4. Social Situations as a Determinant of Behaviour

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About this Lecture

Lecture

In this lecture, we think about social situations, focusing in particular on: (i) the shared tendency to react in certain ways to specific situations found across many people, as demonstrated by the ‘visual cliff’ illusion study, where babies do not cross what appears to be a high ledge; (ii) the increased power of highly structured situations to elicit specific responses; (iii) the impact that social groups can have on expectations of their members’ behaviour; (iv) the bias toward considering internal factors when evaluating someone’s response to a situation.

Course

In this course, Dr Ayoub Bouguettaya (University of Birmingham) explores the individual versus situational factors debate. In the first lecture, we think about what drives behaviour and the tendency to focus on internal/individual factors when evaluating a person’s behaviour. In the second lecture, we think about the doctrines of traits and situationism, as well as trait activation theory. In the third lecture, we think about how personality acts as a determinant of behaviour and how a trait is defined. Next, we think about social situations and the tendencies of many people to act in similar ways when confronted with certain situations. In the fifth and final lecture, we think about some key questions which surround the individual versus situational factor debate, including whether personality itself is a Western construct.

Lecturer

Dr Ayoub Bouguettaya is a lecturer in the School of Psychology at the University of Birmingham. Dr Bouguettaya’s research interests are in social psychology and how knowledge from that field can be applied to others, particularly health, including how we can apply social identity theory to societal problems, as well as investigating the different perspectives one might take on those issues. Some of Dr Bouguettaya’s recent publications include 'The relationship between gambling advertising and gambling attitudes, intentions and behaviours: a critical and meta-analytic review' (2020) and 'The Effect of a Food Addiction Explanation Model for Weight Control and Obesity on Weight Stigma' (2020).