...Social Influences on Behavior Amy Clinton Psy. 300 09/16/2013 Karin Detweiler Abstract Social Influences on Behavior “In psychology there have been countless experiments on social behavioral patterns in different sized groups to better assess how individuals will react in a situation with social pressure. These experiments prove a variety of different reactions, from minimal change to extreme changes in social behavior. ”. (Kowalski &Westen, 2011) These results also varied on group size and the subjective information of the study. All of these studies are extremely helpful today when trying to asses tough situations with group behavior but can’t always help prepare for any given outcome. These social behavioral changes happen daily and many of them are unseen by most because they are almost expected or considered harmless. A few examples could be lying, stereotyping or even arousal. These different behaviors are all directly affected by social surroundings and situations. The first social influenced behavior is casual drug abuse or Smoking cigarettes. This has a lot to do with Conformity which is “the process of changing attitudes and behaviors to accommodate the standards of a group they are around”. (Kowalski &Westen, 2011, p 684) People are like camellias especially the younger generation; blend in to fit in”. This is really dangerous these days. Like casual drug use. Some Individuals turn down drugs in a group for many different times, but...
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...Social Behavior What is a social behavior? Social behavior is behavior fixed towards humanity, or taking place among constituents of the same species. There many factors that comes in to play when defining a social behavior such as attitude, prejudice, and aggression. Understanding how groups affect a person behavior. As well as knowing the difference between conformity and obedience. There are a few factors that can play into an attitude. Attitude involves emotions, behaviors, and cognitions. When emotions, behaviors, and cognitions are working in agreement, it is simple to realize person’s drive. Often time’s social customs are not steady with one’s attitude and cause a disturbance that result in a conflict. Attitudes can be explicit or unspoken. Explicit attitudes are those that we are knowingly aware of and that undoubtedly influence our behaviors and beliefs. Whereas, unspoken attitudes are unconscious, but still have an effect on our beliefs and practices. Prejudice is everywhere and happens whenever. Prejudice can be actively unaffected change. One can have a prejudice attitude against anything or anyone. It can be easily pointed out in others people actions or words and harder for one to see prejudice in their actions and words. Aggression contains words or bodily acts to an individual that causes harm. There are many forms of aggression. People are attracted to people that are like themselves and who are physically attractive and knowledgeable. ...
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...SOCIAL INFLUENCES ON BEHAVIOR Abstract Reading this paper it will give you an insight as to how society influences behavior. Pavlov wasknown for his study of learned behavior with his dog and salvation experiment. This paper willidentify situations when parents raise their kids and try to discipline them and not allow their personalities to conform to fearfulness or defiance. Also, you will get a understanding of classical and operant conditioning. This paper will discuss the effects of society and drinking andthe effects it will have on a person. What would have the greatest effect on a person¶s life, todiscipline or not to discipline or to describe alcohol as something bad and never give reasoningor to introduce it without warrant? As we grow through life we learn how behavior changes based on our social situations. Itis known that social psychology is the scientific study of how people¶s thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others (Kowalski,2009). We begin as a tabula rasa on which various experiences throughout development write behavior and, ultimately, the person him/her self. We will take a look at the relationships whichdetermine behavior of parents and children when it comes to discipline as well as the relationship between persons who are sober and person who are drunk and their different behaviors. Children and Parents When examining parent and children relationship and discipline. We can conclude...
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...Social Influences on Behavior Donnie Toms PSY 200 Feb 24 2013 Dr. Hawkins Social Influences on Behavior Introduction Everybody has their normal day to day life, whether that is going to work, going to school, staying at home, or doing whatever that day. Most of us have some type of social interaction on a daily basis and depending on what your day consist of dictates the type of social influences around us. We all have our own thoughts, feelings and actions, but when we are around other people those same thoughts, feelings and actions could be different. When you are at work the atmosphere is professional and work related, but if you are out with friends having some fun the atmosphere is more party like. The change in social influences dictates our behavior and what we deem to be appropriate. Social influence is defined as “the process wherein one person's attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors are changed as a result of interaction with another individual or with a group” (Stavrositu 2011). Social Behaviors There are various types of social behaviors that people exhibit depending on the influences around us. These influences can be conformity, the act of matching our attitude, beliefs and behaviors with a group of people. Conformity is when we would adapt what the culture deems normal and include that into our daily lives even when alone. Peer pressure is the influence put on us by a peer group or any individual to change our attitude, beliefs, or behaviors. Peer...
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...Social Influences on Behavior Debbie Noonan PSY 300 October 15, 2011 Ashley Dolecki Social Influences on Behavior Social psychology is the scientific study of how people think about, influence, and relate to one another. These are the broad questions that social psychologists and personality psychologists seek to answer. By exploring such inner motivations such as traits, attitudes, and goals and looking at the situation or context such as social norms, social psychologists seek to unravel how interactions such as romance, friendship, aggression, and group interactions affect social areas of our lives. Although personality psychology focuses on the individual, and social psychology on the situation, the two perspectives are often explored together in explanations of human behavior in psychology. This paper shall outline human behavior changes based on two social situations, teasing and prejudice, and the precursors and consequences of those behaviors. Teasing is almost as much a part of childhood as skinned knees and runny noses, but the effects of that teasing can have long-lasting and profound effects. Is there a place for this behavior? We do playful teasing every day, poking fun at the coworker who is always running late, commenting on someone’s choice of words, or even making innocent comments about our spouse’s choice of clothing for the evening. Is this teasing acceptable in all situations? How do we know when it isn’t? One of the...
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...Social Psychology and Behavior Kary Garrett University of Phoenix PSY/300 General Psychology October 2, 2010 Dr. Stephanie Sencil Social Psychology and Behavior Social Psychology is the scientific method concerning how people react in situations in which they are interacting with other people and to understand or explain why they act this way. These interactions can be positive, negative, or neutral. Most people prefer to have positive or neutral interactions. However, there are some personality types who prefer the negative interactions and seem to thrive on interacting with others in this manner. Completing tasks in a group environment can cause the tasks to be performed at a higher rate, or faster than if the task were performed when an individual was alone. “This tendency for people to perform simple tasks better when in the presence of others was called social facilitation” (Unknown, n.d., para. 5). Students often perform tasks in group situations in which they are being timed. These tasks can be taking a test, such as a math test, or running distance, such as a mile. That individuals want to perform well in the presence of their peers encourage them to complete the task more rapidly and efficiently. Runners in a group will have faster speeds while in this group, then if they were running alone. Group behavior and social facilitation also can be shown in animals. Teaching a dog to walk on a leash can often be met with resistance. One way to overcome...
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...Social Influences on Behavior 1 Social Influence on Behavior Frances Sequoyah PSY/300 February 10, 2014 Trisha Ferre Social Influences on Behavior 2 Abstract From the moment humans are born, they are social beings because without another person feeding, giving them personal care and love, no human infant would survive. Even after humans become adults and are able to take care of themselves, they still need or choose to interact with other individuals since the majority of humans need companionship of some type. Whether it is interacting with people who are friends or someone they choose as a companion. The only people who prefer not to associate with others are the ones with anti-social disorders or other mental illnesses. The following article will examine the fundamental concept of human interactions from the perspective of social psychology. This includes examples how human behavior changes when subjected to different social situations and what specific behaviors were shown and the context in which they occurred. The examples used will provide analyses of possible precursors and the consequences of different behaviors and will identify phenomenon associated with the selected behavioral examples such as social facilitation and social loafing. Social Influences on Behavior ...
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...Running Head: SOCIAL INFLUENCES ON BEHAVIOR Social Influences on Behavior Paper Destiny Kloepfer Psych 300 March 20, 2011 Mr. Avery Social Influences on Behavior Behaviorism, explores ways in which observable behavior is learned and shaped by the environment (McAdams, D. P., 2006). “Social influence, refers to the influence of the presence of other people on thought, feeling, and behavior” (Kowalski & Westen, 2009, p. 663). The affects of social influence from environments can have both positive and negative consequences. Each individual approaches situations with their own set of personal characteristics (McAdams, D. P., 2006); however different aspects of influence determine how an individual may modify their behaviors to react in a given situation. Let us explore two examples of socially influenced behaviors to better understand the affects they may have on an individual. Obedience The blind obedience to authority study conducted by Stanley Milgram is an example of how social influence can actually change the way an individual will behave regardless of personal belief in the presence of an authority figure in a hierarchical situation (Kowalski & Westen, 2009). The Milgram experiment measured obedience to an authority figure through electric shocks which were given by study participants to another person upon directives given from whom the participants thought of as an authority figure (Kowalski & Westen...
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...Social Influences on Behavior Behaviorism explores the ways that are observable behavior can be learned and shaped in the environment (McAdams, D. P., 2006). “Social influence, refers to the influence of the presence of other people on thought, feeling, and behavior” (Kowalski & Westen, 2011). The effects of social influence from environments can have both positive and negative consequences. Each individual approaches situations with their own set of personal characteristics (McAdams, D. P., 2006); however different aspects of influence determine how an individual may modify their behaviors to react in a given situation. Let us explore two examples of socially influenced behaviors to understand the affects they may have on an individual. The blind obedience to authority study conducted by Stanley Milgram is an example of how social influence can actually change the way an individual will behave regardless of personal belief in the presence of an authority figure in a hierarchical situation (Kowalski & Westen, 2011). The Milgram experiment measured obedience to an authority figure through electric shocks, which are given by study participants to another person upon directives given from whom the participants thought of as an authority figure. Milgram’s study showed how far people would go to obey orders from an authority figure. Obedience is the act of carrying out commands in compliance to authority (Kowalski & Westen, 2011). Information...
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...Analyzing Human Behavior from a Social Psychological Perspective Social psychology is the study of human behavior in the social situations. There are many different topics that are studied by social psychologists. They can include different behaviors such as attitudes, aggression, prejudice, pro-social behavior and self-identity. The goal of social psychology is to study the behavior of individuals to learn more about how people form impressions of others, interpret the behavior of others and behave in social situations. Social psychology also looks at a range of social topics. Leadership, group behavior, social perception, nonverbal behavior, aggression and prejudice are to name a few. Social psychology is not just about looking at social influences. Social perception and social interaction are vital to understanding social behavior. Social Psychology began to become more to the forefront after World War II. Other events just after like the Holocaust for example, caused Psychologists to start to ask themselves the effects of society on human behavior, according to an article by, Kendra Cherry titled, “What is Psychology?” (Cherry, 2012) The term social psychology was first used in the 1860’s. In 1908 the first textbooks on the subject were published. Floyd Allport in 1924 wrote a modern textbook and was regarded as the rebirth of social psychology. Kurt Lewin was called the father of social psychology. He was one of the first researchers to study organizational development...
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...conform to social norms in order to be accepted into a certain group or society. Although everyone conforms to social standards, not everyone realizes that they do. However, one might register this social conformity if they simply ask themselves the question, “why do I act the way I do?”. For example, when teenagers are surrounded by their peers, they might find it acceptable to drink alcohol and use profanity. On the other hand, when in a school setting, teenagers would not find this behavior acceptable because they are surrounded by authority figures. Therefore, behavior that is acceptable in one setting is not tolerable in another. Consequently, the tolerability of certain behaviors differs upon the setting and can be influenced...
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...Social Psychology: Prosocial Behavior Social psychology is one of the wide topics in sociology that have been widely studied. Social psychology is the study of human behavior in a social context. Stangor (2013) has described social psychology as the scientific study of how people think, feel and behave around people and how people’s feelings, thoughts and behaviors are influenced by these people. It aims at studying and explaining how individual personalities change due to social groups. Social psychology helps one understand how individuals fit in the society. Social psychology exists in our daily life. When we make friends, when we argue with friends, how we live with people and relate with them, are all examples of social psychology. There are different study areas in social psychology and they are; prosocial behaviors, prejudice, discrimination and diversity, self and social behavior, social influence, cultural links, psychology of gender and violence, conflict resolution and peace. In this paper I will discuss prosocial behavior. Prosocial behavior is the opposite of anti-social behavior. While anti-social people will exclude themselves from the society, are selfish and don’t contribute much in conversations, prosocial people are philanthropic, obedient and cooperate with others. Prosocial behavior has been described as the phenomenon where people help each other, either willingly or with a hidden motive. Prosocial behavior should not be confused with altruism, which is...
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...Social Behaviors Social behaviors are a hot topic in psychology as psychologists try to understand the human behaviors and attitudes towards people, objects, situations, and more. Attitude is the inclination to judge, attitudes can be formed by the way individuals were raised, religion, social groups and more. Attitudes have three important components: affects, behaviors, and cognitions. Affects refers to the emotions that we have towards certain situation, individual or object. Behaviors, is the actions that we may have and lastly, cognitions that refers to the thoughts that we have against that specific situation that we encounter. Social interactions play an important role in social behaviors as well, prejudice, aggression, and attraction are part of this. Prejudice is the predispositions that we have against or toward certain music, food, religion, and etcetera. Aggression refers to the psychological or physical actions that we have with the intent of causing harm. Attraction is the power that creates interest, like or desire to certain things or situations. There are different kinds of attractions such as physical which may be the appearance of a person therefore we feel attracted because we like the way they look. Competence is other example where we may feel attracted to people that is competent; it could be at work where we may want to be surrounded by individuals that we believe are intelligent and competent. Groups are part of the social behavior as majority...
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...same obstacles of racism, poverty and failed relationships that are impeding their search for selfhood. Florence’s prayer starts the section in order to fight against the same weaknesses that John is dealing with. As she reminds and revealed how Gabriel had controlled her life while a child. As a result, Perkins says “Baldwin's juxtaposition of narrative voice in Go Tell It on the Mountain provides no easy answers for John as he struggles to rise above racism, poverty, and family tensions in order to define himself and his place in his world. In his successful merging of structure and thematic import, Baldwin illustrates the difficulties inherent in the quest for selfhood. Perkins, Wendy, Novels for Students, Vol. 4, Gale, 1998” The behavior demonstrated by some of the characters of this...
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...Original Article Rationality, norms and identity in international relations Ji Young Choi Department of Politics & Government, Ohio Wesleyan University, Elliott Hall 204, Delaware, OH 43015, USA. E-mail: jychoi@owu.edu Abstract This article examines major debates between rationalism and constructivism. It presents that there are politically significant motives of social actions, including norms and identity, which cannot be completely subsumed by the concept of instrumental rationality. These ideational or social-psychological motivations are governed primarily by thymos or affect (the moral or emotional part of the human personality) and/or valueoriented rationality. We need more flexible assumptions about main actors and their motives than those of rationalism to explain appropriately the politics of anger, loyalty and a sense of justice at international levels. However, constructivism’s emphasis on ideational motivations cannot totally replace rationalism in explaining international political life. Constructivism maintains that identity or norms are causally prior to actors’ interests. Yet when there is conflict between pursuit of interests and maintenance of identity or norms, actors’ strong and well-defined self-interests can overrule their contested or unstable identity or norms. In short, causal arrows can flow in either direction between identity or norms and interests. This implies that rationalism and constructivism are complementary rather than competitive...
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