Social Psychology
10th EditionElliot Aronson, Robin M. Akert, Samuel R. Sommers, Timothy D. Wilson
525 solutions
HDEV5
6th EditionSpencer A. Rathus
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Consumer Behavior: Buying, Having, Being
13th EditionMichael R Solomon
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Essentials of Abnormal Psychology
8th EditionDavid Barlow, Stefan Hofmann, V Durand
433 solutions
personality
a child's unique pattern of relating socially and emotionally to other human beings.
social competence
the ability to establish and maintain satisfying social interaction and relationships with peers and adults.
-social and emotional competence differ from child to child. significant as children develop through preschool years and prepare for challenges of adjusting to life in elementary school.
social play
play is a unique aspect of development that provides children with the opportunity to experiment with their own development- to practice and perfect what they have already become, and to explore the cutting edge of their developmental potential.
-children try out new roles and new ways of doing things and compare and contrast the new with the old.
-emphasis is on process rather than product. doesn't have to be any permanent change in personality. just to see how it feels and how other react.
-allows children to regulate degree to which they involve social partners in play episodes. social partners can be real or pretend.
Mildred Parton and dimensions of social participation
1. unoccupied behavior= the child is not involved in play and does not interact with other children or teachers.
2. onlooker behavior= the child observes the play of other children with obvious interest but makes no effort to become involved in any way.
3. solitary play= the child plays independently with toys that are unlike those played with by other children. there is no social contact or apparent interest in what other children are doing.
4. parallel play= the child plays beside other children with toys that are similar to this used by other children. there is no social contact with other children nor any effort to coordinate play.
5. associative play= the child plays with other children, sharing materials and conversing but there is no consistent theme to the play or division of roles.
6. cooperative play= the child plays with other children in an organized manner, with roles differentiated to accomplish some goal or to act out some agreed upon play theme.
social pretend play
children acting out roles and themes associated with stories, television cartoon shows, or common family events such as "supper time" or "bathing baby".
-increases through the preoperational period and declines at 6 or 7.
socio-dramatic play
requires that children learn to negotiate and communicate about the roles, objects, settings, and actions that will be employed in any given "pretend engagement".
-the failure to negotiate successfully can easily undermine the quality of social pretense.
promoting social pretense
when adults observe children's pretend play they sense more action, more fun, ore adventure, and more "development" going on in these activities.
-children who pretend more tend to be more socially skilled, more popular, and empathetic than children who pretend less.
social preference
by the age of 2, babies start to show their like and dislike for others.
-some babies seem to be more popular than others, and they attract other people.
-some babies are ignored/rejected.
5 aspects of relating to peers
1. social
preference
2. friendships
3. conflicts
4. aggression
5. dominance
sociometric test
individual children are asked to nominate 3 children they most like to play with and three that they least like to play with.
-take a portrait picture of all the boys and all the girls (gender-segregated)
-interview kids individually and take the image of all of his peers. "who do you like to play with the most?"
take picture away to get 2nd and 3rd preferences.
-"point to the boy you don't like to play with" = add all the positive and negative votes.
social status subgroups
children are classified in groups based on positive and negative preferences
-kids from different social statuses live in different worlds.
popular
children who are clearly more liked than disliked.
-get a lot of positive votes and NO negative votes. care about others' feelings.
rejected
those who are clearly more disliked than liked
-only get negative votes. NO positive votes.
neglected
those who are neither liked or disliked.
-they get no vote. they are invisible-people walk right past them.
-school shooters tend to be neglected or rejected in school.
controversial
children who are simultaneously liked by some children and disliked by others.
-very powerful in social interactions. able to influence others.
average
children who do not fall neatly into one of these subgroups.
-not high profile, but not rejected.
social status based on two variables
1.measure of popularity/sociable
2. measure of rejection
-children who show pro-social behavior lead them to be more popular and sociable.
-children who participate in imagination and drama, are them more favorable because they are fun to play with.
-physical/verbal aggression earns you negative votes. when kids are aggressive, peers don't want to play with them.
two types of neglected kids
1. lacking in social kills- not attractive in any way as a play partner.
2. socially skilled but introverts/loners.
-turn out fine and fair better than those lacking social skills.
friendship
an enduring close, mutual relationship between two individuals, expressed by a tendency to spend disproportionate amount of play time together.
-when two children show positive preference for one another as play partners over time
-involves reciprocity-- the relationship is shared and of mutual interest to both parties.
how do preschoolers form friendships?
"bird of a feather flock together"
preschoolers are drawn to other children who they perceive to be similar to themselves.
-tend to make friends with children of the same sex.
-attracted to others whose behavioral style and approach to play match their own.
what specific skills are involved in making and keeping friends?
-more likely to reinforce each other during play episode and to cooperate in the use of resources such as toys and props.
-sympathize with each other in distress situations and are more likely to come up with ways to rescue friend from such distress.
-quarrel more than children who are not friends, but are also more likely to successfully resolve conflicts and to continue playing together after conflicts end.
-initiating social interaction and extending interaction over time.
conflicts
any situation in which children find themselves opposing one another.
-when two or more preschool children interact in situations where resources are limited, conflict is bound to occur.
-most conflicts do not involve serious aggression and are short lived, lasting less than one minute.
-conflicts that do not involve aggression, are resolved without adult intervention and end with a clear "winner" or "loser".
-friends show great ability to resolve conflicts.
aggression
children hurt others with purposeful efforts to inflict pain or injury on another child.
-when children learn that aggression can be an effective way to resolve conflicts in their favor, it establishes a foundation for increasingly violent behavior as children grow.
-preschoolers are more aggressive than children at any other stage of development. babies can display aggression from a very early age-its in the fabric.
-children like when adults get the situation right, because it helps their authority.
-adults have to observe children constantly.
two forms of aggression:
1. proactive aggression
2. reactive aggression
pro-active aggression
some kid has a plan to hurt someone. they initiated this act of infecting pain. low morality.
-refers to a child's unprovoked, voluntary efforts to cause harm to a selected victim.
reactive aggression
someone is engaging in an aggressive act to defend themselves. higher morality.
-a child is provoked by the behavior an instigator, and the child responds defensively or in retaliation to that provocation.
retaliation
wait and scheme an act of aggression.
-pro-active, revenge.
3 common forms of aggression in young children
1. instrumental aggression
2. bullying or hostile aggression
3. relational aggression
1. instrumental aggression
most aggression is over object possession -toys.
-refers to object-oriented struggles between children over possession, territory, and privilege.
-grabbing a toy form another child, tugging for possession, change a child who has a desired object, or sticking a child while fighting over disputed object.
-increase around object-oriented stuff. level off at 3rd year and drops off. cognitive changes in 3rd year of life-- they understand ownership.
-peaks during second year of life, and declines significantly during preschool years.
2. bullying or hostile aggression
-not about object possession, about social control/power/dominance/intimidation.
refers to person-oriented acts aimed at forcefully gaining social control over another child.
-threatening by gesture or word, or actually striking a child to persuade or intimidate.
-can be physical. happens around 3 years old.
-verbal threatening/ direct attack--ugly.
-majority of perpetrators are boys.
-infrequent in toddlers, but increases through the early and middle-childhood years.
3. relational aggression
all about relationships. refers to behavior that is designed to inflict harm by undermining or damaging relations with peers.
-starts early: " you can't play with us"
-can hurt more than hostile aggression. devastation can be so impactful. emotional toll.
-majority of perpetrators is girls
-rejection by peers
-technology/social media has played a large role in increasing damage
to relationships.
Theories of Childhood Aggression: Where does all this aggression come from?
1. Evolutionary Theory
2. Freud Biological Theory
3. Operant Conditioning
Biological Theories of Aggression
1. Konrad Lorenz
2. Freud
Evolutionary Theory: Konrad Lorenz
aggression helped us survive.
-survival of the fittest-- humans are instinctively aggressive.
-fight off predators/other humans
Freud- Biological Theory
individual differences in aggression
-added to the evolutionary theory
-aggression is not just instinctive, but also pleasurable and irresistible-- sadistic.
-children choose targets for satisfaction of hostile impulses in the same way that sex objects are selected.
-phallic stage during preschool: children have destructive impulses directed toward the same-sex parent, who is perceived as a rival for the affection of the opposite sex parent.
-children's hostile impulses must be released for healthy psychological adjustment. they may sublimate (or channel) their aggression into socially acceptable forms of expression. ex: pounding clay
-masochism: inflicting pain on oneself-
cutting
-sadism: inflicting pain on others.
Social Learning Theory of Aggression
1. Operant Conditioning or observational theory- Albert Bandura
2. Coercion Theory- Patterson
Observational theory/ operant conditioning - Albert Bandura
children acquire aggressive responses by observing the aggressive behavior of models and produce aggressive responses when the situation suggests that such behavior will not be punish or possibly even reinforced.
-if we engage in behavior and that behavior is rewarded, then we are more likely to do it again (positive reinforcement).
-boys get reinforced by aggression usually by his dad. parents may directly reinforce manliness.
-may not use it defensively or reactively. maybe the first perpetrator.
-once you power a child with reactive skills, we take a chance
that they might use their skills proactively.
-if person modeling aggression is reinforced-- situation suggests that such behavior will not be punished or possibly reinforced.
-exposed children to an adult who modeled aggressive acts to a "bobo" doll.
aggressive scripts
children are learning to aggress and learning how to get away with no punishment.
-when script is right for them, they will
engage in behavior.
-video games: when violent, children are he perpetrator w
-when watching cartoons, they are passive.
-parenting approach: experience aggression with children. watch cartoons and play video games with the children. bring empathy and moral compass. help kids understand severity of aggression.
2. coercion theory- Patterson
aggressive children's interactions with peers or with
parents tend to escalate into chains of aversive events.
-one child's aggression against another elicits retaliation by the victim. if the retaliation is successful in terminating attack, the victim's aggression is reinforced.
-if not successful, the original attacker, who is now the victim, retaliates for the retaliation.
-this exchange of retaliatory attacks continues until one child gives in, reinforcing the other child's aggression.
reinforcement trap
negatively reinforced. mom gives into child and child ends up getting his way when he is aggressive.
-once a chain begins, participating children/adults alternate in the roles of aggressor and victim in an escalating pattern of violence.
-if parents rely on physical punishment, they inadvertently train their children to be aggressive and are trained by their children to use physical punishment.
-may be aggressive inward and threaten to harm
themselves
-child gets reinforced for aggression and parent gets reinforced for giving in.
-the first aggression you see has to have consequences!
Dominance
aggressive behavior or even the threat of aggression, has powerful impact on the organization of children's groups.
dominance hierarchy
over time, the aggressive interactions among members of the group establish a systematic ordering of power relationships from the most to the least power member
-MINIMIZES aggression by allowing each member of the group to anticipate the outcome of potential aggressive interactions with each member of the group.
promoting social competence
parents influence the development of social competence by establishing high-quality interpersonal relationships with their children.
two challenges:
1. establishing a secure attachment relationship in infancy and early childhood
2. developing a positive approach to socialization and discipline of their children.
attachment and social competence
-secure attachment to the mother during the infant-toddler period is associated with the child's development of social skills in the early preschool years.
-as children develop during the preschool years their attachment relationship to their parents changes for 2 reasons:
1. advances in language ability enable children and parents to communicate effectively at greater distances, decreasing the need for close proximity.
2. mental representations of the attachment relationship (or internal working models) allow children to feel secure as they explore farther and farther from the attachment figure.
-goal-corrected
partnership: attachment based more on emotional closeness than physical closeness.
4 distint parent styles:
1. authoritarian
2. indulgent-permissive
3. authoritative
4. neglectful
1. authoritarian
parents assert great power over their children, setting strict limits and standards on children's behavior.
-deviations from rules result in moderate to severe punishment
-disciplinarian
-military families
2. indulgent-permissive
parents are very accepting of their children's impulses, avoid setting rules and assert very little authority over their children's behavior.
-"friend parent"
3. authoritative parent
have
expectations for their children's behavior, firmly enforce the rules and standard, but allow children some say in the development of rules.
-high control and high warmth
4. neglectful
parents are uninvolved in their children's lives and consider parenting a burden.
-emotionally distance themselves from their children and minimize the time and effort devoted to chid care.
Prosocial Behavior
behavior that shows concern for the welfare of others.
-helping, caring, sharing, rescuing, protecting, and donating.
-forms of prosocial behavior increase in frequency during the preschool years.
-some children are more prosocial than others.
gender identity
the ability to classify oneself and others by sex- appears in the 3rd
year of life.
-girls: by second birthday
-boys: by 3rd birthday
gender constancy
the concept that gender does not change regardless of how one behaves or what clothes one wears.
gender roles
the behaviors, attitudes, and beliefs that a particular culture considers appropriate for males and females.
-men are portrayed
as strong, competent, independent, aggressive, and unemotional.
-women are expected tone nurturant, emotional, dependent, unassertive, and compliant.
development of gender roles
1. the psychoanalytic perspective
2. the social learning perspective
3. the gender schema theory
4. the cognitive-developmental perspective
the psychoanalytic perspective
during the phallic sage, preschool children develop intense sexual love for the opposite sex parent which can only be fulfilled by sexual intercourse with that parent.
-Oedipal Complex in male
-Electra Complex in females
-when children's sexual aims are blocked, the children are overwhelmed by anxiety.
-children defend themselves against anxiety through identification- by incorporating characteristics of the same sex parent.
-incorporate characteristics to a lesser extent from the opposite-sex parent into the personality as an ego ideal.
The Social Learning Perspective
children learn gender roles by observing how same-sex peers and adults behave, imitate what they see, an are reinforced or punished depending on whether their behaviors are gender-appropriate.
The Cognitive-Developmental Perspective
extends Piaget's theory to sex-typing and gender role development. portrays children as active agents in the learning of gender roles.
-children begin to label themselves accurately as boys or girls during the 2nd or 3rd year of life.
-helps children organize information about the world by sorting new experiences into sex-appropriate and sex-inappropriate categories.
-incorporate sex-appropriate values into
their self-concept.
The Gender Schema Theory
accounts for gender-typing by combining the concept of an active role for the child from cognitive-developmental theory, and the concept of environmental influence from social learning theory.
-gender schema: a cognitive structure with which the child actively searches for gender-related information from the environment.
-when a child enters a new experience,
the gender schema searches for information that helps the child define the situation in terms of femaleness or maleness.
-as gender schema develops, it becomes an essential component of the child's self-concept, promoting the child to perceive the world and self through "gender-colored glasses".
gender segregation
behaviors within and between segregated same-peer groups: learning of gender roles, promoting dominance, aggression, and competitiveness for boys; nurturance, prosocial behavior, and compliance for girls.
-groups form very early in development: girls prefer to play with girls by the end of second year, and boys prefer to play with boys by the end of the 3rd year.
sending and masking emotional signals
young children wear their emotions on their sleeves. they supplement their facial expressions with gestures and with changes in posture and activity level.
display rules
conventions for appropriate displays of emotion in particular situations
-children are expected to learn that they cannot always express overtly what they feel covertly.
-rules cage from situation to situation: crying in your room is appropriate but not in the movie theater.
masking
the process by which children alter the overt expression of emotions to conform to display rules.
-children understand why someone might display an emotion that is different from the felt emotion.
children and stress
children are highly vulnerable to family stress and that stress ha potent effects on young children's behavior.
-ex: divorce, death in family, severe illness, etc.
-stress may cause parents to neglect their children's health and nutrition
-stress reduces immune system response of family members
emotional reactivity
variations in thresholds for specific emotions and the intensity and duration of emotional reactions.
self-regulate
to control the intensity and duration of their emotional reactions to conform to the requirements of challenging situations.
-pre-school children begin to show stable individual differences in the ability to self-regulate.
-children learn to achieve self-regulation by refocusing their attention, controlling distance form the source of arousal, and by self-soothing behaviors.
-ability to successfully self-regulate emotions plays a critical role and long-term role in social adjustment.