Social Expectations and Perception

Social Expectations and Perception
Author: Michael A. Barendse
Publisher: Penn State University Press
Total Pages: 96
Release: 1981
Genre: History
ISBN:

This study was prompted by the author's observation of a sharp dichotomy in interpretations written before and after the mid-1960s--relying largely on the same data--regarding the impact of Slavic immigrants on the Pennsylvania anthracite fields. Investigations dated between 1902 and 1964 blamed the Slavic immigrants for the exploitation of anthracite mines, the failure of unionization until 1902, and the relative social backwardness of Northeastern Pennsylvania. The old view led to the "split labor market" theory, which holds that immigrants tend to divide the labor market by their willingness to work for lower wages than those demanded by the established work force. Since 1964 historians such as Victor Greene and Harold Aurand have shown that Slavic immigrants in the anthracite fields were in fact a progressive social influence. Dr. Barendse starts with a hypothesis to explain the interpretive dichotomy: that social reality is a cultural construct created out of the perceptions and expectations of its creators, even when these are professional historians and social scientists. According to this hypothesis--based on studies in the sociology of knowledge by Goffman, Berger, and Luckman--pre-1964 experts expected Slavic immigrants to be poorly adapted to the social environment of the coal region and therefore perceived the behavior they studied as confirmation of that expectation. A very different picture emerges when the same source material is examined without such biases: the Slavic immigrants, despite alien languages and customs, made a remarkably fast adjustment in the 1890-1902 period, as attested to by their acquiring real estate, founding complex organizations such as the Polish National Church, demanding equal treatment on the job, and spearheading United Mine Workers organizing strikes. The monograph includes a brief history of the anthracite industry from 1740 to 1890 (when the Slavs arrived), a survey of immigration history, and an epilogue on the assimilation of Slavic-Americans into American society down to the present.

Social Psychology

Social Psychology
Author: Daniel W. Barrett
Publisher: SAGE Publications
Total Pages: 697
Release: 2015-12-19
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 1506310591

Employing a lively and accessible writing style, author Daniel W. Barrett integrates up-to-date coverage of social psychology’s core theories, concepts, and research with a discussion of emerging developments in the field—including social neuroscience and the social psychology of happiness, religion, and sustainability. Social Psychology: Core Concepts and Emerging Trends presents engaging examples, Applying Social Psychology sections, and a wealth of pedagogical features to help readers cultivate a deep understanding of the causes of social behavior.

Social Perception and Social Reality

Social Perception and Social Reality
Author: Lee Jussim
Publisher: OUP USA
Total Pages: 485
Release: 2012-04-06
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0195366603

This title contests the received wisdom in the field of social psychology that suggests that social perception and judgment are generally flawed, biased, and powerfully self-fulfilling.

Synesthesia

Synesthesia
Author: Lynn C. Robertson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 279
Release: 2005
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 019516623X

Owing to its bizarre nature and its implications for understanding how brains work, synesthesia has recently received a lot of attention in the popular press and motivated a great deal of research and discussion among scientists. The questions generated by these two communities are intriguing: Does the synesthetic phenomenon require awareness and attention? How does a feature that is not present become bound to one that is? Does synesthesia develop or is it hard wired? Should it change our way of thinking about perceptual experience in general? What is its value in understanding perceptual systems as a whole?This volume brings together a distinguished group of investigators from diverse backgrounds--among them neuroscientists, novelists, and synesthetes themselves--who provide fascinating answers to these questions. Although each approaches synesthesia from a very different perspective, and each was curious about and investigated synesthesia for very different reasons, the similarities between their work cannot be ignored. The research presented in this volume demonstrates that it is no longer reasonable to ask whether or not synesthesia is real--we must now ask how we can account for it from cognitive, neurobiological, developmental, and evolutionary perspectives. This book will be important reading for any scientist interested in brain and mind, not to mention synesthetes themselves, and others who might be wondering what all the fuss is about.

Social Psychology of Visual Perception

Social Psychology of Visual Perception
Author: Emily Balcetis
Publisher: Psychology Press
Total Pages: 780
Release: 2010-05-31
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 1136945520

This volume takes a contemporary and novel look at how people see the world around them. We generally believe we see our surroundings and everything in it with complete accuracy. However, as the contributions to this volume argue, this assumption is wrong: people’s view of their world is cloudy at best. Social Psychology of Visual Perception is a thorough examination of the nature and determinants of visual perception, which integrates work on social psychology and vision. It is the first broad-based volume to integrate specific sub-areas into the study of vision, including goals and wishes, sex and gender, emotions, culture, race, and age. The volume tackles a range of engaging issues, such as what is happening in the brain when people look at attractive faces, or if the way our eyes move around influences how happy we are and could help us reduce stress. It reveals that sexual desire, our own sexual orientation, and our race affect what types of people capture our attention. It explores whether our brains and eyes work differently when we are scared or disgusted, or when we grow up in Asia rather than North America. The multiple perspectives in the book will appeal to researchers and students in range of disciplines, including social psychology, cognition, evolutionary psychology, and neuroscience.

The Perception of People

The Perception of People
Author: Perry R. Hinton
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 315
Release: 2015-09-16
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 1317481305

What are other people like? How do we decide if someone is friendly, honest or clever? What assumptions do we develop about them and what explanations do we give for their behaviour? The Perception of People examines key topics in psychology to explore how we make sense of other people (and ourselves). Do our decisions result from careful consideration and a desire to produce an accurate perception? Or do we jump to conclusions in our judgements and rely on expectations and stereotypes? To answer these questions the book examines models of person perception and provides an up-to-date and detailed account of the central psychological research in this area, focusing in particular on the social cognitive approach. It also considers and reflects on the involvement of culture in cognition, and includes coverage of relevant research in culture and language that influence the way we think and speak about others. As well as providing a valuable text in social psychology, The Perception of People also offers a direction for the integration of ideas from cognitive and social psychology with those of cultural psychology, anthropology, sociology, philosophy and social history. Clear explanation of modern research is placed in historical and cultural context to provide a fuller understanding of how psychologists have worked to understand how people interpret the world around them and make sense of the people within it. Ideal reading for students of social psychology, this engaging text will also be useful in subject areas such as communication studies and media studies, where the perception of people is highly relevant.

Social Perception

Social Perception
Author: Jenifer B. Teiford
Publisher: Nova Publishers
Total Pages: 170
Release: 2008
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9781600216329

The contemporary concept of social perception is considered to be an umbrella term that includes various other traditional and related phenomena such as person perception, impression and attitude formation, social cognition, attribution, stereotypes, prejudice, social categorisation, and social comparison and implicit personality theories. This new book presents research on issues related to social perception and behavioural responses which follow. These include child perceptions, social class issues, perceived attractiveness theories, occupational prestige and related communication factors.

Sociolinguistics

Sociolinguistics
Author: Lesley Milroy
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 281
Release: 2008-04-15
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 0470758201

Sociolinguistics: Method and Interpretation presents a thorough and practical description of current sociolinguistic methodology while recognizing that methodological decisions can never be separated from questions of theory. Presents a thorough and practical description of current sociolinguistic methodology. Considers a range of issues including speaker selection, data collection, social considerations, phonological and syntactical variation, style-shifting and code-switching. Recognizes that methodological decisions can never be separated from questions of theory. Stresses the need for the entire research process from the initial design of the project to the interpretation of results to be grounded in theoretically defensible positions. Shows how the research paradigm established by a few influential pioneers has been fruitfully expanded by exciting new trends.

The Perception of People

The Perception of People
Author: Perry R. Hinton
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 291
Release: 2015-09-16
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 1317481313

What are other people like? How do we decide if someone is friendly, honest or clever? What assumptions do we develop about them and what explanations do we give for their behaviour? The Perception of People examines key topics in psychology to explore how we make sense of other people (and ourselves). Do our decisions result from careful consideration and a desire to produce an accurate perception? Or do we jump to conclusions in our judgements and rely on expectations and stereotypes? To answer these questions the book examines models of person perception and provides an up-to-date and detailed account of the central psychological research in this area, focusing in particular on the social cognitive approach. It also considers and reflects on the involvement of culture in cognition, and includes coverage of relevant research in culture and language that influence the way we think and speak about others. As well as providing a valuable text in social psychology, The Perception of People also offers a direction for the integration of ideas from cognitive and social psychology with those of cultural psychology, anthropology, sociology, philosophy and social history. Clear explanation of modern research is placed in historical and cultural context to provide a fuller understanding of how psychologists have worked to understand how people interpret the world around them and make sense of the people within it. Ideal reading for students of social psychology, this engaging text will also be useful in subject areas such as communication studies and media studies, where the perception of people is highly relevant.