Chapter 2 Flashcards (AI)

2.1

Perception: Is the process of selecting, organizing, and interpreting information

  • Perception of selected stimuli pass through our perceptual filter

  • Are organized into our existing structures and patters

  • Are then interpreted based on previous experiences.

Perceptual field: The world around us

Salience: The degree to which something attracts our attention in a particular context.

  • Found in things visually or aurally stimulating

  • Found in things that meet our needs or interests

  • Found in expectation

Three ways we sort things into patters:

  • Proximity

  • Similarity

  • Difference

Punctuation: Refers to the structure of information into a timeline to determine the cause (stimulus) and effect (response) of our communication interactions.

Schemata: Databases of stored, related information that we use to interpret new experiences.

Key takeaways:

  • Perception is the process of selecting, organizing, and interpreting information. This process affects our communication because we respond to stimuli differently, whether they are objects or persons, based on how we perceive them

  • Given the massive amount of stimuli taken in by our senses, we only select da portion of the incoming information to organize and interpret. We select information based on slience. We tend to find salient things that are visually or aurally simulating and things that meet our needs and interests. Expectations also influence what information we select.

  • We organized information using schemata, which allow us to assign meaning to information based on accumulated knowledge and previous experiences.

  • We interpret information using schemata, which allow us to assign meaning to information based on accumulated knowledge and previous experiences.

2.2

We try to attribute the cause of others behaviors to internal or external factors.

  • Internal attributes: Attributes behaviors to personal aspects such as personality traits

  • External attributions: Attributes behaviors cause of behavior to situational factors

Note: These are important to consider. If you fight with your get yelled at by your partner you would react differently if you thought they had a bad day at work vs is you assume this was their personality

Fundamental attributions error: Our tendency to explain others behaviors using internal rather than external attributions

Self serving bias: A perceptual error through which we attribute the cause of our successes to internal personal factors while we attribute our failures to external factors beyond our control.

Primacy Effect: Leads us to place more value on the first information we receive about a person.

Recency Effect: Leads us to put more weight on the most recent impression we have of a persons communication over earlier impressions.

Selective Distortion: Adapting information that conflicts with our earlier impressions in order to make it fir within the from we have established

  • Halo effect: Leads us to view later interactions as positive based on earlier positive interactions

  • Horn Effect: Leads us to view later interactions as negative based on earlier negative interactions.

Perception in the senses:

  • Sight: Different cultures read art differently, starting at different spots first

  • Sound: In Asian countries Atonal music is used, but is often unpleasant to those not familiar

  • Touch: A man tapping a woman on the shoulder may be very offensive in some cultures

  • Taste: Foreign foods often are unappetizing to foreigners

  • Smell: Many cultures do not worry about B.O or soaps and perfumes as much as the US

Cultural identities shape how we perceive others because of beliefs, attitudes, and values of the cultural groups to which we belong are incorporated into our schema.

Personality: Refers to a persons general way of thinking, feeling, and behaving based on underlying motivations and impulses.

The Big Five Personality Traits:

  1. Extraversion: Refers to a persons interest in interacting with others. (High = Extrovert, Low = Introvert)

  2. Agreeableness: A persons level of trustworthiness and friendliness. (Higher = Cooperative, Lower = suspicious)

  3. Conscientiousness: Level of self-organization and motivation. (High = methodical and motivated, Low = less focused, careful, and dependable)

  4. Neuroticism: Level of negative thoughts towards ones self. (High = insecure and unstable, Low relaxed and stable)

  5. Openness” Willingness to consider new ideas. (High = Creative and open minded, Low = Rigid and “set in their ways”)

Assumed Similarity: Our tendency to perceive others as similar to us.

  • Ex. You set your friend up with a great girl but they don’t click, you assumed your friend had the same taste in women as you did.

Implicit personality theories: Used to generalize a persons overall personality from the traits we can perceive, while filling in the gaps.

  • Advantages: Can lead us to feel a connection and initiate further and better interaction from a first impression comfortably

  • Disadvantages: An early Horn/ Halo effect can be wrong and physical and environmental cues can add to the effect. Leading to assumptions about connection, similarities, and likability that were categorized wrong by the brain and thus observed differently

Key Takeaways:

  • We use attributions to interpret perceptual information, specifically, people’s behavior. Internal attribution connects behavior to personality while External Attribution connects behavior to external characteristics such as situational factors.

  • Two perceptual errors that occur in the process of attribution are the fundamental attribution error and the self-serving bias. (Fundamental error = over attribute behavior to personality, Self-serving bias = Attribute our success to internal factors and failures to external)

  • First and Last Impressions: We tend to put more importance on initial impressions over later ones. Recency Effects = More weight on the most recent impression over earlier

  • Halo & Horn Effect: (Halo = initial positive impression makes later interactions seem positive, Horn = Initial negative impressions make later interactions seem negative)

  • Cultural Identities: Affect the perceptions that we make about sensory information such as sounds as well as larger concepts such as marriage.

  • Personality Traits: Our underlying and enduring motivations for thinking and behaving the way we do, affect how we see others and ourselves.

2.3

Self Concept: The overall idea of who a person things he or she is. (Ex. Tell me about yourself)

Looking glass Self: We see ourselves reflected in other people’s reactions to us and then form our self-concept based on how we believe others see us.

Social comparison theory: We describe and evaluate ourselves in terms of how we compare to other people.

  • Superiority/Inferiority: We evaluate off charetoristics like attractiveness and intelligence.

  • Similarity/Difference: Both may be more or less desirable based on the situation.

Self Esteem: The judgement and evaluations we make about our self-concept.

  • Our self esteem also is situational and based off our self concept.

Self Efficancy: Judgements people make about their ability to perform a task within a specific context.

  • Self-concept, self-esteem, and self-efficacy all behave in an equal Vinn diagram way

Self-discrepancy Theory: People have beliefs about and expectations for their actual and potential selves that do not always match up with what they actually experience.

  • Actual Self: consists of the attributes that a you or someone else believes you actually have

  • Ideal Self: Consists of the attributes that you or someone else would like you to possess

  • Ought Self: Consists of the attributes you or someone else believes you should possess

  • Discrepancies: Can be positively used for self improvement or stressful when your actual self cannot complete the goals of the others, or doesn’t want to.

Actual Vs. Concepts: Lead to stress

  • Actual vs own ideals: Feeling of not obtaining our desires and hopes.

  • Actual vs others ideals: Feeling that we are not obtaining significant others desires and hopes for us.

  • Actual vs. Others ought: Feeling that we are not meeting what others see as our duties and obligations

  • Actually vs own ought: Feeling that we are not meeting our duties and obligations

Influences On Self Perception:

  • Social and Family: Praise can help or hinder an individuals confidence and self-efficacy and varies by culture

  • Culture:

  • Self-enhancement bias: is we tend to emphasize our desirable qualities relative to other people.

  • Media: Media guides what is acceptable and unacceptable and values within a society

  • Self-Presentation: The process of strategically concealing or revealing personal information in order to influence others perception. (Ex. Positive = good self monitoring, Bad = Lying on an application)

Types of Self-presentation:

  • Prosocial self-presentation: entails behaviors that present a person as a role model and male a person more likable and attractive.

  • Self-serving self-presentation: Entails behaviors that present a person as highly skilled, willing to challenge others, and someone not to be messed with.

  • Prosocial = benefiting others, Self-serving = Benefit self at expense of others

Key Takeaways:

  • Our self-concept is the overall idea of who we think we are. It is developed through interactions, social comparison and allows us to compare our beliefs and behaviors to others.

  • Our self-esteem is based on the evaluations and judgements we make about various characteristics of our self-concept. It is developed through our self-efficacy and comparison.

  • Social comparison theory and self discrepancy theory arrest our self concept and esteem through comparison with others and comparison of our actual, idea, and ought to selves we make judgements about who we are and our self worth.

  • Socializing forces such as family, culture, and media affect self-perception by giving feedback on who we are. Either positive or negative, with corresponding patterns.

  • Self-presentation refers to the process of strategically concealing or revealing personal information in order to influence others perceptions. Prosocial = benefiting others, Self-serving = Benefit self at expense of others.

  • Self enhancement: Self presentation strategy by which people intentionally seek out positive evaluations.

2.4 (Improving perception)

Learning objectives:

  1. Discuss strategies for improving self perception

  2. Discuss strategies for improving perception of others

  3. Employ Perception Checking to improve perception of self and others

Key Takeaways:

  1. We can improve self-perception by avoiding reliance on rigid schemata, thinking critically about socializing institutions, intervening in self-fulfilling prophecies, finding supportive interpersonal networks, and becoming aware of cycles of thinking that distort our self-perception.

  2. We can improve our perceptions of others by developing empathetic listening skills, becoming aware of stereotypes and prejudice, and engaging in self-reflection.

  3. Perception checking is a strategy that allows us to monitor our perceptions of and reactions to others and communication.

Improving Self-Perception:

  • It is a constant slow process except when a life change happens. Improvement is often met with backlash as you are no longer the same as other previously perceived you.

Avoid Reliance on rigid schema:

  • Be aware of new or contradictory information that may warrant revision of a schema. Autopilot is helpful sometimes but we can miss things and it makes for bad communication and growth.

Be Critical of socializing forces:

  • The health vs size debate shows that media and weight loss industry can have serious negative effects on self evaluation.

Beware of self-fulfilling prophecies:

  • Thoughts and action patterns in which a persons false belief triggers a behavior that makes the initial false belief actually or seemingly come true.

  • Ex. A shy person that sees themself as boring or unattractive will not talk a lot or put effort into a date, so the date will see him as shy and boring.

Create and maintain supporting interpersonal relationships:

  • We all have positive and negative relationships. Choosing intentionally positive and not to put energy into negative ones is important; however not having anyone to be constructive and only positive can also be a hindrance to self perception.

Beware of distorted patterns of thinking and acting:

  • Low self-esteem can lead to compensation, with either material things or relational choices.

  • They can also have unrealistic goals that lead to frustration when not met.

  • They can lack accurate information of themself that leads to frustration (Ex. X Factor contestants who are super confident but are in reality TERRIBLE singers)

Overcoming Barriers to perceiving others:

  • Working on perception skills and monitoring behaviors for change helps overcome these.

Develop empathetic listening skills:

  • Not everyone will have the same problems as you. Actively listening helps build an understanding of what is important to the other person and develop empathy.

Beware stereotypes and prejudice:

  • Stereotypes: Sets of beliefs that we develop about groups, which we then apply to individuals from that group.

  • Prejudice: Negative feelings or attitudes toward people based on their identity or identities.

Engage in self-reflection:

  • Asking yourself why a certain communication moment didn’t go well and reflecting on it from the other persons perspective helps grow your knowledge of cultural awareness but also helps you know how your actions are perceived by others.

Perception Checking:

  • A strategy to help monitor our reaction to and perceptions about people and communication.

  • Talking a step back to figure out what may be affecting your perceptions. Even using external feedback to verify our perceptions.