C4

Question 1

Social Perception

Answer 1

The study of how we form impressions of and

make inferences about other people.

Question 2

Nonverbal Communication

Answer 2

–How people communicate, intentionally or 
unintentionally, without words
–Examples:
▪Facial expressions
▪Tone of voice
▪Gestures
▪Body position
▪Movement
▪Use of touch
▪Gaze

Question 3

Darwin’s theory on nonverbal communication

Answer 3

Darwin
–Nonverbal forms of communication is species, not
culture, specific
–Example: Susskind and colleagues (2008)
▪Studied facial expressions of fear and disgust
▪Found that muscle movements opposite each other
–Fear: enhanced perception—facial and eye movements
increase sensory input
–Disgust: decreased perception—facial and eye movements
decrease sensory input

Question 4

Encode

Answer 4

–Express or emit nonverbal behavior

▪Examples: smiling, patting someone on the back

Question 5

•Decode

Answer 5

–Interpret the meaning of nonverbal behavior
▪Example: deciding pat on the back was an
expression of condescension, not kindness

Question 6

six (or seven) major emotions/expressions

Answer 6

joy
sad
anger
fear
disgust
surprise

maybe contempt

Question 7

Affect blends

Answer 7

Facial expressions in which one part of the
face registers one emotion while another part
of the face registers a different emotion

Question 8

Display rules

Answer 8

–Dictate what kinds of emotional expressions
people are supposed to show
–Are culture-specific
–Eg, personal space

Question 9

Emblems

Answer 9

–Nonverbal gestures that have well-understood
definitions within a given culture
–Usually have direct verbal translations, like the “OK”
sign.
•Emblems are not universal!

Question 10

speed of first impressions

Answer 10

Form initial impressions based on facial
appearance in less than 100 milliseconds!
•Infer character from faces as young as 3 years
old
Limited exposure can lead to meaningful first
impressions of abilities and personalities

Question 11

thin slicing

Answer 11

Drawing meaningful conclusions about another
person’s personality or skills based on an extremely
brief sample of behavior

Question 12

Primacy Effect

Answer 12

–When it comes to forming impressions, the first traits
we perceive in others influence how we view
information that we learn about them later

Question 13

•Belief Perseverance

Answer 13

–The tendency to stick with an initial judgment even in
the face of new information that should prompt us to
reconsider

Question 14

Using First Impressions and Nonverbal

Communication to Our Advantage

Answer 14

Public speaking:
–Make sure opening is strong
•Job interview:
–Dress, eye contact, body posture all affect 
evaluations
•Hand shake quality:
–Affects assessments of personality and final hiring 
recommendations

Question 15

Attribution theory

Answer 15

The way in which people explain the causes
of their own and other people’s behavior
–Internal, dispositional attribution
–External, situational attribution

Question 16

happy marriage attributions

Answer 16

Partner’s positive behaviors are internally attributed; negative behaviors are externally (contextually) attributed

Question 17

distressed marriage attributions

Answer 17

Partner’s positive behaviors are externally (contextually) attributed; negative behaviors are internally attributed

Question 18

covariation model on causal attributions

Answer 18

theory: to form an attribution about what caused a person’s behavior, we systematically note the pattern between the presence or absence of possible causal factors and whether or not the behavior occurs

Question 19

The Covariation Model: how?

Answer 19

Focuses on how behavior “covaries”
Across time, place, actors, and targets 
Examines how perceiver chooses an 
internal or an external attribution 
We make choices about internal versus 
external attributions by using three pieces 
of information
–Consensus
–Distinctiveness
–Consistency

Question 20

consensus

Answer 20

Consensus refers to the similarity between the actor’s behavior and the behavior of other people in similar circumstances/the extent to which other people behave in the same way in a similar situation.

high consensus=situational

Question 21

distinctiveness

Answer 21

The extent to which one particular actor
behaves in the same way to different
stimuli/how uncommon is it for this person to behave this way?

if it’s highly distinctive, uncommon

high distinctiveness=situational

Question 22

consistency

Answer 22

The extent to which the behavior between
one actor and one stimulus is the same
across time and circumstances. When the behavior is inconsistent, regardless of the level of consensus or distinctiveness, an attribution to circumstances is predicted.

high consistency=internal

Question 23

fundamental attribution error

Answer 23

Tend to make internal attributions for other
people’s behavior and underestimate the
role of situational factors

Question 24

•Why does the fundamental attribution error

occur?

Answer 24

•Perceptual Salience

Question 25

•Perceptual Salience

Answer 25

–The seeming importance of information that is the
focus of people’s attention
–Tend to focus attention on person, not the
surrounding situation

Question 26

two step attribution process

Answer 26

1. Make an internal attribution
   –Assume that a person’s behavior was due to
   something about that person
   –Occurs quickly, spontaneously
2. Adjust attribution by considering the situation
   –May fail to make enough adjustment in second step
   –Requires effort, conscious attention

Question 27

two step attribution process

Answer 27

1. Make an internal attribution
   –Assume that a person’s behavior was due to
   something about that person
   –Occurs quickly, spontaneously
2. Adjust attribution by considering the situation
   –May fail to make enough adjustment in second step
   –Requires effort, conscious attention

Question 28

self serving attributions/bias

Answer 28

•Explanations for one’s successes that credit
internal, dispositional factors, and explanations
for one’s failures that blame external, situational
factors/bias=tendency to self serve attribute
–More prevalent in Western, individualistic cultures
than Eastern collectivist cultures

Question 29

Belief in a just world

Answer 29

–The assumption that people get what they
deserve and deserve what they get
–Type of defensive attribution
Advantage is that it allows people to deal with feelings of
vulnerability, mortality
Disadvantage: Blaming the victim

Question 30

cultural differences in fundamental attribution error

Answer 30

Members of individualistic cultures prefer dispositional attributions
Members of collectivistic cultures prefer situational explanations

Question 31

cultural differences in attribution experiment

Answer 31

Hedden and colleagues (2008) used functional magnetic
resonance imaging (fMRI) to identify where in the brain
cultural experience predicts processing
•Judged length of line inside boxes
•Two conditions:
– Ignore the box around each line (ignore context)
– Pay attention to the box around each line (attend to context)
•Results:
– Americans: greater brain activation when told to pay attention to context (meaning harder to pay attn to context)
– East Asians: greater brain activation when told to ignore context (meaning harder to ignore context)