"When are social judgments made? Evidence for the spontaneousness of trait inferences": Correction to Winter and Uleman.

Reports an error in "When are social judgments made? Evidence for the spontaneousness of trait inferences" by Laraine Winter and James S. Uleman (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1984[Aug], Vol 47[2], 237-252). There are errors in the labeling of Figure 1 on p. 244. The ordinate percentages should be three times greater than indicated. In addition, the algebraic formula in the note for Table 2 on p. 245 is incorrect. The correct ordinate percentages and the correct algebraic formula are provided in the erratum. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 1985-01259-001.) Adapted E. Tulving and D. M. Thomson's (see record 2005-09647-002) encoding specificity paradigm for 2 recall experiments with 153 undergraduates to investigate whether Ss would make trait inferences without intentions or instructions at the encoding stage of processing behavioral information. Under memory instructions only, Ss read sentences describing people performing actions that implied traits. Later, Ss recalled each sentence under 1 of 3 cuing conditions: a dispositional cue (e.g., generous); a strong, nondispositional semantic associate to an important sentence word; or no cue. Results show that recall was best when cued by the disposition words. Ss were unaware of having made trait inferences. Interpreted in terms of encoding specificity, findings indicate that Ss unintentionally made trait inferences at encoding. It is suggested that attributions are made spontaneously, as part of the routine comprehension of social events. (39 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

When are social judgments made? Evidence for the spontaneousness of trait inferences.

[Correction Notice: An erratum for this article was reported in Vol 50(2) of Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (see record 2008-10962-001). There are errors in the labeling of Figure 1 on p. 244. The ordinate percentages should be three times greater than indicated. In addition, the algebraic formula in the note for Table 2 on p. 245 is incorrect. The correct ordinate percentages and the correct algebraic formula are provided in the erratum.] Adapted E. Tulving and D. M. Thomson's (see record 2005-09647-002) encoding specificity paradigm for 2 recall experiments with 153 undergraduates to investigate whether Ss would make trait inferences without intentions or instructions at the encoding stage of processing behavioral information. Under memory instructions only, Ss read sentences describing people performing actions that implied traits. Later, Ss recalled each sentence under 1 of 3 cuing conditions: a dispositional cue (e.g., generous); a strong, nondispositional semantic associate to an important sentence word; or no cue. Results show that recall was best when cued by the disposition words. Ss were unaware of having made trait inferences. Interpreted in terms of encoding specificity, findings indicate that Ss unintentionally made trait inferences at encoding. It is suggested that attributions are made spontaneously, as part of the routine comprehension of social events. (39 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personality differences in spontaneous personality inferences at encoding.

Examined the relationship between individual differences on a trait measure with behavioral correlates—a balanced authoritarianism (F) scale developed by D. Byrne (1974)—and the content of stimulus sentences and their related dispositional retrieval cues. Two sets of sentences were developed in pretesting with 33 undergraduates. In the 1st set, events suggested a consensual disposition for each sentence actor to either high-F (HF) or low-F (LF) Ss. In the 2nd set, events suggested a different consensual disposition to HF and LF Ss. 38 HF and 39 LF undergraduates then read both sets of sentences for a "memory study." Consensual dispositions and semantic associates to the actors were used to cue recall. For the 1st set, there was a significant interaction between S type, sentence type, and cue type. LF dispositions were more effective retrieval cues for LF than for HF Ss. Ss had little accurate awareness of having made trait inferences. No significant effects were found for HF cues alone or for the 2nd sentence set. Results indicate that HF and LF Ss differ in their spontaneous social inferences about others and have little awareness of making these inferences. Implications for integrating trait and cognitive approaches to personality are discussed. (33 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The role of construal processes in overconfident predictions about the self and others.

Overconfident behavioral predictions and trait inferences may occur because people make inadequate allowance for the uncertainties of situational construal. In Studies 1–3, Ss estimated how much time or money they would spend in various hypothetical, incompletely specified situations. Ss then offered associated "confidence limits" under different "construal conditions." In Study 4, Ss made trait inferences about someone they believed had responded "deviantly," again with situational details unspecified and construal conditions manipulated. In all 4 studies, Ss who made predictions or trait inferences without being able to assume the accuracy of their situational construals offered confidence limits no broader than those of Ss who made their responses contingent on such accuracy. Only in conditions where Ss were obliged to offer alternative construals did they appropriately broaden their confidence limits or weaken their trait inferences. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Person memory and causal attributions.

Three experiments with 273 college students were conducted to reconcile the apparent contradiction between the well-established finding that initial impressions are resistant to incongruent (ICG) information and the finding that information ICG with an impression is particularly likely to be recalled. Using a procedure similar to that of R. Hastie and P. A. Kumar (1979), a situational or dispositional attribution was provided for a target item, which was either congruent (CG) or ICG with an initial impression. The ICG item was more likely than the CG item to be recalled only when attributed to dispositional causes (Exp I). The congruence of the target had greater impact on impressions when attributed to dispositional causes, particularly when Ss were given little other information about the target (Exps I and II). Exp III revealed that Ss preferred situational attributions for ICG items and dispositional attributions for CG. The authors conclude that Hastie and Kumar's findings may be limited to conditions in which situational attributions for TCG information are not provided. Possible mediators of the effects of causal attributions on recall, and the relation between recall and impressions are discussed. (29 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Trait attributions: Relative validity, covariation with behavior, and prospect of future interaction.

Data obtained from 39 undergraduates suggest that the prospect of future interaction and the type of information available about an actor exerted considerable influence on the trait attributions offered by Ss. Attributions were more extremely dispositional, more valid, and more strongly related to subsequent behavioral tendencies when future interaction was anticipated than when it was not. Ss offered more extreme trait attributions when they were provided with behavioral information about the actors that warranted a dispositional inference than when they were not provided with such information. However, even when Ss were not provided with information that warranted a dispositional attribution, they still offered more extreme trait inferences when future interaction was anticipated than when it was not. Findings are interpreted in terms of three explanations for why the naive psychologist offers attributions. (30 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dispositional Attribution: Multiple Inferences About Motive-Related Traits.

This research views dispositional inference as a process whereby perceivers integrate multiple inferences about a target person's motives and traits. The findings suggest that although perceived motives may stimulate extra attributional processing (S. Fein, 1996), the content of the inferred motive is important as well. Perceivers learned about situational forces implying that a target person had free choice, no choice, or an ulterior motive for helpful behavior. Inferences about the target's helpfulness differed depending on whether the target's behavior was attributed to an obedience motive (no-choice condition) or to a selfish motive (ulterior-motive condition). In general, inferences about motives were more predictive of dispositional inferences than were global causal attributions (to situational vs. dispositional forces) or base rate assumptions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"How automatic are social judgments?" Correction to Winter, Uleman, and Cunniff.

Reports an error in "How automatic are social judgments" by Laraine Winter, James S. Uleman and Cathryn Cunniff (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1985[Oct], Vol 49[4], 904-917). There are errors in the labeling of the ordinates of the figures. The correct labeling is provided in the erratum. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 1986-03720-001.) Adapted the encoding-specificity paradigm developed by D. Thomson and E. Tulving (see record 1971-03487-001) to test 3 operational indicants of automatism (absence of intention, of interference from other mental activity, and of awareness). Recruited for a digit-recall study, 95 undergraduate students read sentences describing actions during the retention interval of either an easy or a difficult digit-recall task. Later, sentence recall was cued by (a) disposition cues, (b) strong semantic associates to the sentence actor, or (c) words representing the gist of the sentence, or (d) sentence recall was not cued. Awareness was measured immediately after the last sentence was read. Disposition-cued recall was higher than (b) or (d) and was unaffected by digit recall difficulty. Awareness of making dispositional inferences was only weakly correlated with disposition-cued recall. Results suggest that disposition inferences occurred at encoding, without intention, without interference by differential drain on processing capacity, and with little awareness. Thus, making dispositional inferences seems to be largely, but not entirely, automatic. (50 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Trait memory and behavior memory: The effects of alternative pathways on impression judgment response times.

The 1st author (1980) and J. H. Lingle (see record 1984-15004-001) argued that remembered behaviors, previous trait inferences, or both may be accessed and used in making new trait inferences. This argument is related to a spreading activation model of memory, and factors that should affect the relative accessibility of inferences and behaviors during trait judgment processes are suggested. A study with 112 undergraduates varied several of these factors and assessed accessibility, using response-time methods. Results support the model's prediction that prompting inference formation facilitates subsequent trait judgment response times, but only when relevant behavior memories have not been recently primed. It is theorized that the inference manipulations used in this study strengthened the direct pathway to a relevant trait concept, but that the strength of this pathway was immaterial to judgment response times when a "proximal prime" directed retrieval efforts along an alternative "behavioral" route to the trait information. Results also suggest that the proximal behavior prime facilitated trait responses among Ss who had not been induced to make trait inferences, but slowed trait responses among Ss who had previously been induced to make trait inferences. (29 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

How automatic are social judgments?

[Correction Notice: An erratum for this article was reported in Vol 50(2) of Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (see record 2008-10961-001). There are errors in the labeling of the ordinates of the figures. The correct labeling is provided in the erratum.] Adapted the encoding-specificity paradigm developed by D. Thomson and E. Tulving (see record 1971-03487-001) to test 3 operational indicants of automatism (absence of intention, of interference from other mental activity, and of awareness). Recruited for a digit-recall study, 95 undergraduate students read sentences describing actions during the retention interval of either an easy or a difficult digit-recall task. Later, sentence recall was cued by (a) disposition cues, (b) strong semantic associates to the sentence actor, or (c) words representing the gist of the sentence, or (d) sentence recall was not cued. Awareness was measured immediately after the last sentence was read. Disposition-cued recall was higher than (b) or (d) and was unaffected by digit recall difficulty. Awareness of making dispositional inferences was only weakly correlated with disposition-cued recall. Results suggest that disposition inferences occurred at encoding, without intention, without interference by differential drain on processing capacity, and with little awareness. Thus, making dispositional inferences seems to be largely, but not entirely, automatic. (50 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Inferences about the morality of an aggressor: The role of perceived motive.

The research investigated perceivers' inferences about the morality of target persons who engaged in aggressive behavior. Across several experiments, inferences about the morality of an aggressor were based more on the perceived motives of the target than on the presence of facilitating situational forces. For example, when a target's aggression was facilitated by personal rewards for aggression (instrumental aggression), perceivers inferred more negative motives and attributed lower morality to the target than when the target's aggression was facilitated by situational provocation (reactive aggression). The results suggest that perceived motives play an important role in dispositional inference and pose a problem for models that focus primarily on perceived causality, assumptions about base rates (consensus), or diagnosticity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Processing alternative explanations of behavior: Correction or integration?

Three experiments investigated how activation of knowledge about situational forces affects discounting in dispositional inference tasks. Each experiment varied a different knowledge activation factor—salience, accessibility, or specificity of situational information. In addition, all 3 experiments varied situational demands and cognitive load. The results showed that cognitive load eliminated discounting when situational information was low in salience, accessibility, or specificity. However, when situational information was more salient, accessible, or specific, it produced strong discounting effects even when perceivers were under cognitive load. These results are discussed in terms of correction and integration models of dispositional inferences from behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Suspicion of ulterior motivation and the correspondence bias.

Three studies examined the hypothesis that when perceivers learn of the existence of multiple, plausibly rival motives for an actor's behavior, they are less likely to fall prey to the correspondence bias than when they learn of the existence of situational factors that may have constrained the actor's behavior. In the 1st 2 studies, Ss who learned that an actor was instructed to behave as he did drew inferences that corresponded to his behavior. In contrast, Ss who were led to suspect that an actor's behavior may have been motivated by a desire to ingratiate (Study 1), or by a desire to avoid an unwanted job (Study 2), resisted the correspondence bias. The 3rd study demonstrated that these differences were not due to a general unwillingness on the part of suspicious perceivers to make dispositional inferences. The implications that these results have for understanding attribution theory are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effortfulness and flexibility of dispositional judgment processes.

Two experiments investigated situational information is used to identify behavior (assimilative identification) and to adjust dispositional inferences from the identified behavior (inferential adjustment). Participants heard an ambiguous or unambiguous evaluation of a job candidate by an evaluator who was under situational pressure to present either a positive or negative evaluation. In Experiment 1 participants were under low or high cognitive load. In Experiment 2 the situational information was either validated or invalidated. Results showed that cognitive load and invalidation eliminated the use of situational information for inferential adjustment. Behavior ambiguity determined the use of situational information for assimilative identification. The results suggest that the use of situational information for assimilative identification is resource independent but inflexible, whereas inferential adjustment is flexible but resource dependent. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Of thoughts unspoken: Social inference and the self-regulation of behavior.

Suggests that perceivers draw dispositional inferences about targets (characterization) and then adjust those inferences with information about the constraints on the targets' behaviors (correction). Because correction is more effortful than characterization, perceivers who devote cognitive resources to the regulation of their own behavior should be able to characterize targets but unable to correct those characterizations. In Exp 1, unregulated Ss incidentally ignored an irrelevant stimulus while they observed a target's behavior, whereas self-regulated Ss purposefully ignored the same irrelevant stimulus. In Exp 2, unregulated Ss expressed their sincere affection toward a target, whereas self-regulated Ss expressed false affection. In both experiments, self-regulated Ss were less likely than unregulated Ss to correct their characterizations of the target. The results suggest that social interaction (which generally requires the self-regulation of ongoing behavior) may profoundly affect the way in which active perceivers process information about others. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Echoic memory processes in good and poor readers.

Conducted 4 experiments to determine whether echoic memory plays a role in differences between good and poor readers. In Exp I, with 9 poor (mean age 11.05 yrs) and 9 good (mean age 10.9 yrs) readers, and Exp II, with 12 poor (mean age 10.85 yrs) and 12 good (mean age 10.7 yrs) readers, a suffix procedure was used in which the S was read a list of digits with either a tone control or the word go appended to the list. For lists that exceeded the length of the Ss' memory span by 1 digit (i.e., that avoided ceiling effects), poor readers showed a larger decrement in the suffix condition than did good readers. In Exp III, with 14 poor (mean age 10.64 yrs) and 14 good (mean age 10.83 yrs) readers, Ss shadowed words presented to 1 ear at a rate determined to give 75–85% shadowing accuracy. The item presented to the nonattended ear were words and an occasional digit. At various intervals after the presentation of the digit, a light signaled that the S was to cease shadowing and attempt to recall any digit that had occurred in the nonattended ear recently. Whereas good and poor readers recalled the digit equally if tested immediately after presentation, poor readers showed a faster decline in recall of the digit as retention interval increased. In Exp IV, using Ss from Exp II, bursts of white noise were separated by 9–400 msec of silence, and the S was to say whether there were 1 or 2 sounds presented. There were no differences in detectability functions for good and poor readers. (39 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Intuitions about situational correction in self and others.

People's attributional phenomenology is likely to be characterized by effortful situational correction. Drawing on this phenomenology and on people's desire to view themselves more favorably than others, the authors hypothesized that people expect others to engage in less situational correction than themselves and to make more extreme dispositional attributions for constrained actors' behavior. In 2 studies, people expected their peers to make more extreme dispositional inferences than they did themselves for a situationally constrained actor's behavior. People's expectation that they engage in more situational correction than their peers was diminished among Japanese participants, who have less desire to view themselves as superior to their peers (Study 3), and among participants who were led to view dispositional attributions more favorably than situational attributions (Study 4). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Objective self-awareness as a variable in counseling process and outcome.

Hypothesized that client objective self-awareness (OSA), as both a transient state and an enduring trait, is important in counseling. OSA refers to reflexive attention to oneself and internal comparison of one's own behavior with salient societal or personally held values. 60 undergraduates completed the Private Self-Consciousness subscale of The Self-Consciousness Scale, the Procrastination Log, and the Procrastination Inventory. Two levels of trait OSA were used as a blocking variable, while 3 counseling conditions varied the amount of state OSA. The self-aware condition sought to enhance S self-focus, the non-self-aware condition sought to minimize S self-focus, and the control group received no counseling. Findings indicate an interaction between trait and state dimensions such that Ss high in trait OSA were most affected by the interview that sought to enhance state OSA. Ss low in trait OSA were the only ones who made changes over time in behavior and self-satisfaction. Findings have implications for therapeutic approaches to clients with differing amounts of dispositional self-consciousness. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)