The Social Animal with Elliot Aronson

Our guest today is an American psychologist who has carried out experiments on the theory of cognitive dissonance and invented the Jigsaw Classroom, a cooperative teaching technique that facilitates learning while reducing interethnic hostility and prejudice.  In his 1972 social psychology textbook, The Social Animal, he stated his First Law: "People who do crazy things are not necessarily crazy," thus asserting the importance of situational factors in bizarre behavior. He is the only person in the 120-year history of the American Psychological Association to have won all three of its major awards: for writing, for teaching, and for research.  In 2007 he received the William James Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Association for Psychological Science, in which he was cited as the scientist who "fundamentally changed the way we look at everyday life.”  A Review of General Psychology survey, published in 2002, ranked him as one of the most cited psychologists of the 20th century. He officially retired in 1994 but continues to teach and write. It is an immense honour to host him on today’s show to share his brilliant work. We welcome the author of The Social Animal, amongst a plethora of others,  Elliot Aronson, welcome to the show Jigsaw Classroom: https://www.jigsaw.org