History and links of social psychology

History Of Social Psychology

According to Kruglanski and Stroebe (2012) social psychology is defined as the scientific study of how a person's feelings, behaviors, and thoughts are influenced by the implied, imagined, or real presence of other people. Social psychology will analyze various social topics including social perception, behavior leadership, conformity, prejudice, nonverbal behavior, and aggression. It attempts to understand a person's behavior in a social context. Therefore, social psychology will look at human behavior as other people and the social setting that this occurs shape it. Social psychologists will deal with the factors that lead a person to behave in a given way in front of others, and it looks at the conditions in which some behaviors and feelings will occur. Social psychology is a young field that began in the 20th century. Around 90% of all social psychologists are believed to be alive. The early influencers of this field are Aristotle, who believed that human beings were naturally sociable, which allowed humans to live together. This is an individual centered approach. Plato who believed that the state controlled the person, and encouraged them to be socially responsible coined a socio-centered approach.

Early years

Texts that focused on social psychology started emerging at the beginning of the 20th century. The first famous book was "An Introduction to Social Psychology" by William McDougall in 1908. The book included chapters on sentiment and emotion, character, religion, and morality, which were all quite different from the ones included today. McDougall conceived that social behavior was instinctive and individual, which led to his choice of topics. Modern social psychology does not hold this belief. The current thinking is underpinned to Floyd Allport's work of 1924. Allport recognized that social behavior resulted from interactions amongst people. He chose a methodological approach, which focused on actual research and emphasized the social psychology was a scientific field (Fiske, Gilbert, & Lindzey, 2010). Allport's book covered topics that are still evident today like conformity, emotion, and an audience effect on others.

Norman Triplett conducted the first experiment in social psychology in 1898. Triplett used the experimental method to look into the performance of schoolchildren and cyclists on how being with others influenced their overall performance. In 1935, Sherif conducted an experiment on how people behaved based on society rules. Majority of research in social psychology arose after World War II. This was when people gained interest in human behavior in social situations. There were key studies conducted in several areas. Some of the studies centered on how attitudes are formed, how they are changed in a social context, and measured to establish if there were any changes. Some of the famous research in social psychology include the obedience study carried out by Stanley Milgram using the electric shock. The study looked at the role of an authority figure in shaping human behavior. Another study was Philip Zimbardo's prison simulation, which manifested conformity to the roles given in the social world.

Significant researchers of social psychology

Floyd Henry Allport is regarded as the founder of experimental social psychology due to his theoretical rigor and insistence on measurement. He is also considered because of his 1924 textbook that has gone through 13 editions since it was first published. Gordon Willard Allport was the younger brother to Floyd Allport. Gordon carried out pioneering research on prejudice, attitudes, rumor transmission, and religion. He also trained prominent psychologists like Stanley Milgram, Jerome Bruner, Anthony Greenwald, and Thomas Pettigrew. Laboratory studies to establish conformity were conducted by Solomon Asch. His studies demonstrated that under certain circumstances, individuals would conform to the majority position even if the position is wrong. Asch inspired the Milgram study on obedience. Roger Brown published the acclaimed textbook Social Psychology in 1965. The textbook played an integral role in teaching a generation of social psychologists. Brown also contributed in cognitive and psycholinguistics psychology. Kenneth Clark and his wife carried out research that suggested black children had a preference to playing with white dolls. The Supreme Court as evidence to prove that segregation would generate a feeling of inferiority later cited these results. Clark was also the first Africa American elected as President of the American Psychological Association.

Evelyn Hooker studied the psychosocial adjustment of gay men out of prison or hospital. She was the first social scientist to conduct such a study. The results of her study demonstrated heterosexual and gay men did not have any difference, which challenged the antigay stereotypes. Her results eventually led to the removal of homosexuality as a mental disorder from the American Psychiatric Association diagnostic manual (Baumeister & Finkel, 2010). Albert Bandura brought in the notion that it is possible to model behavior in the social world. He developed the social learning theory where he divided children into three groups. The children watched a video where the adult would be aggressive towards a doll. The adult would either be rewarded or published by another adult. The children who saw the video where the adult was rewarded were more likely to copy the adult's behavior. Leon Festinger, Stanley Schacter, and Black established cognitive dissonance in 1950. The argued that when a person holds on to beliefs, cognitions, and attitudes that are different they experience dissonance. Individuals will then try to change this by modifying their beliefs, thoughts, or attitudes. Dissonance will mostly occur when there are hard decisions or choices or when a person participates in a behavior that is against their attitude. Tajfel and Turner formulated the social identity theory, which stated that an individual has a need to maintain a positive sense of social and personal identity. The researchers conducted an experiment where they divided artificial groups. When the members of the group were requested to allocate points to others either in their group or the other group, they tended to award their group members more points.

Historic link to psychology and sociology