Com Arts 272 Chapter 4

Front 1

- Definition of Perception

Back 1

The process of making meaning from the things we experience in the environment.

Front 2

- Three stages of the perception process

Back 2

1) Selection
2) Organization
3) Interpretation

Front 3

3 factors affecting Selection

Back 3

1. Change/Uniqueness
(Deviations from the norm)

2. Repetition/Pattern
(Look for patterns in life, Ex. jingles on commercials)

3. Intensity
(Movement, color, size)(Bright, large, quick)

Front 4

3 ways we organize information

Back 4

1. Perceptual schema:
- Way our mind works to organize information (Schema: Mental template)

2. Rules:
- Preexisting rules of ways to structure information.

3. Scripts:
- How we should do normal things

Front 5

3 factors affecting interpretation

Back 5

1. Personal experience
- How we have been treated in the past

2. Knowledge of the person
- How well we know a person

3. Closeness of your relationship
- If they are doing it because they are a friend or because they want something in return.

Front 6

- Influences on our perceptual accuracy (3 influences)

Back 6

1. Physiological states and traits. (Physiology – how your body works and moves)

2. Cultural and co-cultural background

3. Social roles

Front 7

- Six Fundamental Forces in Interpersonal Perception

Back 7

1) Sterotyping

2) Primacy effect and Recency effect

3) Perceptual set / perceptual accentuation (Mars face, Pollyanna effect)

4) Egocentrism (altercentric)

5) Positivity and Negativity bias

6) Implicit Personality Theory (Halo effect, Reverse halo / horns effect)

Front 8

- Stereotyping
(definition, process, advantages/disadvantages, selective memory bias)

Back 8

i. Definition:
- Generalizing about groups of people that are applied to individual members of those groups.

ii. Process
- Identify a group we believe another person belongs to.
- Recall generalizations others make about people in that group
- Apply that generalization to the person

iii. Examples:
1. Bondes – dumb
2. Jews – cheap

ii. Benefits of stereotypes
1. They are energy-saving devices
2. They allow us to simplify information by categorizing information.

iii. Drawbacks to stereotypes
1. They can be used incorrectly.

Front 9

Primacy effect and Recency effect

Back 9

o Primacy effect:
• Tendency to emphasize the first impression over later impressions

o Recency effect:
• Tendency to emphasize the most recent impression (the last impression) over earlier impressions

Front 10

Perceptual set / perceptual accentuation (Mars face, Pollyanna effect)

Back 10

• More likely to see something because we are looking.

o Mars Face – humans trained to see/recognize faces
o Pollyana effect – tend to remember positive qualities more than negative qualities

Front 11

Define Egocentrism (altercentric)

Back 11

• Egocentrism:
- Inability to take another person’s perspective.

• Altercentric:
- When you always take perspective of someone else

Front 12

Positivity and Negativity bias

Back 12

• Positivity bias
- Positives can outweigh all the negative things

• Negativity bias
- Negatives outweigh all the positive things.

Front 13

Implicit Personality Theory (Halo effect, Reverse halo / horns effect)

Back 13

• Halo effect
– We think someone has a positive characteristic so we assign many other positive characteristics to that person

• Reverse halo/horns effect
- Assign many negative characteristics to a person when only knowing one negative characteristic about them

Front 14

How We Explain What We Perceive (Three Types of Attributions)

Back 14

1. Locus of control
i. Cause of behavior is located within ourselves (internal) or outside ourselves (external)

2. Stability
i. Stable – permanent, not easily changed
ii. Unstable – unpredictable, fleeting

3. Controllability
i. Whether or not our behavior is under our control or not

Front 15

- Attribution Errors (three types of errors)

Back 15

1. Self serving bias – attributing successes to internal causes and failures to external causes

2. Fundamental attribution error – attribute others behaviors to internal rather than external causes

3. Over attribution – attribute a range of behaviors to a single characteristic of a person