PSY220H1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Dispositional Attribution, Fundamental Attribution Error, John Ausonius
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Basis of first impressions: first impressions are formed almost instantly. A picture or even a name is often enough: name can draw inferences about age judith logan sounds like an old person name. First impressions can be surprisingly accurate on some occasions: famous study involved showing students a six second silent video clip of their professors. Students were asked to rate their professor on a whole host of traits. After the semester, students were asked to re-rate their professor and the ratings were remarkably similar: appearance. Election & competency experiment: group memberships. We use readily available information to form first impressions. Todorov, mandisodza, goren & hall (2005) perceived competence from appearance. Participants were exposed to unfamiliar faces for one second unbeknownst to them was that they were faces of actual candidates in previous house and senate elections. If face was familiar to participant, trial was negated.