Grouptalk Presentation

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Technology-based Research Opportunities for Social Psychology

Grouptalk Interdisciplinary Meeting

Linda George U.C. Berkeley

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n  Scientific study of the way individuals think, feel, desire,

and act in social situations. n  Historically:

n  Research on individuals and groups n  Attitudes, persuasion n  Conformity, compliance

n  Then came… n  Social learning (imitation, modeling) n  Social cognition (unconscious, automatic) n  Self- and other-perception (identity, self-image, etc.)

What is Social Psychology?

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n  Current trends: n  Emotion / affect n  Motivation n  Culture n  Stereotypes (social cognition) n  Social power and justice n  Social neuroscience

n  Some of our traditional research areas are most active in other fields, such as organizational behavior, public policy, & consumer marketing.

& Today…

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n  A lot of research is done via survey. n  Behavioral research is more expensive – time

consuming, harder to orchestrate, etc. n  Several “classic” social psychology experiments would

not be allowed by today’s Human Subjects standards.

Traditional Methods

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What about technology?

Web Science Research Initiative - MIT & other schools n  Interdisciplinary effort to study the scientific and societal consequences of

wiring the planet together. n  "We're doing this partly out of excitement and partly out of duty," said Tim

Berners-Lee, who invented the technical underpinnings of the Web in 1989 and now wears several hats, including senior research scientist at MIT.

“2016” Symposium n  Computer scientists from academia and companies like I.B.M. and Google

discussed topics including social networks, digital imaging, online media and the impact on work and employment. But most talks touched on two broad themes: the impact of computing will go deeper into the sciences and more into the social sciences, and policy issues will loom large as the technology becomes more powerful and more pervasive.

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A quick tour connecting technology with social psychology…

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Relationships & Phones

n  “Redefinition of social relations and their connection to place”

¨  M. Ito, USC – anthropology ¨  Implications for “power geometries” at home and school ¨  Construction of “peer-based” places through mobile communication

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Relationships: Creative Exits

“Someone won't leave you alone?

Give them "your" number: 212-479-7990 The official New York Rejection Line!”

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Media, Relationships, and Multitasking

“Divided partial attention”? Closer together? Farther apart? …Multitasking?

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Distraction & “Infomania”

n  Diminished attention: ¨  Ratey, Harvard Medical School ¨  Bederson, U. of Maryland Human-Computer interaction lab: generating

a minimum of distraction for the computer user. How do computer interfaces get in the way of being able to concentrate?”

¨  Checking email; vs. having computer assess & interrupt: “predictive interfaces”

¨  British survey: 10-point drop in IQ when juggling email, phone calls, and work (G. Wilson, King’s College London Univ.)

¨  D. Meyerson, Stanford: “being accessible all the time is a source of stress”

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FlashMobs: Conformity, deindividuation, contagion

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Snowboardgang.com

facebook

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Trust, Self-presentation, Connection

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Time Magazine Invention of the Year, 2006 11/26/2007

Community, Grassroots, Media

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Decision-making, Collective Judgment

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Attitudes, Cognitive Bolstering, Group Polarization

“We’ve followed the old advice to discuss this amongst ourselves. Democracy, we’ve been told, is best served when informed citizens deliberate the issues of the day, pooling their wisdom to reach a judicious consensus.” 11/26/2007

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Resistance to disconfirming evidence

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(Zillow)

Zillow.com

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Cooperation, Competition

n  “Can You See Me Now?” …a chase game played online and on the streets.

n  Geocaching

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Welcome to the world's first 3D online church Enter the church come in, pull up a pew and find out what all the fuss is about Also available in 2D join others in the chat café or the discussion forum View clips, news, sermons catch up on Church of Fools past, present, future

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Spirituality? Compassion, Role development

NY Times experiment in interactive worship

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Information processing, Collaboration

“Software for visualizing and managing information, allowing individuals and teams to more effectively think, plan, and collaborate.”

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Individual differences, Innovative personnel selection

n  Correlations between gaming and managerial behavior: “People

who play [video] games are into technology, can handle more information, can synthesize more complex data, solve operational design problems, lead change and bring organizations through change.” (Luman, CS vp)

n  James Rosser: research indicated that surgeons adept at video games were less likely to make mistakes during certain forms of operations and suturing.

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Technology and…

n  Sociology n  Anthropology n  Communications n  Education n  Psychology

n  How can we best use the unprecedented amounts of data available to us?!

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THANKS!