Chapter 3

Question 1

What are the components of perception?

Answer 1

1. Perceiver
2. Target (What you’re looking at)
3. Situation

Question 2

Perception

Answer 2

Interpreting messages of the senses to provide order and meaning to the environment.

Question 3

Perceptual defense

Answer 3

The tendency for the perceptual system to defend the perceiver against unpleasant emotions.

Question 4

Social Identity Theory (SIT)

Answer 4

A theory that states that people form perceptions of themselves based on their personal characteristics and membership in social categories

Question 5

Primacy effect

Answer 5

The tendency for a perceiver to rely on early cues or first impressions

Question 6

Recency effect

Answer 6

The tendency for a perceiver to rely on recent cues or last impressions

Question 7

Central traits

Answer 7

Personal characteristics of a target person that are of interest to a perceiver

Question 8

Implicit personality traits

Answer 8

Personal theories that people have about which personality characteristics go together

Question 9

Projection

Answer 9

The tendency for perceivers to attribute their own thoughts and feelings to others

Question 10

Stereotyping

Answer 10

The tendency to generalize about people in a certain social category and ignore variations among them

Question 11

Attribution

Answer 11

The process by which causes or motives are assigned to explain people’s behaviour

Question 12

Dispositional attributions

Answer 12

Explanations for behaviour based on an actor’s personality or intellect

Question 13

Situations attributions

Answer 13

Explanations for behaviour based on an actor’s external situation or environment

Question 14

Consistency clues

Answer 14

Attribution cues that reflect how consistently a person engages in a behaviour over time

Question 15

Consensus cues

Answer 15

Attribution cues that reflect how a person’s behaviour compares with that of others

Question 16

Distinctiveness cues

Answer 16

Attribution cues that reflect the extent to which a person engages in some behaviour across a variety of situations

Question 17

Fundamental attribution error

Answer 17

The tendency to overemphasize dispositional explanations for behaviour at the expense of situational explanations

Question 18

Actor-observer effect

Answer 18

The propensity for actors and observers to view the causes of the actor’s behaviour dufferently

Question 19

Self-serving bias

Answer 19

The tendency to take credit for successful outcomes and to deny responsibility for failures

Question 20

Workforce diversity

Answer 20

Differences among recruits and employees in characteristics such as gender, race, age, religion, cultural background, physical ability or sexual orientation

Question 21

Stereotype threat

Answer 21

Members of a social group feel they might be judged or treated according to a stereotype and that their behaviour and/or performance will confirm the stereotype

Question 22

Trust

Answer 22

A psychological state in which one has a willingness to be vulnerable and to take risks with respect to the actions of another party

Question 23

Perceived organizational support

Answer 23

Employees’ general belief that their organization values their contribution and cares about their well-being

Question 24

Organizational support theory

Answer 24

A theory that states that employees who have strong perceptions of organizational support feel an obligation to care about the organization’s welfare and to help the organization achieve its objectives

Question 25

Perceived supervisor support

Answer 25

Employees’ general belief that their supervisor values their contribution and cares about their well-being

Question 26

Signalling theory

Answer 26

Job applicants interpret their recruitment experiences as cues or signals about unknown characteristics of a job and an organization and what it will be like to work in an organization

Question 27

Contrast effects

Answer 27

Previously interviewed job applicants affect an interviewer’s perception of a current applicant, leading to an exaggeration of differences between applicants

Question 28

Leniency

Answer 28

The tendency to perceive the job performance of ratees as especially good

Question 29

Harshness

Answer 29

The tendency to perceive the job performance of ratees as especially ineffective

Question 30

Central tendency

Answer 30

The tendency to assign most ratees to middle-range job performance categories

Question 31

Halo effect

Answer 31

The rating of an individual on one trait or characteristic tends to colour ratings on other traits or characteristics

Question 32

Similar-to-me effect

Answer 32

A rater gives more favourable evaluations to people who are similar to the rater in terms of background or attitudes

Question 33

Behaviourally anchored rating scale (BARS)

Answer 33

A rating scale with specific behavioural examples of good, average and poor performance

Question 34

Frame-of-reference (FOR) training

Answer 34

A training method to improve rating accuracy that involves providing raters with a common frame of reference to use when rating individuals

Question 35

What are the effects of diversity in the workplace?

Answer 35

Diversity in the workplace improves

1. Problem solving, creativity, marketing
2. The recruiting of talent
3. Competitiveness in global markets
4. Financial performance