WEBVTT 00:12.830 --> 00:16.150 Professor Paul Bloom: This is going to begin a 00:16.146 --> 00:20.096 two-lecture sequence on social psychology on how we think about 00:20.100 --> 00:22.780 ourselves, how we think about other people, 00:22.778 --> 00:25.838 how we think about other groups of people. 00:25.840 --> 00:31.060 We've talked a lot about the capacities of the human mind and 00:31.064 --> 00:36.384 some of these capacities involve adapting and dealing with the 00:36.375 --> 00:39.965 material world. So, we have to choose foods, 00:39.966 --> 00:43.906 we have to navigate around the world, we have to recognize 00:43.909 --> 00:46.519 objects, we have to be able to 00:46.518 --> 00:49.508 understand physical interactions. 00:49.510 --> 00:52.760 But probably the most interesting aspect of our 00:52.760 --> 00:57.140 evolved minds is our capacity to understand and deal with other 00:57.142 --> 01:00.472 people. We are intensely interested in 01:00.467 --> 01:02.417 how other people work. 01:02.420 --> 01:10.950 The story that was a dominant news story in 2005 was this. 01:10.950 --> 01:14.350 And some of you--this--for those of you who aren't seeing 01:14.351 --> 01:18.361 the screen, is the separation of Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt. 01:18.360 --> 01:24.080 I remember where I was when I first heard about this. 01:24.080 --> 01:26.700 [laughter] And it's an interesting sight. 01:26.700 --> 01:29.250 Just remember--stepping back. 01:29.250 --> 01:32.680 As psychologists we have to question the natural. 01:32.680 --> 01:36.250 We have to take things that are commonsense and explore them. 01:36.250 --> 01:39.770 And one thing which just happens is, we're fascinated by 01:39.768 --> 01:42.278 this stuff. We're fascinated by the lives 01:42.275 --> 01:44.755 of celebrities. We're fascinated by the social 01:44.756 --> 01:45.946 lives of other people. 01:45.950 --> 01:51.330 And it's an interesting question to ask why. 01:51.330 --> 01:54.430 And this is one of the questions which I'm going to 01:54.429 --> 01:58.329 deal with in the next couple of lectures but before I get to the 01:58.334 --> 02:02.124 theory of social psychology I want to talk about an individual 02:02.116 --> 02:05.416 difference. So, we devoted a lecture early 02:05.418 --> 02:09.468 on--of a couple of weeks ago, to individual differences 02:09.466 --> 02:13.136 across people in intelligence and personality. 02:13.139 --> 02:16.739 I want to talk a little bit about an individual difference 02:16.741 --> 02:20.601 in our social natures and then I want people to do a test that 02:20.596 --> 02:23.626 will explore where you stand on a continuum. 02:23.629 --> 02:26.939 That test is the piece of paper you have in front of you. 02:26.939 --> 02:29.609 Anybody who doesn't have it please raise your hand and one 02:29.609 --> 02:31.809 of the teaching fellows will bring it to you. 02:31.810 --> 02:35.680 You don't know what to do yet with it so don't worry. 02:35.680 --> 02:39.590 The test was developed actually by Malcolm Gladwell who is a 02:39.585 --> 02:43.685 science writer--in his wonderful book The Tipping Point. 02:43.689 --> 02:47.679 And as he introduces the test, Gladwell recounts another 02:47.675 --> 02:51.485 experiment done by Stanley Milgram, of course famous for 02:51.494 --> 02:55.734 his obedience work but he did a lot of interesting things. 02:55.729 --> 03:01.319 And one classic study he did was he gave a package to 160 03:01.317 --> 03:07.007 people randomly chosen in Omaha, Nebraska and he asked these 03:07.009 --> 03:11.609 people to get the package somehow – and this was many 03:11.609 --> 03:16.529 years ago before the internet, before e-mail – to get the 03:16.530 --> 03:20.830 package to a stockbroker who worked in Boston but lived in 03:20.826 --> 03:23.286 Sharon, Massachusetts. 03:23.289 --> 03:27.349 What he found was that most people were able to do it. 03:27.349 --> 03:30.119 Nobody, of course, knew this man but they knew 03:30.122 --> 03:33.512 people who might know people who would know this man. 03:33.510 --> 03:35.540 So, most people succeeded. 03:35.539 --> 03:41.029 Most people were able to get the packages to this man and it 03:41.027 --> 03:45.117 took at maximum six degrees of separation, 03:45.120 --> 03:48.540 which is where the famous phrase comes about that we're 03:48.541 --> 03:51.711 all separated from another person by six degrees of 03:51.709 --> 03:54.449 separation. This is not true in general. 03:54.449 --> 03:57.409 This was a very--a single experiment done within the 03:57.406 --> 03:59.896 United States, but the idea is appealing, 03:59.900 --> 04:05.390 that people are connected to one another via chains of 04:05.388 --> 04:09.468 people. But what Milgram found that was 04:09.466 --> 04:15.456 particularly interesting was that in about half of the cases 04:15.456 --> 04:19.716 these packages went through two people. 04:19.720 --> 04:25.210 That is, if you plot the relationships between people--We 04:25.210 --> 04:28.740 can take each person in this room, 04:28.740 --> 04:33.130 find everybody you know and who knows you and draw a line, 04:33.126 --> 04:37.586 but if we were to do this you wouldn't find an even mesh of 04:37.590 --> 04:40.080 wires. Rather, you'd find that some 04:40.079 --> 04:41.369 people are clusters. 04:41.370 --> 04:44.440 Some people are what Gladwell calls "connectors." 04:44.440 --> 04:45.950 It's like air traffic. 04:45.949 --> 04:50.059 Air traffic used to be everything flew to places local 04:50.060 --> 04:53.240 to it but now there's a system of hubs, 04:53.240 --> 04:58.810 Chicago O'Hare for instance or Newark where planes fly through. 04:58.810 --> 05:00.990 Some people are hubs. 05:00.990 --> 05:05.970 Some people are the sort of people who know a lot of people. 05:05.970 --> 05:10.160 Some people in this room might be hubs, and it is not 05:10.157 --> 05:12.167 impossible to find out. 05:12.170 --> 05:17.230 The piece of paper you have here is 250 names chosen 05:17.230 --> 05:21.100 randomly from a Manhattan phone book. 05:21.100 --> 05:26.670 They capture a range of ethnicities, different parts of 05:26.666 --> 05:30.786 the world, different national origins. 05:30.790 --> 05:32.050 Here's what I'd like you to do. 05:32.050 --> 05:34.190 And I'll give about five minutes for this. 05:34.190 --> 05:40.520 Go through these names and circle how many people you know. 05:40.519 --> 05:45.459 Now, the rules of this are, to know somebody you have 05:45.463 --> 05:48.603 to--they have to know you back. 05:48.600 --> 05:56.310 So, if it's a celebrity--Well, here--one of the names here is 05:56.314 --> 05:59.114 Johnson. Now, I've heard of Magic 05:59.112 --> 06:02.072 Johnson but Magic Johnson has never heard of me, 06:02.074 --> 06:03.654 so I cannot circle it. 06:03.649 --> 06:06.339 On the other hand, our department chair is Marcia 06:06.339 --> 06:08.279 Johnson. She has heard of me, 06:08.280 --> 06:09.800 so I could circle it. 06:09.800 --> 06:11.610 Go through and circle it. 06:11.610 --> 06:16.210 Circle all the people you know who know you. 06:16.209 --> 06:18.099 Those are the people you're connected to. 06:18.100 --> 06:21.890 If you know more than one person with the same last name, 06:21.891 --> 06:24.191 circle it twice. If you don't have this piece of 06:24.191 --> 06:25.971 paper and you want to participate, please raise your 06:25.971 --> 06:28.101 hand and one of the teaching fellows will bring it to you. 06:28.100 --> 08:06.030 08:06.029 --> 08:09.869 I'm going to talk a little bit more about this while people go 08:09.866 --> 08:12.676 through this. The issue of connections 08:12.678 --> 08:17.658 between people is intellectually interesting for many reasons and 08:17.662 --> 08:22.492 might allow us to develop some generalizations about how people 08:22.489 --> 08:25.779 interact. The game of Six Degrees of 08:25.781 --> 08:29.681 Separation has, of course, turned into a famous 08:29.675 --> 08:34.835 movie trivia thing revolving around the actor Kevin Bacon, 08:34.840 --> 08:38.500 I think chosen just because it rhymes with "separation." 08:38.500 --> 08:43.280 And the game of "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" is played by taking 08:43.279 --> 08:47.909 any actor and computing how many steps it would take to get to 08:47.906 --> 08:50.746 Kevin Bacon. And some computer scientists 08:50.754 --> 08:51.984 have developed this. 08:51.980 --> 08:55.630 They've gone through each of the quarter million actors and 08:55.629 --> 08:59.219 actresses on the international movie database and computed 08:59.216 --> 09:00.786 their "Bacon number." 09:00.789 --> 09:05.049 And the Bacon number is the number of steps it takes for 09:05.045 --> 09:07.285 them to get to Kevin Bacon. 09:07.289 --> 09:12.869 So for instance, Ed Asner was in the movie 09:12.872 --> 09:17.912 Change of--;"JFK" with Kevin Bacon. 09:17.909 --> 09:21.239 So, Ed Asner has a Bacon number of one. 09:21.240 --> 09:25.980 Elvis Presley was in the movie "Change of Habit" with Ed Asner 09:25.983 --> 09:29.953 and that's his closest connection to Kevin Bacon. 09:29.950 --> 09:33.430 So, Elvis Presley has a Bacon number of two. 09:33.429 --> 09:37.429 It turns out that if you look at the 2.5--sorry, 09:37.430 --> 09:42.450 the quarter million people on the movie database and compute 09:42.452 --> 09:47.432 their Bacon number, the average Bacon number is 2.8. 09:47.429 --> 09:50.499 That's how many steps your average person is away from 09:50.499 --> 09:52.779 Kevin Bacon. You could then, 09:52.777 --> 09:58.447 for any actor or actress, compute the most connected one. 09:58.450 --> 10:01.940 So, the most connected one would be the one for whom the 10:01.941 --> 10:05.121 quarter million are, on average, the most connected 10:05.115 --> 10:07.215 to. And the answer of the most 10:07.215 --> 10:10.585 connected actor or actress is reasonably surprising. 10:10.590 --> 10:11.920 Does anybody want to guess? 10:11.920 --> 10:15.970 10:15.970 --> 10:19.090 I'll start you off with the wrong answer and this, 10:19.094 --> 10:21.904 by the way, can be found on this web site. 10:21.900 --> 10:24.300 It's not John Wayne. 10:24.299 --> 10:27.779 John Wayne has been in many movies, 180 movies, 10:27.781 --> 10:32.021 in fact, over sixty years, but he isn't well connected at 10:32.019 --> 10:36.179 all because mostly he was in westerns so we saw the same 10:36.182 --> 10:38.682 people over and over again. 10:38.680 --> 10:43.470 10:43.470 --> 10:47.900 Meryl Streep also isn't it because Meryl Streep has the 10:47.900 --> 10:51.510 misfortune of playing only in good movies. 10:51.509 --> 10:54.129 [laughter] So, she has no connection with 10:54.133 --> 10:57.613 people like Adam Sandler and John-Claude Van Damme. 10:57.610 --> 11:00.950 [laughter] Guess. 11:00.950 --> 11:02.590 Any guesses? Student: 11:02.590 --> 11:03.290 Christopher Walken Student: 11:03.294 --> 11:04.644 Nicholas Cage Professor Paul Bloom: Christopher Walken is 11:04.638 --> 11:06.428 a good one. We could look it up. 11:06.430 --> 11:07.960 I only know a few names here. 11:07.960 --> 11:09.450 Christopher Walken is not a finalist. 11:09.450 --> 11:11.790 Nicolas Cage is an interesting case. 11:11.789 --> 11:14.289 Has Nicolas Cage been in good movies? 11:14.289 --> 11:18.889 I don't want to get--I'm going to get more controversial than I 11:18.888 --> 11:21.778 want to. Student: 11:21.780 --> 11:27.230 A guy who is one step above an extra. 11:27.230 --> 11:29.710 He's like a B-list actor at best. 11:29.710 --> 11:34.110 The most connected guy, and I think this shows that 11:34.105 --> 11:36.825 you're right, is Rod Steiger. 11:36.830 --> 11:40.820 He's the most connected actor in the history of acting because 11:40.815 --> 11:44.795 it isn't that he's been in more movies than everybody else. 11:44.799 --> 11:48.149 Michael Caine has probably been in the most movies of any person 11:48.152 --> 11:50.762 on earth, but he's been in all sorts of movies. 11:50.759 --> 11:54.599 He was in "On the Waterfront," "In the Heat of the Night," and 11:54.604 --> 11:56.814 really bad movies like "Carpool." 11:56.809 --> 12:00.269 He's been in dramas and crime serials, thrillers, 12:00.274 --> 12:03.164 westerns, horror movies, science fiction, 12:03.161 --> 12:08.691 musicals. Now, some people are like Rod 12:08.686 --> 12:11.596 Steiger. So, some people in their 12:11.598 --> 12:15.128 day-to-day lives have many interactions and I think one of 12:15.134 --> 12:18.364 the things we know from interacting with people is we 12:18.360 --> 12:21.090 can distinguish them from other people. 12:21.090 --> 12:24.230 How many people have finished their things right now? 12:24.230 --> 12:26.680 Okay. I know one person in the 12:26.676 --> 12:30.576 department who is one of the most connected people I know on 12:30.575 --> 12:33.185 earth. If I wanted--If I really had to 12:33.193 --> 12:36.263 talk to Rumsfeld, I'd go to this person and say, 12:36.262 --> 12:39.072 "Can you get me in touch with Rumsfeld?" 12:39.070 --> 12:43.440 If I wanted to get somebody whacked, I'd ask this guy. 12:43.440 --> 12:45.370 [laughter] Then I know someone else in the 12:45.365 --> 12:46.765 department and, as best I know, 12:46.773 --> 12:48.373 I'm the only person she knows. 12:48.370 --> 12:54.750 [laughter] So, how many people scores 12:54.747 --> 12:58.287 below ten on this? 12:58.290 --> 13:01.860 13:01.860 --> 13:05.500 How many between ten and twenty? 13:05.500 --> 13:07.530 Between twenty and thirty? 13:07.530 --> 13:11.010 Thirty and forty? 13:11.010 --> 13:15.050 Between forty and fifty? 13:15.050 --> 13:21.770 Fifty and sixty? How many people scored above 13:21.772 --> 13:28.392 sixty? Anybody above sixty? 13:28.389 --> 13:31.509 Gladwell has done this in a lot of places. 13:31.509 --> 13:36.229 The average is twenty-one among a college crowd. 13:36.230 --> 13:40.110 Some people score as high as over 100. 13:40.110 --> 13:43.040 The older you are, the more--the higher you tend 13:43.041 --> 13:46.531 to score, maybe obviously, not--the longer you've been in 13:46.533 --> 13:49.343 the country the higher you tend to score. 13:49.340 --> 13:52.680 Journalists tend to score reasonably high, 13:52.683 --> 13:56.843 academics not so high, and--but what Gladwell points 13:56.842 --> 13:59.862 out is some people have the gift. 13:59.860 --> 14:03.320 Some people are more social than others and this connects in 14:03.315 --> 14:05.185 all sorts of interesting ways. 14:05.190 --> 14:11.600 The issue of connection has social factors and it's one 14:11.601 --> 14:19.201 answer that sociologists give for why it's good to go to Yale. 14:19.200 --> 14:24.030 So, one answer is, well, because of the great 14:24.027 --> 14:26.657 intellectual benefits. 14:26.660 --> 14:30.430 Put that aside. Let's be more cynical here. 14:30.429 --> 14:36.909 Another answer is that you develop powerful friends. 14:36.909 --> 14:40.259 And that's closer, but the interesting answer 14:40.255 --> 14:44.815 sociologists come to is it's not so much you develop powerful 14:44.817 --> 14:48.647 friends; rather, you develop powerful 14:48.653 --> 14:51.993 acquaintances. Through Yale you know a lot of 14:51.985 --> 14:55.395 people and they don't have to be close friends but they are 14:55.399 --> 14:58.439 acquaintances. And sociologists point out that 14:58.436 --> 15:02.046 for a lot of aspects of your life, like getting a job, 15:02.049 --> 15:04.579 acquaintances matter, connections matter, 15:04.584 --> 15:07.884 and the connections you establish by going to a place 15:07.878 --> 15:11.868 like Yale hold you in good stead for the rest of your life, 15:11.870 --> 15:14.890 above and beyond any intellectual qualities that this 15:14.893 --> 15:15.943 place may offer. 15:15.940 --> 15:19.300 15:19.299 --> 15:21.489 Here's what we're going to do for the next lecture and a half, 15:21.491 --> 15:23.631 two lectures. We're first going to talk about 15:23.632 --> 15:25.642 the self. Then we're going to talk about 15:25.644 --> 15:28.724 the self and other; basically, differences between 15:28.717 --> 15:33.077 how we think of ourselves and how we think about other people. 15:33.080 --> 15:35.680 Then we're going to talk exclusively about how we think 15:35.683 --> 15:38.383 about other people and then we'll talk about how we think 15:38.383 --> 15:41.083 about groups like Harvard students or gay people or black 15:41.083 --> 15:41.713 people. 15:41.710 --> 15:45.640 15:45.639 --> 15:50.769 I'll start with my favorite finding of all time and this is 15:50.767 --> 15:56.237 about the self. And this is about the spotlight 15:56.236 --> 15:59.366 effect. So, my mornings are often 15:59.369 --> 16:02.069 rushed because I have two kids. 16:02.070 --> 16:04.740 So, I get up and sometimes I don't set the alarm and I get up 16:04.738 --> 16:06.608 late; I stagger out of bed; 16:06.610 --> 16:08.720 I wake the kids; I greet the servants; 16:08.720 --> 16:12.330 I get ready; [laughter] I make breakfast. 16:12.330 --> 16:16.000 I run out of the house and then usually around 3 o'clock 16:16.001 --> 16:19.001 somebody points out, in one case a homeless man, 16:19.004 --> 16:21.734 that I have a big glob of shaving cream in my ear 16:21.731 --> 16:24.741 or--because I neglected to actually look in the mirror 16:24.743 --> 16:27.923 while I shaved. Or I have once been to a party 16:27.915 --> 16:30.965 and I found my shirt was misaligned, seriously 16:30.969 --> 16:34.199 misaligned, not one button but--Anyway, 16:34.204 --> 16:37.344 [laughter] so--and so I feel when this 16:37.335 --> 16:39.785 happens I'm very immature. 16:39.789 --> 16:42.709 And I basically feel this is the end of the world, 16:42.714 --> 16:45.344 this is humiliating and everybody notices. 16:45.340 --> 16:49.080 And so the question is, how many people notice when 16:49.075 --> 16:50.565 something happens? 16:50.570 --> 16:54.320 And the spotlight effect--Well, before talking about my 16:54.323 --> 16:57.563 favorite experiment ever, there is an episode of "The 16:57.555 --> 17:00.265 Simpsons" that provides a beautiful illustration of the 17:00.266 --> 17:01.266 spotlight effect. 17:01.269 --> 17:05.659 And then it has a beautiful illustration of psychological 17:05.663 --> 17:10.453 testing, so I'll give you them quickly one after the other. 17:10.450 --> 17:13.530 So, Tom Gilovich, a social psychologist, 17:13.533 --> 17:18.043 was interested in the question of the spotlight effect, 17:18.039 --> 17:20.849 which is when we wear a pink shirt to work, 17:20.850 --> 17:23.460 shaving cream in our ear or whatever, 17:23.460 --> 17:28.610 do we systematically overestimate how much other 17:28.607 --> 17:32.437 people notice? He did a series of experiments. 17:32.440 --> 17:37.030 And in one experiment what he did was he got in the subjects 17:37.025 --> 17:40.595 – standard Intro Psych drill – and said, 17:40.599 --> 17:45.329 "I want you to wear a T-shirt for the next day and I want it 17:45.326 --> 17:49.086 to have a picture on it," and he got them to wear 17:49.092 --> 17:53.482 T-shirts that had pictures on it that were the most embarrassing 17:53.482 --> 17:56.202 pictures that they could have on it. 17:56.200 --> 17:59.960 It turns out that if you ask people what's the worst picture 17:59.964 --> 18:02.904 to have on the T-shirt that you are wearing, 18:02.900 --> 18:11.930 the number one answer is Hitler tied with Barry Manilow. 18:11.930 --> 18:17.080 [laughter] The best pictures to have on 18:17.076 --> 18:22.626 your T-shirt are Martin Luther King Jr. 18:22.630 --> 18:24.360 and Jerry Seinfeld. 18:24.359 --> 18:28.389 It turns out that people--And then he had them go about their 18:28.391 --> 18:31.621 day and asked them, "How many people noticed your 18:31.616 --> 18:34.586 T-shirt?" And then the psychologists went 18:34.586 --> 18:38.436 around and they asked the people, "How many of you noticed 18:38.441 --> 18:40.201 this person's T-shirt?" 18:40.200 --> 18:45.570 And it turned out they got it wrong by a factor of about two. 18:45.569 --> 18:48.719 They thought, say, 100 noticed, 18:48.717 --> 18:51.547 but fifty people noticed. 18:51.549 --> 18:54.969 And across study after study after study Gilovich and his 18:54.969 --> 18:58.449 colleagues have found support for the spotlight effect, 18:58.450 --> 19:02.870 which is that you believe that people are noticing you all the 19:02.872 --> 19:04.542 time but they aren't. 19:04.539 --> 19:06.889 They're busy noticing themselves. 19:06.890 --> 19:12.610 And this is actually a useful thing to know. 19:12.609 --> 19:17.479 Gilovich got interested in this because he's interested in the 19:17.482 --> 19:19.322 psychology of regret. 19:19.319 --> 19:23.039 And it turns out that if you actually ask dying people, 19:23.043 --> 19:27.183 or really old people basically, "What do you regret from your 19:27.180 --> 19:30.770 life?" they regret the things as a 19:30.769 --> 19:33.669 rule that they didn't try. 19:33.670 --> 19:37.900 But when you asked them why they didn't try it the answers 19:37.899 --> 19:40.569 tended to be "I would look silly." 19:40.569 --> 19:42.969 And it turns out, interesting to know, 19:42.966 --> 19:46.846 that people just don't care as much as other people think you 19:46.851 --> 19:49.321 are. You could take that as good 19:49.320 --> 19:53.220 news or bad news but the spotlight is not on us as much 19:53.222 --> 19:54.742 as we think it is. 19:54.740 --> 19:59.050 There's a second effect Gilovich discovers called "the 19:59.049 --> 20:00.919 transparency effect." 20:00.920 --> 20:03.750 And the transparency effect is quite interesting. 20:03.750 --> 20:10.140 The transparency effect is that we believe that we're more 20:10.143 --> 20:13.063 transparent than we are. 20:13.059 --> 20:21.479 I need somebody up here who thinks that he or she is a bad 20:21.476 --> 20:22.506 liar. 20:22.510 --> 20:26.350 20:26.349 --> 20:29.179 Just--I just need you to say three sentences. 20:29.180 --> 20:31.520 I'll even tell you what it is ahead of time. 20:31.519 --> 20:34.119 I'm going to ask you three questions: "Have you been in 20:34.117 --> 20:36.157 London? Do you have a younger sibling?" 20:36.160 --> 20:38.080 and "Do you like sushi?" 20:38.079 --> 20:41.369 I want you to answer with one of those answers there. 20:41.369 --> 20:44.749 I want you to lie about one of them. 20:44.750 --> 20:49.150 The task will be for everybody else to recognize and guess 20:49.148 --> 20:51.538 which one you're lying about. 20:51.540 --> 20:52.810 Do you want to go up? 20:52.810 --> 20:56.210 Yeah. And I will even write down 20:56.210 --> 20:58.420 which one you should lie on. 20:58.420 --> 21:02.870 So, I want you to lie as to that number. 21:02.870 --> 21:03.760 Okay? 21:03.760 --> 21:10.090 21:10.090 --> 21:13.660 Have you ever been in London? 21:13.660 --> 21:17.890 Student: No, I have not been in London. 21:17.890 --> 21:20.600 Professor Paul Bloom: Do you have a younger sibling? 21:20.599 --> 21:23.549 Student: Yes, I have a younger sibling. 21:23.549 --> 21:25.209 Professor Paul Bloom: Do you like sushi? 21:25.210 --> 21:28.510 Student: No, I do not like sushi. 21:28.509 --> 21:29.639 Professor Paul Bloom: Okay. 21:29.640 --> 21:30.690 Let's have a vote. 21:30.690 --> 21:33.070 She was lying about one of them. 21:33.070 --> 21:36.290 Who votes for one? 21:36.290 --> 21:40.210 Who votes for two? 21:40.210 --> 21:42.530 Who votes for three? 21:42.529 --> 21:45.799 Pretty much of a tie between two and three. 21:45.799 --> 21:47.369 You could say which one you were lying. 21:47.370 --> 21:50.620 Student: Three. 21:50.619 --> 21:53.359 Professor Paul Bloom: The effect--there are two 21:53.359 --> 21:54.599 aspects of the effect. 21:54.599 --> 22:00.279 One aspect is people are actually quite good at lying. 22:00.279 --> 22:04.609 It is a rare person who couldn't stand up there and 22:04.606 --> 22:09.276 everybody would figure out what they're lying about, 22:09.279 --> 22:14.379 but the transparency effect is we don't feel that way. 22:14.380 --> 22:18.040 We often feel like things bleed out of us and so people will 22:18.035 --> 22:21.685 systematically overestimate the extent to which other people 22:21.691 --> 22:23.241 notice their secrets. 22:23.240 --> 22:27.090 And this is actually, in general, why it's sometimes 22:27.086 --> 22:31.456 difficult to teach or to tell stories because we constantly 22:31.461 --> 22:34.781 overestimate how much other people know. 22:34.779 --> 22:40.389 We think of ourselves as more transparent than we are. 22:40.390 --> 22:44.650 A second social psychological phenomena is you think you're 22:44.651 --> 22:47.601 terrific. If I asked people, 22:47.595 --> 22:54.115 "How well are you doing in Intro Psych this semester?" 22:54.119 --> 22:57.679 and I asked you to give yourself a percentage rating 22:57.684 --> 23:00.204 relative to the rest of the class, 23:00.200 --> 23:05.270 then if everybody was accurate, or at least not systematically 23:05.269 --> 23:08.759 biased, the number should add up to 50%. 23:08.759 --> 23:11.589 Roughly half of you are doing better than average and roughly 23:11.585 --> 23:13.605 half of you are doing worse than average. 23:13.609 --> 23:17.709 It turns out though that people will systematically and 23:17.710 --> 23:21.810 dramatically view themselves as better than average. 23:21.809 --> 23:26.459 They will view themselves as better than average when asked 23:26.461 --> 23:29.991 how good they are as a student, as a teacher, 23:29.990 --> 23:33.680 as a lover, and particularly, as a driver. 23:33.680 --> 23:36.090 [laughter] Everybody who drives thinks 23:36.085 --> 23:38.615 that he or she is a wonderful driver. 23:38.619 --> 23:42.699 This has been called the "Lake Wobegon effect" based on 23:42.697 --> 23:47.527 Garrison Keillor's story about a place where all the children are 23:47.530 --> 23:51.210 above average. And the Lake Wobegon effect in 23:51.210 --> 23:56.080 psychology involves a systematic bias to see ourselves as better 23:56.082 --> 23:59.972 than average. What psychologists don't really 23:59.968 --> 24:03.558 know is why the Lake Wobegon effect exists, 24:03.557 --> 24:06.887 and there are a couple of proposals. 24:06.890 --> 24:11.030 One is the nature of the feedback we get. 24:11.029 --> 24:15.809 So, for a lot of aspects of your life you only get feedback 24:15.813 --> 24:19.693 when you're good, when you do something good. 24:19.690 --> 24:21.410 In a normal, productive, healthy, 24:21.408 --> 24:23.768 happy environment, people don't scream at you 24:23.771 --> 24:27.101 about how bad you're doing but they compliment how good you are 24:27.101 --> 24:30.161 and that could lead to an inflated self-esteem on the part 24:30.162 --> 24:32.152 of people in certain domains. 24:32.150 --> 24:36.440 Another possibility is there's different criteria for goodness. 24:36.440 --> 24:38.560 For a driver, for instance, 24:38.558 --> 24:42.958 when I ask you to rank how good you are as a driver, 24:42.960 --> 24:46.000 what people often do is they think--they say, 24:45.997 --> 24:50.067 "I'm better than average," but what they do is they focus on 24:50.070 --> 24:52.280 one aspect of their driving. 24:52.279 --> 24:55.479 So, some of you might say, "Hey, I'm just a great parallel 24:55.475 --> 24:57.265 parker so I'm a great driver." 24:57.269 --> 24:59.499 Others might say, "I'm very careful, 24:59.500 --> 25:01.780 great driver." Others might say, 25:01.779 --> 25:06.079 "I take chances no one else will--great driver," [laughter] 25:06.077 --> 25:10.667 but above and beyond that there does seem to be a psychological 25:10.672 --> 25:14.602 effect manifested here and manifested elsewhere, 25:14.599 --> 25:17.869 which is a motivation to feel good about yourself. 25:17.869 --> 25:22.459 You think you're important, which is why the spotlight 25:22.455 --> 25:25.895 effect exists. You think your thoughts bleed 25:25.899 --> 25:29.449 out, which is why the transparency effect exists. 25:29.450 --> 25:32.430 But above and beyond that, in a normal, 25:32.432 --> 25:35.652 healthy mind you think you're terrific. 25:35.650 --> 25:38.420 And so, this shows up in all sorts of ways. 25:38.420 --> 25:42.520 It shows up as well in what's been called "the self-serving 25:42.515 --> 25:46.485 bias." Half of you did above average 25:46.489 --> 25:50.779 on the Midterm; half of you did below average 25:50.784 --> 25:54.614 on the Midterm, but if I went up and asked each 25:54.614 --> 25:58.864 of you why the answers would not be symmetrical. 25:58.859 --> 26:01.869 People who did well in the Midterm would describe it in 26:01.866 --> 26:04.146 terms of their capacities or abilities. 26:04.150 --> 26:08.040 They'd say, "It's because I'm smart, hardworking, 26:08.037 --> 26:11.097 brilliant." People who did poorly would 26:11.098 --> 26:13.328 say, "The Midterm was unfair. 26:13.330 --> 26:17.040 I was busy. I have better things to do with 26:17.039 --> 26:20.879 my time." Professors as well--When people 26:20.878 --> 26:25.698 get papers accepted it is because the papers are 26:25.697 --> 26:28.867 brilliant. When they got them rejected 26:28.867 --> 26:32.127 it's because there's a conspiracy against them by 26:32.134 --> 26:34.384 jealous editors and reviewers. 26:34.380 --> 26:36.340 There is this asymmetry all the time. 26:36.339 --> 26:40.319 The asymmetry has been found in athletes, in CEOs and in 26:40.323 --> 26:41.703 accident reports. 26:41.700 --> 26:46.350 And again, this is sort of a positive enhancement technique. 26:46.349 --> 26:51.059 You think that you're terrific and because you're terrific the 26:51.062 --> 26:55.932 good things that happen to you are due to your terrific-ness; 26:55.930 --> 26:58.230 the bad things are due to accident and misfortune. 26:58.230 --> 27:01.400 27:01.400 --> 27:05.960 The final aspect of self that I want to talk about is the idea 27:05.961 --> 27:08.281 that what you do makes sense. 27:08.279 --> 27:12.329 And this is one of the more interesting sub domains of 27:12.331 --> 27:13.861 social psychology. 27:13.859 --> 27:17.669 The idea was developed by the social psychologist Leon 27:17.665 --> 27:21.825 Festinger and it's called "Cognitive Dissonance Theory." 27:21.829 --> 27:25.479 And what Festinger was interested in was the idea that 27:25.483 --> 27:29.213 what happens when people experience an inconsistency in 27:29.206 --> 27:32.116 their heads. And he claimed it causes an 27:32.122 --> 27:35.282 unpleasant emotional state, what he described as 27:35.276 --> 27:39.126 "dissonance." And he argued that we act so as 27:39.134 --> 27:41.114 to reduce dissonance. 27:41.109 --> 27:45.149 When there's a contradiction in our heads we're not happy and 27:45.149 --> 27:48.649 will take steps to make the contradiction go away. 27:48.650 --> 27:52.720 This all sounds very general but there are some striking 27:52.721 --> 27:57.461 demonstrations of this and how it could work in everyday life. 27:57.460 --> 28:04.070 So, this very simple example is that--is the confirmation bias. 28:04.069 --> 28:06.599 Some of you are politically right wing. 28:06.599 --> 28:08.349 Some of you are politically left wing. 28:08.349 --> 28:11.839 If I asked you what magazines you read, it turns out people 28:11.835 --> 28:14.655 who are right wing read right wing magazines, 28:14.660 --> 28:18.400 people who are left wing read left wing magazines, 28:18.402 --> 28:22.982 because people don't as a rule enjoy getting information that 28:22.984 --> 28:25.814 disconfirms what they believe in. 28:25.809 --> 28:29.309 They want to have information that confirms what they believe 28:29.312 --> 28:30.832 in and that supports it. 28:30.829 --> 28:33.839 If you support Bush you're going to be looking for good 28:33.843 --> 28:36.473 news about Bush, if you don't support him you'll 28:36.467 --> 28:38.027 be looking for bad news. 28:38.029 --> 28:45.089 And this manifests itself in all sorts of interesting ways. 28:45.089 --> 28:48.759 I'll tell you about a very simple experiment. 28:48.759 --> 28:52.339 I'll--It was done by Louisa Egan here at Yale and it 28:52.336 --> 28:56.396 illustrates a point which is going to--which--and then I'll 28:56.403 --> 28:59.703 talk about real world implications of this. 28:59.700 --> 29:04.230 Very simple. You have three M&Ms. 29:04.230 --> 29:08.290 You pretest to make sure that the person doesn't like any 29:08.286 --> 29:10.456 M&M more than the other. 29:10.460 --> 29:11.410 And there are three M&Ms. 29:11.410 --> 29:14.510 Who cares? But then you ask them to choose 29:14.513 --> 29:15.793 between two of them. 29:15.789 --> 29:19.409 So, suppose they choose the red one. 29:19.410 --> 29:20.770 You've got to choose one. 29:20.770 --> 29:22.500 So, they get to eat the red one. 29:22.500 --> 29:26.210 Now, they're offered--You take the red one away and now they're 29:26.208 --> 29:29.198 offered a choice between the two remaining ones. 29:29.200 --> 29:31.400 It turns out, to a tremendous degree, 29:31.401 --> 29:34.521 and you could imagine yourself in that situation, 29:34.519 --> 29:39.179 they choose this one, the one that wasn't the one 29:39.183 --> 29:41.033 they turned down. 29:41.029 --> 29:46.089 And the claim is that when you choose this, in order to justify 29:46.088 --> 29:49.268 your decision, you denigrate the one you 29:49.271 --> 29:53.201 didn't choose. And so this one you didn't 29:53.203 --> 29:59.083 choose is then tainted and you turn and then when compared to a 29:59.079 --> 30:02.679 third one you favor that third one. 30:02.680 --> 30:07.350 What's particularly interesting is you get this effect easily 30:07.346 --> 30:12.166 with undergraduates but you also get it with four-year-olds and 30:12.167 --> 30:15.677 with monkeys. So, the same denigration tends 30:15.680 --> 30:17.140 to be more general. 30:17.140 --> 30:22.660 Well, that's a laboratory effect but there are some more 30:22.655 --> 30:27.965 interesting manifestations of cognitive dissonance. 30:27.970 --> 30:31.030 One is the insufficient justification effect, 30:31.026 --> 30:34.496 which is so famous it had a cartoon based on it. 30:34.500 --> 30:37.470 The guys says, "Why should I hire you as my 30:37.470 --> 30:40.110 consultant?" The dog--Some dog says, 30:40.114 --> 30:44.504 "I use my special--the special process of cognitive dissonance 30:44.500 --> 30:46.730 to improve employee morale." 30:46.730 --> 30:48.380 "How does it work?" 30:48.380 --> 30:52.040 "Well, when people are in an absurd situation their minds 30:52.035 --> 30:55.555 rationalize it by inventing a comfortable illusion." 30:55.560 --> 30:57.900 Not quite right. When people are--have an 30:57.903 --> 30:59.943 internal conflict, when there's something 30:59.943 --> 31:01.833 uncomfortable--Well, that's right. 31:01.829 --> 31:05.349 So says to this person, "Isn't it strange you have this 31:05.347 --> 31:08.927 dead-end job when you're twice as smart as your boss? 31:08.930 --> 31:10.930 The hours are long, the pay is mediocre, 31:10.932 --> 31:12.632 nobody respects your contribution, 31:12.627 --> 31:14.627 yet you freely choose to work here. 31:14.630 --> 31:15.870 It's absurd. No. 31:15.870 --> 31:17.450 Wait. There must be a reason. 31:17.450 --> 31:21.660 I must work here because I love this work, I love this job." 31:21.660 --> 31:24.150 [laughter] This actually works. 31:24.150 --> 31:27.100 Here is the classic experiment by Festinger. 31:27.099 --> 31:30.229 Gave two groups of people a really boring task, 31:30.233 --> 31:32.553 paid one of them twenty dollars, 31:32.549 --> 31:35.839 which back when this study was done was real money, 31:35.842 --> 31:38.742 gave another group of subjects one dollar, 31:38.740 --> 31:41.950 which was insultingly small, then asked them later, 31:41.948 --> 31:44.128 "What do you think of the task?" 31:44.130 --> 31:48.740 It turns out that the group that had--were paid a dollar 31:48.741 --> 31:53.601 rated the task as much more fun than the group given twenty 31:53.603 --> 31:57.003 dollars. So, think about that for a 31:56.995 --> 31:59.015 moment. You might have predicted it the 31:59.019 --> 32:00.519 other way around, the twenty dollars, 32:00.517 --> 32:01.737 "wow, well, twenty dollars, 32:01.738 --> 32:04.248 I must have enjoyed it because I got twenty dollars," but in 32:04.249 --> 32:06.109 fact, the logic here is the people 32:06.110 --> 32:09.150 with twenty dollars when asked, "What do you think of the 32:09.151 --> 32:12.881 task?" could say, "It was boring. 32:12.880 --> 32:15.500 I did it for twenty dollars." 32:15.500 --> 32:18.580 The people paid one dollar were like the character in the 32:18.576 --> 32:19.946 Dilbert cartoon. 32:19.950 --> 32:26.360 When paid a dollar they said, "Well, I don't want to be a 32:26.359 --> 32:28.869 donkey. I don't want to be some guy who 32:28.871 --> 32:30.641 does this boring thing for a dollar. 32:30.640 --> 32:34.560 It wasn't that bad really, it was kind of interesting, 32:34.557 --> 32:37.807 I learnt a lot," to justify what they did. 32:37.809 --> 32:41.559 This has a lot of real world implications. 32:41.559 --> 32:45.889 Festinger did a wonderful study with people--a group of people, 32:45.890 --> 32:50.290 and he wrote this up in a book called When Prophesy Fails, 32:50.289 --> 32:54.569 who were convinced that the world was going to end so 32:54.565 --> 32:59.285 they went on a mountain and they waited for the world to end. 32:59.289 --> 33:02.049 They had a certain time and date when the world was going to 33:02.049 --> 33:02.329 end. 33:02.330 --> 33:05.430 33:05.430 --> 33:09.950 He hung out with them and then the time passed and the world 33:09.953 --> 33:12.333 didn't end. What people then said, 33:12.329 --> 33:14.959 and this is what he was interested in--;So, 33:14.964 --> 33:18.354 people's predictions were totally proven wrong and they 33:18.351 --> 33:21.321 left their families, they gave away their houses, 33:21.319 --> 33:24.119 they gave away all their possessions, they lost all their 33:24.119 --> 33:27.389 money, but what Festinger found was 33:27.385 --> 33:31.605 they didn't say, "God, I'm such a moron." 33:31.609 --> 33:36.039 Rather, they said, "This is fantastic. 33:36.039 --> 33:39.759 This is exactly--This shows that us going to the mountain 33:39.763 --> 33:43.753 has delayed the ending of the world and this shows that we're 33:43.752 --> 33:46.082 doing exactly the right things. 33:46.080 --> 33:47.780 I couldn't have been smarter." 33:47.779 --> 33:51.139 And in general, when people devote a lot of 33:51.142 --> 33:54.992 energy or money or expense to something, they are 33:54.986 --> 33:59.466 extraordinarily resistant to having it proven wrong. 33:59.470 --> 34:04.760 Now, people have manipulated cognitive dissonance in all 34:04.760 --> 34:07.740 sorts of ways and, for instance, 34:07.741 --> 34:10.981 hazing. Hazing is cognitive dissonance 34:10.984 --> 34:14.384 at work. Fraternities and med schools 34:14.379 --> 34:17.999 and other organizations haze people. 34:18.000 --> 34:21.090 What they do is when people enter the group they humiliate 34:21.094 --> 34:24.134 them, they cause them pain, they cause them various forms 34:24.134 --> 34:25.984 of torture and unpleasantness. 34:25.980 --> 34:29.460 Why? Well, because it's very 34:29.461 --> 34:34.641 successful at getting somebody to like the group. 34:34.639 --> 34:39.099 If I join a fraternity--it is also by the way illegal so – 34:39.104 --> 34:42.664 but if I were to join a fraternity and they say, 34:42.661 --> 34:44.931 "Welcome to the fraternity, Dr. 34:44.931 --> 34:46.481 Bloom. Here. 34:46.480 --> 34:49.820 Have a mint," and then we have a good time and everything. 34:49.820 --> 34:53.320 I'm thinking "okay, sounds like a fun idea." 34:53.320 --> 34:57.990 But if I join a fraternity and they pour cow poop on my head 34:57.986 --> 35:02.566 and make me stand in the rain for a month wearing pantyhose 35:02.573 --> 35:05.583 while they throw rocks at me [laughter] 35:05.578 --> 35:08.898 I then think--after it I think "God, 35:08.900 --> 35:12.270 I went through a lot of stuff to get into this fraternity. 35:12.270 --> 35:14.710 It must be really good." 35:14.710 --> 35:17.670 And in fact, hazing through cognitive 35:17.671 --> 35:21.791 dissonance draws the inference that this is really, 35:21.785 --> 35:25.565 really valuable and this is why it exists. 35:25.570 --> 35:30.570 If you are a political--If you are running for office, 35:30.567 --> 35:35.377 you will tend to have volunteers and not necessarily 35:35.375 --> 35:38.445 pay people. One reason for this is obvious; 35:38.449 --> 35:41.399 it's cheaper not to pay people, but the other reason is more 35:41.400 --> 35:44.160 interesting. If you don't pay people, 35:44.155 --> 35:47.405 they are more committed to the cause. 35:47.409 --> 35:49.539 Again, it's cognitive dissonance. 35:49.539 --> 35:52.369 If you pay me ten thousand dollars a month to work for you, 35:52.365 --> 35:54.945 I'll work for you and I'll think "I'm doing it for ten 35:54.947 --> 35:58.417 thousand dollars a month, that makes a lot of sense," but 35:58.422 --> 36:01.752 if I do it for nothing then I have to ask myself, 36:01.750 --> 36:03.260 "Why am I doing it?" 36:03.260 --> 36:08.200 And I will conclude I must think very highly of you. 36:08.199 --> 36:13.759 Therapy for free tends to be useless therapy. 36:13.760 --> 36:16.720 This is one-- [laughs] Therapists ask for money for 36:16.715 --> 36:19.665 all sorts of reasons, including they like money. 36:19.670 --> 36:23.040 But one reason why they ask for money is if you don't pay for 36:23.036 --> 36:25.446 therapy you don't think it has any value. 36:25.450 --> 36:26.890 You have to give up something. 36:26.889 --> 36:30.869 So, cognitive dissonance will lead you then to think that what 36:30.872 --> 36:34.202 you are giving it up for has some value and then you 36:34.201 --> 36:36.161 establish a liking for it. 36:36.160 --> 36:39.370 36:39.369 --> 36:44.729 Finally, cognitive dissonance shows up with children. 36:44.730 --> 36:49.390 One of the most robust and replicated findings in education 36:49.386 --> 36:52.996 or developmental psychology is very simple. 36:53.000 --> 36:57.360 You take two groups of kids and you ask them to do something 36:57.358 --> 36:58.908 like draw pictures. 36:58.910 --> 37:01.720 Half of the kids you reward. 37:01.719 --> 37:04.239 Maybe you give them a sticker or a toy. 37:04.240 --> 37:06.950 The other half you don't reward. 37:06.949 --> 37:11.319 Now, according to sort of a simple-minded view of operant 37:11.318 --> 37:15.608 conditioning in behaviorist psychology, the children you 37:15.608 --> 37:17.868 reward should do it more. 37:17.869 --> 37:19.979 That's how operative conditioning works. 37:19.980 --> 37:22.970 In fact though, the children who you reward 37:22.973 --> 37:26.963 later on think that this activity has less value and they 37:26.964 --> 37:31.244 are less likely to do it when there's no reward present. 37:31.239 --> 37:33.459 And the idea, again, is the kids who don't 37:33.457 --> 37:35.617 get rewarded say to themselves, "Well, 37:35.619 --> 37:38.569 I just spent time doing it, it must have an intrinsic 37:38.571 --> 37:41.411 value," while the children who get rewarded say, 37:41.410 --> 37:43.110 "I did it for the sticker. 37:43.110 --> 37:44.370 I did it for the toy. 37:44.370 --> 37:46.210 I don't care much for this." 37:46.210 --> 37:50.370 And so, rewarding children has a danger, which is if you give 37:50.368 --> 37:54.318 them too much reward and too much a value for what they're 37:54.319 --> 37:57.299 doing they will denigrate the activity. 37:57.300 --> 38:04.140 Now, we need to be careful here about what's going on. 38:04.140 --> 38:06.440 It's not simple inconsistency. 38:06.440 --> 38:09.940 So, go back to this insufficient justification 38:09.940 --> 38:12.410 effect. So, the dollar group rated a 38:12.409 --> 38:15.379 task as more fun than the twenty dollar group. 38:15.380 --> 38:17.660 And it's true; each group needed a 38:17.657 --> 38:20.027 justification for lying about the task. 38:20.030 --> 38:22.550 Each group needed a justification for saying how 38:22.552 --> 38:24.912 interesting the task was, but they each had a 38:24.913 --> 38:27.943 justification. They were each doing it for 38:27.941 --> 38:30.931 money after all. So, cognitive dissonance is a 38:30.930 --> 38:32.330 little bit more subtle. 38:32.329 --> 38:34.389 It's not just that there's a clash. 38:34.389 --> 38:39.669 Rather, we adjust our beliefs to make ourselves look more 38:39.669 --> 38:42.779 moral and rational than we are. 38:42.780 --> 38:44.380 Go back to hazing. 38:44.380 --> 38:47.670 There's a perfectly good reason why I let them do all those 38:47.669 --> 38:50.589 things to me. I'm the sort of person who will 38:50.594 --> 38:52.874 let people do those things to me. 38:52.869 --> 38:56.629 The problem is that's not an answer I could live with. 38:56.630 --> 39:00.150 So, cognitive dissonance motivates me to create an answer 39:00.147 --> 39:04.967 that's more comfortable for me, an answer such as "This must be 39:04.965 --> 39:10.275 a really wonderful group with a wonderful bunch of people." 39:10.280 --> 39:14.000 And in other words, we are biased to believe that 39:14.003 --> 39:16.533 we are terrific. So, to sum up, 39:16.534 --> 39:20.994 there are three main findings about you that come out in 39:20.989 --> 39:22.689 social psychology. 39:22.690 --> 39:27.290 One is you believe everybody notices you even when they 39:27.288 --> 39:31.408 don't. You're the hero of your story. 39:31.409 --> 39:34.039 The second one is, you're terrific, 39:34.044 --> 39:37.844 you are better than average in every possible way, 39:37.840 --> 39:40.350 each one of you. And finally, 39:40.353 --> 39:42.363 what you do makes sense. 39:42.360 --> 39:45.620 If it doesn't make sense, you'll--If it doesn't make 39:45.621 --> 39:49.561 sense or, more to the point, if it's something that you do 39:49.556 --> 39:53.446 that's foolish or makes you look manipulative or cheap, 39:53.449 --> 40:00.749 you'll distort it in your head so that it does make sense. 40:00.750 --> 40:04.600 I want to move now to how we think about self and other, 40:04.604 --> 40:08.674 how we think about ourselves relative to how we think about 40:08.668 --> 40:12.158 other people. And this brings us to the 40:12.156 --> 40:14.266 notion of attribution. 40:14.269 --> 40:20.749 So, an attribution is a claim about the cause of somebody's 40:20.749 --> 40:26.779 behavior and Heider--;Now, there's all sorts of reasons 40:26.782 --> 40:29.912 for somebody's behavior. 40:29.909 --> 40:33.989 Suppose you insult me or suppose you're very kind to me. 40:33.989 --> 40:36.959 I could say you're a kind person or you're a rude person. 40:36.960 --> 40:39.880 I could say "this must be a great day for you" or "you must 40:39.878 --> 40:42.398 be a lot of--under a lot of stress or you must want 40:42.395 --> 40:44.855 something." There's different sorts of 40:44.857 --> 40:48.727 attributions we could make to people but Heider's insight is 40:48.732 --> 40:52.082 we tend to attribute other people's actions to their 40:52.082 --> 40:58.762 personality characteristics, to long-standing aspects of 40:58.756 --> 41:03.686 what they are. And this is known as a person 41:03.687 --> 41:05.537 bias. And more generally, 41:05.535 --> 41:09.495 people tend to give too much weight to the person and not 41:09.501 --> 41:11.911 enough weight to the situation. 41:11.910 --> 41:15.370 41:15.369 --> 41:19.549 This is also sometimes known as the fundamental attribution 41:19.553 --> 41:21.503 error. The fundamental attribution 41:21.503 --> 41:24.203 error, which is one of the core ideas in psychology, 41:24.199 --> 41:29.789 is that we tend to over-attribute things to a 41:29.789 --> 41:37.669 person's personality or desires or nature and not enough to the 41:37.665 --> 41:41.345 situation or the context. 41:41.349 --> 41:44.369 There's a lot of demonstrations of this. 41:44.369 --> 41:48.659 A lot of the demonstrations have to do with intelligence so, 41:48.664 --> 41:51.654 for example, there's actually been studies 41:51.648 --> 41:55.938 showing that people tend to overestimate the intelligence of 41:55.942 --> 41:58.342 professors. Why? 41:58.340 --> 42:03.000 Because I stand up here and I talk about the one or more than 42:03.004 --> 42:07.594 one thing I know about and so it's easy to infer that I must 42:07.591 --> 42:12.181 know a lot but in fact by the time this semester ends I will 42:12.178 --> 42:15.908 have tell you--told you everything I know. 42:15.909 --> 42:17.939 [laughter] And if you stood up and started 42:17.940 --> 42:20.710 talking about everything you knew you'd look really smart 42:20.713 --> 42:23.533 too. The best study to show this is 42:23.531 --> 42:27.241 a quiz show study, which is you take two people 42:27.243 --> 42:29.103 and you flip a coin. 42:29.099 --> 42:33.239 And one of them is the quiz master and the quiz master gets 42:33.241 --> 42:36.741 to ask questions, any question he or she wants. 42:36.739 --> 42:39.069 And the other person has to answer the questions. 42:39.070 --> 42:42.810 And if they play seriously, the quiz master's going to 42:42.806 --> 42:44.706 destroy the other person. 42:44.710 --> 42:46.520 "What was my dog's name?" 42:46.520 --> 42:48.950 [laughter] "Well, I don't know." 42:48.949 --> 42:51.699 "What's the capital of the city in which I was born?" 42:51.700 --> 42:53.120 "Well, I don't know." 42:53.119 --> 42:57.589 And then you'd expect a third person watching this to say, 42:57.590 --> 42:59.950 "Who cares? It's just--They're just doing 42:59.954 --> 43:01.814 this because of the coin they flipped." 43:01.809 --> 43:04.219 But in fact, when the person watching this 43:04.224 --> 43:07.644 has to assess their intelligence they give the quiz asker a 43:07.639 --> 43:10.759 higher intelligence rating than the other person. 43:10.760 --> 43:12.980 After all, "He seemed to know a lot of answers. 43:12.980 --> 43:15.350 The other person didn't get much right." 43:15.349 --> 43:18.579 We tend to fail to discount the situation. 43:18.579 --> 43:22.089 If you were giving a job talk--and this is for people in 43:22.091 --> 43:26.051 graduate school particularly--If you were giving a job talk and 43:26.050 --> 43:29.750 the slide projector breaks, you're screwed. 43:29.750 --> 43:31.940 Nobody is going to say to themselves, "Oh, 43:31.941 --> 43:35.041 well, it's not such a good talk because the slide projector 43:35.041 --> 43:36.621 broke." They'll say, 43:36.620 --> 43:40.830 "It's not such a good talk because of the person." 43:40.829 --> 43:43.279 Somebody could give a talk and we could throw smarties at them 43:43.279 --> 43:45.489 the whole time and then you could--then the other people 43:45.487 --> 43:47.217 would say, "The person looked kind of 43:47.217 --> 43:48.517 upset during the whole talk. 43:48.519 --> 43:50.739 [laughter] I wonder--They seemed like a 43:50.743 --> 43:52.483 nervous type." [laughter] 43:52.484 --> 43:57.234 This can be taken to extremes and the biggest extreme is the 43:57.231 --> 44:01.781 case of actors, which is if there's ever a 44:01.777 --> 44:06.897 case--Anybody know who this is, the actor? 44:06.900 --> 44:12.070 [laughter] Have none of you been alive in 44:12.074 --> 44:14.944 1950? [laughter] This is Robert Young. 44:14.940 --> 44:18.750 Does anybody know the part he plays? 44:18.750 --> 44:22.990 He played an--He played a doctor called Marcus Welby in 44:22.985 --> 44:27.685 this famous show "Marcus Welby, M.D.," and Marcus Welby was a 44:27.692 --> 44:29.342 wonderful doctor. 44:29.340 --> 44:32.140 He was compassionate and kind, he made house calls, 44:32.135 --> 44:34.255 he saved lives, he counseled people, 44:34.260 --> 44:38.070 and it turned out that Robert Young was then deluged with 44:38.070 --> 44:40.520 mail, thousands of pieces of mail, 44:40.519 --> 44:45.209 by people asking for his advice on health matters. 44:45.210 --> 44:46.900 [laughter] And he then, 44:46.904 --> 44:50.604 in a twist, exploited the fundamental attribution 44:50.602 --> 44:54.922 error--people confusing the actor for the role--exploited 44:54.917 --> 44:59.077 this by going on TV and espousing the benefits of Sanka 44:59.077 --> 45:03.617 decaffeinated coffee where he produced the famous line "I am 45:03.623 --> 45:07.093 not a doctor but I play one on TV," 45:07.090 --> 45:09.060 [laughter] whereupon people heard this and 45:09.055 --> 45:11.835 said, "Well, he must have some authority then about medical 45:11.836 --> 45:13.436 matters." [laughter] 45:13.439 --> 45:19.419 It turns out that the confusion between actors and their roles 45:19.416 --> 45:21.666 is extremely common. 45:21.670 --> 45:23.630 Many people, for instance, 45:23.627 --> 45:28.167 view Sylvester Stallone as either an actual hero during the 45:28.170 --> 45:32.950 Vietnam War or sort of a hero during the Vietnam War given all 45:32.947 --> 45:37.977 his Rambo stuff but in fact, of course, he played--he was in 45:37.982 --> 45:42.882 a Swiss boarding school teaching girls age twelve through fifteen 45:42.880 --> 45:44.870 during the Vietnam War. 45:44.869 --> 45:48.659 But it doesn't seem that way because the role infects how we 45:48.662 --> 45:50.272 think about the person. 45:50.269 --> 45:55.139 When this movie came out twenty years ago they needed a 45:55.142 --> 45:57.852 character to play a gay man. 45:57.849 --> 46:00.629 According to IMDb, where I get all my information, 46:00.632 --> 46:03.282 they hit up all the big stars, Harrison Ford, 46:03.280 --> 46:05.240 Michael Douglas, and Richard Gere, 46:05.239 --> 46:08.739 and they all turned it down because they didn't want to play 46:08.740 --> 46:12.360 a gay man because people would think that they were gay. 46:12.360 --> 46:15.890 Finally, they got Harry Hamlin to do it, who was kind of a 46:15.889 --> 46:17.189 B-list sort of guy. 46:17.190 --> 46:20.450 The biggest extreme of the fundamental attribution error, 46:20.445 --> 46:22.475 confusing the actor for his role, 46:22.480 --> 46:26.110 is Leonard Nimoy who, because he played the 46:26.114 --> 46:29.754 emotionless Vulcan, Spock, on Star Trek, 46:29.750 --> 46:34.480 was then repeatedly viewed by people who saw him on the street 46:34.479 --> 46:36.959 as if he was an actual Vulcan. 46:36.960 --> 46:39.780 [laughter] He got sufficiently upset about 46:39.784 --> 46:43.714 this to write a book called I Am Not Spock where he 46:43.711 --> 46:47.571 described all the ways in which he was not a Vulcan. 46:47.570 --> 46:50.740 [laughter] His career, where he attempted 46:50.740 --> 46:55.420 many times to play roles that were different from his Vulcan 46:55.418 --> 46:58.378 nature, stalled until finally many 46:58.382 --> 47:03.132 years later he gave up and wrote another book called I Am 47:03.129 --> 47:06.989 Spock [laughter] where he finally conceded to 47:06.991 --> 47:10.131 the fundamental attribution error. 47:10.130 --> 47:13.410 [laughter] If I gave this lecture ten 47:13.405 --> 47:19.135 years ago, I would say that the fundamental attribution error is 47:19.138 --> 47:23.348 a human universal, something that we're born with, 47:23.345 --> 47:26.045 a fundamental aspect of human nature. 47:26.050 --> 47:31.350 This is not entirely true though and we know that through 47:31.348 --> 47:35.988 some very interesting cross-cultural research that 47:35.985 --> 47:40.995 compares these biases across different countries, 47:41.000 --> 47:44.210 in this study between the United States and India. 47:44.210 --> 47:46.770 And it turns out that for whatever reason, 47:46.768 --> 47:49.828 and it would take another course to talk about the 47:49.825 --> 47:53.525 different explanations, but people start off at, 47:53.525 --> 47:58.225 say, age eight not committing the fundamental attribution 47:58.228 --> 48:02.658 error but in Western cultures, where there's an ideology 48:02.657 --> 48:06.367 perhaps that people are in charge of their own destiny, 48:06.369 --> 48:11.389 the error occurs and people over-attribute the role to the 48:11.387 --> 48:14.077 person. In some Eastern cultures 48:14.079 --> 48:18.669 there's more of a view about faith and more attributions to 48:18.670 --> 48:21.380 situation. And this has been shown in many 48:21.384 --> 48:22.654 ways. For instance, 48:22.649 --> 48:25.979 if you look at newspaper reports about murders, 48:25.975 --> 48:29.805 in cultures like the United States the report tends to 48:29.806 --> 48:33.486 emphasize the personal characteristics of the person 48:33.493 --> 48:35.593 accused of the murder. 48:35.590 --> 48:38.770 In countries like India, the reports tend to emphasize, 48:38.773 --> 48:42.053 to a greater degree, the situation that the person 48:42.046 --> 48:46.406 found himself in that might have driven him to commit a murder. 48:46.409 --> 48:50.579 So, this is an important reminder that just because we 48:50.576 --> 48:55.216 find something in our culture and just because it might well 48:55.215 --> 49:00.085 be pervasive doesn't mean necessarily that it's universal. 49:00.090 --> 49:04.370 49:04.369 --> 49:07.689 So, to summarize so far, and we're going to look at this 49:07.685 --> 49:10.635 a little bit more for the rest of this lecture, 49:10.639 --> 49:14.499 we've talked about two morals in social psychology. 49:14.500 --> 49:19.260 One is enhancement of the self but the other is what you can 49:19.261 --> 49:22.571 call "oversimplification of the other." 49:22.570 --> 49:27.500 So, we know ourselves that our behavior is due to a complicated 49:27.497 --> 49:31.627 cluster of the situation and our personal natures. 49:31.630 --> 49:35.020 When things go badly, in fact, we'll blame the 49:35.016 --> 49:37.496 situation. When things go well, 49:37.499 --> 49:42.159 the self-serving attribution bias, we'll credit ourselves. 49:42.159 --> 49:44.899 We don't do this for other people. 49:44.900 --> 49:47.410 For other people we're a lot less forgiving. 49:47.409 --> 49:51.579 You do something stupid, that's--you're a stupid person. 49:51.579 --> 49:55.489 I do something stupid, it's an off day. 49:55.489 --> 49:59.549 And so, you have this difference between how we think 49:59.546 --> 50:03.756 about ourselves and how we think about other people. 50:03.760 --> 50:08.150 Let's talk a little bit about what we think about other people 50:08.152 --> 50:12.042 and start by talking about why we like other people. 50:12.039 --> 50:15.969 And here I'm going to some extent to go over material that 50:15.972 --> 50:20.112 was raised earlier in the course in Peter Salovey's wonderful 50:20.112 --> 50:21.942 lecture. So, some of this, 50:21.937 --> 50:25.277 our liking of other people, is obvious and we talked about 50:25.282 --> 50:28.562 it in Dean Salovey's lecture, we talked about it when we 50:28.556 --> 50:30.486 talked about sexual attractiveness. 50:30.489 --> 50:34.119 We like people who are honest, who are kind, 50:34.120 --> 50:36.480 who are smart, who are funny, 50:36.484 --> 50:41.304 but study after study finds more fundamental processes are 50:41.296 --> 50:45.936 also at work and here is a list of three of them. 50:45.940 --> 50:48.100 One is proximity. 50:48.099 --> 50:52.799 We tend to like people who we're close to physically, 50:52.803 --> 50:56.783 who we are physically and spatially close to, 50:56.783 --> 51:00.043 who we spend a lot of time with. 51:00.039 --> 51:06.129 In one study they looked at a housing project in Manhattan and 51:06.130 --> 51:12.120 they asked people where their best friend was and 90% of them 51:12.121 --> 51:14.991 said, "My best friend is in the same 51:14.991 --> 51:18.541 building as me," and 50% of them says the same floor. 51:18.539 --> 51:21.929 Ask yourself who is your best friend at Yale. 51:21.929 --> 51:25.319 For how many of you is it somebody in your same college? 51:25.320 --> 51:29.790 Okay. How many in a different college? 51:29.789 --> 51:33.649 So, call it a tie but then there's a lot more colleges that 51:33.646 --> 51:37.696 aren't yours than the one--How many of you would you--say your 51:37.701 --> 51:41.091 best friend is somebody your--currently on your same 51:41.092 --> 51:42.992 floor? Yeah. 51:42.989 --> 51:47.479 If you were going to marry somebody from this class, 51:47.482 --> 51:51.272 it is the person you are sitting next to? 51:51.269 --> 51:58.279 [laughter] Now, in some sense this is 51:58.281 --> 52:04.321 an--a rather trivial finding. 52:04.320 --> 52:07.770 Of course you're going to get more involved in people you 52:07.765 --> 52:09.175 encounter frequently. 52:09.180 --> 52:11.090 How else is it going to work? 52:11.090 --> 52:13.390 But it's actually more than that. 52:13.389 --> 52:17.849 The more you see something the more you like it and this is 52:17.854 --> 52:21.554 sometimes known as "the mere exposure effect." 52:21.550 --> 52:26.550 The mere exposure effect is simply seeing something makes it 52:26.547 --> 52:31.457 likable perhaps because it becomes comfortable and safe. 52:31.460 --> 52:35.590 In one study by James Cutting, Cutting taught an Introduction 52:35.591 --> 52:39.931 to Psychology course and before each lecture he'd flash pictures 52:39.930 --> 52:42.460 on the screen. He'd have a screen saver 52:42.463 --> 52:45.483 showing pictures on the screen, paintings, and didn't say 52:45.480 --> 52:46.720 anything about them. 52:46.719 --> 52:48.559 People would sit down, look at them while they 52:48.559 --> 52:49.499 prepared their notes. 52:49.500 --> 52:53.210 At the end of the semester he then asked people to rate 52:53.208 --> 52:56.778 different pictures as to how much they liked them, 52:56.780 --> 53:01.750 and even though people had no memory of seeing one or--versus 53:01.745 --> 53:06.955 the other they tend to like the pictures more that they had seen 53:06.959 --> 53:09.969 before. They were somehow familiar and 53:09.969 --> 53:11.509 somehow more likable. 53:11.510 --> 53:16.510 If I showed you a picture of yourself versus a mirror image 53:16.510 --> 53:20.560 of yourself and asked which one you'd like more, 53:20.563 --> 53:23.153 the answer is very strong. 53:23.150 --> 53:26.770 You'd like your mirror image more because the mirror image is 53:26.774 --> 53:29.134 what you tend to see from day to day. 53:29.130 --> 53:33.130 If I showed your best friend a picture of you versus a mirror 53:33.127 --> 53:36.537 image picture of you, your best friend would say he 53:36.541 --> 53:40.501 or she likes the picture more because that corresponds to what 53:40.498 --> 53:42.248 he or she sees each day. 53:42.250 --> 53:49.150 Familiarity is itself a desire for liking, a force for liking. 53:49.150 --> 53:52.230 53:52.230 --> 53:56.680 Similarity--we like people who are similar to us. 53:56.679 --> 54:01.139 Friends tend to be highly similar to one another. 54:01.140 --> 54:02.920 So do husbands and wives. 54:02.920 --> 54:06.710 Now, to some extent, similarity is hard to pull 54:06.706 --> 54:08.596 apart from proximity. 54:08.599 --> 54:11.949 So, the fact that you are similar to your friends at Yale 54:11.953 --> 54:15.433 might just be because you are close to your friends at Yale 54:15.427 --> 54:18.897 and people who are at Yale tend to be fairly similar to one 54:18.901 --> 54:21.741 another. But there's a lot of evidence 54:21.738 --> 54:24.698 that similarity, above and beyond proximity, 54:24.702 --> 54:28.082 has an effect on attractiveness and on liking. 54:28.079 --> 54:32.409 Similarity predicts the success of a marriage and through a 54:32.410 --> 54:35.770 phenomena people aren't exactly sure about, 54:35.769 --> 54:39.379 couples become more and more similar over the course of a 54:39.382 --> 54:42.892 relationship. Finally, people like 54:42.886 --> 54:45.546 good-looking people. 54:45.550 --> 54:47.040 People like attractive people. 54:47.040 --> 54:50.200 54:50.199 --> 54:54.149 Physically attractive people are thought to be smarter, 54:54.146 --> 54:57.066 more competent, more social and nicer. 54:57.070 --> 55:02.290 Now, some of you who are very cynical and/or very good looking 55:02.288 --> 55:06.638 might wonder "yes, but good-looking people like me 55:06.641 --> 55:09.711 actually are smarter, more competent, 55:09.708 --> 55:12.688 more social and morally better." 55:12.690 --> 55:16.080 This is not a crazy response. 55:16.079 --> 55:18.349 It is--it could be, for instance, 55:18.352 --> 55:22.542 that the advantages of being good looking make your life run 55:22.542 --> 55:25.502 a lot easier. Teachers are more responsive to 55:25.498 --> 55:28.828 you, people treat you better, you have more opportunities to 55:28.826 --> 55:31.846 make your way through the world, you make more money, 55:31.854 --> 55:34.284 you have more access to things, and that could, 55:34.280 --> 55:37.400 in turn, cause you to improve your life. 55:37.400 --> 55:42.250 This would be what's known in the Bible as a "Matthew effect." 55:42.250 --> 55:45.100 A Matthew effect is a developmental psychology phrase 55:45.097 --> 55:48.357 for the sort of thing where, well, as Jesus said, 55:48.361 --> 55:53.231 "For unto everyone that hath shall be given and he shall have 55:53.225 --> 55:56.365 abundance." That means if you're good 55:56.373 --> 56:01.453 looking you'll also be smart but from him that hath not shall be 56:01.448 --> 56:04.508 taken away even that which he hath. 56:04.510 --> 56:10.260 It's a long version of the rich get richer and the poor even 56:10.264 --> 56:12.414 lose what they hath. 56:12.409 --> 56:15.999 So, there's a variety of studies suggesting that teachers 56:16.003 --> 56:19.793 rate attractive children as smarter and higher achieving. 56:19.789 --> 56:24.919 Adults think that when an ugly kid misbehaves it's because they 56:24.923 --> 56:29.563 have an ugly soul [laughter] while the attractive kid, 56:29.559 --> 56:32.159 "oh, that little scamp, somebody must have been 56:32.159 --> 56:35.539 bothering him." When I was in the University of 56:35.536 --> 56:39.426 Arizona and we lived next--and all I remember of my 56:39.434 --> 56:44.424 neighborhood is we lived next to this little boy and his name was 56:44.424 --> 56:46.214 Adonis. [laughter] 56:46.208 --> 56:48.158 Cute kid, but come on. 56:48.159 --> 56:50.909 [laughter] Also in mock trials judges give 56:50.909 --> 56:53.659 longer prison sentences to ugly people. 56:53.659 --> 56:55.859 [laughter] That's the Matthew effect, 56:55.860 --> 56:59.590 those who hath little get even that taken away and thrown into 56:59.587 --> 57:02.317 prison. There is a recent study, 57:02.315 --> 57:07.705 which I'll tell you about but I am not comfortable with it as an 57:07.710 --> 57:11.560 experiment. The study observed people in a 57:11.557 --> 57:16.587 shopping--in a parking lot of a supermarket and found that 57:16.587 --> 57:21.877 parents were a lot rougher to the kids if their kids are ugly 57:21.881 --> 57:25.501 than if their kids are good looking. 57:25.500 --> 57:28.490 And they attribute it to the fact that, for all sorts of 57:28.492 --> 57:31.542 reasons, the ugly kid just matters less to the parent. 57:31.539 --> 57:36.489 I was watching a poker game once on TV and somebody who lost 57:36.491 --> 57:39.691 said, and I quote, "They beat me like an ugly 57:39.691 --> 57:42.321 stepchild" [laughter] and the fate of the ugly 57:42.323 --> 57:45.463 stepchild is, in fact, not a very good fate 57:45.462 --> 57:47.742 but this is not a good study. 57:47.739 --> 57:50.449 For one thing, and I don't know how to phrase 57:50.451 --> 57:52.671 this in a politically correct way, 57:52.670 --> 57:57.210 but the parents of ugly kids are likely to themselves be ugly 57:57.206 --> 58:00.756 people [laughter] and maybe what they're finding 58:00.759 --> 58:04.769 is just ugly people are more violent than good-looking 58:04.767 --> 58:06.327 people. [laughter] 58:06.328 --> 58:09.508 This is an excellent time to stop the lecture [laughter] 58:09.507 --> 58:12.397 so I'm going to stop the lecture and we're going to 58:12.398 --> 58:14.998 continue social psychology on Wednesday.