PSYCHOLOGY 160: Social Psychology

SYLLABUS

 

Fall 2006

Mondays & Wednesdays, 11-12

145 Dwinelle

 

 

INSTRUCTOR: 

 

Professor Serena Chen

Office:  3413 Tolman

Phone:  643-0843

Office hours:  Wednesdays, 1:30-3 p.m.

E-mail:  serchen@berkeley.edu (please try to visit office hours first)

 

GRADUATE STUDENT INSTRUCTORS:

 

 

Sang Hee Park

Chris Soto

Liz Horberg

Office:

4129 Tolman

4115 Tolman

4135 Tolman

E-mail:

sanghee@berkeley.edu

cjsoto@berkeley.edu

horberg@berkeley.edu

Sections:

107, Monday, 2-3

101, Wednesday, 2-3

104, Thursday, 9-10

 

108, Monday, 3-4

102, Wednesday, 3-4

105, Thursday, 10-11

 

109, Monday, 4-5

103, Wednesday, 4-5

106, Thursday, 11-12

 

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

 

Social psychology is the scientific study of the way people think about, feel, and behave in social situations. It involves understanding how people influence, and are influenced by, the others around them. A primary goal of this course is to introduce you to the perspectives, research methods, and empirical findings of social psychology. Topics to be covered include: impression formation, conformity, prosocial behavior, interpersonal attraction, persuasion, stereotyping and prejudice. Equally important is the goal of cultivating your skills for analyzing the social situations and events that you encounter in your everyday lives. Finally, throughout the course, emphasis will be placed on developing critical and integrative ways of thinking about theory and research in social psychology.   

 

COURSE FORMAT AND REQUIREMENTS:

 

Course lectures are designed to reinforce and supplement the course readings, so they may include material that is not covered in the readings. The sections led by your GSI are intended to hone and discuss in depth the ideas covered in each week's lectures and readings. You are expected to attend and actively participate in these sections. Sections begin meeting the week of Sept. 4th. (Wednesday, Sept. 6th will be the first day of sections since Sept. 4th is Labor Day and there are no Tuesday sections). 

 

There will be 3 exams (multiple choice & short answer) given during lecture time. The dates are:

Wednesday, Oct. 4th

Monday, Nov. 6th

Wednesday, Dec. 6th

 

MARK THESE IN YOUR CALENDARS NOW. There is no exam during the final exam period. All exams are non-cumulative. Each covers the material presented in the lectures, readings, AND sections within the specified dates. Make-up exams require advance notice and a legitimate and documented excuse (e.g., a legible doctor’s note for illness). 

 

Finally, there is a 3-credit Research Participation Program (RPP) requirement for this course. RPP coordinators from the Psychology Department will visit our first lecture to provide information regarding the prescreening survey (which counts for 1 credit) and enrolling in the on-line RPP system called Experimetrix.

The URL for Experimetrix is: http://www.experimetrix.com/berkeley

Deadlines for RPP can be found at: http://psychology.berkeley.edu/rpp/

GRADING:

 

Your final grade in this course will be based on your achievement on the course requirements weighted in the following manner:

 

Exam #1

30%

Exam #2

30%

Exam #3

30%

Section Participation & RPP Participation

10%

 

Final letter grades are based on standard percentages, not curves, as follows:

 

97-100% …

A+

 

77-79% …

C+

93-96% …

A

 

73-76% …

C

90-92% …

A-

 

70-72% …

C-

87-89% … 

B+

 

67-69% …

D+

83-86% …

B

 

63-66% …

D

80-82% …

B-

 

 

 

 

REQUIRED READINGS: 

Textbook

Social Psychology (5th Edition)

Authors: Elliot Aronson, Timothy D. Wilson, & Robin M. Akert

Publisher: Prentice Hall, 2005

The course textbook can be bought at ASUC, and possibly at Neds and Campus Textbook Exchange (CTE). 

 

[Two copies of the textbook will be available on reserve in the Ed-Psych library in Tolman]

 

Supplementary Empirical Articles

These articles can be downloaded from the following website: http://eres.berkeley.edu. Click “Electronic Reserves and Course Materials” and then it’s probably quickest to search by instructor (Chen, Serena) to get to our course webpage. To access the readings, you will need to enter the course password (XXXXX). Once you are in the course webpage, click on the EMPIRICAL ARTICLES folder. In there, you should be able view and print the readings as PDF files simply by clicking on their titles. [Full citations for these articles are on the last page of the syllabus]

 

Lecture Power Point Slides

Power Point slides will also be available on the ERES website (see above) no later than 48 hours after each lecture. To open the ERES folder where the slides will be stored, use the following password: XXXXX.

To view and/or print each Power Point file itself, use the following password: XXXXX.

 

Lecture Notes

Lecture notes will be available through Black Lightning Lecture Notes.

 

Podcast

Lectures will be podcast (i.e., audio-recorded) through a university-provided service. Quality of the podcasts is not guaranteed, so listening to them is not meant to serve as a substitute for attending lectures. Rather, doing so may serve as a useful way to review the course material. For information on how to download and listen to the lecture podcasts, visit the following website: http://webcast.berkeley.edu/podcasting.html.

 

Course Website (displays basic course info)

http://courseweb.berkeley.edu/courseweb/pub/courses/2006/Fa/PSYCH/160/001

 


 

COURSE SCHEDULE & READINGS:

 

DATE

TOPIC

READINGS

M, Aug. 28

Introduction

 

W, Aug. 30

Themes

Chapter 1

 

 

 

M, Sept. 4

No Class—Labor Day

 

W, Sept. 6

Research Methods

Chapter 2

 

 

 

M, Sept. 11

Introduction to Social Cognition

Chapter 3

W, Sept. 13

Effects of Schemas

Hastorf & Cantril (1954)

 

 

 

M, Sept. 18 

Confirmation Biases & Schema Change

Chapter 4

W, Sept. 20

Automatic vs. Controlled Processing

Bargh, Chen, &  Burrows (1996)

 

 

 

M, Sept. 25

Nonverbal Communication & Culture

 

W, Sept. 27

Attribution, Part I

Choi & Nisbett (1998)

 

 

 

M, Oct. 2 

Attribution, Part II

 

W, Oct. 4

EXAM #1

Exam covers 8/28-10/2 material

 

 

 

M, Oct. 9  

The Self, Part I

Chapter 5

W, Oct. 11

The Self, Part II

Linville (1985)

 

 

 

M, Oct. 16  

Cognitive Dissonance

Chapter 6

W, Oct. 18

The Multiply Motivated Self

 

 

 

 

M, Oct. 23

Attitudes & Persuasion, Part I

Chapter 7

W, Oct. 25 

Attitudes & Persuasion, Part II

Petty, Cacioppo, & Goldman (1981)

 

 

 

M, Oct. 30  

Conformity & Compliance

Chapter 8

W, Nov. 1

Obedience

Santos, Leve, & Pratkanis (1994)

 

 

 

M, Nov. 6  

EXAM #2

Exam covers 10/9-11/1 material

W, Nov. 8

Group Processes

Chapter 9 

 

 

 

M, Nov. 13   

Attraction

Chapter 10

W, Nov. 15

Close Relationships

Aron, Aron, Tudor, & Nelson (1991)

 

 

 

M, Nov. 20  

Prosocial Behavior

Chapter 11

W, Nov. 22

Stereotyping & Prejudice, Part I

Chapter 13

 

 

 

M, Nov. 27  

Stereotyping & Prejudice, Part II

Johns, Schmader, & Martens (2005)

W, Nov. 29

Intergroup Relations

Dovidio & Gaertner (1999)

 

 

 

M, Dec. 4

Applying Social Psychology & Revisiting Themes

 

W, Dec. 6

EXAM #3

Exam covers 11/8-12/4 material

 

 


 

Supplementary Empirical Articles

 

Hastorf, A. H., & Cantril, H. (1954). They saw a game – A case study. Journal of Abnormal and Social

Psychology, 49, 129-134. 

 

Bargh, J. A., Chen, M., & Burrows, L. (1996). Automaticity of social behavior:  Direct effects of trait

construct and stereotype activation on action. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,

71, 230-244.

 

Choi, I., & Nisbett, R. E. (1998). Situational salience and cultural differences in the correspondence

bias and actor-observer bias. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 24, 949-960.

           

Linville, P. W. (1985). Self-complexity and affective extremity: Don't put all your eggs in one

cognitive basket. Social Cognition, 3, 94-120.

 

Petty, R. E., Cacioppo, J. T., & Goldman, R. (1981). Personal involvement as a determinant of

argument-based persuasion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 41, 847-855.

 

Santos, M. D., Leve, C., & Pratkanis, A. R. (1994). Hey buddy, can you spare seventeen cents?

Mindful persuasion and the pique technique. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 24, 755-

764.

 

Aron, A., Aron, E.N., Tudor, M., & Nelson, G. (1991). Close relationships and including other in the

self. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60, 241-253.

 

Johns, M., Schmader, T., & Martens, A. (2005). Knowing is half the battle: Teaching stereotype threat

as a means of improving women’s math performance. Psychological Science, 16, 175-179.

 

Dovidio, J. F., & Gaertner, S. L. (1999). Reducing prejudice: Combating intergroup biases. Current

Directions, 8, 101-105.