Social Psychology

Social psychology is the scientific study of how the thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, and implied presence of others, "imagined" and "implied presences" referring to the internalized social norms that humans are influenced by even when they are alone.

Social psychologists typically explain human behavior as being a result of the relationship between mental state and social situation, studying the conditions under which thoughts, feelings, and behaviors occur and how these variables influence social interactions.

Social psychology has bridged the gap between psychology and sociology to an extent, but a divide still exists between the two fields. Nevertheless, sociological approaches to psychology remain an important counterpart to conventional psychological research. In addition to the split between psychology and sociology, there is difference in emphasis between American and European social psychologists, as the former traditionally have focused more on the individual, whereas the latter have generally paid more attention to group-level phenomena.

Although issues in social psychology already had been discussed in philosophy for much of human history - such as the writings of Islamic philosopher Al-Farabi, which dealt with similar issues - the modern, scientific discipline began in the United States when the American Sociological Association was founded in 1905.

In the 19th century, social psychology was an emerging field from the larger field of psychology. At the time, many psychologists were concerned  with developing concrete explanations for the different aspects of human nature. They attempted to discover concrete cause-and-effect relationships that explained social interactions. In order to do so, they applied the scientific method to human behavior. The first published study in the field was Norman Triplett's 1898 experiment on the phenomenon of social facilitation. These psychological experiments later went on to form the foundation of much of 20th century social psychological findings.

In addition, during the 19th century, many Gestalt psychologists, most notably Kurt Lewin, fled to the United States from Nazi Germany. They were instrumental in developing the field as an area separate from the dominant behavioral and psychoanalytic schools at that time. Attitudes and small group phenomena were the topics most commonly studied in that era.

During World War II, social psychologists were mostly concerned with the study of persuasion and propaganda for the US military. Following the war, researchers became interested in a variety of social problems, including issues of gender and racial prejudice. Most notable and contentious of these were the Milgram experiments. During the years immediately following World War II, there were frequent collaborations between psychologists and sociologists. The two disciplines, however, have become increasingly specialized and isolated from each other in recent years, with sociologists generally focusing on macro features, whereas psychologists generally focusing on more micro features.

In the 1960s, there was growing interest in topics such as cognitive dissonance, bystander intervention, and aggression. By the 1970s, however, social psychology in America had reached a crisis, as heated debates emerged over issues such as ethical concerns about laboratory experimentation, whether attitude could actually predict behavior, and how much science could be done in a cultural context. This was also a time when situationism came to challenge the relevance of self and personality in psychology.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, social psychology reached a more mature level, especially in regard to theory and methodology. Now, careful ethical standards regulate research, and pluralistic and multicultural perpectives have emerged. Modern researchers are interested in many phenomena, through attribution, social cognition, and the self-concept are perhaps the areas of greatest growth in recent years. Social psychologists have also maintained their applied interests with contributions in the social psychology of health, education, law, and the workplace.

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This blog entry is sponsored by HSBC.