I&G Week 7 Person Perception Flashcards
What are the raw materials of social perception?
Physical appearance
Behaviour
Situational factors
– (e.g. where you live, your friends, your job)
Communications from other people (tell us about the person)
Communications from the person themselves
(Ichheiser, 1949)
What are some of the reasons for personality misinterpretations?
The tendency to overestimate the unity of personality (if see someone behaving in a way in one context- we assume they will behave the same in other contexts)
Stereotyped classifications as sources of misinterpretations.
Limits of insight as sources of misinterpretation- (we tend to believe we know what’s going on in other peoples lives- when we don’t actually know)
Mechanisms of rigidity- (we view personality as something that is fixed- does not change over our lifespan)
The tendency to overestimate the role of personal and to underestimate the role of situational factors- ( e.g. may see someone who looks anxious at the dentist- then may believe they are an anxious person in general-
What did Asch say about forming impressions?
Impression formation is very fast- we immediately form an impression of their character.
Primacy effects
What study did Asch conduct?
Asch (1946), Experiment 6
Lists of traits of two individuals:
Target A: intelligent—industrious—impulsive—critical—stubborn—envious
Target B: envious—stubborn—critical—impulsive—industrious—intelligent
What do you think of these two people?
They gave the same adjectives, but put them in a different order.
Primacy effects
What were the results of Asch study?
For person A- they were given a more positive description, as the first adjectives in the lost describing the individual were positive.
For person B- given a more negative description- as the negative adjectives were first.
Conclusion- the order depends on how the person is perceived- it matters which information is presented first- which is then used to understand the subsequent information.
Central traits
Asch 1946 - what was the study?
Asch (1946), Experiment 1
Lists of traits of two individuals:
Target A: intelligent—skillful—industrious—warm—determined—practical—cautious
Target B: intelligent—skillful—industrious—cold—determined—practical—cautious
What do you think of these two people?
Only difference is A is “warm” and B is “cold” (character traits). They key trait then shapes how the other traits are viewed.
Central traits
What was the conclusion from Asch 1946 study?
we are very quick to form judgement & observations.
The central traits (warmth & coldness) effected the interpretation of all the other traits.
What two traits were argued to be particularly important when forming impressions of others?
“warmth” & “competence”
They argued they are fundamental & universal dimensions of how we judge others as individuals.
They are central for aspects of stereotypes too.
Argue- whether we see someone as warm/ cold will affect our emotions towards the person
Also affect the actions we are motivated to take towards others.
What are some examples of stereotypes for low/ high competence & warmth?
High warmth- low competence:
- Elderly
- People with disabilities
- Children
Low competence- low warmth:
-Poor
- Homeless people
- Immigrants
High competence- high warmth:
- Citizens
- Middle class
- Majority groups
High competence- low warmth:
- Rich people
- Professionals
- Technical experts
Who was the originator or attribution theory?
Fritz Heider
What did Heider believe about how we view others behaviour?
When see someone behaving in a certain way- it captures our attention.
We then ignore the context surrounding the behaviour which may explain why they are behaving in that way.
What is attribution theory?
Heider (1958) idea of “naïve psychology” (all have different ideas on how peoples brains work/ how people think)
Attribution theory is concerned with how people make causal explanations for their own and others’ behaviour (Kelley, 1973).
Focused on how we as social perceivers use information to arrive at these causal explanations
What are the different types of attribution?
Dispositional vs situational
What is dispositional attribution?
Process of assigning a behavior’s cause to internal characteristics such as personality traits, efforts, moods, judgements, abilities, motives, or beliefs
(about the person themselves)
What is situational attribution?
Assigns the behavior’s cause to an event or situation outside the individual’s control such as the weather, other people’s attitudes, time, task difficulty, and luck
(external factors)
What is correspondent inference theory interested in?
(Jones & Davis, 1965)
Concerned with the conditions under which people will make dispositional attributions of others’ behaviour.
What are the factors in correspondent inference theory?
choice- (if someone chose to behave in a way- it reflects what the person is like.)
social desirability-(if behaviour is desirable- they did it to do the right thing & its not a true reflection of their own disposition- how they would naturally behave.
social roles- (if the behaviour is fulfilling a role that you would expect them to fill- then their behaviour is more to do with the role then the person.)
Example study: Jones and Harris (1967) and the attitude attribution paradigm
What did they do in the study?
Participants (N = 41) read essays on Castro’s Cuba (communist leader- controversial topic at time)
Informed that a student had written the essay in response to the following instructions:
either (a) “Based on the past week’s discussion and lectures, write a short cogent criticism of Castro’s Cuba as if you were giving the opening statement in a debate”
or (b) “…short cogent defence of Castro’s Cuba as if…”
or (c) “…. short cogent essay either defending or criticizing Castro’s Cuba as if …”.
200-word pro-Castro or anti-Castro essay
Asked to judge characteristics of author and estimate their true attitude towards Castro
