U4 The Big Idea Blast: Getting Along

Getting Along

What are the challenges of human interactions?

Background

There are over 7 billion people currently living on our planet, and that number keeps
growing. Interacting with others is a part of life, for better or worse. Humans are not
solitary creature—we crave companionship. But interacting with our fellow humans
isn’t always easy. Human interaction can be fraught with all kinds of challenges. In
fact, there is a field of psychology devoted to studying all aspects of human
interaction: It is called social psychology.

Social psychologists are scientists who study the behavior of individuals in social
situations. They study both verbal and nonverbal communication. Their goal is to
understand the differences between the way people behave in groups and the way
they behave on their own. They study how group environments can influence our
actions, choices, and perceptions.

Background

Several interesting experiments have been conducted by social psychologists, including
one by Solomon Asch in the 1950s. Asch wanted to study conformity, or how people act
when exposed to peer pressure. Each subject of his experiment was told that he or she
would be put in a group of nine people and asked to work together to answer a simple
question. What the test subjects didn’t know was that the eight other people in the groups
were actors hired by Asch. The actors were told beforehand to decide on a wrong answer
to the question. Asch wanted to find out if the real test subject would insist on the right
answer, or if he or she would go along with the group despite knowing the group’s answer
was incorrect.

Surprisingly, Asch found that most people were willing to quash their own ideas in the
interest of group harmony. Many of them second-guessed themselves, thinking that they
must somehow be wrong if eight other people thought so.

Social conformity is just one challenge of human interaction that scientists study. What are
other challenges of human interaction?

Open Ended

What are the challenges of human interactions?

Poll

What do you think is the most challenging aspect of human interaction?

• Spcial conformity/peer pressure

• Predjuidice/stereotyping

• Conflict/conflict resolution

Multiple Choice

Number Crush! Take a guess what the number 25 means?!?

• Percertange of people who get cyberbullied online

• Percentage of preteens who have cellphones

• Percentage of people who refused to conform to the rest of the group and gave the correct answer in the Asch experiment

• Percentage of adults who walk to work