Social Psychology

Posted: December 10th, 2013

Assignment
The Godfather (1972) is the movie to analyze. After reviewing notes and readings, identify 3 different social-psychological principles that appear to be operating in the events or individuals depicted in the film (e.g., cognitive dissonance, schemas, self-fulfilling prophecies, groupthink, deindividuation, conformity, realistic conflict theory, modern racism, etc.). For each principle that you identify:

1. Briefly describe the relevant scene (you may assume that your reader has seen the film).

2. Describe in detail the social-psychological principle you believe is relevant. Your job here is to demonstrate that you understand the principle or theory, and that you can describe it in your own words. You should be conveying your knowledge without the aid of others’ words. It would be beneficial to describe the original research on the psychological concept or some of the more recent research on the concept. Again, you need to show that you have a good understanding of the concept/principle. It’s best if you are specific about the principles you discuss. For example, don’t just indicate that your scene illustrates helping, or conformity, or persuasion, or aggression. Instead, indicate what specific theory, or principle or aspect of helping/conformity/persuasion/aggression, etc. that your scene illustrates.

3. Elaborate on how the selected scene illustrates the principle you have identified. It’s also okay to write about how a scene fails to follow predictions derived from the social-psychological principle or theory. Where possible, make reference to how your scene maps onto specific research findings (for example, describe how the scene is similar to or different from relevant experiments you’ve read or heard about). It’s very important that you do more than simply say something like “this scene illustrates conformity.” You must be specific on precisely how and in what form the scene illustrates conformity.

4. Remember, you must identify 3 DIFFERENT SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL PRINCIPLES that are relevant to your film. Your written analysis should be succinct and well-written (5-6 pages). Be sure to include a short Introduction to orient the reader, as well as a short Discussion to tie things together.

THE PAPER MUST BE WRITTEN WITH PROPER APA FORMATTING.