Transcript Teaching via integrative themes: Use streamers, not confetti

Teaching via Integrative Themes:
Use Streamers, not Confetti
Susan T. Fiske
Princeton University
Mardi Gras Problem
• Colorful, exciting, & human
• Long, rich tradition
• But too chaotic?
• Student overload: 600 theories
• Professor overload: no take-home
message
• Lots of leftover confetti
Themes: Finding Streamers
• Big-picture perspectives
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Notice patterns
Link topics
Find gaps
See directions
• Point of view
• Generate discussion
• Facilitate student initiatives
• Tell a good story
• Flows as narrative
Find Unifying Themes
How many?
• 1?
• Too broad: e.g., situationism
• 20?
• Grid problem: 20 themes x 15 chapters
• 7 +/- 2
• Memorable
Find Unifying Themes
Content of themes?
• Field itself will tell you
• Listen to its message
• Tell interested outsiders
• Pedagogical responsibility
• Represent accurately
• Can’t use own theory, own area
Find Unifying Themes
How evaluate?
• Each matters
• Each differs
• Together cover
• Principle underlies
Social Psych Example
Motives & goals
• Cut across all areas
• Long tradition
• Intuitively accessible
Social Beings
(Fiske, 2004)
• Social adaptation
• Other people are relevant niche
• Survival within the group
• Situationism: Respond to others*
• Culture as context
• Attuned to learn culture
• Variability & similarity
Core Social Motives
• Method
• Review 100 years of motives
• Personality & social psychology
• Criteria
• Consensus
• Heuristic
• Coherent
Core Social Motives
• BUC(K)ET
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Belonging
Understanding
Controlling
Enhancing Self
Trusting Others
• 5 +/- 5
Belonging, Defined
• Motive for strong stable relationships
• Ease of bonding
• Sherif, Festinger, Bowlby, Schachter
• Social isolates risk ill health, death
• Mortality, immune, cardiovascular risk
• Ostracism = death
• Survive & thrive in group if motivated
Belonging, Illustrated
• Close relationships
• Attach in dyads
• Follow relationship norms
• Helping
• Keep collective identity & norms
• Groups
• Seek, join, identify, & conform
Belonging, Illustrated
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Close relationships
Helping
Groups
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Attitudes (express identity)
Self (self-present)
Prejudice (define ingroup-outgroup)
Social influence (conform)
Belonging: Social Beings
• All maintain relationships
• What does it motivate here, now?
• Cultures vary
• Collectivist: stable networks
• Individualist: flexible autonomy
• Underlies other 4 motives
Belonging: Core of Core
Cognitive
Affective
• Understanding • Enhancing Self
• Controlling
• Trusting Others
Understanding, Defined
• Motive to share meaning & prediction
• Thinking is for (social) doing
• James, Gestaltists, Jones, Kelley
• Deviants endanger coordination
• Generate misunderstanding, confusion,
inefficiency, pressure, & rejection
• Survive & thrive if motivated to match
group’s cognition
Understanding, Illustrated
• Attribution
• Understanding intent, traits, feelings
• Social cognition
• Heuristics, mental representations
• Self
• Self-concept & self-verification
• Attitudes
• Object appraisal, persuasion
Understanding, Illustrated
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Attribution
Social cognition
Self
Attitudes
Also
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Attraction (similar, easily understood)
Prejudice (dissimilar, novel)
Aggression (hostile attribution)
Social influence (via information)
Understanding: Social Beings
• All maintain shared meaning
• What does it motivate here, now?
• Cultures vary
• Collectivist flexibility
• Individualist honesty
• One of 2 cognitive motives
Controlling, Defined
• Motive to perceive contingency
between behavior & outcomes
• Seek pattern of reinforcements
• White, Skinner, Adams, Walster
• Lack of control risks ill health
• Depression & learned
helplessness
• Survive & thrive if motivated to
be effective in group context
Controlling, Illustrated
• Social cognition
• Belief in control (esp. thoughts)
• Close relationships
• Mutual control in interdependence
• Aggression
• Frustrated control
• Prejudice
• Controlling outgroup threat
Controlling, Illustrated
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Social cognition
Close relationships
Aggression
Prejudice
Also
• Attributions (personal control)
• Helping (egoistic control)
• Social influence (obedience & compliance)
Controlling: Social Beings
• All maintain sense of effectance
• What does it motivate here, now?
• Cultures vary
• Collectivist group harmony control
• Individualist personal control
• One of 2 cognitive motives
Enhancing Self, Defined
• Motive to see self as worthy or improvable
• Self-esteem as key to well-being
• Freud, Maslow, Sullivan, Rosenberg
• Low self-esteem risks
• Mental & physical health
• Relationships
• Survive & thrive in group if motivated to
enhance self (sociometer)
Enhancing Self, Illustrated
• Self
• Self-esteem biases
• Attraction
• Similarity, reciprocity, looks
• Prejudice
• Subtle bias, ingroup favoritism
Enhancing Self, Illustrated
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Self
Attraction
Prejudice
Also
• Attribution (defensive biases)
• Helping (egoism)
• Aggression (narcissistic rage)
Enhancing Self: Social Beings
• All enhance self relative to others
• What does it motivate here, now?
• Cultures vary:
• Collectivist modesty, self-improvement
• Individualist pride
• One of 2 affective motives
Trusting, Defined
• Motive to view others as benign
• Benevolent world
• Rogers, Maslow, Sears, Taylor
• Distrust harms sociality
• Survive & thrive when motivated
to expect positivity
Trusting, Illustrated
• Social cognition
• Positivity bias
• Close relationships
• Attachment, interdependence
• Groups
• Loyalty
Trusting, Illustrated
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Social cognition
Close relationships
Groups
Also
• Helping (altruism)
• Social influence (obedience)
Trusting: Social Beings
• All motivate to see positivity
• What does it motivate here, now?
• Cultures vary:
• Collectivist: trust closest ingroup
• Individualist: trust generalized other
• Last of 2 affective motives
Social Beings
• Social adaptationist view
• Sensitivity to social situation
• Core social motives
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Belonging
Understanding
Controlling
Enhancing self
Trusting
• Cultures vary
Integrative Themes:
Streamers, Not Confetti
• Tell a good story
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Unity
Narrative flow
Memory aid
Coherence
Organization
• Intellectual challenge
• Practical & useful
Thank you