13.1
Forming impressions of other people
Bias:
1. Provide clues about the mental processes that contribute to
accurate/inaccurate perceptions and judgements.
2. An understanding of bias can promote social justice.
Making attributions from observed behavior
Attributions = a claim about the cause of someone’s behavior.
The person bias in attributions
The person bias = people tend to give too much weigh to personality and
not enough to environmental situations when they make attributions
about other’s actions.
Fundamental attribution error = a label designed to signify the
pervasiveness and strength of the bias and to suggest that it underlies
many other social-psychological phenomena. -> maybe not as
fundamental as researchers thought at first, because people are much
likely to make this error if their minds are occupied by other tasks.
There are cultural differences in making attributions.
Effects of facial features on person perceptions
Biases that derive from perceptions on facial features=
1. Attractiveness bias = attractive people are commonly judged as more
intelligent, sociable and competent. Relation IQ and attractiveness =
good genes theory. -> attractiveness signals good genes and people
have evolved to judge good-looking people as high-quality potential
mates.
2. Baby-face bias = innocent, naive helpless.
Forming impressions on the internet
People that initially meet on the internet are more likely to like each
other than if they met face-to-face. -> people on the internet are less
anxious and freed from biases of appearance.
Identify experiments = pretending you are someone else. -> potential
dangers.
13.2
Perceiving and evaluating the self
, Self-concept = the way that a person defines himself -> social product:
you must firs become aware of others of your species and then become
aware that you are one of them.
Seeing ourselves through the eyes of others
Looking-glass self = a metaphor for other people who react to us -> we
naturally infer what others think of us from their reactions to build our
own self-concepts.
Effects of others’ appraisals on self-understanding and behavior
Self-fulfilling prophecies/ pygmalion effect = the briefs that others have
of a person can create reality by influencing that person’s self-conception
and behavior.
Self-esteem as an index of other’s approval and acceptance
Self-esteem = one’s feeling of approval, acceptance and liking oneself.
Sociometer theory = proposes that self-esteem acts like a meter to
inform us of the degree to which we are likely to be accepted or rejected
by others.
Evolutionary perspective = survival depends on others’ acceptance of us
and willingness to cooperate with us. -> motivation to act in way that are
accepted by others.
Actively constructing our self-perceptions
We actively try to influence others’ views of us -> in that way we also
influence our own self-perception.
We compare ourselves to others as a way of defining and evaluating
ourselves -> bias of comparisons by giving more weight to some pieces
of evidence than to others. -> social comparison.
Direct consequence of social comparison is that the self-concept varies
depend on the reference group = the group against whom the
comparison is made.
Big-fish-in-small-pond effect = students at nonselective schools have
higher academic self-concepts than students at selective schools ->
effect reflects the difference in the students’ reference groups and a
change in that group can affect our self-esteem
Positive illusory bias = overestimation of one’s abilities. -> greater
psychological well-being.
Self-attributional bias = tendency to attribute our successes to our own
inner qualities and our failures to external circumstances.
Forming impressions of other people
Bias:
1. Provide clues about the mental processes that contribute to
accurate/inaccurate perceptions and judgements.
2. An understanding of bias can promote social justice.
Making attributions from observed behavior
Attributions = a claim about the cause of someone’s behavior.
The person bias in attributions
The person bias = people tend to give too much weigh to personality and
not enough to environmental situations when they make attributions
about other’s actions.
Fundamental attribution error = a label designed to signify the
pervasiveness and strength of the bias and to suggest that it underlies
many other social-psychological phenomena. -> maybe not as
fundamental as researchers thought at first, because people are much
likely to make this error if their minds are occupied by other tasks.
There are cultural differences in making attributions.
Effects of facial features on person perceptions
Biases that derive from perceptions on facial features=
1. Attractiveness bias = attractive people are commonly judged as more
intelligent, sociable and competent. Relation IQ and attractiveness =
good genes theory. -> attractiveness signals good genes and people
have evolved to judge good-looking people as high-quality potential
mates.
2. Baby-face bias = innocent, naive helpless.
Forming impressions on the internet
People that initially meet on the internet are more likely to like each
other than if they met face-to-face. -> people on the internet are less
anxious and freed from biases of appearance.
Identify experiments = pretending you are someone else. -> potential
dangers.
13.2
Perceiving and evaluating the self
, Self-concept = the way that a person defines himself -> social product:
you must firs become aware of others of your species and then become
aware that you are one of them.
Seeing ourselves through the eyes of others
Looking-glass self = a metaphor for other people who react to us -> we
naturally infer what others think of us from their reactions to build our
own self-concepts.
Effects of others’ appraisals on self-understanding and behavior
Self-fulfilling prophecies/ pygmalion effect = the briefs that others have
of a person can create reality by influencing that person’s self-conception
and behavior.
Self-esteem as an index of other’s approval and acceptance
Self-esteem = one’s feeling of approval, acceptance and liking oneself.
Sociometer theory = proposes that self-esteem acts like a meter to
inform us of the degree to which we are likely to be accepted or rejected
by others.
Evolutionary perspective = survival depends on others’ acceptance of us
and willingness to cooperate with us. -> motivation to act in way that are
accepted by others.
Actively constructing our self-perceptions
We actively try to influence others’ views of us -> in that way we also
influence our own self-perception.
We compare ourselves to others as a way of defining and evaluating
ourselves -> bias of comparisons by giving more weight to some pieces
of evidence than to others. -> social comparison.
Direct consequence of social comparison is that the self-concept varies
depend on the reference group = the group against whom the
comparison is made.
Big-fish-in-small-pond effect = students at nonselective schools have
higher academic self-concepts than students at selective schools ->
effect reflects the difference in the students’ reference groups and a
change in that group can affect our self-esteem
Positive illusory bias = overestimation of one’s abilities. -> greater
psychological well-being.
Self-attributional bias = tendency to attribute our successes to our own
inner qualities and our failures to external circumstances.
