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Principles of Social Psychology

v3.0 Charles Stangor and Sue Frantz

Chapter 1 Welcome to Social Psychology

The Remarkable Human Being

Human behavior is both complex and remarkable. What makes humans both so successful and yet also so dangerous is our social behavior. Humans work together in social groups to produce 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, war, and genocide.

Social psychology is about us—how we perceive and interact with each other. Human behavior is fascinating, and social psychologists specialize in understanding it.

Social psychologists begin with the fact that human beings are a major success story on the planet earth. Only humans have been able to adapt to every environment on the planet and to make monumental changes to it. This success has been caused in large part by our abilities to successfully interact with other human beings in social groups. 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 bad can easily be seen by looking at some of the events surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic. 

  1. Mask-wearing gradually became a social norm in many communities.

  2. The availability of vaccines divided people into opposing groups.

  3. Isolation took a toll on people deprived of everyday interactions. 

  4. With restaurants closed or operating with reduced staff, neighborhoods came together to help.

  5. Employees who could work remotely learned how to communicate effectively with colleagues in new ways. 

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:

  1. Social psychologists study social norms and how those norms can influence our behavior, for both good and bad.     

  2. Social psychologists study human aggression, and we have a good idea of the causes of gun violence (DeWall, Anderson, & Bushman, 2011). 

  3. 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.

  4. Social psychologists study what makes people initially like each other and potentially fall in love with each other (Clark & Lemay, 2010).

  5. Social psychologists study the development and influences of stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination.

Throughout this book, we will explore how we perceive ourselves, how we perceive others, and how our perceptions affect our interactions. 

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. Social psychologists study why we are often helpful to other people but at other times may 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 juries work together to make important group decisions, and what makes some people more likely to engage in environmentally friendly behaviors.

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, to the neuroscience level of brain systems. Social psychology is a language that can inform our understanding of human behavior.

The goal of this book is to look at human behavior through the lens of social psychology. I hope you will find this approach useful because it will allow you to think about human behavior more critically and 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.