David Myers Chapter 3: Social Beliefs and Judgments ©2013 McGraw-Hill Companies 1

David MyersChapter 3:

Social Beliefs and Judgments

©2013 McGraw-Hill Companies 1

What is “motivated reasoning”?“2/3 or what we see is behind our eyes”

Perceiving our Social WorldJudging our Social WorldExplaining our Social WorldExpectations of our Social World


Perceiving Our Social WorldsOur assumptions and pre-judgments guide what we see, interpret and recallWe construct our own reality

PrimingActivating particular associations in memory

Example: Watching a scary movie at home may prime us to interpret furnace noises as a possible intruder

-”embodied cognition” –bodily sensations -> judgments

Perceiving and interpreting events Kulechov effect –what is it? Spontaneous trait transference -what is it?

Are you a gossiper? Or just gossip?


Perceiving Our Social Worlds

Belief PerseverancePersistence of one’s initial conceptions, as when the

basis for one’s belief is discredited but an explanation of why the belief might be true survives Explain why a risk taker makes a better firefighter.. The more we examine our explanations for our beliefs,

the stronger we belief in them What effect does this have on the juror’s initial impression

of guilt or innocence of the defendant? Explanations survive well! What’s the way to avoid this trap?

Explain the other side! (Lord, Lepper, & Preston, ‘84


Perceiving Our Social Worlds

Constructing Memories of Ourselves and Our WorldsElizabeth Loftus Misinformation effect

Incorporating “misinformation” into one’s memory of the event after witnessing an event and receiving misleading information about it

Reconstructing our past attitudes We remember the last event which overrides the previous

Reconstructing our past behavior Rosy retrospective Downward spiral (Holmberg found what?)

Underestimated earlier liking of partner


Judging Our Social World

Intuitive Judgments Powers of intuition

Explicit Controlled processing

Reflective, deliberate, and conscious Automatic processing

Impulsive, effortless, and without our awareness implicit Schemas Emotional reactions

What is blindsight? Not being able to recognize the stick but being able to Determine if it’s vertical or horizontal


Judging Our Social WorldThe Limits of Intuition

Can subliminal messages make you eat popcorn?

Illusory Intuition To follow…



Overconfidence Phenomenon

D Kahneman & Tversky Tendency to be more confident than correct – to

overestimate the accuracy of one’s beliefs Incompetence feeds overconfidence

Don’t let his happen on the exam!!!! How can you avoid it?

Are you ignorant of your ignorances? Planning fallacy Stockbroker overconfidence Political overconfidence



Confirmation BiasTendency to search for information that

confirms one’s preconceptions 2-4-6 what is the rule to generate another 3

number set? -Any three ascending numbers (P. C.Watson, ‘60)

Search for disconfirming information Helps explain why our self-images are so stable Self-verification



Remedies for Overconfidence Give prompt feedback to explain why

statement is incorrectFor planning fallacy, ask one to “unpack a

task” – break it down into estimated time requirements for each part

Get people to think of one good reason why their judgments might be wrong



Heuristics: Mental ShortcutsRepresentativeness heuristic

Tendency to presume, sometimes despite contrary odds, that someone or something belongs to a particular group if resembling (representing) a typical member Is linda a bank teller or Bank teller and feminist activist?

Two conjunctive events can’t be more likely than either one alone (Kahneman & Tversky)



Heuristics: Mental Shortcuts Availability heuristic

Cognitive rule that judges the likelihood of things in terms of their availability in memory The more easily we recall something the more likely it seems How does this affect a supervisor’s appraisal of an

employee’s performance? What can be done about it?

What percent of U.S. adults are homosexual? Why do people overestimate?

What impression do most people who saw “The Wire” think of the crime rate in Baltimore?

We underestimate high probability events and overestimate low probability events



Counterfactual ThinkingImagining alternative scenarios and outcomes

that might have happened, but didn’t Mentally simulating what might have happened How should I award grades to make you all feel better? Should you change an answer on your test?

Underlies our feelings of luck Good luck… good outcome and we imagine a negative

outcome Bad luck…bad outcome and we imagine a good one

--”if I had only….” “shouda, wouda, couda”



Illusory ThinkingOur search for order in random events

Illusory correlation Perception of a relationship where none exists, or

perception of a stronger relationship than actually exists We ignore unusual events that don’t confirm the

perceived relationship



Illusory ThinkingIllusion of control

Perception of uncontrollable events as subject to one’s control or as more controllable than they are Gambling Regression toward the average

Statistical tendency for extreme scores or extreme behavior to return toward one’s average

Lowest scoring students on the exam will likely do better

Exceptional performance tends to decline over the long run. What about stock market successes?



Moods and Judgments Good and bad moods

trigger memories of experiences associated with those moods

Moods color our interpretations of current experiences

Priming again!

A temporary good or bad mood strongly influenced people’s ratings of their videotaped behavior. Those in a bad mood

detected far fewer positive behaviors.


Explaining Our Social World

Attributing Causality: To the Person or the SituationMisattribution

Mistakenly attributing a behavior to the wrong sourceAttribution theory

Theory of how people explain others’ behavior Dispositional attributions

Are most workers lazy or conscientious? Is it something about them?

Situational attribution Are most workers lazy or conscientious? Is it something about the situation? What could that be?


Explaining Our Social WorldInternal or external cause? Attribution theoriesInferring Traits

We often infer that other people’s actions are indicative of their intentions and dispositions

Commonsense Attributions – theory of correspondent inferencesConsistency – same behavior in similar

situation?Distinctiveness – only in this situation?Consensus –how do others behavior in this

situation?



Fundamental Attribution Error (Lee Ross)

Tendency for observers to underestimate situational influences and overestimate dispositional influences upon others’ behavior Example: Assuming questioning hosts on game

shows are more intelligent than the contestants



Why Do We Make the Attribution Error?Perspective and situational awareness

Actor-observer perspectives Attribute good behavior to self / bad to external

causes Self-serving bias

Camera perspective bias Perspectives change with time

“that was the old me..” –someone else



Why Do We Make the Attribution Error?Cultural Differences

Dispositional attribution Situational attribution

“the clock made me do it!”

Where could that happen?

We follow the causal chain to find whatever suits our belief

How does this play out when you are approached by a panhandler?

Attributions and Reactions


Expectations of Our Social World

Self-Fulfilling ProphecyBelief that leads to its

own fulfillment Experimenter bias

Teacher Expectations and Student Performance

Do students learn more if they expect the professor is good?

(Feldman & Prohaska ‘79)

Self-Fulfilling Prophecies


Expectations of Our Social World

Self ful-filling prophecyDoes it happen at work?In marriagesIn friendship relationships?

Getting from Others What We ExpectBehavioral confirmation

Type of self-fulfilling prophecy whereby people’s social expectations lead them to behave in ways that cause others to confirm their expectations


What can we conclude?Social cognition powers are impressive

But fallible! Be on guard and use reasonIllusions are persistentRely on intuition but check whenever

possible - especially for important decisions

Remember the biases in thinking and notice when they occur


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David Myers Chapter 3: Social Beliefs and Judgments ©2013 McGraw-Hill Companies 1