Ch. 3 Definitions
The term self-concept refers to
the sum total of a person’s beliefs concerning his or her own personal attributes.
The tendency for people to think of those worse off than themselves when faced with difficulties of their own is called
Downward Social Comparison
____ is the process by which people attribute humanlike mental states to various animate and inanimate objects, including other people.
Mind Perception
Vernell is being interviewed for a job. The interviewer suspects that Vernell is incompetent. The interviewer doesn’t expect much from Vernell and sits far away from her during the interview. He interrupts her frequently, and seems distracted when she speaks. As a result, Vernell becomes nervous, starts to stutter, and loses her train of thought several times. The interviewer’s final impression is that Vernell is, as he suspected, incompetent. This impression is most likely the result of
Self-fulfilling prophecy
What construct is examined in the Mirror Test?
Self-Awareness
The process of predicting how one will feel in response to future emotional events is called
affective forecasting.
According to research on perceptions of the self, people have a tendency to...
A. exaggerate their control over life events.
B. rate themselves less positively than others rate them.
C. underestimate their intellectual and social abilities.
A. exaggerate their control over life events.
A group of theories that describe how people explain the causes of behavior is known as
Attribution Theory
Cosmo is convinced that his accountant is addicted to drugs. To determine whether he is correct, Cosmo asks his friends if the accountant sniffs a lot, uses slang when he speaks, or frequently excuses himself to use the men’s room—three behaviors Cosmo believes are characteristic of those with drug addictions. Cosmo’s methods illustrate
confirmatory hypothesis testing.
All of the following are characteristics of the language a person uses when lying EXCEPT:
A. third person or distancing language
B. negative language
C. convoluted phrasing (extra words)
D. using their own and other peoples' names
D. using their own and other peoples' names
People’s recollection of a sequence of events that directly touched their lives is called
autobiographical memory.
Carlos is nervous about giving a class presentation because he doesn’t think he can communicate very well with everyone watching him. If Carlos attempts to deal with his anxiety by self-handicapping, he will most likely...
A. stay out all night partying the night before the presentation.
B. rehearse his presentation in front of a mirror.
C. compare himself to others who are eloquent speakers.
A. stay out all night partying the night before the presentation.
What is priming effect?
The tendency for recently used concepts to come to mind easily and influence the interpretation of new information
While watching a political debate on television, Martha, who describes herself as very conservative, is watching as the liberal candidate answers a question. When the candidate makes strong points that are backed up by logic, Martha rolls her eyes and doesn’t say a word. When the candidate makes one minor error, Martha yells, “See I told you she doesn’t know what she’s talking about. All of those liberals are idiots!” Martha is demonstrating the
Confirmation Bias
Believing that poor people are happier than others, or that obese people are more sociable, helps to satisfy
belief in a just world.
SOKA stands for
Self-Other Knowledge Asymmetry.
After her college’s football team wins the national championship, Liz starts yelling out “We won, we won” at the party she is attending. Her friends all join in, and soon they start changing “We’re number one! We’re number one!” The enthusiastic fans seemingly fail to realize that they did not actually accomplish anything except watching others win a game. This increase in self-esteem that occurs by associating with others who succeed is called...
basking in reflected glory. (BIRG)
What is trait negativity bias?
The tendency for negative trait information to have a greater impact on impressions
You hear Tiger Woods doing a radio commercial for Buick. Even though you know that Woods did not write the commercial himself, was paid to provide the voice-over for the commercial, and probably does not drive a Buick in real life, you still think that at some level, Woods must think highly of Buicks. This is an example of the
Fundamental Attributional Error
LeBron is eating at a restaurant on a first date when his date spills spaghetti all over his lap. Which of the following conclusions would LeBron be most likely to draw if he commits the fundamental attribution error?
A. his date is messy
B. his date gets nervous on first dates.
C. his date is even more attractive than he originally thought.
A. his date is messy
The process by which we seek to control or alter our thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and urges in order to live an acceptable life is called
self-regulation
Alex changes his behavior in response to self-presentation concerns and various situations, and thus, he is exhibiting a high level of..
Self monitoring
____ is the process by which one’s expectations about a person eventually lead that person to behave in ways that confirm those expectations.
Self-fulfilling prophecy
Sophia voted for Barack Obama in the 2008 U.S. presidential election. She believes that approximately 90% of college students also voted for Obama, when in reality that number is much lower. Sophia’s overestimation is consistent with the...
false-consensus effect.
_______ involves the tendency to mentally undo events or to ask “What if…?”
Counterfactual Thinking