The Belief in a Just World and Domestic Abuse

One of my very good friends was in an abusive relationship about six months ago.  When she was upset or after they got in a fight, she would come over to vent about everything her boyfriend had done.  He often was verbally and emotionally abusive and manipulative; occasionally, he was physically threatening.  Unfortunately, my friend also lived with this boyfriend.  Due to economic restraints, she did not have enough money to move out.

While she was venting, I would always tell her that she could just move in with me instead.  She always said, “Maybe, if it gets bad enough.”  I was constantly worried about her, but I continued to think that she was (somewhat) accountable for her situation.  I always thought along the lines of, “If she only moved in with me, this would stop happening because she could finally break up with him,” or “If she just would work more hours, she would (1) have more money to move out sooner and (2) stay at home less, and thus, give her boyfriend fewer chances to hurt her,” or “If she had not just bought a plane ticket to visit her mom, she would have had enough money to move out!”

 Although I was not directly blaming my friend, I still thought that her behavior was leading to the consequences, rather than explaining the situation using her boyfriend’s behavior (which is where the blame should fall).  The act of blaming victims is also known as a defensive attribution, or the belief in a just world (Lerner, 1980).  In other words, we believe that good things happen to good people, and that bad things happen to bad people.  In short, “What goes around comes around.”

We use defensive attributions to protect ourselves from the idea that something bad can happen to us (Lerner, 1980).  Because, in general, most people think that they are good people, or at least better than average (Brown, 2012), they believe that they will “get what they deserve,” which are primarily good things and fewer bad things (if they think that they are good people; Lerner, 1980). 

In my example, I was using the belief in a just world to protect myself from the idea that something terrible, like domestic abuse, could happen to me.  Instead of blaming my friend’s boyfriend (like I should have), I blamed her inability to move out and her failure to make and save more money (even though her money situation was mostly out of her control).  Thus, I distanced (and protected) myself from the fact that her situation is a very real possibility for me, especially given that, on average, one in four women are victims of domestic abuse at some time in their life (CDC, 2008).

Luckily my friend is no longer in that relationship.  Nevertheless, the belief in a just world can have significant consequences, particularly for victims of domestic abuse and other acts of violence against women.  Imagine that my friend charged her boyfriend with sexual abuse (which he occasionally did); if the jurors found blame with my friend’s actions, instead of her boyfriend’s (as I did), he may have been found not guilty or served a lesser sentence.  In fact, past work supports that belief in a just world influences mock jurors’ decisions on damages awarded to the plaintiff (Foley & Pigott, 2000).  All in all, we should be careful of being biased by the just world hypothesis; although it can help us to defend ourselves, it can also lead to us making incorrect inferences about an individual. (n= 592)

References

Brown, J. D. (2012). Understanding the better-than-average effect: Motives (still matter). Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 38(2), 209-219. doi: 10.1177/0146167211432763

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2012).  Adverse health conditions and health risk behaviors associated with intimate partner violence.  Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 57(5), 113-117. Retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/PDF/wk/mm5705.pdf

Foley, L. A., & Pigott, M. A. (2000). Belief in a just world and jury decisions in a civil rape trial. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 30(5), 935-951. doi: 10.1111/j.1559-1816.2000.tb02504.x

Lerner, M. J. (1980). The belief in a just world: A fundamental delusion. New York: Plenum. 

Note: If you or someone you know is a victim of domestic abuse or sexual assault, please get help! You can find additional resources by clicking here and here. 

A "Nice" Impression

A few years ago, my older brother brought his new girlfriend home to meet my parents for the first time.  Because I was not there to meet her, I asked my mom what she was like afterward.  My mom started out by saying, “She’s really nice,” and then continued to say that she was “nice” multiple times throughout our conversation.  Because my mom used a fairly average trait multiple times to describe my brother’s new girlfriend, my main take-away from this conversation was that she was either really terrible (and my mom was trying to think of positive things to say) or that she was really boring. 

            Later on, I spoke with my brother to learn more about his new girlfriend and he was gushing about her, saying things like, “She’s really smart, she has a 4.0.  She loves animals.  She just got into veterinarian school.”  It was fairly clear that she made my brother very happy.  Yet, I could not overlook my first impression of her, that she was boring.

            Although my brother described his girlfriend overwhelmingly positively, you may be wondering why I still thought that she was average.  Social psychologist Norman Anderson would use his information integration theory (1981) to describe how I assimilated information about my brother’s girlfriend to form an impression of her.  Anderson would explain that I took a weighted average of the traits that I was presented (Anderson, 1981); in other words, I averaged how important I believed the traits to be.  For instance, to me, nice is about a six out of ten on importance, whereas intelligence is about a ten (not that nice isn’t a good trait, it is just not exceptional).  Thus, although my brother provided me with many remarkable traits (e.g., intelligence), my mom’s description (using a fairly average trait) diluted my impression, leading to her seeming fairly average and boring.

            Other social psychologists would say that my impression was influenced by confirmation biases, specifically a perseverance effect (Anderson, Lepper, & Ross, 1980; Darley & Gross, 1983).  Confirmation biases are when we understand information in light of previously held information, in order to confirm our first impression (Darley & Gross, 1983).  Because I had already formed an impression of my brother’s girlfriend as boring, I interpreted the traits he provided differently.  For example, I interpreted the fact that she has a 4.0 GPA to mean that she was no fun (even though having a 4.0 is a great thing in my book!). 

Furthermore, perseverance effects are when we persist in a belief, even when it has been discredited (Anderson et al., 1980).  My belief that she was boring continued, even after the first couple of times that I spent time with her and found her to be pretty interesting!  Luckily, I have gotten to know her better and have changed my impression of her, but it just goes to show that first impressions are not always accurate. (n=488)

References

Anderson, C. A., Lepper, M. R., & Ross, L. (1980). Perseverance of social theories: The role of explanation in the persistence of discredited information. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39(6), 1037-1049.

Anderson, N. H. (1981). Foundations of Information Integration Theory.  New York: Academic Press.

Darley, J. M. & Gross, P. H. (1983). A hypothesis-confirming bias in labeling effects. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44(1), 20-33.

So Long, Farewell (to my skill as a musician)!

For years, my mom dreamed of having a family of musicians.  Because I have four siblings, I think (for whatever reason) she visualized all five of us forming a band.  One of her favorite movies is the Sound of Music, so I think that this scene is probably pretty similar to what she had in mind…

My older brother complied and learned to play an assortment of instruments, including piano, tuba, trumpet, and trombone.  He actually went above and beyond my mom’s expectations and now can play a total of eight instruments; he even joined the band in high school and college.  So, when I was in high school and was still not proficient with an instrument, my mom felt that I, compared to my brother, was slacking.  

Just look at that show-off! (He's the one in the middle)

Thus, my mom took it upon herself to buy me a brand new guitar (because every band needs a guitar, right?), complete with six months’ worth of guitar lessons.  Consequently, I gave it a chance.

Because my brother was so musically-inclined, I was very ambitious and I determined that I was going to be just as talented within the first couple of weeks.  After a while, I was still absolutely terrible not very good and I began to get frustrated.  Therefore, I started procrastinating when I was supposed to practice.  Then, when I got to my guitar lesson, I could just explain my terrible playing to my instructor by saying, “Oh I didn't have time to practice. I had too much homework” or “I had a basketball practice last night and I was just too tired,” or something along those lines. 

I did not realize it at the time, but I was self-handicapping.  Self-handicapping is when people put obstacles in their own way, to preserve their self-esteem from failure (Berglas & Jones, 1978). 

First, I was setting myself up to fail, by setting unrealistic expectations (e.g., comparing myself to my brother, who had been playing instruments for many years).  Past work has found that one self-handicapping technique (often used by perfectionists) is to set impractical goals for oneself (Hewitt et al., 2003), which is exactly what I did.  So when I failed, I could blame my failure on my idealistic standards, instead of my own competence at learning to play guitar.

Second, I procrastinated and did not practice as much as I should have.  One study theorized that people procrastinate as a self-handicapping technique (Ferrari, 1998); in other words, people give themselves an excuse for failure, which helps to buffer their self-esteem from the idea that their failure was their own fault.  By convincing myself that I was too busy to practice, I gave myself an excuse for not playing well.  

Of course, by self-handicapping, I never learned to play guitar.  Ironically, by setting myself up to fail, I actually failed.  So, although we don’t have a family full of musicians, at least my brother plays enough instruments to make up for my self-handicapping!  (n=492)

References

Berglas, S., & Jones, E. E. (1978). Drug choice as a self-handicapping strategy in response to noncontingent success.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 36(4), 405-417.   doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.36.4.405

Ferrari, J. R. (1998). Procrastination. In H. S. Friedman (Ed.). Encyclopedia of mental health (pp. 5.1-5.7). San Diego: Academic Press.

Hewitt, P. L., Flett, G. L., Sherry, S. B., Habke, M., Parkin, M., Lam, R. W., ... & Stein, M. B. (2003). The interpersonal expression of perfection: Perfectionistic self-presentation and psychological distress. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(6), 1303-1325.

The Worst Procrastinator Ever

Self-concepts are an integration of what people think and believe about themselves.  According to Hazel Markus (1977), self-concepts are made up of cognitive self-schemas, which help individuals to organize thoughts about themselves to process information more proficiently.  We more easily recall information that adheres to our self-schema and disregard information that doesn’t (Markus, 1977).  For example, I think that I am a hard-working person, which is part of my self-schema.  I can recall plenty of times when people have told me so, such as when past employers have written recommendation letters for me.  However, last year my roommate called me “the worst procrastinator ever.”  I remember arguing with her and telling her that I don’t procrastinate that much and that I work really hard.  In retrospect, however, I did procrastinate quite a bit.  Clearly, procrastinating did not fit into my self-schema of being hard-working, which led to our disagreement.  Similarly, if I do not finish something by a deadline that I set, I often feel very disappointed in myself (even if I finish it before the real deadline), illustrating that our self-schemas have a large impact on how we feel about ourselves (Markus, 1977). 

Furthermore, Markus (1977) argues that our self-concept is structured around schematic traits, the self-schemas that we view as most important to our self-concept.  Not only do schematic traits affect our processing about ourselves, but also about others; they allow us to make quick judgments about other people based on where they fall on the schematic trait (Markus, 1977).  One of my schematic traits, as described above, would be that I am hard-working.  In general, I do not like group projects because I always feel like my peers are not as dedicated to the project as I am.  I can remember one particular instance when a teacher assigned us to groups for a project.  When my group first met and introduced ourselves, I was quick to judge one member of the group.  After he introduced himself, he stated that we should not worry if he seems lazy because even if he doesn’t show up for meetings or finish his material before the group deadlines, he will eventually get his stuff done.  As soon as the meeting ended, I met with my teacher to demand to switch to a different group.  Because the group member appeared to be the polar opposite on one of my schematic traits, I was very quick to judge him.  Perhaps if I had stayed in that group, he could have proven my judgment incorrect. (n= 421)

References

Markus, H. (1977). Self-schemata and processing information about the self. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 35(2), 63-78.

Welcome!

Welcome to my Social Psychology Blog! 

Here are a couple things about me:

1. I love coffee!  My new favorite coffee drink is Normandy coffee, which is similar to Wassail or mulled apple cider, but with the addition of coffee.  Essentially, it is a blend of coffee, apple juice, oranges, and spices.

2. One of my favorite things to do is cook.  I like making different things, especially vegetarian meals.  My favorite dishes that I have made recently are mushroom risotto and ratatouille.

3.  I caught the travel bug last summer when I studied abroad! The next places that I hope to visit are Greece and Spain.