CS 160 Lecture 18 Professor John Canny Fall

CS 160: Lecture 18 Professor John Canny Fall 2004 10/7/2020 1

Social Psychology 4 Why study it? 4 It helps us understand human collaboration, which is one of the most difficult areas of HCI. 10/7/2020 2

Mere presence effects 4 Simply being near others can lead to changed performance, e. g. Triplett’s fishing observations. 4 How would fishermen in a group perform differently from individuals? 10/7/2020 3

Mere presence effects 4 A: They catch more fish per fisherman ! 4 But specifically, which aspects of performance change? 10/7/2020 4

Mere presence 4 Stress, anxiety or stimulation increase physiological arousal, and arousal speeds up behavior. 4 The presence of others pushes these buttons… 4 But increased speed can also increase errors, so it can be bad on difficult tasks. 10/7/2020 5

Mere presence 4 Increased arousal generally helps learning 4 But, it also heightens response to well- learned stimulae (Zajonic and Sales): It says “alpha helix” 10/7/2020 6

Mere presence 4 Mere presence isn’t quite the right idea. 4 The presence of a blindfolded subject didn’t increase arousal, and didn’t affect performance. 4 The presence of others evaluating or competing with us is what matters. 10/7/2020 7

Mere presence – Design Implications 4 Increasing the level of group “awareness” should increase mere presence effects: * * Heightened arousal Faster performance Increased learning More errors 4 Examples: * High awareness – video conferencing, phone * Medium – Instant messaging * Low awareness – Email 10/7/2020 8

Mere presence – Design Implications 4 What would be a good medium for: * Routine discussions? * Brainstorming? * Working on difficult tasks, e. g. programming? 10/7/2020 9

Attribution 4 How do we attach meaning to other’s behavior, or our own? 4 This is called attribution. 4 E. g. is someone angry because something bad happened, or because they are hot-tempered? 10/7/2020 10

Attribution: ourselves 4 Lets start with ourselves, how good are we at figuring out our emotions? 4 Schacter: it depends strongly environmental and physiological factors, and others near us. 4 The bottom line is that we can feel strong emotion, but struggle to recognize it as happiness or anger. 10/7/2020 11

Attribution theory 4 Attribution theory: was this behavior caused by personality, or environment? 4 Fundamental attribution error: * When I explain my own behavior, I rely on external explanations. * When I explain others’ behavior, I’m more likely to attribute it to personality and disposition. * e. g. other drivers are either “lunatics” (faster than me) or “losers” (slower than me). Of course, they have the same model about you … 10/7/2020 12

Attribution theory 4 How should you design communication systems to minimize attribution errors? 10/7/2020 13

Attribution theory – design implications 4 To reduce attribution errors, its important to have as much context as possible. 4 E. g. room-scale video-conferencing, or ambient displays: 10/7/2020 14

Social Comparison 4 We need to make comparisons to make judgements about people. Three rules: * Limitation: qualities must be observable and comparable to be attributed. * Organization: we use categories to describe and think about people; friendly, studious, careless etc. * Meaning: categories of personality must make sense, e. g. friendly and cooperative go together, friendly and hostile do not. 10/7/2020 15

Groups 4 Groups are a strong influence on our behavior. 4 A “reference” group is one we share a psychological connection with, e. g. a club or honor society we aspire to join. 4 We compare our selves to reference groups to make self-assessments. 10/7/2020 16

Groups 4 Groups give us value in several ways: 4 They provide us norms for behavior (informational function) 4 They satisfy interpersonal needs (interpersonal function) 4 They provide us with concrete support, resources, help (material function) 10/7/2020 17

Groups and Motivation 4 Groups increase motivation in two ways 4 First, the social interaction with the group intensifies individual motivation, and sometimes generates new individual motives. 4 Second, the group can cause group goals and motives to be created. E. g. group maintenance is goal most groups have. 10/7/2020 18

Group goals 4 Goals can be either short-term or long-term. 4 Long-term goals are harder to manage and maintain and generally have less effect on group behavior. 4 Short-term goals are strong force in motivating and reinforcing group performance. 10/7/2020 19

Group goals 4 The composition of the group can strongly affect its goals. 4 E. g. a group united by profession will tend to adopt goals related to the profession’s methods. 4 Groups often have subgroups that wield influence over the main group. They need not be majorities. 10/7/2020 20

Group experiences 4 Previous experience affects goal-setting. 4 Groups that have succeeded are more likely to raise goals, groups that have failed are unlikely to lower them. 10/7/2020 21

Group experiences – Design implications 4 Normative data can be very helpful – how am I doing compared to a typical colleague? * Compute normative data automatically 4 Set short-term goals, mark off successes – challenge to do this efficiently * PERT charts or Calendars * Daily software builds * Extreme programming 10/7/2020 22

Summary 4 Mere presence influences speed of performance, through evaluation and competition. 4 Attributions of behavior causes have an actor-observer effect. 4 Social comparison is how we make judgements. 4 Groups influence our perception of self and others through norms (reference groups). 4 Groups influence behavior as well. 10/7/2020 23

Break 10/7/2020 24

The Psychology of Creativity 4 Conformity: the enemy of creativity 4 Organizations encourage conformity: IBM, Disney etc. part of “corporate identity”. * Note: IBM research and many other research labs reject their corporation’s mainstream culture. 10/7/2020 25

The Psychology of Creativity 4 Pressure to conform affects judgment and perception: * The emperor’s new clothes 4 People in the minority will adopt majority opinion and even manufacture their own explanation of it. 10/7/2020 26

Enhancing Creativity 4 Thinking outside the box (literally): 4 Draw a series of 4 straight lines through all the points below, without lifting pen from paper: 10/7/2020 27

Why is this hard 4 Even without being told, we adopt expectations about what the solution should look like. 4 Based on conventions, and also what we believe the questioner expects. 10/7/2020 28

Creativity and Groups 4 Since groups create pressure to conform, they often hamper creativity. * This is called “groupthink”. * Groups are usually less creative than the individuals. * Email increases participation and reduces the effect of groupthink. 4 This contradicts our best experiences of group work. 4 What is missing? 10/7/2020 29

Creativity and Dissent 4 Authentic dissenters – people who really disagree with the group – can enhance group creativity. 4 Their opinion needn’t be right – but they can free the group from stagnant thinking. 4 The originality of the minority stimulates the majority. 10/7/2020 30

Dissent and authenticity 4 The benefits of dissent are weakened if either: * The dissent is not real, but is enacted: such as by a deliberate “devil’s advocate” in the group. (The devil’s advocate can actually stifle dissent, because the majority know their opinion is manufactured. ) * The group does not encourage dissent. Polite or pro-forma acceptance is not enough. 10/7/2020 31

Brainstorming 4 Based on IDEO’s principles * world’s best known Design firm. 10/7/2020 32

Brainstorming Rules 1. Sharpen the Focus 2. Playful Rules 3. Number your Ideas 4. Build and Jump 5. The Space Remembers 6. Stretch Your Mental Muscles 7. Get Physical 10/7/2020 33

Sharpen the Focus 4 Posing the right problem is critical – neither too narrow, nor too fuzzy 4 Not “bicycle cup-holders” but “helping cyclists to drink coffee without accidents”. 4 Focus outward (on the user’s needs) not on the company’s strengths. 10/7/2020 34

Playful Rules 4 Rules constrain choice and inhibit exploration. 4 Making the rules playful or ironical can shape the discussion without limiting it. 4 Examples: “encourage wild ideas, ” “be visual, ” “go for quantity. ” 10/7/2020 35

Number your ideas 4 Obvious but very useful 4 Helps keep track of them when the brainstormer is successful (and a hundred or more ideas are in play). 4 Allows ideas to take on an identity of their own. 10/7/2020 36

Build and Jump 4 Build to keep momentum on an idea: * “shock absorbers are a great idea; what are other ways to reduce coffee spillage on bumps? ” 4 Jump to regain momentum when a theme tapers out: * “OK, but what about hands-free solutions? ” 10/7/2020 37

The Space Remembers 4 Covering whiteboards or papering walls with text is extremely useful in group work. 4 It’s a very effective form of external (RAM!) memory for group members. 4 Even better, its shared RAM. It’s a way for group members to share understanding. 10/7/2020 38

Stretch your Mental Muscles 4 Warmups: word games, puzzles 4 Get immersed in the domain: go visit the toy shop, or the bicycle shop, phone shop etc… 4 Bring some examples of the technology to the brainstomer. 10/7/2020 39

Get Physical 4 Do as well as talk. 4 Sketching. 4 Making models. 4 Acting out. 10/7/2020 40

Ways to kill a brainstormer 1. The boss gets to speak first 2. Everybody gets a turn 3. Experts only 4. Do it offsite 5. No silly stuff 6. Write down everything 10/7/2020 41

Summary 4 Principles of creativity: 4 Groupthink dissent 4 Brainstorming: rules to discourage groupthink, and encourage divergent thought. 10/7/2020 46