SOCIAL COGNITION

1970s, label ‘social cognition’ (arises out of earlier work on attitudes, attribution, person

perception)

‘…The social cognition approach is based on the conviction that constructs relevant to cognitive representation and process are fundamental to understanding all human responses, regardless of whether those responses are social or non-social in nature…’ (Ostrom 1994)

Process by which people make sense of/think about other people Premise that cognition underlies all important

human phenomena: Cognition both determines and is determined by how we live our

lives. Sole difference between cognitive psychology and

social cognition is phenomena being understood

Contribution: use of common explanatory principles across all areas of social psychology Drive toward theoretical generality, theoretical integration

Core principles of social cognition Experimentation

Metaphorical models: Information processor; naïve scientist; cognitive miser; motivated tactician (Fiske & Taylor 1991) James 1890/1983:960 ‘My thinking is first and last and always for the

sake of my doing and I can only do one thing at a time’

Constructivism & Realism

Perceptual cognitivism (therefore posits internal cognitive constructs)

Mental representations

Unconscious operations

Controlled processes

Objects vs. People as targets of perception Some important differences

People intentionally influence their environment (intentionality) People as objects of perception perceive back; joint

perception is negotiated (mutual perception) Social cognition implicates the self as subject as well as

object (self-presentation) Social objects may change upon being the target of cognition

(variable) The accuracy or veracity of cognitions about people is harder

or impossible to assess than for non-social objects (complex) Social cognition involves social explanation Social cognition is shared.

Pragmatic social context of thinking about othersPHILOSOPHY

2 descriptions of thinking Locke’s 1690 elemental approach Kant 1871 interpretative constructive approach (Gestalt)Asch 1964 (configural model)Impressions are a configuration, they are unified and integrated

- active process We go beyond information given Bruner 1957

alternative: elemental or algebraic model Anderson 1981 Take components of impression, extract evaluations Decision making model Highly predictive

Holistic or Gestalt model started research into schemas= cognitive structure that represents knowledge about concept

or stimulus, incl. attributes & relations among attributes (Fiske & Taylor 1991:98)

Preconceptions or theories about social world    Person schemas    Self-schemas    Role schemas    Event schemas

Information management

Schemas shape how we encode, remember & judge information - categorization process

        Direct attention        Guide memory        Influence judgement

Schemas vs. evidence – theory vs. data? Depends on fit & diagnosticity; motivation; conditions

Default option – schema.

3 major processes operate on Schemas and attributions = fundamental building blocks of social cognition

Attention Memory inference

Attention Selectivity in processing information from the environment. What effects does salience have on our perception of others?

2 different kinds of processes: encoding and consciousness, the experience of awareness itself.

Most important features: selective & limited.

Context – salience is a property of a stimulus in a particular context.       Immediate context       One’s schema or prior knowledge       Current task

Salience: exaggerates people’s causal attributions exaggerates our evaluations, polarises them.

Person memory Sets or goals relating to learning new information

Memory set Impression set Empathy set Self-reference Anticipated interaction

Priming of old information

Human Inference – core of SCOnce information is available: 

personal filters in the form of cognitive categories; limited ability to process information; and values and interests

act to select, categorize and provide the basis for a person to organize events

Personal constructs - templates through which we draw inferences about others’ characteristics.

We do not invent these cognitive units, we acquire them primarily through the language of our culture.

Inferences drawn often fallacious or biased.

Errors and biases: Heuristics

    Tversky & Kahneman 1974

Representativeness Availability Simulation (counterfactual thinking) Anchoring & adjustment

Continuing critique from European inspired intergroup perspective (Social Identity Theory)

Social cognition ignores group conflicts & memberships, asocietal individual Low context, high objectivity Decontextualized and individualistic

Self/other : Psychological/social can’t be detached

Social & psychological determinants of behaviour not competing alternatives but inseparable complements

Reading 2 pages on Macrae et al. study 1994 – Augoustinos et al.

2006*(required).

Ch. 5 in the Blackwell Reader McGarty & Haslam, Ch. 23 & 7 Steele, R.S. & Morawski, J.G. (2002) Implicit cognition and

the social unconscious. Theory & Psychology, 12(1), 37-54. Fiske, S.T., Cuddy, A.J.C. & Glick, P. (2006) Universal

dimensions of social cognition: Warmth & competence. Trends in Cognitive Science, 11(2), 77-83.