Those new to the subject of social psychology are welcomed with an introductory module that outlines the basic concepts and sub-disciplines within which social psychologists conduct research experiments, along with a little about the history of the practice.
Following this introduction, the Social Psychology Diploma Course guides you through a comprehensive exploration of 4 intrapersonal phenomena: attitudes, persuasion, social cognition, and self-concept, and 3 interpersonal phenomena: social influence, group dynamics, and interpersonal attraction.
You’ll learn how to define attitude, the components (cognitive, emotional, behavioural) and dimensions (strength, accessibility, ambivalence) that they consist of, the ways in which they are formed and can change, and the ways attitude can be measured.
Relating to attitudes and behaviours, the course provides you with a clear understanding of what persuasion is within the context of social psychology. This includes looking at the 5 variables that influence the effectiveness of persuasion, the methods used in persuasion, and theories on how persuasion works.
Social cognition is how we process the world in order to understand it. The Social Psychology Diploma Course explains how this happens and the intricacies of the processes involved – defining what it is, detailing attributions and bias, and how we use heuristics, schemas, stereotypes and scripts to make sense of the world around us.
A person’s self-concept is how we perceive ourselves - an all-encompassing awareness we had of ourselves in the past, have in the present and our expectations of the future. You’ll look at the importance of a healthy concept of self and what can influence this, the self-perception theory and how it relates to cognitive dissonance, and the link between self-esteem and self-concept.
Social influence is defined and explained in the Social Psychology Diploma Course through looking at its 3 common areas: conformity, compliance and obedience, and the factors that affect them. You’ll also look at group dynamics – what they are and how they work, the key areas of study for group characteristics: norms, roles and relations, the benefits and drawbacks of groups, and the dangers of deindividuation.
Looking on an individual level, the course explores interpersonal attraction and how this leads to relationships, both platonic or romantic, and how one person feels about another (level of like, dislike or hate). You’ll be guided through the dimensions of attraction, the factors that can influence attraction, and the social theories on the topic.
Having learned about a number of intrapersonal and interpersonal phenomena, the course walks you through research methods used in social psychology – the approaches and types of research methods and the ethics that need to be considered when undertaking research. To give you a real-world understanding of research in action, you’ll be exposed to 3 famous social psychology experiments and their important results: The Asch Conformity Experiments, The Milgram Experiment, and the Bobo Doll Experiment.
