Chapter 3: Perceiving Ourselves and Others in Organizations Flashcards
Self-Concept
Individual’s self-beliefs and self-evaluations; complexity, consistency, clarity
Complexity
number of distinct and important ; more roles, more complex
Consistency
When most of the individual’s self-perceived roles require similar personality traits, values, and other attributes; prison guard is one way at work and another at home
Clarity
Degree to which you have a clear, confidently defined, and stable self-concept
Self-enhancement
A person’s inherent motivation to have a positive self-concept (and to have others perceive him or her favorably), such as being competent, attractive, lucky, ethical, and important; “Welcome to … where all the children are above average”
Self-verification
Person’s inherent motivation to confirm and maintain his/her existing self-concept; “Lockup” show trying to verify what a bad person they are
Self-evaluation
Evaluation of yourself mostly defined by three elements: self-esteem, self-efficacy, and locus of control
Self-esteem
Extent to which people like, respect, and are satisfied with themselves
Self-efficacy
Person’s belief that he or she has the ability, motivation, correct role perceptions, and favorable situation to complete a task succesfully
Locus of Control
A person’s general belief about the amount of control he or she has over personal life events; people with a more internal locus of control have a more positive self-evaluation
Social identity theory
Theory stating that people define themselves by the groups to which they belong or have an emotional attachment; how we perceive ourselves to others; who’s in or out; Fixed or Growth mindset
Perception
process of receiving information about and making sense of the world around us; entails which info to notice, how to categorize this info, how to interpret it within the framework of our existing knowledge
Selective attention
Process of attending to some info received by our senses and ignoring other info
Confirmation bias
Process of screening out info that is contrary to our values and assumptions and to more readily accept confirming info
Categorical thinking
Organizing people and objects into preconceived categories that are stored in our long-term memory
Mental models
Knowledge structures that we develop to describe, explain, and predict the world around us
Stereotyping
Perceptual process of assigning traits to people based on their membership in a social category; natural non-conscious “energy-saving” process
Attribution theory process
Perceptual process of deciding whether an observed behavior or event is caused largely by internal or external factors; three attribution rules: consistency, distinctiveness, consensus; “Why did that happen”
Self-serving bias
Tendency to attribute our favorable outcomes to internal factors and our failures to external factors; associated with self-enhancement
Fundamental attribution error
Tendency to see the person rather than the situation as the main cause of that person’s behavior
Self-fulfilling prophecy
Perceptual process in which our expectations about another person cause that person to act more consistently with those expectations; stronger effect at the beginning of a relationsihp
Positive organizational behavior
Perspective of org behavior that focuses on building positive qualities and traits within individuals or institutions as opposed to focusing on what is wrong with them
Halo effect
Perceptual error whereby our general impression of a person, usually based on one prominent characteristic, colors our perception of other characteristics of that person; guy bringing breakfast example
False consensus effect
Perceptual error in which we overestimate the extent to which others have beliefs and characteristics similar to our own
