"[S]ocial Psychologists regard their discipline as an attempt to understand and explain how thought, feeling and behavior of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of other human beings." This is contrasted with "higher level" disciplines which focus on "laws of social structure, social change, and cultural patterning." (G. Allport 1954, p. 5, in G. Lindzey Handbook of Social Psychology) Allport nominates Comte for the honor of founding social psychology. "[T]he true final science i.e., morale, is able to systematize the special knowledge of our individual nature, by virtue of an appropriate combination of the two points of view, the biological and the sociological (Comte, 1852 [seen in Allport, 1954]).

Most early theories were simple and sovereign. That is, they tended to have a single principle to account for social psychology. Examples include:

1. hedonism or utility, Bentham, J.S. Mill, Spencer, Dollard & Miller, Freud;
2. Egoism (power) Hobbes, Nietzsche, Adler, Le Dantec (a French biologist 1918);
3. Instinct, McDougall;
4. rationalism Locke, Madison;
5. irrationalism, Schopenhauer;
6. Sympathy, Adam Smith:
7. Imitation, Tarde, Mead;
8. classical conditioning, F. Allport;
9. Suggestion, Le Bon;
10. Group mind.

1. William McDougall (1871-1938) in 1908 textbook emphasized many instincts including social instincts such as a maternal instinct, an affiliative instinct, an instinct for love, an instinct for domination, an instinct for submission, an instinct for sharing, etc. His list of instincts changed regularly over the years, and there never was a stable list. Others also had instincts as the basis of human behavior. I recall someone reviewed the literature and came up with a list of over 1000 instincts.
2. Henry Murray (1893-1988) developed the TAT and invented measures of "needs" such as need achievement, need affiliation, need dominance (?). need succorance, and many others. Although these needs seem to me (Segal) to be very similar in their nature to McDougall’s instincts, they were seen to be personality traits which varied across individuals which came into play in social situations. This is one of the reasons social and personality psychologies came together for so many people.
3. Floyd Allport (1890-1978) some of the first experimental studies in social psychology. He identified "social facilitation" (one of the first experiments in social psychology), people performed better on tasks when others were around. His primary mechanism was conditioning.
4. Gordon Allport (1897-1968), studies on, rumor, attitudes and memory, prejudice and its effect on memory. He developed a "value profile" in which people’s value system could be measured. Values included Theoretical, Practical, Aesthetic, Social, Power, and Religious. He demonstrated that people develop false memories to support prejudices. Attitude measurement became important.
5. Carl Hovland-- the dynamics of attitude change, some attitudes are easier to change than others. Not only the message, but the intentions of the communicator influences attitude change. Public defense helps make one resistant to change. If the goal is to change an opinion, presenting both sides is better than presenting only one. To strengthen resolve, one side is better.
6. Thurstone, Likert, and others developed testing methods to measure attitudes, and especially during the second world war and immediately thereafter, there were many studies done with the goal of changing attitudes.
7. The "Hawthorne effect." Western Electric studies (1924-1927) on the value of bright lights. And its evidence for social facilitation found. This study has been used as a reminder that intentionally manipulated experimental variations may not be the cause of the measured effect.
8. Muzafer Sherif (1935) and group norms. Get judgments about something, and then finds if group gets together, their judgments converge. Autokinetic (point of light in a dark room) effect is an example. Peer pressure among adolescents. Development of group dislikes and prejudices, even over arbitrary differences if there are intergroup conflicts set up. One cannot negotiate successfully in hostile environments.
9. One version of group norms is "risky shift." Often group comes to a decision toward the most daring member’s position (Kogan, Pruitt)
10. Solomon Asch and social pressures, even for obvious physical events. Confederates act as subjects. Difficulty for a single person to resist. But the power of a colleague is great.
11. Group dynamics: Kurt Lewin, --[elements in the psychological field have a valence, positive valences attract and negative valences repel; there are also principles of balance among these forces. The forces upon an object should balance, or else there is a tension which might lead to change] Public commitment leads to action. To achieve a desired change one must overcome resistance, introduce innovation. Congruity theories include Festinger--cognitive dissonance, and Heider--balance theory.
12. Stanley Milgram and obedience in people’s responses even though they may not approve of their actions. Zimbardo--"police and prisoners"
13. Festinger, Riecken & Schachter, When prophesy fails. Two major kinds of reactions: Quit or proselytize.
14. Schachter, arousal and emotional content.
15. Latané and Darley--Bystander apathy. "Kitty Genovese" case. The diffusion of responsibility so no one aided at all.
16. Kenneth Clark--social stigmata played a role in Brown vs. Board of Education showing how stigmata interfere with learning: Separate in such cases can never be equal.