What Was That? Come Again?

Effort justification (Aronson & Mills, 1959) is when you begin to really like something that you suffer for. This can come about from an initiation into a group, having to pay something yourself instead of being given it, or suffering emotionally or psychologically for some one, thing, or ideal. It is brought about by the discrepancy between the cost and the benefits. We want to believe that the benefits match if not outweigh the costs. So, the more we pay for something, the more we rationalize to ourselves that it is worth, so that we do not experience cognitive dissonance (Festinger, 1957) from the discrepancy between the costs and the benefits.

Okay, so- let's flashback to a fourteen year-old me for a second.

I remember the first girl I asked out. It was sophomore year in high school. Yeah, a little late, but I thought dating in middle school was pointless and girls tended to be a bit bold and make the moves on me. Anyway, moving on, her name was Sarah, and we had been friends since freshman year.

When I decided to ask Sarah out my feelings toward her were complicated. I knew that I liked her, but I wasn't crazy for her. I was, however, determined to finally grow some balls and ask someone out.

I planned it all out, I would do it when we went to Fiesta Texas with ROTC (I had joined it for her). So as the day came I got more and more apprehensive, and by the time Fiesta Texas came, I was in a nervous wreck. I tried not to think about it all day but that was unsuccessful, I thought about it every second. I dreaded the moment, though I knew not when I would finally do it. I was hyper aware of people and of Sarah, trying to catch her alone and waiting for the 'right moment'.

At one point everyone wanted to go on the bumper carts and Sarah didn't want to go, so I stayed behind with her. We were the only two who hadn't gone. The line was long. So I sat down and experienced the most acute psychological stress I had ever felt in my life, and then finally went something to the extent of, "Hey, why don't we go out?"

"What?"

"Well we're really good friends, and we hang out a lot, so I figured- why don't we go out?"

"Wait, one more time?"

"Will you go out with me?"

Well, every time I had to repeat it I suffered exponentially more acute stress! I couldn't even think.

So my question is- guess how much I liked Sarah at the moment I voiced the third proposition? I was madly into her. She was the object of my every desire. Her saying yes would be like God lifting me up straight into Heaven. I realized that without her I would be lost.

A strikingly different picture from how I felt about her before I decided to ask her out. Where I once liked her, I was now infatuated with her. According to effort justification, this makes perfect sense. Asking her out was AGONY, of course my feelings for her knew no bounds! I HAD to be that into her, otherwise, why would I be subjecting myself to the most brutal experience of my life? (do I exaggerate? 14 year old me would think not)

So I guess I can't leave it at that, huh? Do you want to know what she said? Hmm? What was that? Come again? Hehe, just kidding.

"No."

I'm not sure how many awws I'm going to get, depends on how well I made the story, which might not be very well. But to those who like happy endings, I will say that she said no because her friend liked me and it was against the code. But two days later she called me up and said, "Hey, you know what you said the other day? You still want to go out?"

Aaaaand considering this was after two miserable and depressed days full of yet more agony- guess what I said?



Aronson, e., & Mills, J. (1959). The effect of severity of initiation on liking for a group. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 59, 177-181.

Festinger, L. (1957). A theory of cognitive dissonance. Stanford, C.A: Stanford University Press.

Persuasion and Teenagers

I can remember a time that I exhibited psychological reactance (Brehm & Brehm, 1981), where one reacts to the fact someone is trying to change their mind by moving in the opposite direction argued (with respect to one's personal attitude).

When I was a sophomore in high school I started dating this girl named Sarah. I didn't know too much about her when we started dating, but I soon knew more than I wanted to. Anyway, my mother found a letter I had from her and freaked out because it contained some stuff about Sarah's past, and she tried to make me stop seeing her. Well, I didn't have a car and we lived half an hour from my high school so I was only seeing her at school as it was, and when I interpreted my mother's yelling as trying to persuade me of something, I moved in the opposite direction.

"No way I'm breaking up with her!" I told myself. Even though I knew it was probably a smart move, my mother trying to persuade me made me react and try to cling to my independence and freedom by stubbornly, against my own reason, insisting that I keep dating her.

I remember this happening a lot in those years. Adolescents are told they aren't children and they aren't adults. The only freedoms adults give adolescents are responsibilities. Your old enough to be responsible, but not to know what is good for you, or just plain what is good. I'm sure everyone displayed psychological reactance in their adolescent youth, many times.

Brehm, S.S., & Brehm, J. W. (1981). Psychological reactance: A theory of freedom and control. New York: Academic Press.

Attitudes

I don't act according to my attitudes all the time, mostly because of subjective norms (Ajzen, 1991) which tell me I shouldn't voice my thoughts or act in a way that I want to.

The most obvious that I run into the most at Southwestern is the need to suppress my ideas, thoughts, and attitudes which come from being an atheist. For the most part one would think that any atheist acting according to his or her attitude would criticize or mock religious beliefs all the time. This, of course, is hardly helpful. Besides, isn't it a norm in our society that we accept that people have differing opinions from our own?

This is why I rarely bring the subject up and usually stay quiet when people begin to talk about religion. And I actually usually don't really care about people and their beliefs. Occasionally, though, I come across a particularly difficult situation, like people who insist they have special communication with god, or can speak in tongues, etc. I think the hardest situation sometimes is when I go home and my little 6 yr old brother asks a question and my mother proceeds to take advantage of the opportunity to teach my little brother more about god and catholic culture. Sometimes I just feel like voicing some kind of skepticism, just to give the kid a chance to make a choice. But I realize this is inane, and that every child needs some kind of structure, and deconstruction of that structure at too early a point may lead to bad things. I'll catch him when he's halfway through high school.

The norms about what is okay and not okay to say about religion are set by religious people in the U.S. After all, they are the majority. So, where someone who doesn't believe in hell and only in heaven may interject a fellow religious person and proceed to argue this point, it is far more of a social stigma to interject and say that one doesn't believe in a god at all and proceed to argue the point.

For these reasons, I rarely voice my beliefs or act accordingly or even mention that I am an atheist, even though I have strong attitudes in this area and perceive myself as having a lot of control over my behavior.

In conclusion, 'coming out' as an atheist' has its unique subjective norm, more specifically it is a stigma- we will see a black AND woman president FAR before we see an atheist one.

Marcos

Ajzen, I. (1991). The theory of planned behavior. Organizational Behaavior and Human Decision Processes, 50, 179-211.

The Saga of the Violator

When I first went to Dr. Guiliano's office to get her approval for my violation of a social norm, I was very proud of myself for coming up with such a cool idea. But when I walked into Dr. D's office I could've cursed myself and my ideas.

I walked into her office and she turned from her desk and saw me and greeted me warmly with a, “Hi, Marcos!”

I, almost simultaneously, said, “Hi, Paula!”

I wish I could've remembered her facial expressions or something. But I think that I was too busy engaging in strategic self-presentation, where I was trying to influence how Dr. D. thought of me, specifically by acting really excited about my Social Psychology grade and by talking really fast (Kassin, Fein, & Markus, 2008) . I was trying to make it seem as if it was the most natural thing in the world to call a professor by her first name when she had never said or implied that it was okay.

Just to make sure that I did it right, soon I dropped the bomb again:

“And I looked at the paper and saw the grade, and I thought to myself, 'I've got to go tell Paula!'”

Dr. D. was smiling and as excited as I was, or so she seemed. I took it as far as saying goodbye to her and walking out of her office for a few seconds, before coming back-

“Okay, before I let you go, I have to ask you a few questions,” I said as I came back into her office.

She admitted to being taken aback, but a couple factors helped her take it all in tow (I hadn't noticed any difference in her behavior or anything). First, I had had Dr. D. for three classes, and we periodically talked about things that were not class-related, like politics and so forth, so the fact that she knew me well was important. She said that if it had been an advisee she had only met once or twice it would've been a different story. Secondly, she made a situational attribution for my behavior, where she explained my behavior in terms of the situation instead of a personal trait, in this case- the fact that I was so excited about my test grade (Kassin, Fein, & Markus, 2008). In my excitement I had forgotten the social propriety of the professor-student relationship.

This social norm where a student shows respect to the professor by calling them either 'professor' or more preferably, 'Dr. Something', is an implicit rule in our society. Specifically, it is understood that unless a professor says otherwise, one of these more formal names need be utilized. Calling a professor by his or her first name without being invited to do so can be seen as inappropriate, audacious, or arrogant.

I don't think I could have done this with too many professors. I chose Dr. D. because I didn't have a class with her this semester and because I knew her well, two factors which would make the first time I violated the norm easier.

The second time I violated this norm, it was going to be in the middle of a class discussion, in my philosophy class, with Dr. Alejandro DeAcosta. I was particularly anxious about this because I didn't know DeAcosta as well as Dr. D., but I knew enough that he wouldn't care, so that made it doable. In fact, my anxiety over how DeAcosta would take it was nothing compared to my worries about how my classmates would take it. I was afraid of a combination of the trait negativity bias and some belief perseverance, where even if I explained to the class afterward that it was just for a class assignment, that they would continue to think me a prick, and since most don't know me at all in that class, that this negative experience would weigh unfairly heavy in their minds (Kassin, Fein, & Markus, 2008), (Skowronski & Carlston, 1989).

To account for my self-awareness and strategic self-presentation during the violation of the social norm, I asked someone I knew, let's call her Jen, to notice people's facial expressions and body language during class, or their nonverbal behavior (Duval & Wicklund, 1972), (Kassin, Fein, & Markus, 2008). I knew that I would be too busy abstracting from my mental state of self-awareness by dropping the 'first name bomb while I was asking DeAcosta questions and pretending to scrutinize a certain passage in our book. Jen thought my assignment was to look at facial expressions and body language, and said she wouldn't do the work I was too lazy to do, but I explained that this was not my assignment. She asked what was. “You'll know when I do it.” This gave her a rough idea of what was to happen, I was going to do something unexpected, there would be some kind of reaction. We were now sharing a secret, and it reminded me of that article we read where people feel more attracted to each other or closer after sharing a secret, but I was too lazy to go and look that up so I won't mention it further or I'll need a citation, if I don't already.

What I didn't expect was for DeAcosta to get into class so early. He usually comes after over half the class is in their seats. He came when it was still only Jen and I, so said to myself, 'Hey, why now?'

“Hey Alex, we didn't need to read to any particular designated page for today, right?” He hadn't outlined how to split up the reading over the two class periods we would be covering this particular book in class.

He took it in tow and answered my question, no noticeable reaction. I breathed a sigh of relief. But after students started piling in it was decided that today we would all sit in a circle on the floor in the center of the classroom. So now we were in a more intimate discussion setting- perhaps enough to excuse another 'Alex' bomb?

“Hey Alex, I was wondering if we could go to page 35 for a bit, I was having some trouble with this counterpower concept....”

I didn't look up until after I had read from the passage and DeAcosta had begun talking about it. He actually got up and went to the blackboard and started writing some things to help us better understand the concepts. Interestingly, when he sat back down, he was further away from his books and notes, and from being inside the circle, than he had been before. It could've just been coincidence, of course, he said it wasn't anything conscious.

Anyway, before I could look up Jen nudged me and I looked toward her. She moved her notebook to me and pointed at the top of the page- 'Three people looked stunned and confused, the rest didn't notice.”

I looked around and saw people smiling at me, and I couldn't help but smile back because it was one of those, “Oh, you so sneaky, huh?” smiles and I felt a little embarrassed.

I'm proud that I didn't fall prey to the spotlight effect though (Gilovich, Medvec, & Savitsky, 1999), where I thought that people were thinking of me the rest of the class period instead of moving on with the discussion and such.

After the class period, before everyone left, I debriefed everyone, including DeAcosta. One guy came up to me to tell me what his reaction was and he said it was “What? Really? You're going to call him that?”. Other people just admitted they thought it was amusing and slightly shocking, and Jen elaborated on her observations, saying that several people were putting heads together and whispering about my Alex bomb immediately after I said it.

Overall, there were very few, if any, consequences from breaking this social norm, and yet it was not an easy thing to do. Granted, it was easy in the fact that it was doable, but still, there was that hesitation and anxiety.

I was trying to think of the reason for this social norm to exist, and I realize that professors need some kind of power to control students in the classroom, they need to quiet everyone down once in a while, etc. But professors already have power, they make our grades. Does this norm exist to remind us of that, instead of when it is more salient like when papers are returned? Or perhaps it's some kind of reminiscent byproduct of the whole 'respect your elders' thing which I don't buy into anymore now that I'm not a child but which was bigger in our society back in the day.

It seems to me that at the university level, where professors know so much and are experts in their fields, have PhDs and everything, that this norm could be done away with. People will respect the knowledge, the expertise, right? But then I remember, there are professors who are unpopular, whose teaching techniques or expertise are questionable, and perhaps this norm exists for them? They can always appeal to their 'Dr. Something' status when students begin to gripe.

Who knows. All I know is, this social norm is very real and breaking it causes anxiety.

Duval, S., & Wicklund, R. A. (1972). A theory of objective self-awareness. New York: Academic Press.

Gilovich, T., Medvec, V.H., & Savitsky, K (1999). The spotlight effect in social judgment: An egocentric bias in estimates of the salience of one's own actions and appearance. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

Kassin, S., Fein, S., & Markus, H.R. (2008). Social psychology. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.

Skowronski, J. J., & Carlston, D. E., (1989). Negativity and extremity biases in impression formation: A review of explanations. Psychology bulletin, 105, 131-142.

Cliques

Ingroups are groups which are important to the identity of an individual because from them a person feels at home, accepted, important (Kassin, Fein, & Markus, 2008).

Nine days out of ten I'll eat lunch in the cove with some friends of mine. This group started out small, with three of us. Now it sometimes reaches six or seven people. Of course, not everyone shows up all the time, but some of us are consistent. The person who originally brought the first three of us together, let's call her Jessica, likes to make certain observations and comments about the group.

For example, let's take the other day. I had done something which didn't sit well with some members of the group, and though no one was really truly upset, Jessica started kidding around, as we do.

"I swear, I could kick you out of the group right now. No, wait... I couldn't, you're a core member."

Now, of course, the implication is that there are peripheral members. Well, one guy, let's call him Jack, then asked, "Hey wait, am I a core member?"

"No, you are not."
"You could kick me out!"
"Yes, yes I could."

All of it was said with a light air, even though it was understood that Jessica was being honest. It was almost as if she was making an ingroup and an outgroup (a group which a person doesn't feel a close membership to) within our lunch group, yet with both groups in a larger ingroup (Kassin et al., 2008).

This made me reflect a little bit. I knew that Jessica and others in the group were close friends of mine. And I feel a strong loyalty to our group. After all, it isn't just lunch, we hang out all the time outside of lunch and school, and we always talk about our lives and our pasts, our relationships. Our relationships within the group can also be said to be intricate and harmonious, for the most part.

So I find myself asking this question. Would I feel as strongly invested and at home in this group if it weren't for Jessica's occasional comments of this sort? I really don't know. But the question is intriguing.

Kassin, S., Fein, S., & Markus, H.R. (2008). Social psychology. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.