Chapter 2: Perception, Personality, Emotion Flashcards
Perception is determining whether a given behaviour is
internally or externally caused.
Perception
how individuals organize and interpret their impressions to give meaning to their environment.
Importance of Perception (2)
- Behaviour based on perception of what reality is, not on reality itself.
- World as it is perceived is the world that is behaviourally important
Goals of Understanding Perception (3)
- Better understand how people make attributes about events
- We don’t see reality; we interpret what we see and call it reality
- Attribution process guides our behavior, regardless of truth of attribution
Perceptual Errors
Perception is susceptible to influence of external and internal factors
Attribution Theory
and pay attention to 3 things
How individuals should make attributions by paying attention to distinctiveness, consensus, and consistency
Distinctiveness
What does it assess?
External Attribution
Internal Attribution
- “How often does the person do this in other situations?”.
- External attribution: Not Often = high distinctiveness and thus situation is likely responsible for behavior
- Internal attribution: Very Often = low distinctiveness and thus person is likely responsible for behavior
Consensus
What does it assess?
External Attribution
Internal Attribution
“How often do other people do this in similar situations?”.
External attribution: Very Often = high consensus and thus situation is likely responsible for behavior
Internal attribution: Not Often = low consensus and thus person is likely responsible for behavior
Consistency
What does it assess?
External Attribution
Internal Attribution
“How often did the person do this in the past?”.
External attribution: Not Often = low consistency and thus situation is likely responsible for behavior
Internal attribution: Very Often = high consistency and thus person is likely responsible for behavior
Attribution for Self-Serving-Bias
Example
Tendency to attribute one’s success to internal factors and blame for failures on external factors
Example: if I get A+ then attribute to talents, hard work, smartness (internal) but if F then attribute to exam hard, professor didn’t explain (External)
Attribution for others – Fundamental Attribution Error
Example
Tendency to underestimate external factors and overestimate internal factors when making judgements about other’s behaviors.
Example: if John gets A+ I attribute to his luck or the easy test (External) and if gets an F I attribute to his lack of talent (Internal)
Selective Perception:
people’s tendency to selectively interpret what they see based on interests, background, experience and attitudes
Halo Effect
tendency to draw a general impression about an individual based on a single characteristic, such as intelligence, like-ability, or appearance, first impression
Contrast Effect
person’s evaluation is affected by comparisons with other individuals recently encountered
Phenomenon:
fact or situation that is observed to exist or happen, especially one whose cause or explanation is in question.
Projection
Example
Tendency to attribute one’s own characteristic to other people. Project our preferences on others.
Example: If I like this food then others should as well
Stereotying
Negative
Positive
Tendency to judge someone on basis of our perception of the group to which they belong. Etc by race, sex, religion, ethnicity, culture, their job.
Negative aspect: Judge in negative view, perspective, excluded for their identity
Positive aspect: Useful when under time pressure to get to know someone.
Prejudice and how it is different than stereotyping
unfounded dislike of a person or group based on their belonging to a particular stereotyped group. Prejudice is always negative views whereas stereotyping can be negative, neutral and positive
Is It Possible to Eliminate Perceptual Errors?:
Errors are cognitive shortcuts for people to make quick decisions so unlikely to remove errors entirely. Must be aware of them when bias decisions are likely to cause significant damage
Personality
Stable patterns of behaviour, internal states that determine how an individual reacts and interacts with others
Why Is Personality Important?
Useful in hiring decisions, help manager forecast who fits job