Social Psycology

Social Psychology

WA1

Social psychology is the scientific field that seeks to understand the nature and causes of the individual behavior and thought in social situation. Social psychology investigates the ways in which our thoughts, feelings, and actions are influenced by the social environments in which we live. Social interactions help to shape who we are and how we act in different situations. The factors affecting social interaction fall into five major categories. They are the actions and characteristics of others, basic cognitive processes, ecological variables, cultural context and biological factors.

The Cognitive processes such as perception, memory and inferences play a key role on the understanding and behavior of every individual in the society. Reactions to certain situations by an individual strongly depend on the memories of others past behaviors and the inferences an individual formed about these behaviors. If anybody wants to clearly understand the causes of others behavior in a social situation it is a must that one should understand what went on in the thinking pattern and understanding process of those people when they behaved in a particular social situation. For example, if your friend sets an appointment with you in a particular time. You are waiting for him at a particular point in a particular time, if he comes late what would be your reaction. In such a situation, cognitive process plays a crucial role in the social behavior and social thoughts of every individual. A study of how people perceive, think bout and remember information about others are really have a contributing effect of human social behavior.

The weather and the climate a person experiences has a say in his behavior. This indicates the physical environment necessarily influences the feelings, thoughts and behavior of everyone. The climate conditions make a person either happy or sad. For example, if there is rain for a few days most of the people's day to day lives get disturbed. Another example is when the weather is hot and steamy rather than when it is cool and comfortable, people become more irritable and aggressive. The cognitive, affective, interpretive, and evaluative responses of individuals change drastically. If a person is exposed to a particular environment for a long time he or she will adapt to that environment and will become familiarized to that condition. The environmental stimulations facilitate physical and psychological arousals. The increased arousals will either improves or impairs individual performances. The environment on the social behavior of individual has become one of the very important factors of study in social psychology.

People live in different cultural settings. Each culture starts out with its own rules and norms to be systematically followed in different facets of human life cycle. The practices followed in one culture will be different than the other cultures. If a person is hailing from a

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