2 The Psychology of Social Dilemmas "I wonder men dare trust themselves with men"-William Shakespeare Every citizen enjoys the benefits of public services, such as hospitals, libraries and the police, but most will be reluctant to pay extra taxes to maintain them. Car drivers generally support the government's plans to promote public transportation. Yet, how many drivers are prepared to volunta...

An unobstrusive experimental manipulation was used to test the hypothesis that the mere presence of others can influence an individual’s performance. A task was employed for which there were no clear performance criteria, and which was very unlikely to engender evaluation apprehension. Performance times on this task (dressing and undressing in familiar and unfamiliar clothing) were compared for...

We present an alternative view to the dominant discourse in scientific psychology, where researchers are concerned primarily with predictability of phenomena based largely on simple tests of linear relation. Instead, the time-dependent and evolving nature of social experience and interaction can be examined using the methodology of nonlinear dynamical systems theory (NDS). We review relevant co...

The Common Ingroup Identity Model (CIIM) holds that four levels of categorization (the interpersonal, intergroup, and particularly, superordinate group, and dual identity levels) mediate the intergroup contact-bias relationship. CIIM was tested in an Anglo-French intergroup context with explicit and implicit (IAT) measures of prejudice. Results showed that the intergroup level partially mediate...

In a meta-analysis, the authors test the theoretical formulation that religiosity is a means for self-enhancement. The authors operationalized self-enhancement as socially desirable responding (SDR) and focused on three facets of religiosity: intrinsic, extrinsic, and religion-as-quest. Importantly, they assessed two moderators of the relation between SDR and religiosity. Macrolevel culture ref...

Social psychologists are interested in the ways that other people affect thought, emotion, and behavior. To explore these concepts requires special research methods. Following a brief overview of traditional research designs, this module introduces how complex experimental designs, field experiments, naturalistic observation, experience sampling techniques, survey research, subtle and nonconsci...