Social psychology is concerned on how different people make relationships and how different behaviors are manifested in social situations. It should be noted that better understanding of how people interact and learn from others to be a continuous process that deals with social interaction. In studying interactions, therefore, we must understand what social psychology is all about. When studying social psychology, social interaction is a continuous process of actions that determines how we think and act towards other people in a social context. These activities usually involve two or more individuals and particularly groups to a larger extent (Aronson & Wilson, 2010).
When two or more people are associating, their actions and reactions are modified to fit or accommodate what they want to satisfy in those group and individual interactions. Social interactions can also be defined as an exchange of a social aspect with one another and it may involve groups. An individual therefore forms the basis of social interaction. According to Reynolds & Mason (2002), all pillars of any social interactions start with an own understanding of terms and rules that should exist in a given setting. Social interactions always form the basis as to which structure is achieved and thus more insights can be obtained from that interaction.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
There are three main classifications of social interactions which are accidental, repeated, regular and regulated. In unexpected social interaction is that which happens without any prior planning with the group or an individual in a particular social setting. Repeated social interactions are interactions that occur most often, and they may be planned or just coincidence. A situation such as an individual visiting a bank regularly and meeting the same person each time is repeated social interactions. Regular interactions are interactions which may be planned or accidental but it occurs over a given period, and a relationship is created out of such an arrangement. Regulated social interactions form another basis of interactions in whereby it happens in a given planned scenarios, and somebody is controlling.
Social interaction provides an avenue whereby analysis can be done on an individual and to understand the circumstances that make them behave in a given manner when interacting with others and how other people also influence his or her behaviors. It can, therefore, be analyzed within larger social groups, with two individuals (dyads) and within three people who are known as triads. All these types of settings will lead to a better understanding of how people interact and understand each other. When people interact socially, there is a given pattern and structure that is formed. Social structures lead to a given culture of that group (Reynolds & Mason, 2002). A culture of a given social interaction can be defined as beliefs, values or a particular kind of way that individual does things making a component of that person. Social interactions, therefore, are built on a one shared culture more so in a group.
When people interact with each other, they tend to form a given structure where rules are designed within the context of the institutions. People’s interactions can be understood from the perspective of their attitudes. Attitudes are one’s feelings that are formed out of one’s beliefs and which end up determining how we react and view people, objects, and situations. Attitudes are a major force that determines how various people think and act when interacting with the rest of the individuals in a given group or individual setting. Our attitudes always provide a future thinking of the outcome of our behavior in a social setting (Pastorino & Doyle-Portillo, 2012). They determine how we conduct ourselves in front of others. They have behavioral, cognitive and they are always effective when external influence is experienced. An individual behaves according to which attitude he or she has on that particular day or time.
For a social group or a given person to act in the right way, it is important that attitudes of individual changes positively. People influence their attitudes or can modify the way they think of about a given person or an event through two main ways: a central route to persuasion and a peripheral route to persuasion. People are different in forming attitudes, and when they apply a central route to persuasion, they use scientific evidence and end up responding in a more positive mode to a situation or events in their lives. Their attitudes, therefore, change since they have understood how badly they are behaving to an individual but mostly from the facts that they have gathered through analysis of their behavior and situation. Social psychology also explains that a person may use a peripheral route to persuasion whereby a person after listening to a speech by a given celebrity or having addressed by a prominent individual they may change their attitudes towards a given behavior (Pastorino & Doyle-Portillo, 2012). It is most common when counseling is done. As a qualified individual is treating the person who is into alcoholism, they always rethink about their attitudes, and they end up addressing their alcoholic behaviors.
When a particular action is against the beliefs and feelings of an individual, they tend to be in conflict of the outcome. When a situation makes an individual think otherwise about a given action, they can be understood from the angle of Cognitive dissonance theory. An individual’s attitudes, therefore, can change effectively when they feel that their beliefs and behaviors are conflicting. People tend to change their attitudes so that they can make a situation better out of their immediate actions that always influence their behaviors. In a social interaction seating and by applying social psychology, we always make some conclusions on other people’s responses when we observe them (Pastorino & Doyle-Portillo, 2012).
People view or judge others in a given social setting by not factoring in the external influences on an individual’s behavior. More often people tend to assume that a person has behaved in a given way due to his or her personality but this is what is referred to as the attribution error. The most applicable attribution error that is applied when explaining how people judge an individual’s character is by using the fundamental attribution error. People do not consider the influence of others, situations and other external forces that make a person to behave in a certain way. People end up concluding that an individual is bad mannered, rude and arrogant when they interact with them but we must always factor the status and the situation that they were at that particular moment to better understand their behaviors.
To understand other people better, it is, therefore, important we know what they are facing at that given time so that we stop making a conclusion concerning their behaviors that are not true according to the situation at hand (Reynolds & Mason, 2002). When people are in a given social group setting, they are influenced by various issues, and they end up behaving the way they behave because of how the team will judge them and appreciate them. Asch’s conformity studies try to explore how people end up acting when they are of a particular social group. The experiments proved that when an individual is in a given social group they tend to be judgmental and they behave differently as compared to when they are as an individual. Various reasons may lead to the change of behavior but above all is the influence of the peer pressure that is exerted on an individual.
Peer pressure makes a person in a given social group to react and think differently. People often behave because of two main reasons in a group. They may behave so as to conform to the demands of the groups and they may change their behavior because of the information that they receive from the rest of the members of a particular group. Social interactions, therefore, end up behaving differently everybody is concerned to please the group members. The environment can, however, influence an individual’s actions as explained earlier. Stanley Milligram wanted to understand why people behaved differently when they were in a given social set up. He used the Milligram’s famous experiments to prove the pressure that obedience as a virtue can have on a human being that may even lead to harming others. He, therefore, came to a conclusion that, various individuals behaves according to the influence exerted on them by others when they deem the authority has having moral values or if it’s a legal action (Aronson & Wilson, 2010).
People may, therefore, behave in a given social grouping because of groupthink and social loafing. Social loafing is the act of an individual when involve in a group role end up joyriding on other’s efforts if it’s a group objective, but they behave differently if it’s a different activity. On the other hand, group think is the behavior that arises when an individual makes unrealistic judgments and ignores the facts to please the rest of the team. In social interactions people end up being individualized when they are in social settings or groups. They tend to be less self-aware of how they should act and are suppressed by the actions of the rest of the members of the group because they feel anonymous (Aronson & Wilson, 2010).
Other people also use prejudice categorization when judging a social group’s behaviors more so when they are not of the same group. Such interactions end up being negatively motivated, and different reasons develop a behavior of an individual. Prejudice is having negative feelings and thinking of a different person in a different social group. When a person has prejudice, their behavior towards such groups is different and about their thinking.
In conclusion, the above approaches have shaped and shown how various thinkers in a society interact and how people behave. One theory proves that the way people view and judges issues is what makes people who they are and is what enables people to choose their friends and groups in a given society. Rules of that society are therefore formed through various basis and which are mostly out of attribution errors and prejudice.
References
Aronson, E., & Wilson, T. (2010). Social Psychology. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Pastorino, E., & Doyle-Portillo, S. (2012). What is Psychology? Essentials. Boston: Cengage.
Reynolds, J., & Mason, R. (2002). How Do People Learn? London: CIPD Publishing.
