Social Perception: How We Come to Understand Other People

Social Perception: How We Come to Understand Other People
Chapter 4 Social Perception: How We Come to Understand Other People © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

© 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.
Social Perception Social perception is defined as the study of how we form impressions of and make inferences about other people. One important source of information about others is their nonverbal behaviour. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Nonverbal communication is defined as the way in which people communicate, intentionally or unintentionally, without words. Non-verbal cues include facial expressions, tones of voice, gestures, body position and movement, the use of touch, and eye gaze. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Nonverbal behaviour is used to, 1)express emotion (eg, your eyes narrow, your eyebrows lower, you stare intently, your mouth is set is a thin, straight line__your angry), 2)convey attitudes(‘I like you’__smiles, extended eye contact__or ‘I don’t like you’ __eyes averted, flat tone of voice, body turned away, 3)communicate personality traits (‘I’m outgoing’__broad gestures, changes in inflection when speaking, an energetic tone of voice), and © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Nonverbal behaviour is used to, 4) facilitate, or modify verbal communication (eg, you lower your voice and look away as you finish you sentence so that your conversational partner knows that you are done and it is his/her turn to speak), 5) repeat, or compliment the spoken language, as when your smiling and say ‘I’m so happy to meet you,’ © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Other uses of nonverbal behaviour 6) In other cases, nonverbal behaviour contradicts spoken behaviour (eg, use of sarcasm, as when someone says, ‘I’m so happy for you’ sarcastically, 7) Finally, nonverbal cues can substitute for the verbal message (eg, hand gestures indicating A OK are used to convey the message that all is well). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis Foremost among the nonverbal channels of communication are facial expressions. Charles Darwin believed that human emotional expressions are universal—that all humans encode and decode expressions in the same way (the universality hypothesis). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis Encode: to express or emit nonverbal behaviour, such as smiling or patting someone on the back Decode: to interpret the meaning of the nonverbal behaviour other people express, such as deciding that a pat on the back was an expression of condescension and not kindness. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis Early research suggested that Darwin was right for the six major emotional expressions (see Ekman & Freisen 1971 New Guinea study): anger, happiness, surprise, fear, disgust, and sadness. Subsequently, researchers added contempt to this list. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis But, not all theorists agreed with the ‘universality’ conclusion. The universality hypothesis would suggest that the basic emotions should be accurately identified regardless of, culture, whether participants are identifying positive or negative emotions, © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis The universality hypothesis would suggest that the basic emotions should be accurately identified regardless of (continued), the participants’ personal situation, the context in which the emotion is judged, and whether participants must name the emotion, or select from a list of names. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis In non of these instances was the universality hypothesis fully supported by research studies. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis Consider the issue of accuracy of identification of the basic emotions shown by participants across cultures (see Japan, U.S., Brazil, Chile, Argentina, New Guinea studies). In these studies, 82% accurately identified happiness, but only 54% identified fear, and 44% identified disgust. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis Moreover, there was even less accuracy when participants were asked to name the emotion shown in the face rather than select an emotion from a list as was done in the Ekman et al studies. (See Russell et al 1993 studies in Canada, Greece, Japan.) These results are contrary to expectations from the universality hypothesis. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis Other research in Quebec and Belgium confirmed earlier findings that negative emotions (e.g., anger) are more difficult to identify than positive ones (e.g., happiness). (See Hess et al, 1998.) These results are contrary to expectations from the universality hypothesis that people from all cultures should be able to identify these emotions with ease, even the negative ones. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis The universality hypothesis would also suggest that facial expressions should be easily identified regardless of the context in which they are perceived. This does not appear to be true. (See Russell & Fehr 1987 University of BC study.) Nonsupport for the universality hypothesis. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Facial Expressions of Emotions: The Universality Hypothesis Finally, the universality hypothesis would suggest that the situation a person is in should not influence identification of facial expressions. This also is not true. The situation does influence the identification of emotions. (See Carroll & Russell, 1996 study.) Nonsupport for the universality hypothesis © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Factors which Decrease the Accuracy with which Facial Expressions are Decoded Researchers agree on other factors that limit the accuracy with which facial expressions are decoded. 1) Affect Blends: Facial expressions may sometimes be hard to interpret accurately because people may display blends of multiple affects simultaneously. Affect Blend: a facial expression in which one part of the face is registering one emotion (eg, anger) and another part of the face is registering a different emotion (eg, disgust). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Factors which Decrease the Accuracy with which Facial Expressions are Decoded 2) Display rules. Decoding facial expressions accurately can be difficult because culture plays a role as when and how people display emotions on their faces. Display rules are culturally determined rules about which nonverbal behaviours are appropriate to display. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Factors which Decrease the Accuracy with which Facial Expressions are Decoded Display rules are culturally determined rules about which nonverbal behaviours are appropriate to display (cont’d). -eg, In North American culture norms discourage emotional displays in men, such as grief or crying, but allow such displays in women. -eg, Japanese norms lead people to cover up negative facial expressions with smiles and laughter, and to display fewer facial expressions in general, than norms in Western culture. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Factors which Decrease the Accuracy with which Facial Expressions are Decoded Other factors that limit the accuracy with which facial expressions are decoded have yet to be discovered. Studies using facial electrodes attached to participants’ faces to record movements of muscles involved in producing certain facial expressions may allow researchers to determine precisely factors involved in the expression of emotion (See Hess et al 1995 facial electrode study.) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Nonverbal Behaviour Other Channels of Nonverbal Communication There are other channels of noverbal communication. 1) Eye contact and gaze are powerful nonverbal cues. 2) The use of personal space is a nonverbal behaviour with wide cultural variation. 3) Emblems are nonverbal gestures (e.g., the OK sign, Trudeau’s finger), that have well understood definitions within a given culture; each culture has their own emblems. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Implicit Personality Theories
Not only do we want to know how a person is feeling and thinking, but we also want to know what this person is like, and why they are feeling/thinking the way they are. Implicit personality theories help us do this. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

An implicit personality theory is a type of schema people use to group various kinds of personality traits together, eg, many people believe that, if a person is kind, he/she is also generous, If her/she is helpful then also sincere, If he/she is practical then also cautious. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Using these theories helps us form well-developed impressions of other people, quickly. We generalize from a very small to a large amount of information, so that we don’t have spend weeks with people to find out what they are like. This increased efficiency can come at a cost, however, if one’s implicit personality theory about what people are like doesn’t fit the situation (see Williams et al 1992 condom study). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

We hold a number of different implicit personality theories in our society. One such is our notion about physical attractiveness. We presume that ‘what is beautiful is good,’ i.e., that people with physical beauty will also have a number of other positive characteristics. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Different cultures have different implicit personality theories. e.g., Western culture has an implicit theory about the artistic personality; Chinese culture does not. These cultural implicit personality theories influence the way people form impressions of others. (See Hoffman et al, 1986 study; Fig. 4.1) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Although nonverbal behaviour may be relatively easy to decode, there is still substantial ambiguity about why people act the way they do. This is the focus of attribution theory. Attribution theory is a description of the way in which people explain the causes of their own and other people’s behaviour. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Nature of the Attributional Process: Heider Fritz Heider is considered the father of attribution theory. He believed that people are like amateur scientists, trying to understand other people’s behaviour by piecing together information until they arrive at a reasonable cause. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Nature of the Attributional Process: Internal-External Attributions He proposed a simple dichotomy for people’s explanations of behaviour: internal attributions and external attributions. Internal Attribution: the inference that a person is behaving in a certain way because of something about him or her, such as his/her attitude, character, or personality (eg, Hama is a bad mother; see Nadia Hama example). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Nature of the Attributional Process: Internal-External Attributions External Attribution: the inference that a person is behaving in a certain way because of something about the situation he or she is in; the assumption is that most people would respond the same way in that situation (eg, Hama was under a great of stress). Whether one makes an internal or external attribution can have serious consequences. (See Coates, judges sentencing study.) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Nature of the Attributional Process: Preference for Internal Attributions Another of Heider’s observations was that people generally prefer internal attributions over external ones, i.e., they tend to see the causes of behaviour as residing in the person, not the situation. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model Kelly (1967) took a different approach to answer the question of why people behave the way they do. He focused how people decide whether to make an internal or an external attribution and developed what was called the covariation model. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model The covariation model states that in order to form an attribution about what caused a person’s behaviour, we systematically note the pattern between the presence (or absence) of possible causal factors and whether or not the behaviour occurs. Kelly (like Heider) assumes that when we are in the process of forming an attribution, we gather information that will help us reach a judgment. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model Kelly’s covariation model (cont’d) The data we use are how a person’s behaviour covaries across time, place, different actors, and different targets of the behaviour. By discovering covariations in people’s behaviour (eg, your friend reuses to lend you his car; but he agrees to lend it to others), you reach a judgment about what caused their behaviour. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model Kelly’s covariation model (cont’d) According to Kelly, we examine three types of information These are consensus, distinctiveness, and consistency information. Suppose your friend won’t let you borrow his car. You try to determine Why? To do this you gather consensus, distinctiveness and consistency information. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model Kelly’s covariation model (cont’d) Consensus: information about the extent to which other people behave the same way as the actor does toward the same stimulus (eg, other people also, won’t let you borrow their car). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model Kelly’s covariation model (cont’d) Distinctiveness: information about the extent to which one particular actor behaves in the same way to different stimuli (eg, your friend lets other people borrow his car). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model Kelly’s covariation model (cont’d) Consistency: information about the extent to which the behaviour between one actor and one stimulus is the same across time and circumstances (eg, your friend never lets you borrow his car, no matter what the circumstances). From this information we would conclude that it is something about you that is the reason why your friend won’t lend you his car (ie, perhaps he thinks you’re a poor driver, and he doesn’t want the car wrecked) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model: Internal Versus External Attributions According to Kelly, people are most likely to make an internal attribution when consensus and distinctiveness are low, but consistency is high (see Fig. 4.2). They are most likely to make an external attribution when consensus, distinctiveness, and consistency are all high. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model: Research Support The covariation model assumes that people make causal attributions in a rational, logical fashion. Research generally supports this view, with two exception. First, people don’t use consensus information as much as Kelley’s theory predicted; they rely more on consistency and distinctiveness when forming impressions. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Covariation Model: Research Support Second, people don’t always have the relevant information they need on all three dimensions (eg, you may not have consistency information because this is the first time you have ever asked your friend to borrow his car) In this circumstance people tend to proceed with the attribution process using the information they do have, and, if necessary, make inferences about the missing data © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Fundamental Attribution Error The schema most of us have about human behaviour is that people do what they do because of the kind of people they are, not because of the situation they are in. This is referred to as the fundamental attribution error The fundamental attribution error is the tendency to overestimate the extent to which people’s behaviour is due to internal, dispositional factors and to underestimate the role of situational factors. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Fundamental Attribution Error There have been many empirical demonstrations of the tendency to see people’s behaviour as a reflection of their dispositions and beliefs, rather than as influenced by the situation. The classic example is Johns and Harris’s (1967) essay topic study (see Figure 4.3) where students persisted in making internal attributions even when a situational constraint on behaviour was obvious. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Fundamental Attribution Error: The Role of Perceptual Salience One reason people make the fundamental attribution error is that observers (eg, you) focus their attention on actors (eg, other person), while actors focus their attention on the situation. This is called perceptual salience. Perceptual salience: is our point of focus, the person, or the situation; And, people tend to overestimate the causal role of perceptually salient information. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Fundamental Attribution Error: The Role of Perceptual Salience Why the fundamental attribution error (cont’d)? In other words, when we try to explain someone’s behaviour, our focus of attention is usually on the person, not on the surrounding situation (see Figure 4.5). A contributing factor in this process is that information about the situational causes of behaviour is frequently unavailable to us, or difficult to interpret accurately. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Fundamental Attribution Error: The Role of Perceptual Salience Why the fundamental attribution error (cont’d)? But, why should the fact that we are focused on a person make us exaggerate the extent to which that person is the cause of his/her actions? Because there is insufficient adjustment away from the focal point (eg, target person), (see the discussion of the anchoring and adjustment heuristic). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Role of Culture in the Fundamental Attribution Error Why the fundamental attribution error (cont’d)? Another reason. Western culture, which emphasizes individual freedom and autonomy, socializes us to prefer dispositional attributions over situational ones. In comparison, collectivist (often Eastern) cultures emphasize group membership, interdependence, and conformity to group norms, preferring situational explanations of others behaviour. (See Fig. 4.6.) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Role of Culture in the Fundamental Attribution Error Why the fundamental attribution error (cont’d)? Another reason, cultural differences. Do people in Collectivist cultures make fewer fundamental attribution errors than Westerners do? Yes, see study by Morris and Peng, 1994 (Figure 4.6), and others (Chui et al, 2000) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Actor/Observer Difference An interesting finding by researchers investigating the fundamental attribution error is that it does not apply to attributions about ourselves to same extent that it applies to attributions about others. This is called the actor/observer difference. The actor/observer difference is the tendency to see other people’s behaviour as dispositionally caused, but our own behaviour as situationally (See Dear Rhona example.) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Actor/Observer Difference Why do we get the actor/observer effect? One reason is the phenomenon of perceptual salience: (see Fig. 4.8). Actors notice the situations around them that influence them to act (i.e., that is what is salient to them); this leads to an external attribution, while observers notice the actors (i.e., salient for them) leading to an internal attribution. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Actor/Observer Difference: The Role of Information Availability Why do we get the actor/observer effect? (cont’d) Another reason is that actors have more information about themselves than do observers, i.e., actors know whether their present behaviour is indicative of the way they always act or not, observers don’t. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Actor/Observer Difference: The Role of Information Availability Why do we get the actor/observer effect? (cont’d) In Kelly’s terms, actors have far more consistency and distinctiveness information about themselves than observers do. Thus, actors self-attributions often reflect situational factors, because they know more about how their behaviour varies from one situation to the next than do most observers, who see them in a limited context. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution The Actor/Observer Difference: The Role of Culture The actor/observer difference is affected by culture (see Choi & Nisbett, 1998) American-Korean study. Americans were more likely to think that the other person’s behaviour was due to his/her disposition (the fundamental attribution error), whereas Koreans were more likley to think that the other person’s behaior was due to the situation. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Self-Serving Attributions: Self-Esteem What about emotional factors (eg, a person’s needs, desires, hopes, fears). Do they bias our attributions? Yes, when people’s self-esteem is threatened (eg, failure on an exam), they often engage in self-serving attributions. Self-serving attributions are explanations for one’s successes that credit internal, dispositional factors and explanations for one’s failures that blame external, situational factors (see sports examples). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Self-Serving Attributions: Research Findings Some research findings: Less experienced athletes were more likely to make self-serving attributions than were experienced ones. Highly skilled athletes made more self-serving attributions than did those with lower ability. Athletes in solo sports made more self-serving attributions than did those in team sports. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Self-Serving Attributions: Implications The self-serving bias has a number of implications: It leads people to believe that their actions are rational and defensible, but that the actions of others are unreasonable and unjustified (see Sande et al, 1989 study). It influences people’s judgment of their involvement in tasks when working with others, even in their closest relationships eg, marriage; people overestimate their own contribution (see Ross & Sicoly, 1979 study). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Self-Serving Attributions & Culture Research suggests that the self-serving bias has a strong cultural component. Because traditional Chinese culture values modesty and harmony with others, it is expected that they would attribute their successes to other people, or other aspects of the situation. This is what studies have found ie, Chinese participants take less credit for successes than do American participants. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Self-Serving: Defensive Attributions People also alter their attributions to deal with other kinds of threats to their self-esteem. One of the hardest things to understand is the occurrence of tragic events (e.g., rape, terminal disease, fatal accident): they remind us of our vulnerability. The recognition that bad things could happen to us leads us to take steps to deny this possibility. One way to do this is to make defensive attributions. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Self-Serving: Defensive Attributions Defensive attributions (cont’d) Unrealistic optimism is one form of defensive attribution. Belief in a just world is another. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Self-Serving_ Defensive Attributions Defensive attributions are explanations for behaviour, or outcomes that avoid feelings of vulnerability and mortality. Unrealistic optimism is a form of defensive attribution wherein people think that good things are more likely to happen to them than to their peers and bad things are less likely to happen to them than to others. (See Murray & Holmes, 1997 romantic relationships study; MacDonald & Ross, 1999 dating relationships study; Martin et al, 2000 battered women study) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Defensive Attributions: Unrealistic Optimism Unrealistic optimism pervades all aspects of people’s lives. It is evident in, -eg, women’s attitudes about getting breast cancer, -eg, herion users’ attitudes about the risk of overdosing, -eg, gamblers’ attitudes about winning the lottery, -eg, motorcyclists’ attitudes about having a serious accident, -eg the popularity of extreme sports © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Culture & Unrealistic Optimism Recent evidence suggests that unrealistic optimism may be a Western phenomenon. (See Heine & Lehman, 1995 study.) Canadian students (from UBC) showed unrealistic optimism, while Japanese students (from Nagaski University) showed unrealistic pessimism. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes People’s tendency to make dispositional attributions for the behaviour of other people can lead to some tragic consequences, such as a tendency to blame those who are victimized, or stigmatized for their plight (see Guimond & Dube, 1989 study) . -eg, victims of crimes, or accidents are often seen as causing their fate ( Lerner & Miller, 1978). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Blaming the victim (cont’d) -eg, those who believe in rape myths (eg, women falsely report rape to get attention) are especially likely to engage in victim blaming (Morry & Winkler,2001). This is true for both men and women. -eg, for a real live example see rape case in Alberta where the decision to blame the 17-year-old woman (by the two lower courts) had to go to the Supreme Court of Canada before it was overturned. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Blaming the victim (cont’d) -eg, battered wives are often seen as responsible for their abusive husbands’ behaviour (Summers & Feldman, 1984). Why do we blame the victim? We justify blaming the victim of violence by assuming that the victims must have done something to provoke the attack. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Blaming the victim (cont’d) Studies show that women are especially likely to be blamed for domestic assaults if they are seen as having done something to provoke their partner (see Kristiansen & Giulietti, 1990 study) Are male victims of violence also blamed? Yes (see Perrott & Webber, 1996 study) © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Blaming the victim (cont’d) When we believe that victims could have exercised control over the situation but didn’t we are especially likely to blame the victim for his/her plight (see Menec & Perry, 1998). -eg, when a stigma was seen as uncontrollable (eg, heart disease due to heredity) participants felt pity for the person and expressed a willingness to help; © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Blaming the victim (cont’d) When a stigma was seen as controllable (eg, heart disease due to smoking, and a high cholesterol diet) participants responded with anger. Thus, when we combine our tendency to explain other people’s behaviour in dispositional terms with our need to see the world as a safe, orderly place, the result is that we blame victims for their misfortunes. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Why do we do this? (cont’d) Research suggests that one way to deal with these reminders that bad things happen we tell ourselves that they could never happen to us. We do this by believing that bad things happen only to bad people. Lerner (1980) has called this belief in a just world. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Belief in a just world is a form of defensive attribution wherein people assume that bad things happen to bad people, and that good things happen to good people. -ie, people get what they deserve and deserve what they get. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Research has demonstrated that the more people’s belief in a just world is threatened, the more likely it is that they will derogate the victim’s character and distance themselves from the victim (Hafer, 2000). Presumably, this is to convince themselves that bad things happen to bad people, and since they are good nothing bad will happen to them. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Hafer (2000b, 2002) has identified another reason why we subscribe to just-world beliefs, namely that such beliefs motivate us to invest in our future -ie, we’re not so likely to plan ahead and make long-term investments if we believe that the world is an unfair, unjust place. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Causal Attribution Blaming the Victim: A By- Product of Attributional Processes Finally, there are educational differences in the extent to which people make dispositional attributions (eg, blame the poor for their poverty). -eg, third year social science students make more situational attributions (eg, less likely to blame the poor for their plight) compared to commerce, or engineering students. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

How Accurate Are Our Attributions and Impressions?
In general, we are quite accurate perceivers of other people. But, there are problems with accuracy when we are unduly influenced by: a) first impressions b) schemas (implicit personality theories) c) self-fulfilling prophecies d) fundamental attribution errors © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Why are Our Impressions Inaccurate? One reason for our inaccuracy can be explained by the fundamental attribution error i.e., we tend to focus only on personalities rather than both personalities and the situation when attributing others’ behaviour. © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Why are Our Impressions Inaccurate? A second reason, we may not realize our impressions are wrong concerns the use of schema (e.g., implicit personality theories). Although many of our schemas are correct, some are not. These lead us to inaccurate impressions (see Rosenhan, 1973 mental hospital study). © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Why are Our Impressions Inaccurate? Finally, we create inaccurate impressions of others through self-fulfilling prophecies (see unfriendly greeting example). We can improve the accuracy of impressions by being aware of a) implicit personality theories, b) self-fulfilling prophecies, and c) fundamental attribution errors, and counteracting these biases. The End © 2004 Pearson Education Canada Inc.

Social Perception: How We Come to Understand Other People

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