PSYC 3080 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Central Tendency, Stereotype, Negativity Bias

• School: University of Guelph
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 3080
• Professor: Harjinder Gill

Document Summary

* note: chapter summaries/explanation boxes on exam (not nit-picky) The process of interpreting the messages of our senses to provide order & meaning to the environment. Target (attributes of a target, relationship of target to others, etc. ) Situation (social/work setting, actions of others, etc. ) Primacy: the tendency for a perceiver to rely on first impressions. Recency: the tendency to rely on recent cues or last impressions. Central traits: reliance on personal characteristics of the target that are of interest to the perceiver (you are well-dressed so you notice that more in other people) Implicit personality theories: theories people have about which personality traits go together (someone who is slow is not as bright, someone is polite so they are trustworthy) Projection: tendency to attribute one"s own thoughts & feelings (you"re upset about your performance appraisal so you think other people must be too) Stereotyping: tendency to generalize about people in a social category & ignore variations among them.