5 sexiest social psychologists and their 5 sexiest theories:

 (in no particular order)

1.) Leon Festinger is sexy because he is big on consistency.  The social comparison theory (1954) sand cognitive dissonance (1957) both hinge on consistency, whether with similar others or between our attitudes and behaviors. Cognitive dissonance is sexy because it demonstrates a counterintuitive idea that rather than changing one’s behavior to fit one’s attitudes, sometimes it’s the other way around.  People actually change their attitudes, which I argue is more salient to one’s identity, to fit and justify their behavior.  Consistency is sexy.

2.) Solomon Asch is sexy because he got participants to behave in a way that was inconsistent with their attitudes.  Again, consistency (and inconsistency) is cool.  In his famous line judgment study (1951), 37% of responses conformed to the group standard and thus were incorrect answers.  The normative influence of conformity is sexy because these participants that gave incorrect answers knew that their answers weren’t actually correct!  They just didn’t want to appear deviant.  Who knew that following norms could outweigh being correct? Social influence in sexy.

3.) Robert Zajonc is sexy because he got cockroaches to navigate a maze (1969).  Who knew that cockroaches are also subject to social facilitation?! Zajonc (1965, 1980) is also cool because he recognized that presence of other for easy tasks improves performance whereas hard tasks hinder performance. Social facilitation is sexy because it demonstrates that we do not live in a vacuum.  Our performance, behavior, attitudes, etc are products of our environment and social interactions.  And social interactions are sexy.

4.) Gordon Allport is sexy because he not only gave us a great definition of social psychology that includes the implied or imagined presence of others (1985), he also created the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues.  He is also the father of the contact hypothesis (1954) which is so intuitive.  How do you fix prejudice, stereotypes, etc?  Just be around diverse people! Duh!  Okay, it’s not that simple, but the contact hypothesis is sexy because it encourages and promotes diversity, equality, and cooperation.  Equality is sexy.

5.) Robert Cialdini is sexy because he teaches us how to get what we want.  His compliance techniques (2007) demonstrate that people can be easily swayed to comply with requests, even from total strangers.  The sexiest compliance strategy is door-in-the-face (2007) because even though you’re tricking someone, there are rarely hard feelings about it.  The fact that a huge, unreasonable request can later lead to compliance with a smaller, intended request blows my mind.  I use this technique all the time.  The key is to not be too unreasonable with the first request, like when I asked Lauren if we could have a baby in order to get her to agree to a puppy.  Compliance is sexy.

Allport, G. W. (1985)  The historical background of social psychology.  In G. Lindzey & E. Aronson (Eds.), Handbook of social psychology (3rd ed., Vol. I, pp 1-46).  New York: Random House.

Allport, G. W. (1954).  The nature of prejudice. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.

Asch, S. E. (1951).  Effects of group pressure upon the modification and distortion of judgments.  In H. Guetzkow (ed.), Groups, leadership, and men.  Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Press.

Cialdini, R. B. (2007).  Influence: The psychology of persuasion.  New York: HarperCollins.

Festinger, L. (1954).  A theory of social comparison processes.  Human Relations, 7, 117-140.

Festinger, L. (1957).  A theory of cognitive dissonance. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

Zajonc, R. B. (1965).  Social facilitation.  Science, 149, 269-274.

Zajonc, R. B. (1980).  Compresence. In P.B. Paulus (Ed.), Psychology of group influence (pp. 35-60).  Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

Zanjonc, R.B. (Heingartner, A., & Herman, E. M. (1969).  Social enhancement and impairment of performance in the cockroach.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 13, 82-92.

I'm just trying to maximize my profits...

According to social exchange theory, human behavior often follows the economic model of profits and losses.  Like with money, peoples' social behavior is motivated by minimizing losses and maximizing profits (Thibaut & Kelley, 1959).

So before Lauren and I were together, I was dating a girl who we'll call Sam.

So be completely honest, I was pretty much miserable.  Sam did not have a car, did not have a job, was not going to school, and was pretty clingy.  The worst part?  We didn't have any interesting conversations and she never got any of my jokes.

Suffice to say, I was not satisfied with Sam. According to Rusbult, Martz, and Agnew (1998), satisfaction can be explained with the following equation:

Satisfaction = Rewards - Costs - Comparison Level

Comparison Level (CL) refers to my expectations of my relationship with Sam given my knowledge of past relationships (Thibaut & Kelley, 1959).  In this context, my CL was moderate.  However, my costs were greater than my benefits, and thus my satisfaction was low. But because I thought I was being a good person and because I had already invested so much time, money, and energy, I stayed with her.  According to social exchange theory, investments are factors, such as time and money, that one cannot get back if the relationship ends (Thibaut & Kelley, 1959).  Because I had already invested so much, I thought I should stay with Sam even though my satisfaction was low.

That is, until I met Lauren.  When Lauren entered my life, I was forced to consider the comparison level of alternatives (CLalt), or what I thought were the costs and benefits of dating Lauren rather than Sam and whether or not I thought a switch would be more beneficial (Thibaut & Kelley, 1959).

Lauren was independent, financially and emotionally, and even had a car!  Plus, she appreciated my wit.  According to Rusbult et al. (1998), commitment can be explained by the following equation:

Commitment = Satisfaction - CLalt + investments

So, even though my investments were great, my satisfaction was very low, my CLalt was enormous (thanks to Lauren).  So, following social exchange theory, I decided to minimize my losses and drop Sam like it's hot.  

In the context of my relationship with Sam, I was losing a lot: money, normal emotional and intellectual processing, and precious time.  With Lauren, I would only have to pay for myself, we could have stimulating conversations, and she was a better prospective mate. 

In the end, I'm glad I unknowingly utilized social exchange theory.  I definitely maximized my profits/satisfaction and minimized my losses.

Rusbult, C.E., Martz, J.M., Agnew, C.R. (1998).  The investment model scale: Measuring commitment level, satisfaction level, quality of alternatives, and investment size.  Personal Relationships, 5, 357-391.

Thibaut, J. W. & Kelley, H. H. (1959).  The social psychology of groups.  New York: Wiley.

Give an oaf, don't loaf!

So recently in one of my classes, we had to do a group project.  When we found out who our group members were, I felt very lucky because my group members 1) were in my Methods class last year 2) have good writing styles 3) care greatly about their academic success.  I knew I could count on them!

Turns out they were a bunch of social loafers... According to Latane and others (1979), social loafing occurs when people in groups do not produce the same amount or quality of work as they would if they were alone.

When my group members were unsure whether we needed outside sources to talk about the etiology and treatment of certain psychological disorders, I thought they were kidding.  I said, "Of course you do! That's not something you innately know..."

And when their sections did not meet the same quality as I had hoped and expected, I was surprised.  It sounded like they just strung ideas together, regardless of being able to cite evidence or sources.  Even though I was the one that was behind schedule, by the due date I'd say my section was the best written.  And I'm not the only one who thought so.  When we got our evaluations back, my sections did not have any critiques, but their sections were criticized for lack of evidence.

I'm not trying to make myself sound great and like the ultimate writer, I'm just saying that when people work in groups, they should behave as if they are completing the assignment alone.  That way, when you get a group grade, your other partners are not screwed over :)

 

 Latane, B., Williams, K., & Harkins, S. (1979).  Many hands make light the work: The causes and consequences of social loafing.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 37, 822-832.

Sorry about this blog, especially the title.  I realize that I sound like an arrogant jerk, but don't judge me.  I'm super assignment-ed out.

Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking

In one sentence, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell explains the ways in which we, as human beings, make quick, and usually accurate, decisions and judgments with limited information and time through unconscious processing, or rapid cogition.  Gladwell begins with our judgments of people and objects.  These judgments are made quickly and are surprisingly accurate.  Often we attribute these accuracies to hunches or gut instincts, when really we observe and process information that we are not aware of.  Gladwell suggests that our judgments are often influenced by implicit associations.  As the concept name suggests, we are unaware of these associations, and therefore we are unable to articulate exactly why we do or do not like someone or something.  Finally, Gladwell concludes Blink with warnings of the limitations and faults of rapid cognition or “mind-reading”.  Such limitations can be seen in the case of implicit associations regarding race or when too much information distracts us from relevant information, and thus clouds our judgment. 

Malcolm Gladwell was a business and science reporter for The Washingston Post before his current position as a writer for The New Yorker.  Thus, Gladwell is not a psychologist or expert in cognitive processes, but he clearly has much experience interacting with, observing, and writing about other social beings.  Blink is definitely credible and possibly scholarly, depending on one’s definition.  The literature used in Blink appears to be explained accurately and is appropriate for the arguments that Gladwell makes.  However, I would be hesitant to give this book the label of scholarly.  Though the explanation of research is adequate, it is counterbalanced with anecdotes and findings that are not empirically-based.  Thus, Blink is credible but does not meet the scholarly standards Southwestern’s psychology department.

To be completely honest, this book was not my first choice.  It was not my second choice either.  But when my top two books had already been selected and it was my turn to sign up, this book was the only one that I had remotely heard of.  I knew that Blink is a best-selling popular psychology book, so I had high expectations. 

My opinion of Blink, after having read it, is that although it is not necessarily my “type” of book, I believe that it is both insightful and successful in conveying interesting psychological concepts to the average person.  I found the book a little repetitive.  I appreciate all of the example that Gladwell provides and I believe that these examples greatly serve individuals without prior knowledge of psychological principles.  However, because we learned about the same concepts and findings in class, I did not need multiple examples in order to understand the information that Gladwell presents.  Furthermore, I was slightly thrown off and confused by the subheadings included in each chapter.  Whereas I usually appreciate outline formats, these subheadings were a bit distracting.  I acknowledge that they break up the chapters into more meaningful chunks, but I would have preferred a different method.

That being said, I would definitely recommend this book to my friends because it covers a lot of information that I believe many people find very interesting and novel.  For instance, I’m sure that a lot of people do not know about the power of priming.  Gladwell explains that through priming, simply reading words that are associated with aging and senior citizens actually would make participants walk slower, a behavior that is often associated with aging.  I also feel like a lot of the information is very applicable to everyday life.  I think that many people would be fascinated to know for example, that participants in a card game experiment at the University of Iowa (Bechara, Damasio, Tranel, & Damasio, 1997) showed physical signs of recognizing a pattern before they were able to articulate a hunch about the pattern.  These participants displayed an unconscious recognition recognition behind the locked door) of the pattern before they consciously knew the pattern.  Given these findings, readers might be more inclined to trust their gut.

I might be more hesitant to recommend this Blink to a psychology major, however.  I think it would be a great tool for first-year psychology majors because Gladwell covers a range of research and a range of areas to which the research can be applied.   Furthermore, Blink describes classic studies that exemplify the importance of strict experimental control and internal validity, such as the Pepsi Challenge “studies”.  Actually, I believe that the inclusion of a vast amount of diverse (as far as topic and level of knowledge of psychology) research is the biggest strength of Blink.  I love reading about new and fascinating studies about random hypotheses that I can later retell to friends (and sound super legit).

This book does greatly overlap with some areas of our Social Psychology class.  However, if someone in the class was really interested in the concepts we covered in the beginning of the semester, especially person perception, making judgments, and the Implicit Association Test (Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998) I would strongly recommend Blink.  I really appreciated that a lot of the research in Blink overlaps with Cognitive Psychology, a class that I took last semester.  I found the research that we reviewed in that class very interesting, so reading Blink was like a pop psych extension of that class.  All-in-all I would recommend this book mostly to people who are not taking currently taking Social Psychology, simply because of the overlap.  However, like I said, I believe it would be very helpful for first-years interested in psychology and would provide fascinating pleasure reading for established psychology majors, even if it might be a bit introductory.

While reading Blink, I noticed that I was definitely more attentive to my physiology, my behavior, and my environment.  Given the extensive research about the accuracy of immediate gut reactions, I paid a lot more attention to my body’s physical cues.  For example, The University of Iowa card game study (Bechara et al., 1997) prompted me to practice using my physiological cues to understand my thoughts and feelings.  When Lauren and I were contemplating adopting our newest guinea pig, Charlie, I definitely used my internal cues in order to understand how I really felt about adopting another guinea pig.  In the end, I attributed my nerves to excitement about having another baby in the house.  I believe that learning how to pay attention to and use my internal cues was the most useful outcome of reading Blink.

After reading about the participants in the experiment conducted by Bargh, Chen, and Burrows (1996), I was much more vigilant about monitoring my behavior for signs of priming.  In the experiment, the researchers gave participants scrambled sentence tests which either included “polite” words or “rude” words.  After they finished and were ready to return their materials to Bargh, they realized that he was in the middle of a conversation.  Those primed with the rude words generally interrupted the conversation after about five minutes.  In contrast, those participants primed with polite words did not interrupt the conversation at all, some waiting 10 minutes before Bargh acknowledged their presence.  Now, I am always wondering if my mood or my behavior is due to priming.  Will listening to angsty music on the way to school make me hate hipster?  Will having a great conversation with a friend at lunch make me more willing to donate money to the Fire Relief effort?  Fortunately, I feel like the power of priming presents a conundrum only in the case of aversive priming.  And that is why I have stopped listing to angsty music.

I also started to pay a lot more attention to my environment.  I was constantly wondering if, when problem solving, I actually suddenly thought of a solution, or if I observed something at the unconscious level that gave me a solution.  This concept was displayed in a study conducted by Norman R.F. Maier (1931) when participants were stumped on a problem solving test.  The researcher casually displayed an “accidental” behavior that suddenly gave participants the solution!  The interesting part was that participants truly believe that the solution spontaneously dawned on them.  This is because the behavior of the researcher was observed at an unconscious level.  I believe that this actually happened to me a couple weeks before I read about this study.  Lauren and I were helping some of our friends move.  We were trying to carry out a couch, but it was too wide to fit through the door.  Frustrated, Lauren sat down and slipped off her flip-flops.  Suddenly and apparently spontaneously I had the idea to take the feet off of the couch in order to fit in sideways through the door.  Only after reading about Maier’s experiment did I realize that my solution may not have been spontaneous after all, but rather the effects of unconscious processing of Lauren’s “hint”.

Blink is a great book for those who are interested in psychological processes and who enjoy the writing techniques found in popular psychology books.  Blink highlights many different cognitive processes and enlightens individuals as to the power of rapid cognition and quick judgments.  Gladwell uses literature to explain numerous well-known events such as the assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan.  Gladwell goes on to provide several limitations to unconscious processing, such as implicit prejudice.  Overall, Blink is a very enlightening, enjoyable book that discusses complex social and cognitive processes in a way that in understandable and relateable to a diversity of readers.

Bechara, Antoine, Damasio, Hanna, Tranel, Daniel, Damasio, Antonio R. (1997).  Deciding advantageously before knowing the advantageous strategy.  Science, 275(5304), 1293-1295. doi: 10.1126/science.275.5304.1293

Bargh, J. A., Chen, M., Burrows, L. (1996).  Automaticity of social behavior: Direct effects of trait construct and stereotype activation on action.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 230-244.

Gladwell, Malcolm (2005).  Blink: The power of thinking without thinking.  New York: Little, Brown and Co.

Greenwald, A. G., McGhee, D. E., & Schwartz, J. K. L. (1998). Measuring individual differences in implicit cognition: The Implicit Association Test. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 1464-1480.

Maier, Norman R. F. (1931).  Reasoning in Humans II: The solution of s problem and its appearance in consciousness.  Journal of Comparative Psychology, 12, 181-194.

...and now we have 4 guinea pigs

So relatively recently, Lauren and I went to PetSmart to pick up more dry food for our 3 guinea pigs.  Of course we had to walk by the guinea pig display, filled with tiny, adorable piggie babies in order to get to the dry food.  As we walked by, Lauren noted that one of the guinea pigs was sitting outside the hutch while the others were inside the hutch sleeping.  This reminded us of our "first born", Adam who we decided to take home because the other guinea pigs were picking on him and wouldn't let him in the hutch.

Anyway, we continued to the dry food.  We picked out our brand and headed back up front.  The air was thick with compliance.

Lauren stopped at the display and the little guy was still sitting outside of the hutch.
She said "He's so tiny! Remember when Adam was that little?"
"Yep. Let's go."
"Maybe we should just watch for a while to see if the others will let him in the hutch."
Silence.
"He's so beautiful! Maybe we should hold him."
"Okay but we're not taking him home."

Long story short, we held him, named him, and took him home with us.

I don't know if that was Lauren's plan all along or if we're just guinea pig hoarders, but the foot-in-the-door technique was definitely used.  According to Cialdini (2007), the foot-in-the-door technique occurs when an individual makes a small, reasonable, seemingly innocent request (like looking at and holding a guinea pig).  Then the target is more likely to comply with the larger, intended request (like adopting a guinea pig).  Because I had already committed to interacting with Charlie, it was easier for me to agree to adopt him.

And now we have 4 guinea pigs.

Cialdini, R. B. (2007).  Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion.  New York: HarperCollins.

Everyone else is doing it...

So the other day I was talking to Lauren about cognitive dissonance.  I explained to her that according to Leon Festinger (1957), cognitive dissonance occurs when one feels anxiety because their behaviors do not match their attitudes.  I told her that there are numerous way that this anxiety can be relieved, including rationalizing that everyone else is also a hypocrite (McKimmie et al., 2003).

Immediately, she said, "Oh, I do that all the time."

Lauren occasionally bends the truth when talking to her parents.  Usually only about living with her lesbian lover (me).  She said that even though she believes that this is her best option, she still feels remorse for lying.

That is, until she talks to our friends about it.  Because some of our friends are in the same situation (i.e. not "out" to their parents), they also make the difficult decision to lie to their parents about certain aspects of their lives.  This evidence that other people also lie to their parents about their sexuality makes Lauren feel less remorse and anxiety about her lies.  And thus, her cognitive dissonance is relieved.

So, like the participants in the study conducted by McKimmie et al. (2003), when Lauren was able to justify her dissonant behavior by concluding that other people are also hypocrites, her anxious and remorseful feelings  were alleviated.



Festinger, L. (1957).  A theory of cognitive dissonance.  Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

McKimmie, B.M., Terry, D.J., Hogg, M.A., Manstead, A.S.R., Spears, R., & Doosje, B. (2003).  I'm a hypocrite, but so is everyone else: Group support and the reduction of cognitive dissonance.  Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice, 7, 214-224.

Also, positive stereotype of lesbians