Psychoanalysis of "Mean Girls"
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SocialPsychologyMeanGirlsS21-class.pptx
Social Psychology
Mean Girls
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The Nature and Origins of Stereotyping
Prejudice
Negative attitudes (affective) toward the members of a specific social group
Stereotyping
Beliefs (cognitive) about social groups in terms of the traits or characteristics that they are believed to share
Discrimination
Negative behaviors (behavioral) directed toward members of different social groups
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Social identity theory
A theory concerned with the consequences of perceiving the self as a member of a social group and identifying with it
People easily divide the social world into us (the in-group) versus them (the out-group)
People considered part of the ‘us’ category are thought of more favorably than those in the ‘them’ category
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Thinking about the self: Personal versus Social Identity
Social identity theory- addresses how we respond when our group identity is salient
Personal-versus-social identity continuum- signifies the two distinct ways that we can categorize ourselves
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Other people are not easy to figure out.
Why are they the way they are?
Why do they do what they do?
We all have a fundamental fascination with explaining other people’s behavior, but all we have to go on is observable behavior:
What people do
What they say
We can’t know, truly and completely, who they are and what they mean to us.
Instead, we rely on our impressions and personal theories, putting them together as well as we can, hoping they will lead to reasonably accurate and useful conclusions.
Attribution
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Attribution: Some Basic Sources of Error
Fundamental attribution error
Tendency to explain others’ actions as stemming from dispositions even in the presence of clear situational causes
We tend to think of others in terms of global traits and tend to discount external causes of behavior
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Actor-Observer Effect: “You Fell; I Was Pushed”
Tendency to attribute:
own behavior mainly to situational causes
behavior of others mainly to dispositional causes
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Self-Serving Attributions
Self-Serving Attributions
Explanations for one’s successes that credit internal, dispositional factors and explanations for one’s failures that blame external, situational factors.
Defensive Attributions
Explanations for behavior that avoid feelings of vulnerability and mortality.
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Self-Serving Attributions
Why do we make self-serving attributions?
Most people try to maintain their self-esteem whenever possible, even if that means distorting reality by changing a thought or belief.
We want people to think well of us and to admire us. Telling others that our poor performance was due to some external cause puts a “good face” on failure; many people call this strategy “making excuses.”
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Self-Serving Attributions
One form of defensive attribution is to believe that bad things happen only to bad people or at least, only to people who make stupid mistakes or poor choices.
Therefore, bad things won’t happen to us because we won’t be that stupid or careless.
Melvin Lerner called this the belief in a just world—the assumption that people get what they deserve and deserve what they get.
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The Potential Benefits of Contact
Contact hypothesis- Increased contact can decrease prejudice by increasing familiarity and reducing anxiety
Can recognize similarities between groups
Cross-group friendships can reduce anxiety associated with interacting with the out group.
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Self-Esteem: Attitudes toward Ourselves
One’s overall attitude toward the self
The degree to which the self is perceived positively or negatively; stable or unstable; Does it vary across contexts
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Implicit Self-Esteem
Implicit Association Test:
Classification task
measures strength of automatic associations between target and attribute categories
Automatic attitude activation
attitudes are activated automatically on encounter with attitude-objects
Self-Esteem IAT (Greenwald & Farnham, 2000)
target = me vs. not me
attribute = positive vs. negative
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Sequence of Steps for Self-Esteem IAT
| Steps | Left Key | Right Key |
| 1 | positive | negative |
| 2 | me | them |
| 3 | positive or me practice | negative or them practice |
| 4 | Positive or me critical | Negative and them critical |
| 5 | them | me |
| 6 | Positive and them practice | Negative or me practice |
| 7 | Positive and them critical | Negative or me critical |
Normative Social Influence
Given this fundamental human need for social companionship, it is not surprising that we often conform in order to be accepted by others.
The influence of other people that leads us to conform in order to be liked and accepted by them.
This type of conformity results in public compliance with the group’s beliefs and behaviors but not necessarily private acceptance of those beliefs and behaviors.
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Informational Social Influence
Social influence based on the desire to be correct
Especially strong source of conformity when the task is important, and difficulty and uncertainty are high
When someone is uncertain with respect to how to act or you are not sure of the answer to a question, you look around for information in your environment.
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Grade School
The general school atmosphere creates an environment of exclusion, mockery and taunting, making life extremely difficult for a sizable number of students.
Most high schools are cliquish places where students are shunned if they are “wrong”-wrong side of the tracks, wearing the wrong clothes, too short, too fat, too tall or too thin.
Cady
4:15
Cady Heron is a sweet girl who has just started public high school for the first time since moving from South Africa
She has no notions of how people behave or ought to behave in cliques and groups.
Unable to make sense of what is going on around her, Cady has to learn about the politics of the high school
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rekn_T5ZAfw 2:33
7:15
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMTPp-QGWfo&list=PL5NarVlMDfGG_Rgal6oaXmusTWK3JsF_q&index=3
Popular kids are generally “alpha males” and “queen bees” -may be more athletic, talkative, attractive or simply controlling than other members of a group.
These kids generally have social skills that draw others to them and are considered leaders of a group
Bi strategic controllers
http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/going-to-school/social/cliques/
9:00
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMTPp-QGWfo&list=PL5NarVlMDfGG_Rgal6oaXmusTWK3JsF_q&index=3 1:10
Where you sit in the cafeteria is crucial
The plastics invite Cady to sit with them-why?
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By Tim Urban
The mammoth’s hurricane of fear of social disapproval plays a factor in most parts of most people’s lives.
It’s what makes you feel weird about going to a restaurant or a movie alone;
It’s what makes parents care a little too much about where their child goes to college;
It’s what makes you pass up a career you’d love in favor of a more lucrative career you’re lukewarm about;
it’s what makes you get married before you’re ready to a person you’re not in love with.
(Tim Urban) https://waitbutwhy.com/2014/06/taming-mammoth-let-peoples-opinions-run-life.html
Sometimes, a mammoth’s focus isn’t on wider society as much as it’s on winning the approval of a “Social Master” in your life.
A “Social Master” is a person or group of people whose opinion matters so much to you that they’re essentially running your life.
A “Social Master” is often a parent, or maybe your significant other, or sometimes an alpha member of your group of friends.
(Tim Urban) https://waitbutwhy.com/2014/06/taming-mammoth-let-peoples-opinions-run-life.html
Regina
Attractive, intelligent, socially adept which gives her the power to control others.
She understands what makes others tick: bi-strategic controller
She deliberately plays people against each other, manipulating them and their insecurities
Makes her own rules
26:30
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0JMoa4QfA0 1:20
Can Regina have any real friends?
Can Regina be defeated?
20:40 Burn book
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Jc7IST4ABI&list=PL5NarVlMDfGG_Rgal6oaXmusTWK3JsF_q&index=5 0:30
Anthropologists believe that throughout human history, gossip has been a way for us to bond with others—and sometimes a tool to isolate those who aren’t supporting the group.
The darkest side of gossip emerges when it becomes the weapon—whether deployed by equal rivals fighting for a position, or by a senior executive protecting her territory.
Drexler (2014)
Gretchen and Karen
Are they mean?
Do they possess the social acumen that Regina and Cady have?
Janis and Damian
Lovable loser/straight shooter
Underestimates Cady’s social acumen –but knows she is a threat to the plastics and uses that for her own purpose
Rejected by the Plastics –how does she compensate?
Why does she dress the way she does?
Rejected Kids At the highest social risk are “rejected kids.” There are two types:
Rejected-submissive kids who become sad and withdrawn to avoid attracting attention
Rejected-aggressive kids can become emotionally explosive if teased excessively. “These kids are not necessarily violent kids, but they are the kids who frequently act up and may wind up in the principal’s office,”
http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/going-to-school/social/cliques/
Observational Learning
31:45
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPwrmfRVwoA
Trying to bring down Regina, but what happens?
43:00
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1JZBseDjfU&list=PL5NarVlMDfGG_Rgal6oaXmusTWK3JsF_q&index=8
Cady has the social acumen that Regina possesses.
Uses it to take out Regina.
“This pattern of aggression is among kids who are relatively popular targeting their rivals, and this tends to escalate until they climb to the very top rung of the social ladder,” Robert Faris(University of California Davis).
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Relational Aggression
Viewing media images of relational aggression impacts subsequent aggression. Girls hide their aggression because they are taught not to be openly aggressive.
The victim may desire an end to the cruelty, but she may still endure it in order to maintain her position within the group
Cady comments (referring to Gretchen): “She knew it was better to be in The Plastics hating life than to not be in it at all.”
Sometimes films show that it only takes one person to make a difference. If someone is willing to take a stand, then the mean girls will lose their power-but is this the case?
Cecil (2008)
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Relational Aggression
Mix of popularity and aggressive behavior
“…girls are socially competitive creatures and that, in their efforts to be popular and powerful, they inflict lifelong damages on their victims.”
While films typically portray aggression by teenage males as a serious moral issue, the mean girl is typically depicted in a comedic fashion.
Cecil (2008)
Relational Aggression
51:30
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVN7TJRRskQ
Women can be extraordinarily mean. “When girls feel angry or resentful, they hurt one another by verbal insults, friendship manipulation, or nonverbal expressions of disgust or disdain.”
“Girls attack each other with behaviors that might be less overt and obvious than boys’ fighting but are no less hurtful or injurious.
Girls hurt each other’s feelings by social exclusion via sneers, verbal comments, nasty notes, gossip and texting.”
Cecil (2008)
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Cady rises to power and takes over the role of queen bee
54:40
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDnJgO1K0dE
Cady becomes a mean girl.
1:00:15
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sT8wMBeVffk
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Bullying
The girls find out that nearly every girl has been victimized in this way. The teacher responds: “There has been some girl-on-girl crime here.” She has them write apologies and play trust games; however, this intervention is not successful in bringing these girls together.
Why doesn’t this work? Can adults help?
“…scoffs at the act’s potential to heal wound—in fact, it shows the possibly more realistic outcome of dividing the girls further”.
Instead it is the popular student, Cady, that brings peace to the school.
Cecil (2008)
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The film also sends a message about power. What do we have to do to become powerful? Who can stop this type of behavior?
Having been raised in Africa, Cady commonly compares the rules of girl world to that of the African wilderness.
Our society does not approve of females participating in open conflict, which helps socialize them to use the hidden tactics inherent in relational aggression.
Cecil (2008)
Moss (2005) comments, “the mean girl has been absorbed as a pop culture figure, while any insight regarding how she got that way (or the degree of cultural change necessary to eliminate her kind) is forgotten”
Not one of the powerless victims fight back-why?
Rather it is a former mean girl herself who is able to deal with the problem
It has been reported that in childhood and adolescence, girls typically begin to experience a decrease in self-esteem whereas the self-esteem of boys typically increases or stays the same
Pollastri et al. (2009) finds that girls who bully reported an increase in self-esteem
The social advantage for girls of bullying appears to be related to an increase in these girls’ sense of global self-worth (stealing a boyfriend, etc.)
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Bullying
Bullying
On one hand, it becomes clear that girls depend on their female friends to navigate their way through life. These friendships can be strong and based on trust and support.
On the other hand, one learns that girls can be extremely cruel to one another
Pairing personal information with positive social feedback (Likes on Instagram or Facebook) can increase self-esteem.
The relationship with aggression is strongest when high explicit self-esteem is combined with low implicit self-esteem, as it is in narcissism.
Cecil (2008)
Narcissism
Social dominance is more central to an adolescent girl’s global self-esteem.
Regina-Fragile self-esteem
At the end Cady gains a sense of implicit and explicit self-esteem-happy with who she is.
1:31:40
https:// www.youtube.com / watch?v = LshX2God-wk 5:10
