Social Psychology PSYC 3402 TOPIC Perceiving Persons Chapter 4 Social Perception 1 Scenario The way we seek to know and understand other persons and events a Driving hoopde really crappy car through bad ass neighborhood at 2 30 3am in the morning and suddently the hoopde stops Have a cell phone but it s totally dead and you can t charge it in a hoopde You re scared At this point you re gonna have a meltdown where you re crying and praying etc Your life is also flashing before you and you think this is it someone s gonna come along with a machete or something All of a sudden you see headlights a car approaching you You re not happy I have like two seconds to go The car approaches you and teenagers are in it 14 15 yrs old one is old enough to drive Hair color is colors other than normal colors clothes hanging off their bodies body jewelry all over the place tattoos and they come toward you You need to leave the area with them so they say they can drive you out Another set of headlights suddenly it s a solo white older male state trooper Comes and asks to take you out of the area You have a choice go with the state trooper or the teenagers What s your choice Depends on your beliefs how you grew up Personally it would be a tough choice but I d probably go with the teenagers b c you never really know if you can trust the state trooper he s all by himself in a position of authority with tons of weapons so he could potentially do something bad to you It s likely that the teenagers are harmless but just interesting looking plus there is safety power in groups 2 Not a single instantaneous event comprises of a number of ongoing processes that are judgmental What people say How people say things predict future actions Deals with people s past behavior and how such past behavior information can 3 Social perception cognitive processes can be divided into two general areas Impression Formation and Attribution Process A Impression Formation information about another into an overall judgment The process by which one integrates various sources of Based on rapid assessments of observable qualities and behaviors in others Such as what a person is wearing the color of their skin their ethnicity Obtained mostly by attending to nonverbal cues Height of person body posture level of attractiveness Usually the first step of social perceptions and sometimes the only step Sizing up people during initial encounters Vital importance to our health and safety Engage in everyday with very little information Impression Formation is integrative Meaning each bit of information about a person is interpreted within the context of all other information we have about him or her Also some bits due to their primacy or centrality will carry more weight and even orchestrate all other bits into a coherent whole Example Scenario o When you re a parent you love your child unconditionally even if they re mean they re strange etc you love your child so much that you re willing to run into a burning building after them even knowing that neither one of you will come out alive o Let s pretend that you re expecting a baby o In our society most people need child care when you find out you re pregnant you re all going to discuss child care it s difficult to find good child care o Even after the baby is born you still don t have a nanny but you have to get back to work o Now at 10 months you get a knock at the door You open it and there s a well groomed young woman Emma Joe standing there The baby is 10 months old and can have stranger anxiety but the baby jumps right into the woman s arms o The woman is very articulate and has a Master s degree meanwhile the baby is all over her and she s good with the baby o You look at her resume and notice there s a 5 year gap o Ask her to explain the 5 year gap she says I was incarcerated during that time for armed robbery I was the driver of the money truck but we all went down for armed robbery o Will you let her watch your baby o The incarceration weighs so much more on your impression of her than any other good traits Impression Formation through Stereotyping The Social Categorization Process The classification of people into groups based on their common attributes To what extent do we do this We categorize each other like we categorize objects o Categorize someone based on personality o Group people based on age occupation appearance socioeconomic status etc Research indicates that readily apparent physical features are the most common way to classify people especially in the initial stages of impression formation These features are usually superficial aspects of an individual s personal qualities Such as race sex attractiveness etc This becomes very habitual and automatic b c it s a subconscious habit From Social Categories to Stereotypes A fixed way of thinking about people that puts them into categories and does not allow for individual variation we group people and then judge them for it How might stereotyping people bring greater efficiency to our social judgment Sometimes it can be efficient shortcuts to thinking but the majority of times it is discriminatory o When we need to think fast and make a quick decision it can give us a basis for immediate actions or it will allow us to redirect our energy intentions Ex networking with potential employers look automatically for people who are dressed nicely presentation may make them more inclined to offer you a job How might stereotyping people inhibit our thought o Employer might be more inclined to look for people of higher socioeconomic status expensive suit vs second hand Impression Formation and Nonverbal Cues Communicating feelings and intentions without words Facial Expressions extremely powerful communication source Charles Darwin proposed that facial expressions not only play an important role in communication but that certain emotional expressions are innate and thus are understood throughout the world Studies conducted during the past 50 years provide strong support for Darwin s assertions Refer to Table 1 KNOW THIS FOR EXAM Darwin also believed that this ability to recognize emotion from the observation of facial expressions had a survival value to us This survival value hypothesis would predict that people do not attend equally to all facial expressions but rather exhibit the most sensitivity to those that would give them the best chance for survival PEOPLE SHOULD BE MOST ATTENTIVE TO FACIAL EXPRESSIONS THAT SIGNAL POTENTIAL