Impression Formation Flashcards
(22 cards)
Forming 1st impressions
1st + easiest available source of info:
- psychical appearance
Info we can extract from physical appearance:
- attractivness
- sociability (kindness)
- morality (trustworthiness)
Attractivness
Easily + reliably determined from appearance within seconds
Attractive people perceived as more:
- interesting
- outgoing
- warm
- socially skilled
Real life implications:
- Law: jurors more liens towards attractive defendants
- Politics: those with little political knowledge prefer attractive candidates
- Education: physically attractive children= rated more intelligent + with greater academic potential
- attractive scientists seen as worse scientists
Other social traits :
Competence: US senate election outcomes could be predicted by how competent candidates appeared
Candidates higher in competence + lower in sociability = more likely to win election
Pepe invested more in trustworthy individuals in financial trust games
Babyfaced defendants more likely to win cases that involved intentional actions—-more likely to loose cases of negligence in small slams
Central traits for social judgment
2 factor model:
- Competence
- intelligence
- efficacy
- ability - Warmth
- kindness
- likeablity
- trustworthiness
3 factor model:
- Competence
- Sociability
- likeability
- kindness - Morality
- honesty
- trustworthiness
Central traits of social judgement
Pagliaro et al. (2013)
Asked ppl to form impression of Boss
High V low in morality and competence
Morality: info determined initial responce to new boss
Ppl Asked to read senario presenting unfamiliar social grouo
- global evaluations better redacted in Morlaity
- exam lined by perception of threat
Accuracy of appearance-based impressions
High agreement between ppl rating faces on social traits — agreement between different cultures
Related to targets own imprsssion of themselves
Related to real-life outcomes:
- competence- political outcomes
- babyfacesness- financial outcomes
Rule et al. (2010):
- peornality tarits imprints in predicting voting behaviour
- varies according to culture
- cultural knowledge neeed to make judgements about electoral success
- US: power significantly predicted % of votes received
- Japan: warmth significantly recited % of votes received
Photos V videos
- pics of scientists rates on social traits
- good scientists= more competent and moral, less sociable + attractive
- science messages associated with ‘good’ scientists percieved as better
- short, silent videos of scientists rates on social traits
Impression formation: environment
Gosling (2002): found that strangers’ rating of students’ bedrooms were similar to studnets’ rating of themselves
Impression formation: online environment
Back (2010);
- collected personality ratings from social media users and their close friends
- examined social media profiles then rated users personality
- corsltion betwen the two ratings
Correlation between in-person ratings and webpage ratings
Impression formation: familiarly
Mere exposure effect = exposure to stimulus w/out any external reward, created familiarity with stimulus + makes ppl feel more positively about it
Moreland (1982):
- ppl saw pics of faces repeatedly or once
- familiar faces rated as more likeable
- studnets Rae’s women they saw more often as more attractive, warm and intelligent
Impression formation: salience
Salience = ability of cue to attract attention in its context
Salient cues = more likert yo be used for 1st impressions
Attend to them first
Van Boven (2020) argued:
- some effects of exposure can be explained by salience instead of
- relative exposure has stronger effect on lining than absolute exposure
Interpreting cues
Cues processed automatically
- spontaneously
- without awareness
First impression can be made within hundred of milliseconds
Cue—> thoughts—> learned associatio
Accessibility
The ease and speed with which info comes to mind and is used
More accessible info:
- will come to mind automatically
- will guide our interpretation of cues
Concurrent activation
Recent activation
Frequent activation
Accessibility: Concurrent activation
Knowledge that is activate at same time that cue occurs
Thoughts already in mind when cue will influence how you interpret it
Expectations also act as accessible knowledge
Rosenhan (1973) - Being sane in insane places:
- wanted to test reliability of diagnosis for mental disorders
- sent group of sane confederates to get admitted to pyshiatric hospital
- one admitted they started behaving normally
- none of staff recognised they were healthy
- staff expecting them to display disturbed behavior
Accessibility: Recent activation
- Mental representation that had been brought to mind will remain accessible for while
Higgins (1977):
- memories words
- either positive or negative
- read text about Donald
- those who rest prostive words before rated Donald more positively
Priming= activation of mental representation to increase its accessibility and this likelihood that it will be used
- primed concepts can have influences up to 24h later
Accessabilty: frequent activation
Requnetly activation of same metal representation makes it more accessible
Eg stereotypes prevalent in media, frequent judgements
Impression formation: impact of impression
1st impression = fairly pervasive
Can alter interpretation of later info
Primacy effect = pattern in which early-end our trees info has greater impact than subsequent info
Impact of impressions: conformation bias
Search for info that confirms your initial impression
Selctuelt attend to info that fits in with initial impression
While not attending to info that might disprove it
Can you get second chase at first impressions?
Gawronski (2010) :
- new experiences that contradict 1st impression become “bound” to context in which they were made, whereas 1st impressions still dominate in other contexts
1st impression = persistent
BUT…
They can be changed if first impression is challenged in multiple contexts —- 1st impression will slowest loose power
Inconsistent info
Threatens our sense of understanding
Threatens our l relationship with that person
We try reconcile with inconsistent info
- if we get on with someone and like them
- then find out they’re taking bad behind our back
- initial reaction may be ignored + try to reconcile the inconsistent into
Inconsistent info: reconcile info
Spend more time thinking about unexpected behaviours
Try explain/ justify undetected behaviours
Recall in constituent behaviours better
Impressions might not change
Do you get 2nd chance at making 1st impression?
Mailing more positive impression in many different contexts
No obvious situational explanation
