Social Perception

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Social Perception
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Lecture Overview

• Communication More than meets the eye
• Effects of Expectations on First Impressions
• Attribution Theory

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Nonverbal Behavior

• The way in which people communicate,
  intentionally or unintentionally, without words.
• Nonverbal cues include
• facial expressions
• gestures
• tone of voice
• body positions and movement
• the use of touch
• eye gaze

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Presidential Candidates Nonverbal Cues

• Rudy Giuliani The Republican and former New York
  City mayor tends to talk with one side of his
  mouth in an upward curl which may convey
  disgust.
• John Edwards The 2004 Democratic vice
  presidential candidate has traded his dazzlingly
  optimistic smile for a more purposeful, even grim
  look perhaps in an effort to convey gravitas.
• John McCain The Republican senator from Arizona
  has a puffer fish look an upside-down smile,
  lips pressed together, cheeks blown out
  revealing exasperation, presumably with the
  status quo.

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Communication More than meets the eye

• Instructor Evaluations and First Impressions
• Predicting Divorce (Gottman)
• Defensiveness, stonewalling, criticism, contempt

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Communication More than meets the eye

• Secrets of the Bedroom (Gosling)
• Administered MMPI on 80 college students
• Extraversion Are you sociable or retiring? Fun
  loving or reserved?
• Agreeableness Are you trusting or suspicious?
  Helpful or uncooperative?
• Conscientiousness Are you organized or
  disorganized? Self-disciplined or weak willed?
• Emotional Stability Are you worried or calm?
  Insecure or secure?
• Openness to new experiences Are you imaginative
  or down-to-earth? Independent or conforming?

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Communication More than meets the eye

• Secrets of the Bedroom (Gosling)
• Obtained ratings from friends of the participants
  on the Big Five.
• Recruited a group of strangers to tour the
  bedrooms of the 80 subjects who completed the
  MMPI.
• Strangers rated on a scale of 1-5 the personality
  of the inhabitant of the room based on the
  artifacts within it.
• Friends better than strangers at predicting
  extraversion and agreeableness.
• Strangers better than friends at predicting
  conscientiousness, emotional stability, and
  openness to new experience.

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Communication More than meets the eye

• Suing Your Family Doctor (Levinson)
• Recorded the conversations of doctors and
  patients
• Half of the doctors had never been sued, Half
  sued at least twice
• Never sued doctors
• Spent 3 minutes longer with patients
• More likely to make orienting comments
• More likely to engage in active listening
• No differences in quality of care or the detail
  that they went into about the patients condition
  or medication.

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Communication More than meets the eye

• Suing Your Family Doctor (Levinson)
• In another study (Ambady), 40 s clips of the
  conversation were analyzed.
• The clips were content filtered.
• Judges rated the clips for warmth, hostility,
  dominance, and anxiousness
• Ratings predicted above chance who got sued and
  who didnt.

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Expectations and First Impressions

• What process do we use to organize traits to
  produce a unified impression? (Asch, 1946)
• Group A intelligent, skillful, industrious,
  warm, determined, practical, cautious
• Group B intelligent, skillful, industrious,
  cold, determined, practical, cautious

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Making a good impression

• Group A (warm) A person who believes certain
  things to be right, wants others to see his
  point, would be sincere in an argument, and would
  like to see his own point won.

• Group B (cold) A rather snobbish person who
  feels that his success and intelligence set him
  apart from the run-of-the-mill individual.
  Calculating and unsympathetic.

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Making a good impression

• 1. Generous--Ungenerous
• 2. Shrewd--Wise
• 3. Happy--Unhappy
• 4. Irritable--Good Natured
• 18. Honest--Dishonest

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Making a good impression
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Making a good impression
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Expectations and Evaluations (Kelley, 1950)
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Causal Attribution Answering the Why Question

• Internal, dispositional attribution
• The inference that a person is behaving in a
  certain way because of something about the
  person, such as attitude, character, or
  personality.
• External, situational attribution
• The inference that a person is behaving 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.

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Kelleys Covariation Model Internal versus
External Attributions

• The covariation model focuses on observations of
  behavior across time, place, actors, and targets.
• It examines how the perceiver chooses either an
  internal or an external attribution.
• We make such choices by using information on
• Consensus
• Information about the extent to which other
  people behave the same way toward the same
  stimulus as the actor does.
• Distinctiveness
• Information about the extent to which one
  particular actor behaves in the same way to
  different stimuli.
• Consistency
• Information about the extent to which the
  behavior between one actor and one stimulus is
  the same across time and circumstances.

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Covariation Model
Claire laughs hysterically at her dates jokes.
WHY? Is it something about Claire? Is it
something about her date? Causes covary with
effects, so must determine when effect
occurs/does not occur in presence/absence of
hypothesised cause. Consensus Information -
does this stimulus produce same effect in other
actors? (Does everyone laugh hysterically at her
dates jokes?) Consistency Information - does
stimulus always produce this reaction in this
actor? (Does Claire always laugh hysterically at
her dates jokes?) Distinctiveness Information -
does only this stimulus cause this effect in this
actor? (Does Claire laugh hysterically at only at
her dates jokes?)
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Why did Claire laugh at her dates jokes?
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The Correspondence Bias

• The tendency to believe that peoples behavior
  matches (corresponds to) their dispositions.
• People do what they do because of the kind of
  people they are, not because of the situation
  they are in.
• The correspondence bias is so pervasive that many
  social psychologists call it the fundamental
  attribution error.

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Correspondence Bias (Nisbett et al., 1973)
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Correspondence Bias (Nisbett et al., 1973)
Number of Reasons Given
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Fundamental Attribution Error (Ross et al., 1977)
General Knowledge Compared to Others
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Perceptual Salience

• One reason we make the fundamental attribution
  error is that when we try to explain someones
  behavior, our focus of attention is usually on
  the person, not on the surrounding situation.
• Taylor and Fiske (1975)

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Self-Serving Attributions

• Self-Serving Bias
• Explanations for ones successes that credit
  internal, dispositional factors and explanations
  for ones failures that blame external,
  situational factors.
• The tendency to perceive ourselves favorably on
  insurance forms (Toronto News, 1977)
• As I reached an intersection, a hedge sprang up,
  obscuring my vision, and I did not see the other
  car.
• A pedestrian hit me and went under the car.

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Attribution and Depression
Nondepressed Folks
Attributed to
Positive Events
Internal Lasting Causes
Negative Events
External Temporary Causes
Depressed Folks
Positive Events
External Temporary Causes
Negative Events
Internal Lasting Causes
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False Consensus Effect (Ross, Green House,
1977)
Percentage of people who would sign
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Attributions When Negative Outcomes are
Attributed to Discrimination (Kaiser Miller,
2001)
Student was perceived as more of a complainer.
Participants formed less favorable impression of
student who complained.