Chapter 14: Studies
- Aronson (1978)
Developed a cooperative learning known as the jigsaw classroom.
School children are placed in small groups that are mixed racially and academically.
Each group divides the material to be learned among its members, much like a jigsaw puzzle.
Each student is responsible for learning one piece of the puzzle, after which he or she must teach it to the other group members.
Regardless of race, aptitude, or skill, everyone was master his or her piece of the learning puzzle in order to complete the overall task of the group.
Children in jigsaw classrooms, compared to those in regular classrooms, tend to be less prejudiced, like each other more, like school more, and have higher self-esteem.
See contact theory, Sherif
- Asch (1956)
Studied the effect of group pressure on perceptual judgments and established the correlation between group size and rate of conformity.
The subject and a number of confederates were placed in a room and asked to judge which of three lines was closest in size to a given line.
The placement and number of confederates varied, but the subject always answered near the end.
The confederates gave obviously wrong answers, and it was found that the subject conformed 30 percent of the time.
See conformity
- Festinger and Carlsmith (1959)
Demonstrated the effects of cognitive dissonance.
They gave subjects exceedingly boring and monotonous tasks, but then asked them to lie to the next subject in line by telling them how enjoyable the tasks were.
The subjects were given either $1 or $20 for lying.
When surveyed later, the subjects who were given $20 indicated that the tasks were boring.
Those who were given only $1 said that the tasks truly were enjoyable.
- Heider (1958)
Studied attribution theory.
His work was applied in order to explain situations such as the USS Vincennes incident in 1988.
The ship was patrolling the Persian Gulf for Iranian and Iraqi vessels and aircraft.
When instruments aboard indicated that an enemy plane was approaching in attack mode, the captain gave the order to shoot down the plane.
The plane turned out to be a civilian aircraft and all 290 passengers were killed.
Heider attempted to explain the attributions the public made about this event.
One who decides that the captain is a bad person and likes to kill makes a stable person attribution.
One who decides that the captain was under the influence of drugs or an illness makes an unstable person attribution.
One who decides that the instrumentation caused the error makes a stable situation attribution.
One who decides that the tension of the situation caused the mistake makes an unstable situation attribution.
- Janis and Feshbach (1953)
Found that the effect on listeners was stronger when the information was not presented in an overly emotional manner.
Students were presented with three different forms of a lecture on tooth decay.
In each lecture, the same essential information on tooth decay was presented, but the lectures differed on the amount of fear they aroused.
The lecture that was designed to arouse only a little fear barely mentioned the consequences of tooth neglect.
In the lecture that was designed to arouse greater fear, however, listeners were told that poor hygiene could cause infection and lead to diseases such as arthritic paralysis, kidney damage, and total blindness.
When fear arousal was high, the effectiveness of the communication was significantly lower than when fear arousal was low.
Emotional appeals are also more effective if listeners are provided with concrete recommendations for action.
- LaPiere (1934)
Revealed that attitudes are a poor predictor of behavior.
In his study, he toured the United States with a Chinese couple.
In nearly every place they stopped, including motels, campgrounds, and restaurants, they were accommodated and treated well.
Six months later, LaPiere sent surveys to the establishments at which they had stopped.
Surprisingly, nearly 90 percent of these institutions said that they would not serve a Chinese couple.
- Milgram (1974)
Showed that subjects would obey a perceived authority figure approximately 60 percent of the time, even when instructed to harm another person.
Subjects were told that they were the "teachers" and were instructed to ask the "learners", who were actually Milgram's confederates, a list of questions.
The subjects were told to punish incorrect answers with increasingly stronger electrical shocks.
The confederates were not actually shocked, but they shouted and acted as though they were.
In spite of these reactions, nearly 60 percent of the subjects continued administering the shocks after Milgram stated that he would take full responsibility.
- Rosenthal and Jacobson (1968)
Study supporting the theory of self-fulfilling prophecy.
Teachers were given a list of students designated as "bloomers", but in fact, the students were randomly chosen.
The progress of all the students was tracked over the course of one year.
It was found that the "bloomers" showed greater increases in IQ and reading performance than the control students due to the teachers' unconcious changes in behavior and expectations towards the bloomers.
- Sherif (1958/1965)
Studied the effects of protagonistic and antagonistic goals on intergroup relations.
First, he divided a group of 11 and 12 year old boys who were unfamiliar with each other into two groups.
He gave each group a task that could only be completed at the expense of the other.
Sherif noticed that the two groups developed hostile attitudes toward the other.
Next he gave the two groups superordinate goals, and observed that the groups worked together successfully and hostility decreased.
- Triplett (1898)
This experiment was designed to study the effects of competition on behavior.
He had children wind a fishing reel several times, either alone or competing in pairs, and found that their performance improved in competition.
This result confirms the idea of social facilitation.
- Zimbardo (1970)
Discovered that even members of normally pacific groups can experience deindividuation.
When members of these groups feel anonymous or "hidden" in a group they may exhibit antisocial behavior.
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