An investigation of the processes mediating schematic effects on the acquisition of social knowledge.

Investigated the cognitive mechanisms that mediate schematic effects on the perception of other people, using 100 undergraduates given 1 of 2 sets of expectations about the interpersonal characteristics of a target male actor. Ss were instructed to indicate subjectively salient events while viewing a videotape of a staged interaction between the target male and a female actor. Results indicate that expectations of a dominant or agreeable target actor influenced the formation of interpersonal impressions. Ss attended to portions of the videotape that were consistent with dominant or agreeable schema induction. There was no evidence of schema-consistent selective memory retrieval or reconstruction. Findings are discussed in terms of information processing vs ecological approaches to perception. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)