more cautious
-supported by many experiments
-groups decision making enhances national pride, negative racial and financial attitudes,
and decision making in juries
-if most jurors favour a larger award, discussions would lead to an even larger
award
-internet also caters to us in this way
-groupthink
-a group decision making environment that occurs when group cohesiveness
becomes so strong it overrides realistic appraisals of reality and alternative
opinions
-mob mentality
-believe they’re unquestionable right
-fail to critically test analyze and evaluate decisions by the group
-individuals usually censor their opinions
-those who disagree are shunned
-be impartial
-groups leader should never endorse a particular from the outset
-encourage critical evaluation
-allow ppl to disagree
-assign a devil's advocate
-subdivide the group
-go into separate groups then come back to discuss ideas
-provide a second chance
-air any lingering doubts here
-bystander effect
-38 ppl witnessed crime from apartment windows and didn’t do anything at all
-no one tried to help her in New York
-people thought there was something wrong with the witnesses
-when interviewed though, many were distraught
-didn’t intervene for personal interview
-didn’t call the police cuz they saw many others watching
-assumed the police had already been called
-the very presence of so many witnesses was in part responsible for the lack of
action
-when do they act?
-the must decide first whether it was an emergency
-ppl were asked to complete a survey alone and with others
-smoke seeped into room
-those working alone reported smoke quickly
-as # of ppl increased the likelihood of ppl reporting decreased
 -collective ignorance
-when each individual in a group sees nobody responding in a
given situation, they conclude that the situation isn’t an emergency
-then they must decide whether they should act
-person was asked to communicate with others over a phone
-were all in separate room
-led to believe there were different numbers of ppl joining the
convo
-heard cries from help from someone suffering from a seizure
-most rapid responses came from ppl who believed no one was
available to take action
-diffusion of responsibility
-in deciding whether we have to act, we determine that someone
else in the group is more qualified
-also consider the special skills of the group

-when you are hurt be specific

-specify a person and give them a direct command
-you’ll break through collective ignorance and diffusion of responsibility
-also seeing someone else helping increases your probability of helping in the future
-helping behaviour is contagious
-social loafing
-special case of diffusion of responsibility
-individuals seem to be less motivated when working in a group than when working
alone
-ppl pulled 18% less when they thought they were pulling in a group vs pulling alone
-another study, less noise was produced as the perceived group size increased
 -they thought they made the same amount of noise in both conditions though
-we diffuse responsibilities for collective efforts too
-when we think there are other ppl present to do the work for us, we have a
tendency to take a free ride
-may also be unconscious in nature

Influence of others 2
-study
-participant arrives and meets another person in waiting room
-purpose of study is to examine effect on punishment on learning
-you’re the teacher and the other person is a learner
-learner is a confederate
-learner has shock electrodes put on them while you watch
-learner mentions they have a heart condition
-you’re feeling nervous but everything seems under control
-you’re seated in front of a counsel in another room
-each button ranges from 15v-450v
-some of the switches have captions
-light, danger, or danger, severe shock
-must read a list of word pairs
-they must respond to second word to pair
-each time they’re wrong u shock them
-shocks increase
-you go up one each time
-at first errors are minimal
-over time the shocks increase
-you look at the experiment but they tell u to keep going
-now you can hear the learner screaming and they wanna stop
-complain about heart
-experimenter says you must continue
-learner stops responding at one point
-when you wanna stop the experimenter tell u you have no chide
-you must continue
-how long will you continue to administer shocks?
-65% of all participants continued to the very end of the experiment
-delivered the danger shock to a non-responsive man with a heart condition
-this was extremely shocking
-strong tendency of obedience to authority
-even if their authority is limited
-we’re not always an accurate judge of how we would behave in the study
-65% of those who say they wouldn't behave that way in the situation were wrong
-corner stone in any debate in ethic sona psych research
-most participants were devastated by the experiment
-many ppl have argued that his experiments were unethical
 -he argued that none of his participants were emotionally scarred for good after
-apparently were happy they participated
-happy they could've helped and were intrigued by the results
-just said it was weird
-why were they willing to obey?
-the inherent prestige of following the instructions of a yale prof at a university
-in a run down office, proportion of people who obeyed and continued to the end of the
experiment dropped to about 50%
-replaced experimenter in the room with a student
-obedience dropped even more
-in one case they got into a physical confrontation with the student left in charge
-obeyed because they were physically separated from the learner
-brought the learner in another room that could be seen by the teacher
-they were in the same room
-teacher had to place the hand on the shock electrode
-the closer they were made to be, the lower proportion of students obeyed
and continued
-proximity of the experimenter to the teacher
-experimenter out of room and issued orders over phone
-25% of ppl obeyed
-many cheated
-delivered lower shocks than they should have
-test in a a real situation
-administer a strong drug to the patient
-by agreeing they violate so many rules
-the requested dose was higher than max daily dose
-medication orders should never be taken over the phone
-fake med wasn’t on the list of official meds
-taking orders from an unfamiliar voice
-when asked 95% of nurses said they wouldn’t obey this order
-in reality 21/22 nurses obeyed the order
-demonstrates the tendency to obey can be irresistible in a variety of circumstances
-you never quite know how you would act until you were placed in a given situation
-⅔ of us would proceed to the end of the experiment
-when you conform to a group, obey a command, or follow a social convention, you’re
performing a behavior that’s not necessarily in line with your attitudes
-can your chosen behaviour affect your attitudes?
-cognitive dissonance
-a state of psychological discomfort brought on by conflict between a person’s
attitudes and their behaviour
-this is often resolved when a person adjusts their beliefs to justify an action they
made in the past and can’t change
-complete a boring task
-were told it was gonna be an exciting study
 -were surprised by how boring it was
-experimenter asks you to tell the next participant the task was
interesting
-they’ll pay you $1 or $20 to do it
-the group paid one dollar to lie rated the experiment higher in
enjoyment than the $20 group and the control group who didn’t
have to lie
-those in the $1 group thinks to themselves “why did I tell them it was fun
when it actually wasn't?”
-they have large dissonance
-to fix this they can either adjust their attitude or behaviour
-can’t adjust behaviour, they can change their attitude to be consistent
with their chose behaviour
-participant convinces themselves that the experiment was more
interesting than they though
-reduced dissonance
-$20 group’s dissonance is minimized
-they may acknowledge that they lied and simply decide they did it
for the money
-attitude was intact and they can go one to believing the
experiment was boring
-motivation of large reward explains the inconsistency of their
behaviours with their attitude
-cognitive dissonance takes place when there’s an
insufficient justification for a behaviour in conflict with the attitude
-$1 can;t justify lying
-overjustification effect
-the resolution of cognitive dissonance as conflict in behaviour and attitude are
justified by some external means
-get a roommate to clean more
-you give a large reward to get them to clean more
-this may stop when you stop giving them a reward though
-original attitude that cleaning is boring will still remain
-if you can convince them to clean as part of a group activity
-may ask why they’re performing this behaviour
-dissonance will lead them to change their attitudes to align with their new
behaviours
-now think chores are fun
-ad seeking male participants for experiment lasting 2 weeks
-basement at stanford
-looked at behaviour of ppl under normal circumstances
-raised chaos and questions of ethics
-24 ppl were checked
 -passed screen test for criminal background check, psychopathology screen,
anti-social behaviour screen
-signed contract agreeing to terms of experiment
-including a limited diet
-treated them like prisoners
-were mock arrested, finger printed etc etc
-guards were told to maintain degree in prison necessary
-study was halted after 6 days because of the sadistic behaviours by the guards
-5 participants suffered extreme depression etc
-when it was halted those assigned as prisoners were soooo happy
-the guards never failed to show up to their shift
-displayed behaviours that were dehumanizing
-would stay later without being paid
-called prisoners only by their numbers
-paraded them naked
-some guards were tough but fair
-some were passive and didn’t instigate control over prisoners
-some were just so cruel
-circumstances and assigned role have a huge impact on human behaviour
-all guards passed initial psychological testing
-later were reported as being sadistic and pathological
-how can normal ppl inflict toture and pain on others in extraordinary circumstances
-the degree to which the participants were made to be anonymous affects their behaviour
-guards wore reflective glasses and prisoners wore the same things, only identified by a
#
-deindividuation
-in a group situation, the loss of a sense of personal responsibility and restraint
-guards loss their sense of responsibility and restraints
-experiments
-ppl wore coats and hoods to cover their faces before shocking confederates
-shocked them way more than ppl wearing normal clothes with name tags
-can occur naturally in cities
-purchased two cars with their hoods up
-in new york things were stolen, and after three days 23 instances of
vandalism were recorded
-in smaller city one person touched the car to lower hood in rain
-you’re involved in a cycle of persuading and being persuaded by others
-communicator of message
-those with high credibility are the most persuasive communicators
-physical attractiveness
-attractive communicators sell more products
-you’re also drawn to communicators who look or sound like you
-you can relate to them
-what’s more important, similarity or credibility?
 -similarity is more persuasive for lifestyle choices
-credibility is more persuasive for matters of objective fact
-speech style influences perceived trustworthiness
-studies in courtroom testimony
-speakers who talked in a very straightforward, concise manner were more
persuasive
-speakers on tape recorded messages are seen as more knowledgeable and persuasive
when they’re played back at faster speeds
-how you frame the message itself
-choosing to frame your message a certain way affects your persuasiveness
-can frame it in a one-sided or two-sided argument to support you cause
-option depends on the prior opinion of your audience
-if you’re audience is initially leaning towards your position, one-sided argument
is more effective
-if your audience initially disagrees with you, you should use a two-sided
argument
-you acknowledge the opposing position, respond, then argue why your
position is better
-central appeal
-well reasoned, factual, two-sided arguments
-the audience actively contributes to making a decision on their own
-effective for academic audiences
-peripheral appeal
-well presented, easy to understand messages
-effective for non-academic audiences
-the foot in the door effect
-call on phone prank
-caller on phone assumed identity of an authority figure
-established credibility using police jargon
-used a gradual escalation of demands to increase compliance
-told them to search through purse then gradually to take off clothes
-this is known as the foot in the door effect
-studies of foot in door effect
-convinced people to put a drive carefully sign up
-17% agreed to do this
-however, if they first asked ppl to put up a smaller sign, 90% agreed later on to
put up the larger sign
-% of toronto residents doubled if they first agreed to wear a pin for the charity the day
before
-foot in door effect is powerful because any one effect in a series is considered in relation to the
previous request and not its broader context
-so a request that seems outrageous in an isolated situation seems reasonable in a
series of requests leading up to it
-low ball technique
 -an escalation of the terms of an agreement after someone has already agreed to
comply
-a customer might agree to a product because of its initial low price
-after signing the papers, the dealer reveals extra costs that weren’t there at first
-when people ask you to perform a small favour you need to be aware of whether a large
request is going to follow
-as a social being you shape the thoughts and behaviours of others
-and vice versa