Perception, Attitudes personality

Chapter 5
Perception, Attitudes,
and Personality

Learning Goals
• Understand human perceptual processes
and how people form impressions of others
• Describe types of perceptual error and their
effects on information people get from their
environment
• Explain attribution processes and their
effects on perception and attitudes

Learning Goals (Cont.)
• Discuss the nature of attitudes, how they
form and how they change
• Explain the different views of human
personality development
• Discuss some dimensions of personality and
several personality types
• Recognize the effects of different cultures
on perception, attitudes, and personality

Chapter Overview
• Introduction
• Perception
• Attitudes
• Personality
• International Aspects of Perception,
Attitudes, and Personality
• Ethical Issues in Perception, Attitudes, and
Personality

and Personality
Perception Attitudes
Personality
Chapter 5

Perception
• A cognitive process: lets a person make
sense of stimuli from the environment
• Affects all senses: sight, touch, taste, smell,
hearing
• Includes inputs to person and choice of
inputs to which the person attends
• Stimulus sources: people, events, physical
objects, ideas
• Helps adaptation to a changing environment

Perception (Cont.)
• Perceptual process
– Target: object of the person’s perceptual
process
– Threshold: minimum information from target
for the person to notice the target
• Detection threshold: point at which person notices
something has changed in her or his environment
• Recognition threshold: point at which person can
identify the target or change in the target
See text book Figure 5.1

Perception (Cont.)
• Perceptual process (cont.)
– Target emerges from its surrounding context
sometimes slowly, sometimes quickly
– Quickly discriminate a high-contrast target
from its background; an ambiguous target takes
more time to see
– Contrast can come from the target's size, color,
loudness, or smell

Perception (Cont.)
• Perceptual process (cont.)
– People attend more quickly to positively valued
stimuli than to negatively valued stimuli
– Example: achievement-oriented employees
notice announcements about promotion
opportunities faster than an employee with less
achievement motivation

Perception (Cont.)
• Perceptual defense: shield self from
negatively valued stimuli
– Example: block out annoying sounds
– Organizational example: block some feedback
from a supervisor or coworker when it is
negative

Perception (Cont.)
• Perceptual errors: mistakes in the
perceptual process
– Perceptual set
• Beliefs about a target based on information about
the target or previous experiences with it
• Information about the target from any source
• Beliefs act like instructions for processing stimuli
from the target

Perception (Cont.)
• Perceptual errors (cont.)
– Stereotype: beliefs and perceived attributes
about a target based on the target’s group
– Examples
• American university students: energetic and
spontaneous
• Russian university students: orderly and obedient

Self-Perception:
A View of Self
• Self-perception: process by which people
develop a view of themselves
• Develops from social interaction within
different groups, including groups
encountered on the Internet
• Self-perception has three parts: self-
concept, self-esteem, self-presentation

Self-Perception:
A View of Self (Cont.)
• Self-concept:
– Set of beliefs people have about themselves
– View people hold of their personal qualities and
attributes
– Factors affecting a person's self-concept
• Observations of behavior
• Recall of past significant events
• Effect of the surrounding social context

Self-Perception:
• Self-concept (cont.)
– Observations of behavior
• People see their behavior, and their situation, in the
same way they see the behavior of other people
• Person believes the behavior occurred voluntarily:
concludes the behavior happened because of some
personal quality or attribute

Self-Perception:
– Observations of behavior (cont.)
• People learn about themselves by comparing
themselves to other people with similar qualities
• Example: you may want to assess your abilities to
hold a supervisory position. You compare yourself
to people with backgrounds similar to yours who
have had recent promotions

Self-Perception:
– Recall of past significant events and effect of
the surrounding social context
• Recall events important in their lives; not error free
• Tend to recall events they attribute to themselves
and not to a situation or other people
• Often overestimate their role in past events
• Place more weight on the effects of their behavior
and less on the surrounding situation or other people

Self-Perception:
• Self-esteem
– Emotional dimension of self-perception
– Positive and negative judgments people have of
themselves
– People with low self-esteem tend to be
unsuccessful; do not adapt well to stressful
events
– Those with high self-esteem have the opposite
experiences

Self-Perception:
• Self-awareness
– People differ in degree of self-awareness
– Two forms
• Private self-consciousness: behave according to
attend to inner feelings and standards
• Public self-consciousness: behave according to
social standard correct for the situation

Self-Perception:
• Self-presentation
– Behavioral strategies people use to affect how
others see them
– How they think about themselves
– Goals of self-presentation
• Affect other people's impressions to win their
approval
• Increase the person's influence in a situation
• Ensure that others have an accurate impression of
the person

Self-Perception:
• Self-presentation (cont.)
– Highly conscious of public image: change
behavior from situation to situation. Readily
conform to situational norms
– People who want others to perceive them in a
particular way behave consistently in different
situations. They act in ways they perceive as
true to themselves with little regard for the
norms of the situation

Social Perception:
A View of Others
• Social perception: process by which
people come to know and understand each
other
• Forming impression of a person: perceiver
first observes the person, the situation, and
the person's behavior

Social Perception:
A View of Others (Cont.)
• Form a quick impression by making a snap
judgment about that person, or
• Make attributions and integrate the
attributions to form a final impression
• Confirmation biases lead the perceiver to
hold tenaciously to it

Social Perception:
• Elements of social perception
– Three sets of clues help form the impression of
another person
• Person
• Situation surrounding the person
• Observed behavior of the person

Social Perception:
• Elements of social perception (cont.)
– Developing first impressions
• Use different physical aspects of the person: height,
weight, hair color, eyeglasses
• Stereotypes based on physical features
– Thin men: tense, suspicious, stubborn
– Blond women: fun loving
– Neatly dressed people: responsible
• Stereotypes result from attributing qualities to
people based on previously formed perceptions

Social Perception:
• Elements of social perception (cont.)
– Preconceptions about the situations in which
we see the behavior of other people
– Develop from experience with the same or
similar situations
– Situation raises expectations about behavior the
situation should cause
– Example: when two people are introduced, we
expect both parties to acknowledge the other
and probably to shake hands

Social Perception:
• Attribution processes
– People use attribution processes to explain the
causes of behavior they see in others
– Begins with a quick personal attribution
followed by adjustment based on the
characteristics of the situation

Social Perception:
• Personal attribution
– Characteristics of the person such as beliefs,
disposition, or personality, and not the
situation, caused the person's behavior
– Example: when you conclude that another
student spends many hours completing a
project because he likes to work hard or values
hard work, you are making a personal
attribution

Social Perception:
• Situational attribution
– Aspects of the situation, not qualities of the
person, cause the person's behavior
– Example: a student worked hard because of the
reward of a good grade

Social Perception:
• Perceiver uses three types of information
when forming an attribution
– Consensus information
– Distinctiveness information
– Consistency information

Social Perception:
• Consensus information
– Observe other people in the same or a similar
situation
• If other people show the same behavior as the target
person, the situation caused the behavior
• If other people behave differently from the target
person, the person caused the behavior

Social Perception:
• Distinctiveness information
– Observe the target person in a different
situation
• If the response is different in the new situation, the
situation caused the behavior
• If the response is the same, the person caused the
behavior

Social Perception:
• Consistency information
– Observe the target person in a similar situation,
but at a different time
• High consistency: same behavior at both times
• Low consistency: different behavior at both times

Social Perception:
• Combine consensus, distinctiveness, and
consistency information to form attribution
– Personal attribution: behavior high in
consistency; low in consensus and
distinctiveness
– Situational attribution: behavior high in
consensus and distinctiveness; low in
consistency

Social Perception:
• Fundamental attribution error
– Observer underestimates situation as cause of
behavior; overestimates the as cause
– Explaining their behavior: tend to ascribe
causes to the situation, not to personal qualities
– Explaining other’s behavior: tend to ascribe its
causes to personal qualities, not the situation

Social Perception:
• False consensus
– Overestimate the degree to which others agree
with the person's view
– Reinforces the view the perceiver has of
another person

Social Perception:
• Integration of attributions to form final
impression: disposition of perceiver
– Effects of recent experiences: positive or
negative event just before meeting someone for
the first time can affect the impression of the
person
– Mood at time of first meeting:
• Positive impressions in a good mood
• Negative impressions in a bad mood

Attitudes
• An attitude is “a learned predisposition to
respond in a consistently favorable or
unfavorable manner with respect to a given
object”
• Attitude object: physical objects, issues,
ideas, events, people, places

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Parts of an attitude
– Cognitive: perceptions and beliefs about an
attitude object
– Affective: feelings about an attitude object
– Behavioral intentions: how the person wants
to behave and what a person says about an
attitude object

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Common work attitudes
– Organizational commitment
– Satisfaction
– Job involvement
• Play a role in employee turnover

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Some connection between attitudes and
behavior, although not strong
– People with strong attitudes about an object
will likely behave in accord with their attitude
– Strong positive attitudes about Macintosh©
computers leads to buying one
– Ardent followers of Jesse Jackson will likely
vote for him

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Attitude formation: affected by the
person’s beliefs about an object and the
amount and type of information the person
has about the object
– Perceives positive attributes: develops positive
attitude
– Perceives negative attributes: develops
negative attitude

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Attitude formation (cont.)
– Family upbringing
– Peer groups
– Work groups
– General social experiences

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Attitude change
– Something persuades the person to shift his or
her attitudes (persuasive communication)
– Norms of a social group can affect a person’s
attitude (social norms)
– Person becomes uncomfortable with some
aspects of her or his beliefs (cognitive
dissonance)

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Persuasive communication
– Advertising
– Tries to change cognitive part of attitude
– Assumes affective part will also change
– Attitude change process
• Win target’s attention
• Understand message
• Accept the influence
• Remember the message

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Social influence on attitudes
– People are embedded in social groups
– Feel pressures to conform to norms
– If person values membership in group, likely
will align attitudes with the group norms

Attitudes (Cont.)
• Cognitive dissonance
– Hold multiple beliefs or cognitions about an
attitude object
– Feel tension when discrepancies develop
– Motivated to reduce the tension
– Change one or more cognitions
– Other parts of attitude also change

Personality
• Set of traits, characteristics, and
predispositions of a person
• Usually matures and stabilizes by about age
30
• Affects how a person adjusts to different
environments

Personality Theories
• Cognitive theory: people develop their
thinking patterns as their life unfolds
• Learning theories: behavior patterns
develop from the social environment
• Biological theories: personality as
genetically inherited

Personality Theories (Cont.)
• Cognitive theory
– Develop thinking patterns as life unfolds
– Affects how the person interprets and
internalizes life's events
– Cognitive development stages
• Reflexive behavior of infant
• More complex modes of perception and
interpretation of events
– Neither driven by instincts nor unwittingly
shaped by environmental influences

• Learning theories
– Learn behavior from social interaction with
other people
– Young child: early family socialization
– Continuously learn from social environment:
stable behavior forms the personality
– Uniqueness of each personality follows from
variability in social experiences

• Biological theories
– Ethological theory
• Develop common characteristics as a result of
evolution
• Behavioral characteristics that have helped survival
over generations become inborn characteristics

• Biological theories (cont.)
– Behavior genetics
• Individual's unique gene structure affects
personality development
• Personality develops from interactions between a
person's genetic structure and social environment

The Big-Five
Personality Dimensions
• Extroversion
– High: talkative, sociable
– Low: reserved, introverted
• Emotional stability
– High: calm, relaxed
– Low: worried, depressed
• Agreeableness
– High: cooperative, tolerant
– Low: rude, cold

The Big-Five
Personality Dimensions (Cont.)
• Conscientiousness
– High: dependable, thorough
– Low: sloppy, careless
• Openness to experience
– High: curious, intelligent
– Low: simple, conventional
Assess yourself on each dimension

Personality Types
• Locus of control: people control the
consequences of their actions or are
controlled by external factors
– External control: luck, fate, or powerful
external forces control one’s destiny
– Internal control: believe they control what
happens to them
Assess yourself against each type.

Personality Types (Cont.)
• Machiavellianism
– Holds cynical views of other people's motives
– Places little value on honesty
– Approaches the world with manipulative intent
– Maintains distance between self and others
– Emotionally detached from other people
– Suspicious interpersonal orientation can
contribute to high interpersonal conflict

• Machiavellianism (cont.)
– Focus on personal goals, even if reaching them
requires unethical behavior
– Suspicious orientation leads to view of
organizational world as a web of political
processes

• Type A personality: a keen sense of time
urgency, focuses excessively on
achievement, aggressive
Type B personality: strong self-esteem,
even tempered, no sense of time urgency
Type A: significant risk factor for coronary heart disease.

• Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)
– Popular personality assessment device
– Four bi-polar dimensions
• Extroverted (E) - introverted (I)
• Sensing (S) - intuitive (I)
• Thinking (T) - feeling (F)
• Perceiving (P) - judging (J)
– Assigns people to one of sixteen types based on
these dimensions

• Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)
(cont.)
– Extroverts look outward; introverts turn inward
– Sensers use data; intuitives use hunches
– Thinkers are objective; feelers are subjective
– Perceivers are flexible; judgers want closure
– ESTJ type: extroverted, sensing, thinking, and
judging

International Aspects of
and Personality
• Culturally based stereotypes
– Swiss: punctual
– Germans: task-oriented
– Americans: energetic
– People who hold these stereotypes experience
surprises when they meet people from these
countries who do not fit the stereotypes

and Personality (Cont.)
• Culturally based stereotypes (cont.)
– Project aspects of own culture onto people and
situations in a different culture
– Assumes that the new culture mirrors their own
– Example: Korean manager visiting Sweden
assumes all women seated behind desks are
secretaries
– Such behavior would be inappropriate and
possibly dysfunctional in Sweden where many
women hold management positions

• Attitudes about organizational design,
management, and decision making:
– U.S. managers: a hierarchical organizational
design helps solve problems and guides the
division of labor in the organization
– French and Italian managers: a hierarchical
design lets people know authority relationships
in the organization

• Attitudes (cont.)
– Italian managers: bypassing a manager to reach
a subordinate employee is insubordination
– Swedish and Austrian organizations:
decentralized decision making
– Philippine and Indian organizations:
centralized decision making
Conclusion: Organizations that cross national borders and draw
managers from many different countries have high conflict potential.

• Personality characteristics
– People in individualistic cultures (United
States) have a stronger need for autonomy than
people in group-oriented cultures (Japan)
– People in cultures that emphasize avoiding
uncertainty (Belgium, Peru) have a stronger
need for security than people in cultures that
are less concerned about avoiding uncertainty
(Singapore, Ireland)

Ethical Issues in
and Personality
• Stereotypes and workforce diversity
– Can have inaccurate stereotypes about the
ethics of people with different social, racial,
and ethnic backgrounds
– These stereotypes can affect the opinions
people develop about the ethical behavior of
such people in the workplace

Ethical Issues in
• Self-presentation
– Deliberately managing self-presentations so
decisions and behavior appear ethical
– Limited experimental evidence suggests one
can favorably manage other people's
impressions of their ethical attitudes

Ethical Issues in
• Attribution and accountability
– Individual responsibility is central to ethical
behavior
• Attribution of responsibility to a person: person
behaved ethically or unethically
• Attribution of responsibility to the situation:
individual not held accountable
• Example: observer believed the person had behaved
unethically because of a directive
– Errors in attribution: could conclude that he or
she was not responsible for an unethical act

Ethical Issues in
• Ethical attitudes
– Little reliable and valid information about
ethical attitudes
– Some evidence points to the absence of a fixed
set of ethical attitudes among managers
– Attitudes about ethics in organizations and
decision making are situational and varying
– The morality of behavior and decisions is
determined by their social context, not by
abstract and absolute rules

Perception, Attitudes personality

In this document

More Related Content

What's hot

Viewers also liked

Similar to Perception, Attitudes personality

More from ASAD ALI

Recently uploaded

Perception, Attitudes personality