Author: btg10

social facilitation occurs when an individual performs a task better when others are around. This was first discovered by Norman Triplett in 1898. He had a cyclist race against another cyclist and then he had a cyclist race against the clock. He realized the cyclist rode faster when he was competing against someone else. In this situation, the cyclist rode faster due to himself being competitive. This is the co-action effect, where the task performance was increased when someone else alongside is performing the same task.

Another way that can increase an individual’s performance is when there are people watching the individual doing it. This phenomenon is called the audience effect. Dashiell found in 1933 that the subject’s multiplication skills increased when there were audience spectating. He was able to complete more equations when others are watching him. This only works when someone who’s performing the task is good at it in the first place; if the individual is bad at some task, and an audience is watching, the individual’s performance may actually decrease. This is called social loafing.

Social facilitation happens to me all the time. When I was in my high school varsity basketball team, we have to face people who are performing the same task while an audience is watching. This means both co-action and audience effect are taking place.  I have been playing this sports for a long time so naturally, my performance increased in games. I get really competitive as I want to be the best on the court and I also get really excited and wants to play harder when the there is a huge crowd. I remember playing in the Jr. NBA finals where I was playing in front of the biggest crowd I’ve seen, and I played my best basketball in that game.

 

 

Dashiell, J. F. (1935). Experimental studies of the influence of social situations on the behavior of individual human adults.

 

Triplett, N. (1898). The dynamogenic factors in pacemaking and competition. The American journal of psychology, 9(4), 507-533.

Misinformation effect occurs when one’s episodic memory becomes inaccurate due to information giving after an event. Loftus and Palmer showed a series of images that involves two cars hitting each other. They realize that using different verbs affect the participants’ prediction of the cars speeding. For example, using the verb “smash” makes the participants think the car is at a faster speed than “bump” or “hit”. Half the participants were then asked “how fast were the cars going when they hit each other” and the other half was asked, “how fast were the cars going when they smashed each other.” Then the researchers asked the participants whether they saw any broken glass, and the correct answer is there was no broken glass in the images. More participants that had the question “how fast were the cars going when they smashed each other?” answered they saw broken glass than the participants with the word “hit”. This shows that memories can be easily manipulated and makes the subject believe it’s real with just a few questions after the event.

 

This happens because memories are constructive. It is constantly build up upon each other and when there are gaps in memories, the brain tends to fill it up. This way our memories more coherent and connected. With some misinformation after the memory has been encoded in the brain, it can be constructed into existing memories appearing as a real memory. The information implemented after the event acts as retrograde amnesia and interferes with the memories of the event.

 

I think everyone had times where they experienced misinformation effect or have memories input in their brains that they don’t remember before. When I am taking a test, I have the habit of recalling the correct information that the professor said in class. This works most of the times and I would usually write out the correct answer. However, when I am uncertain about an answer I tend to recall fake memories, this happens often when it’s a multiple-choice test where I wouldn’t be so confident in choosing an answer. I would see one of the answer and start to “recall” the professor giving out that information in class even though it did not happen. I even have the correct voice and body language of the professor in my brain telling these things. These memories seem so real and I often would choose that answer and it would come out wrong most of the time.

 

Mcleod, Saul. “Loftus and Palmer.” Loftus and Palmer | Simply Psychology, 1 Jan. 1970, www.simplypsychology.org/loftus-palmer.html.