Introduction to Social Cognition

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This engaging text delves into social cognition by exploring major questions in the field through an everyday lens. Students are introduced to core concepts, processes, and findings pertaining to how people come to know themselves and understand the behavior of others.

Why are first impressions so powerful? How do we “know” what others are like when we cannot read their minds? How can scientists measure biases that people do not want to admit--or do not know they have? This engaging text delves into social cognition by exploring major questions in the field through an everyday lens. Students are introduced to core concepts and processes pertaining to how people come to know themselves and understand the behavior of others. Classic and contemporary findings and experimental methods are explained. The text connects the research to pressing contemporary problems--the roots of political polarization, why even rational people fall prey to misinformation, and the best ways to reduce prejudice. Boxed definitions of key terms are included throughout.

Obsah

1. Thinking Is for Action (Purposeful), So We Make Meaning from Chaos
2. We Create Internal Mental Representations of External Reality
3. Self-Report Is Unreliable Because Cognition Is Often Automatic
4. We Can Know What People Think Even When They Don’t Know
5. First Impressions Are “Sticky” and Difficult to Update
6. First Impressions Can Be Implicit, Making Them Even More Persistent
7. We Follow Rules When Asking “Why?,” Acting Like Intuitive Scientists
8. Biases Are Common and Arise from Normal Cognitive Processes
9. Biases Are Common and Are Often Motivational in Nature
10. Beyond the Information Given: Responding Guided by Priming
11. Prejudice and Stereotyping
12. Cognitive Processing Is Flexible, and Processing Types Dissociable
13. The Updating of Impressions Is Promoted by Diagnostic Stimuli and One’s Goals
References
Author Index
Subject Index