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Unit 4
15–25% of examThis unit asks how other people shape what you think and do, and what makes each person's personality, motives and feelings their own. You'll study how people explain behavior, form attitudes and act in groups, then compare the main theories of personality, motivation and emotion.
Longer videos that cover the whole unit. Good for a first pass or a final review.
Attribution is how you explain behavior, either by someone's personality (a dispositional attribution) or by their circumstances (a situational one). People tend to over-blame personality for others' actions and take credit for their own successes. Your sense of control over your life (locus of control), how often you've seen something, and comparisons with others also shape how you see yourself and other people.
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Stereotypes are generalizations about groups that can lead to prejudice and discrimination, sometimes through implicit attitudes you aren't aware of. Attitudes can be stubborn even against evidence (belief perseverance), but they can also shift when your actions and beliefs clash and the discomfort pushes you to bring them back in line (cognitive dissonance).
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Other people change how you act: social pressure leads to conformity, authority figures can win obedience (as Milgram's studies showed), and groups can push opinions to extremes or let individuals slack off. This topic also covers how persuasion works, how culture shapes behavior, and why people do or don't help someone in need.
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Psychodynamic theory, which began with Freud, says unconscious processes drive personality and that defense mechanisms protect you from anxiety without your realizing it; it assesses personality with projective tests such as inkblots. Humanistic theory, led by Carl Rogers, focuses on your natural drive to grow toward your potential and the power of unconditional positive regard.
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Social-cognitive theory says personality comes from the back-and-forth between your thoughts, your actions and your surroundings (reciprocal determinism), shaped by your self-efficacy and self-esteem. Trait theories describe personality as lasting tendencies, most often measured today with the Big Five: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and emotional stability.
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Motivation is what pushes you to act, and theories explain it through body needs (drive reduction), seeking the right level of arousal, inner versus outside rewards, conflicts between choices, and the urge for new experiences. Hunger shows how it all fits together: hormones like ghrelin and leptin signal hunger and fullness, while cues like the time of day or a party also push you to eat.
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Theories of emotion disagree about timing: does your body react first, do the body and the feeling happen together, or do you need to put a label on your arousal before you feel an emotion? (Textbooks call these the James-Lange, Cannon-Bard and two-factor theories, but the exam asks about the ideas, not the names.) You'll also look at how facial expressions may feed back into feelings, how positive emotions widen your thinking, and how cultures set rules for showing emotion.
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