Social Psychology: How Our Brains Influence Our Behaviour

Psychology observes the experience and behavior of an individual. Behavior expresses experience of a particular individual during interaction process. Psychology is concerned with the mental processes, comparing them with one another and grouping them in various classes. The main concepts in psychology can be best understood by exploring what defines human and non-human behavior. Psychologists identifies a number of mental processes and behaviors such as; attention, intelligence, personality, perception, emotion, motivation, and cognition, among others. Various theories have so far been established to explain the extent to which biological aspects primarily influence and whether environmental issues give a better explanation. 

Gordon Allport (2005) recognizes social psychology as a discipline that involves scientific methods in explaining and understanding feelings, thoughts, and behavior of individuals and how they are affected by the real, illusionary or implied existence of the other human beings. Social psychology basically is concerned with the understanding of how a respective individual behavior is affected by the social environment where that particular behavior takes place. 

In most cases, social psychology is confused with conventional wisdom, personality psychology, and sociology. Personality psychology emphasizes on individual behaviors, physical appearance, and beliefs, while social psychology focuses on situations (Cherry, 2008). Social psychologists are concerned about the impact of social setting and group communication on attitudes and behaviors. Social psychology and sociology are almost similar; the distinction however, is that, sociology focuses much on the broad levels of social behaviors and the influences. While psychologists work towards establishing issues that affect social behavior, sociologists focuses on establishing the societies and cultures that affects the behaviors of people. 

Social Psychology Concepts/ Theories 

Action Identification Theory  

Developed by Robin Vallacher and Daniel Wegner, Action Identification Theory identifies the ethics through which individuals implement a particular act identity for their behavior and plans the conditions under which individuals maintain this act personality or adopt a new one (Vallacher & Wegner, 1987). 

The theory holds that action is undertaken with respect to the act identity that stands out in consciousness. This means that people have an idea of what they are doing or want to do and use this act identity as a frame of reference for implementing the action and monitoring its occurrence. Because act identities exist at different levels in an identity structure, this principle specifies that people can perform an action at different levels, (Vallacher & Wegner, 1987 p.56). 

According to Vallacher & Kaufman (1996), individuals like thinking about their behavior with regards to effects, goals, and implications, instead of more mechanistic constituents. Therefore, when an individual has less understanding of his/her behavior, he/she is likely to embrace a high-level identity presented by other people or made accessible by the action environment. For instance, when an individual is persuaded to think about the facts of his/her behavior in a current communication, he/she becomes thoughtful to how this particular behavior is viewed by other people, since such kind of feedback can give a broad understanding to that particular behavior. At the end, such an individual might have confidence that his/her behavior is a reflection of whatsoever interpersonal predisposition such as competition and cooperation is taken in the feedback. 

Reasoned Action Theory 

Reasoned Action is a theory that predicts people’s behavior. The theory states that ‘the best predictor of people’s behavior in any given situation is their intention to perform the behavior.’ (Ajzen and Fishbein, 1975). For instance, the best predictor of whether an individual will in the long run do a particular thing is whether they have any intention of doing it. It is a person’s attitude, attitudes of other people who surround this person, and the social pressures that influence the person’s behavior. 

Sheppard, Hartwick and Warshaw (1988) argue that even though research establishes that people’s attitudes with regards to a particular behavior suggestively influence whether they have intention to do it, research has also indicated that attitudes are not constantly adequate for predicting behavior. Behavioral intentions in most cases are influenced by supposed social pressures (Ajzen &Fishbein, 1975). Reasoned Action Theory is used to envisage a wide range of behaviors that relates to health, voting, consumer acquisitions, and religious participation. This theory is majorly applicable to deliberate behaviors under an individual’s control. 

Social Identity Theory 

Social identity theory explains how the self-concept is associated with group membership and group and intergroup behavior. It defines group membership in terms of people’s identification, definition, and evaluation of themselves as members of a group (social identity) and specifies cognitive, social interactive and societal processes that interact to produce typical group phenomena, (Hogg, 2006 p.123). 

Social identity portrayed psychologically to administer perceptions, attitudes, feelings, and behavior at a point when it is psychologically significant. Individuals tend to entice on freely accessible social identities or categorizations such as profession, and gender, among others, or ones that are appreciated, important, and most often employed facets of the self-concept, or since they are self-evident and perceptually evident in the immediate situation. 

Twenty Statements Tests 

Twenty Statements test takes the form of a survey, whereby the respondents are expected to give up to twenty responses to the prompts. These questions are structured based on, and Who am I?” or “I am...” however it is not compulsory that respondents provide the twenty answers  This kind of test normally takes just a few minutes. 

Kuhn (1960) argues that the responses to the twenty statements test needs to be clustered into five sets: “social groups and classifications, ideological beliefs, interests, ambitions, and self-evaluations.” The Twenty Statement Test is helpful in giving a scientific path of investigating the conception of ‘self’ within social psychology.  

According to Kuhn (1960) the responses within the five coding categories diversified in rate of recurrence depending on the age, sex and profession of respondents.  Lately, Grace and Cramer (2002) did not find any gender differences in terms of self, using Twenty Statement Test. Franklin and Kohout (1971) on the other hand argues that the five-category method of coding results in partiality, as the researcher codes responses using a set of a priori categories. 

The Twenty Statements Test- Who Am I? 

I am dark. 

I am tall. 

I am a Georgiana 

I am beautiful 

I am male 

I am a Christian 

I am a Chinese- American 

I am a university student 

I am a master’s degree holder 

I am a gospel music fan 

I am social 

I am hardworking 

I am a journalist 

I am trustworthy 

I am independent 

I am reliable 

I am generous 

I am a human being 

I am black 

I am a creation of God. 

Responses to the outcome of the Twenty Statement Tests (TST) 

Do you do things for your own benefit or for the benefit of the group? Provide examples 

In most cases, and in several occasions, I do things that please me. I usually prioritize my happiness over that of the group. Before I do anything, I always ask myself, “how will I benefit from this?” before I ask myself how the group would benefit from it. I always like things that benefit the group, but not at my expense, I must come first, my needs must come first, I must benefit first, before the group. 

How did you get to have the self you have? 

I got the self I have because of the environment where I spent the best part of my life. Other people’s behaviors, attitudes, perceptions, beliefs, and customs have influenced my ‘self’. For instance, I lived in an environment where everyone believed education is the key to success, well, they could be right or wrong, but I did not consider any of that, as long as it was the way everyone else followed. I did it because everyone else has been doing it. Furthermore, I have a personality that seems to be little bit complicated, I usually listen keenly without any interruptions as someone talks, then I react later. This is because, everyone else I lived with, could listen to another, even if it takes several minutes doing so, before reacting. 

What do you think are the consequences for a society overwhelmingly populated by one personality type or the other? What would society’s institutions look like if they were dominated by B or C mode only people? 

A society in most cases is composed of heterogeneous groups of people. Thus, it is quite rare to find a common personality in everybody within one locality. However, in some instances, this becomes the case, because some personalities are shaped through the environment through which they live in. for example, some deeds such as alcoholism are highly dominant in some areas, some people would get themselves into alcoholism because that is what everyone else is up to. A society dominated by B and C mode of people only would be such a boring society. I tend to believe that a society comprised of A- D mode of people is good as every trait will be portrayed thus making it easy for one to identify themselves within such a particular society. 

Are these two orientations mutually exclusive, or can you combine the best parts of both? If the latter, what can you do in order to bring that about? 

It is just logical to combine the two orientations. This is because, someone cannot identify himself/herself with a particular group without showing their other emotional side. Once people identify themselves with a particular group, the next aspect to follow, thus becomes the emotional part. 

If you had taken this test five or ten years ago, do you think you'd have the same or similar results? Why or why not? How about five or ten years from now? Why or why not? 

The results of the test would definitely change, because individuals change with time, depending on the environment they live in. For example, the character traits one possesses at childhood, some of them would change in every step this person makes. Particular traits of someone while leading a single life would change with the time they get into marriage. 

References  

Ajzen, I., & Fishbein, M. Belief, attitude, intention and behavior: An introduction to theory and research. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1975. 

Allport , G. W. The historical background of social psychology. In G. Lindzey, and E. Aronson, (Eds.), Handbook of Social Psychology,2005. 1-46. 

Cherry, K. How is Social Psychology Different from other Disciplines ?2008. 

Hogg, M. A. Social identity theory: Contemporary social psychological theories ,In P. J. Burke (Ed2006. (pp. 111-136). Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. 

Kuhn, Manford H.  Self-Attitudes by Age, Sex and Professional Training .  Sociological Quarterly , 1960. 39-56 

Sheppard, B. H., Hartwick, J., & Warshaw, P. R. The theory of reasoned action: A meta-analysis of past research with recommendations for modifications and future research . Journal of Consumer Research, 1988. 15, 325-343. 

Vallacher, R. R., & Kaufman, J. Dynamics of action identification: Volatility and structure in the mental representation of behavior. In P. M. Gollwitzer & J. A. Bargh (Eds.), The psychology of action, 1996. (pp. 260-282). New York: Guilford Press. 

Vallacher, R. R., & Nowak, A. Dynamical social psychology: Finding order in the flow of human experience . In A. W. Kruglanski & E. T. Higgins (Eds.), Social psychology: Handbook of basic principles, 2007. (2nd ed., pp. 734-758). New York: Guilford Press 

Vallacher, R. R., & Wegner, D. M. What do people think they’re doing? Action identification and human behavior . Psychological Review, 1987. 94, 3-15.