Social Psychology

After researching the Social Psychology Network (SPN) website for a few days I noticed that there is a wealth of information on social psychology along with other areas of psychology. There are many links to other web sites such as Understandingprejudice.org and JoeChemo.org which the SPN site labels as partner sites. The SPN site also provides multiple search options under the SPN Directories tap where you can read up on professional profiles, social media and other social psychology topics. This site also offers an interactive forum where you can submit questions and read previous questions asked. The site also provides an about the network tap, under this tap you can click to find ways to donate or join the site as well as the sites history and mission statement. There are also links for career options and additional learning opportunity's like professional journals, online psychology studies, blogs, podcasts, Graduate programs and psychology text books. The site is maintained by Scott Plous who is affiliated with Wesleyan University. If you're looking for a place to get information on social psychology this is a great site to attach a face to a profile. With the search engine being so user friendly, it made it easy for me to locate the five social psychologist that research corresponds with this week's lecture. Below I will discuss the five theoretical perspectives found in this week's lecture, (social learning, evolutionary, sociocultural, and phenomenological and social cognition perspective) along with five social psychologists whose research corresponds with these theoretical perspectives. To conclude I will explain the role of culture and the importance of understanding how it relates to the research humans and the social psychologists I have chosen.

When we think about social psychology we often find ourselves trying to explain exactly what social psychology is or does. If we are asked to define social psychology it can be easily defined as the link between the two disciplines of psychology and sociology (Aronson, Wilson, & Akert, 2010). In other words, we are studying the social influence of how people interact and react to one another. Since social psychology focuses on the power of the social situation we can understand why many who study social psychology study the theoretical perspective of social psychology.

The first social psychologist I have chosen is Joshua Ackerman. Dr. Ackerman is currently an assistant professor at MIT Sloan School of Managementand has his Ph. D from Arizona State University. Dr. Ackerman's primary research areas are in evolution and genetics, social cognition, person perception, motivation and goal setting, interpersonal processes, helping pro-social behavior, emotion and mood affect, and close relationships. In short Dr. Ackerman is interested in most things that are theoretical and conceptual. His current work focuses on adaptive psychological mechanisms and the role it plays in the environment when it comes to decision-making and consumption. Dr. Ackerman fits the evolutionary perspective do to his studies on the influences on thoughts and decisions outside of the conscious awareness.

The second social psychologist is Glenn Adams. Dr. Adams works at the University of Kansas in there department of Psychology. He has taught classes primarily in culture and social psychology. Dr. Adams is also a SPN mentor and has written multiple Journal Articles and a Book. His primary Interest are in culture and ethnicity, close relationships, gender psychology, intergroup relations, prejudice and stereotyping, self-identity, sociology and social networks. Dr. Adams matches with the socio-cultural perspective as his current work focuses on the cultural grounding of personal relationship, emphasizing comparisons between North American and West African settings.

Next up is Phenomenological perspective, for this perspective I have chosen Dr. Sid Abdellaoui. Dr. Abdellaoui received his Ph.D. in Social and Work Psychology from the University of