Study Guide Exam 4  

What is kin selection in evolutionary theory?

1. What is kin selection in evolutionary theory?  

Evolutionary theory explains prosocial behavior in four ways. The first is  kin selection, the idea that behaviors that help a genetic relative are favored  by natural selection, in the greater likelihood that genes held in common will  survive. E.g. Individuals are more likely to help their own child than a  stranger’s child, more likely to help a sibling than a cousin, and more likely  to help a cousin than a stranger.  

Second, the norm of reciprocity, the expectation that helping others  will increase the likelihood that they will help us in the future.  Third, group selection, the idea that social groups with altruistic  members are more likely to survive in competition with other groups.

2. Can you explain the frustration-aggression hypothesis? The theory that any unpleasant stimulation will lead to emotional aggression  which then leads to aggression.  

What types of love exist?

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The internal state that accompanies the disappointment of an attempt  to achieve.

Individuals act aggressively when they feel disappointed in their  attempt to reach a goal.  

3. What types of love exist?

Compassionate love: self-giving and care-giving type of love  Passionate love: involves intense emotional arousal and physical attraction  Companionate love: characterized by deep caring for another person,  comfort and trust, and enjoyment of shared experiences E.g. elderly people

4. What types of aggression exist?

Hostile Aggression: aggression that is intended to harm another, with no  other goal or motive  

E.g. spreading rumors  

Instrumental Aggression: hurting someone to accomplish a non-aggressive  goal  

E.g. one member of a couple says hurtful thing in order to bring about  a breakup  

Relational Aggression: aggression that is focused on the destruction of  relationships or social status

What is love?

E.g. A rumor designed to damage someone’s reputation; excluding  someone from a social group; telling someone they can’t join a group unless  they do a favor

Displaced Aggression: targeting of aggression towards a person or entity  that is not the true target  

E.g. Throwing a pencil at the wall, since your boss made you angry Triggered-displaced Aggression: displaced aggression towards a person who  is not the actual cause of aggressive feelings, but who has done something  minor to evoke those feelings  Don't forget about the age old question of comm 223 concordia

E.g. the person you’re upset with did something minor to annoy you,  but your reaction to the minor event is really due to the larger event that  happened earlier

Violence: Physical aggression that has the potential of severely harming  someone  

E.g. A gunshot to the chest is violence; a slap on the cheek is better  known as aggressive behavior  

Direct: an attempt to hurt face to face  

E.g. physical fight  

Indirect: Attempt to hurt but not face to face  

E.g. Rumors spread by teenage girls

Emotional Aggression: Hurtful behavior from angry feelings  E.g. Child throwing a temper tantrum  

5. Is Freud’s death instinct compatible with evolutionary logic? No, since it’s incompatible with the logic of natural selection  E.g. animals that best promote their reproduction and own survival  will have more offspring

6. Know Milgram’s findings.

Stanley Milgram completed a study of obedience where participants were  asked to follow the orders of an experimenter despite the protests of a  victim.  

In his study, 62.5% of participants were fully obedient.

7. What is love?

Passionate-Physiological Arousal (Longing)  

Intimacy-Close Bonding (Sharing, Support)  

Commitment-willing

8. What is the belief in a just world phenomenon?

The belief that good things happen to good people and bad things happen to  bad people.  

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9. Is empathy a form of altruism?

No, since empathy is evidence of altruism.  

Empathy engages pure altruism and overrides selfish activities.

10.What general pattern describes human heterosexual mating  preferences?

Male  

Looks at attractiveness overall  

Evolutionary, since they look at who could reproduce the healthiest  and best offspring  

Female  

Prefer status over age and attractiveness  

Evolutionary, since women need help to raise an offspring and want a  strong male to provide food and income

11.What is pluralistic ignorance?

The tendency to collectively misinterpret situations when a certain number  of individuals are present.  

E.g. Everyone waiting outside an empty lecture hall, thinking that it is  being used, but nobody actually looks inside to check, they just assume it  was being used since people were waiting inside

12.What situational factors can go in to suppressing helping  behavior?

Risk is great than reward.  

We may be in a hurry.  

Other are around us (diffusion of responsibility and audience inhibition)  Perceived relationship between individuals, event seems ambiguous.

13.What does bystander intervention research tell us about helping  behavior?

Make the emergency situation noticeable.  

Make it obvious that the event is an emergency.  Don't forget about the age old question of uci gender and sexuality studies

Make sure someone takes responsibility for providing help (single someone  out)

Make the type of help you need evident and do what you can to reduce cost  and increase benefits.  If you want to learn more check out tcu internet banking

14.

15.What’s the difference between normative social influence and  informational social influence and what research can you cite? Normative Social Influence: how other people influence our behavior  through social behavior (we conform because we want to be liked and  accepted)  We also discuss several other topics like restaurants near wsu

Informational Social Influence: Conforming because we believe the crowd  may know something we don’t  

16.What kinds of games do social psychologists use to study  competition/cooperation?

Non-Zero Sum Games: games in which outcomes need not to sum to zero  With cooperation, both can win. With competition, and both can lose.  Zero Sum Games: One player’s gain is another player’s loss.  

17.What is attachment theory?

Based on the relationship that infants develop with their primary caregiver  (Explains attachment behaviors later on in life)

18.What does the investment theory say about long-term  relationships?

Animals making a higher investment in their offspring, will be more careful  in choosing mates.  

19.

20.What is unrequited love?

Love that is not reciprocated.  

21.What is our need to belong?

The need for frequent positive contact with others.  

The need for enduring connections marked by mutual concern for the  welfare of other.  

22.What do we know about ostracism?

It’s the exclusion from a group.

E.g. In a virtual study, where people stop passing you the ball. When  you step out of the study, you feel hurt and distraught.  

Vocabulary

1. Kin Selection  

Closer genetic similarity there is the greater likelihood to help someone  out

2. Natural Selection.

Animals that bet promote their reproduction and own survival will have  more offspring

3. Parental Investment Theory  

Theory of why women are more caring in general, and men with more  than one wife is more common than vice versa.

4. Survival of the Fittest

The one that has adapted to the environment the best

5. Frustration-aggression hypothesis

The theory that aggression is an automatic response to any blocking of  goal-directed behavior  

6. Hostile Expectation bias

Refers to the tendency to assume that people will react to potential  

conflicts with aggression

7. Relational Aggression Theory

Aggression that is focused on the destruction of relationships or social  status

8. Displacement

If your boss makes you angry and instead of punching him, you punch the  wall instead because you want to keep your job.

9. Coercion

The practice of persuading someone to do something by force

10. Obedience

Following orders

11. Cooperation  

Working together

12. Conformity

Going along with a group in actions or beliefs  

13. Audience Inhibition

Inhibition of action (helping) that occurs because of embarrassment or  self-consciousness in the presence of other people

14. Pluralistic Ignorance

The tendency to collectively misinterpret situations when a certain number  of individuals are present E.g. Everyone waiting outside an  empty lecture hall, thinking it’s being used. Nobody checks inside to see if  it’s being used, since people are outside waiting.

15. Norm of Reciprocity

When others do something for us, we feel obligated to do something for  them

16. Diffusion of Responsibility

The parceling out of responsibility to help in a large group, with the result  of less helping in an emergency situation when a number of individuals  are present

17. Jocasta

Wife of Laius and mother/wife of Oedipus  

Kills herself when she learns truth of what has actually happened  Describes the latent love a mother has for hers son

18. Eros

Sexual component of life, the intimate love

19. Oedipus

Ills his father and marries his mother (without knowing)  

Oedipus complex is the male’s unconscious desire for the  

exclusive love of his mother

20. Thanatos

Drive to destroy or drive to halt  

Battles with Eros

21. "battering"

Psychological condition of a person who has suffered (usually persistent)  emotional, physical, or sexual abuse from another

22. "ostracism"

Tells us that others don’t value us as much as we value them

23. "stalking"

Repeated and unwanted attention, harassment, contact or any other  behavior directed at a specific person that would cause a reasonable  person to feel fear

24. "unrequited love"

Love that is not reciprocated

25. social acceptance  

Acceptance of a person into a group  

26. loneliness  

The feeling that one is without desired social connections

27. independence  

Not influenced or controlled by others in matters of opinion, conduct  (thinking or acting for oneself)

28. attraction

Natural feeling of being drawn to other individual and desiring their  company, usually due to having a personal liking for them

29. Belief in a just World

The belief that good things happen to good people. Bad things happen to  bad people. A person’s actions are inherently inclined to bring morally fair  consequences.  

30. kin selection

Closer genetic similarity there is the greater likelihood to help someone  out

31. Reciprocity

Act in which one person has received a benefit form another in return  chooses to provide an equivalent benefit back

32. Rule of Law

Principle that all people and institutions are subject to and accountable to  law that is fairly applied and enforced

33. Zero-sum games  

One player’s gain is another player’s loss

34. non-zero-sum games  

Games in which outcome need not to sum up to zero.  

With cooperation, both can win and with competition, both can lose.  35. Commons Dilemma  

Social dilemma of whether to continue to use resources at the expense of  the future of others or sacrifice our own dire for those resources for the  sake of the common (California Drought with reduction of water use) 36. Equity games  

Receiving benefits proportional to what one provides. According to the  equity theory, it’s not the overall amount one receives from a relationship  that is important, it’s whether or not what one gives and what one gets are  equlal

37. Informational Social Influence  

Conforming because we believe the crowd may know something we don’t  know

38. Normative Social Influence  

How other people influence our behavior through social behavior (we  conform because we want to be liked and accepted)  

39. Obedience to Authority  

Milgram completed a study of obedience where participant were asked to  follow the orders of an experimenter despite the protests of a victim.  In his study, 62.5% of partcipants were fully obedient

40. the power of social roles.

Ideas for expected or normal behavior are reinforced both by the  individual and by society.  

The expectations, responsibilities, and behaviors we adopt in certain  situations.

41. social loafing

The tendency for individuals to produce less or not work as hard when  working with others

42. brainstorming

A strategy for coming up with ideas as a group involving generating as  many ideas as possible, with encouragement to combine, improve, or  expand, improve, or expand on previous ideas  

43. groupthink

A decision making process that occurs when a desire for harmony and  consensus within the group interferes with appropriate information  seeking and leas to bad decision making

44. social facilitation

The tendency for the presence of others to increase the dominant response  tendency.  

For an easy or well-learned task, the dominant response tendency is to do  well.  

For a difficult or new task the dominant response is to do poorly. 45. The Commons Dilemma

Social dilemma of whether to continue to use resources at the expense of  the future others or sacrifice our own desire for those resources for the  sake of the common

46. Prisoner's dilemma

A social dilemma involving two individuals. If both compete, both lose. If  they both cooperate, they have the best collective outcome. The best  individual outcome comes when one compete and the partner cooperates.  47. The Matching Game

A tendency to have relationships with those who match us in physical  attractiveness

48. The Naïve Bystander Circle  

The tendency for individuals to be less likely to help in an emergency  situation when others are present, due to a combination of factors  including pluralistic ignorance, diffusion of responsibility, and audience inhibition.