Chapter 1 Introducing Social Psychology
The Remarkable Human Being
Human behavior is both complex and remarkable. In a relatively short time of about 15,000 years, humans have created the greatest achievements the planet earth has ever experienced, but we have also created its most severe problems. And what makes humans both so successful, and yet also so dangerous, is our social behavior. Humans work together, in social groups, to produce the great projects that enhance all of our lives. And yet at the same time we work against each other, again in social groups, to create hatred, killing, wars, and genocides.
If you are interested in what people do and why they do it then you are in the right place. Socialpsychology is about us—you and me and everyone else in the world. Human behavior is fascinating, andsocial psychologists specialize in understanding it.
Homo erectus was an ancestor of human beings. Present day humans have much in common with this human-like species, but they have also evolved much beyond it due to their superior social skills.
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Homo_erectus_adult_female_-_head_model_-_Smithsonian_Museum_of_Natural_History_-_2012-05-17.jpg
Social psychologists begin with the fact that human beings are a major success story on the planet earth. Humans anatomically similar to us, including Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and Neanderthals, lived and thrived for hundreds of thousands of years. But only present day humans—Homo sapiens—have far surpassed all others. Only humans have been able to adapt to every environment on the planet and to make monumental changes to it. And this success has been caused in large part by our abilities to successfully interact with other human beings in social groups (Kamil, 2014).
Homo sapiens have exceptional creativity—not only have we created astounding technical advances in communication, engineering and transportation, but we have also developed civilization and culture, including art, music, and religion. Humans were helped in these endeavors by our remarkable social abilities—we share our ideas with others and we work with others to build those ideas.
The remarkable ability of humans to create both good and evil can be easily seen by looking at some of the events that have occurred in the past year. These events include :
Terrorist attacks in Paris, Berlin, Orlando, Florida, and in many other places around the world.
Global climate change, as 2016 was recorded as the hottest year on record
The Syrian Civil War and the refugee crisis in Europe
Mass shootings and gun violence in the United States
The rise of ISIS and the fight against it by Western powers
The legalization of gay marriage in most US states
The rise to power of President Donald Trump
Perhaps you, like me, are interested and amazed by these things and want to understand them better. If you do, then you are in the right place, because social psychologists do exactly that:
Social psychologists study obedience to authority and conformity. They understand and predict when and how people will be influenced by the other people around them, including their political leaders.
Social psychologists study the development and influences of stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination.
I am looking forward to the journey of social psychology with you and I know you will learn a lot about human behavior during this course. With this in mind, let’s get started.
Social psychologyThe scientific study of how we feel about, think about, and behave toward the people around us and how our feelings, thoughts, and behaviors are influenced by those people. is the scientific study of how our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are influenced by the people around us. As this definition suggests, the subject matter of social psychology is very broad and can be found in just about everything that we do every day. Social psychologists study why we are often helpful to other people, but why we may at other times be unfriendly or aggressive. Social psychologists study both the benefits of having good relationships with other people and the costs of being lonely. Social psychologists study what factors lead people to purchase one product rather than another, how men and women behave differently in social settings, how juries work together to make important group decisions, and what makes some people more likely to recycle and engage in other environmentally friendly behaviors than others.
Social psychology is a broad field that links the study of behavior at different levels of analysis, ranging from the social level of behavior, the cognitive level of mental processes, and the neuroscience level of brain systems. Social psychology is a language that can unite our understanding of human behavior.
The goal of this book is to help you learn to think about social behaviors in the same way that social psychologists do. I hope you will find this approach useful because it will allow you to think about human behavior more critically and more objectively and to gain insight into your own relationships with other people. Social psychologists study everyday behavior scientifically, and their research creates a useful body of knowledge about our everyday social interactions.