PSYC 275 - EXAM #1 (SOCIAL PERCEPTION)

Social Perception

an active cognitive process thru which we know, understand, and judge others

• focus on the power of the situation

  • ex: a perosn behavior → how are they behaving

• stimulant determine response

  • stimululs: situation → perceivers subjective impression of stimulus → perceivers judgement/behavior response

  • ex: someone says a joke (stimulus), someone thought the joke was bad (impression), the the person frowns (response)

Aspects of Social Perception

1. perceiver asesses person’s affective state (reading non verbal cues)

2. attribution: perceiver assesses cause of person’s behavior

   • is it diagnostic or situational? like if someone cuts us in line.

3. Impression formation: perceiver combines info to form impression/judgement

   • combinational process; multiple pieces of info like behavior, attribution to determine an overal impression of a person

     • like a job process to qualify someone

Perceive Target Person’s Affective State

a. nonverbal behavior (body movements, posture, etc)

b. facial expression

• 5 basic emotions (anger, fear, sadness, and disgust) → 4 negatives

• surprise → middle

• happiness → 1 positive

it is a universal aspect, bc it is inherited in us and their perception

c. eye contact

• can produce positive impression, but also negative one

  • depends on power fo situation

  • ex: if a person engaged in eye contact and show express of love → +

  • if a person on the CTA makes eye contact w/ you, you might be uncomfortable → -

d. body langauge

• posture, gesture, emblems: body langauge signal or sign that convey a certain meaning

  • ex: peace sign in US means peace, other countries means its bad

• touching

  • appropirate: somoen close conveys affection → + info = + impression made

  • inappropirate: a stranger touches you conveys a negative impression of not knowing the person

e. detecting deception

the process of knowing when someone is lying or misleading in communication by analyzing their verbal and nonverbal cues

f. Cognitive Tuning Model:

• happy expression produce less systemic processing region sterotypes as quick way to determine judgement

Attributions

perceives infers cause or target behavior