Microsoft Word Chapter 1 done doc

 
1.3 SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY ON CUTTING EDGE : 
 
Social psychology is ever developing science. Various 
journals of social psychology publish research done in this area: 
some of them are Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 

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Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Journal of Experimental 
Social Psychology, Journal of Applied Social Psychology, are some 
examples. In this section, we would discuss current trends, the 
cutting edge of Social Psychology.
1.3.1 Cognition and Behaviour : 
 
Couple of decades back, cognition and behaviourism were 
considered as two different kinds of things in psychology. But it no 
longer exists. Cognition and behaviour are currently considered as 
intimately linked and related approaches. Present research findings 
are clearly indicating that the cognition and behaviour need to be 
considered as strongly linked with each other.
1.3.2 Social Neuroscience : 
 
Social neuroscience is merging of two different fields: social 
psychology and neuroscience. In fact, now specialist journals are 
being published in this area, eg, Social Neuroscience. This 
interdisciplinary field is devoted to understanding how biological 
systems execute social processes and behaviour. It uses concepts 
and methods from biological sciences to understand and purify 
theories of social thought, behaviour and processes. The MRI 
(Magnetic Resonance Imagery), fMRI (Functional MRI), PET 
(Positron Emission Temography) are commonly used techniques in 
this science. Typically, when people engage in social activities, 
their biological parameters are measured.
For example, Ito and Urland (2003) asked white students to 
indicate ethnicity (black / white) and gender (Male / Female) of the 
photograph shown while measuring their event related brain 
potential. Results shown that initially attention was paid to ethnicity 
and then to gender. Other social factors (presence of other 
members) activated brain later. This indicates that people consider 
ethnicity and gender as important factors and paid attention first.