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Chapter Seven Perceptions and Attributions Objectives:
To gain an understanding of:
Perception Perceptual process Perceptual selectivity Perceptual organization Social perception Attribution theory Perceptual errors Reducing perceptual errors
PERCEPTION
Perception is a cognitive process. Cognitions are basically bits of information and cognitive processes involve the ways in which people process that information. The key to understanding perception is thatperception is a unique interpretation of a situation and not an exact recording of it. It is also a subjective process as different people may perceive the same environmental event differently.
Difference between Perception and Sensation:
Sensation is the response of a physical sensory organ while perception is broader and more complex.Although perception depends upon the senses for raw data, the cognitive processes may filter, modify or completely change these data.
Two persons, each receiving the same stimuli may often go their individual process of PERCEPTION andcome to different conclusions.
Example : Seeing the same picture and perceiving different images Why do people perceive things differently?
The perceptual process is different because of the different perceptual mechanisms that take place. PERCEPTUAL MECHANISMS:
I PERCEPTUAL SELECTION:
We are confronted with many stimuli at the same time. Because all this cannot be processedsimultaneously, only the most relevant things are selected and given attention. An individual selects certain objects in the environment for attention. There are two types of factors which affect the selection of the stimuli. These are- A) External and related to the stimuli B) Internal and related to the perceiver C) External and related to Characteristics of the setting.
A) External and related to the stimuli: -Consist of environmental influences and are in the form of the characteristics of perceptual inputs orstimuli. Such characteristics may be in the form of:
i) Size: e.g. big and small letters in newspapers. ii) Intensity: e.g. a loud sound, a bright light. iii) Repetition and Frequency: e.g. advertisements. iv) Motion: Moving objects draw more attention as compared to stationary objects
Organizational context.
II PERCEPTUAL ORGANIZATION:
After the information from the situation has been selected, it is organized to extract meaning out ofwhat is perceived by the individual.Thus, while selection is a subjective process, organizing is a cognitive process. The specific principles underlying perceptual organization are often referred to as the Gestaltprinciple-the name of the school of psychology that first developed it: Gestalt psychology. (Gestalt, in German, means pattern or configuration.).
Factors Influencing Gestalt Perception:
- Stimulus factors are the physical and other observable characteristics of the person, object, orsituation perceived.
- Individual response factors are determinants of perception within the perceiver i.e. interest, needs,motivation, involvement, learning, attitudes, personality etc.
Principles of perceptual organization: -figure and ground,-closure, -grouping,-simplification.
a) Figure and Ground Relationships: Stimuli that contrast with their environment are more likely to benoticed. The perceived object, event or person stands out distinct or separable from its background and gets the cognitive attention of the individual. b) Closure:If the pattern of stimuli to which people are exposed is incomplete, they tend to perceive it,nevertheless, as complete; that is, they consciously or subconsciously fill in the missing pieces. When faced with incomplete information, a person will fill the gaps himself to make the informationmeaningful. The thus perceive a whole when one does not actually exist.
c) Grouping: Continuity, Proximity and Similarity in Groups of Stimuli.When simple constellations of stimuli are presented to people, they tend to group them together by continuity, proximity or similarity.
Continuity: The continuity principle says that a person will tend to perceive continuous lines or patterns.People tend to perceive sensory data in continuous patterns even if the data are not actually continuous.
Proximity:E.g. Several workers who work on a particular machine may be perceived as a single whole. When stimuli are near each other, people perceive them as being related.
Similarity: When stimuli are alike in some way, people tend to group them. The greater the similarity ofthe stimuli, the greater the tendency to perceive them as a common group.
d)Simplification:Whenever people are loaded with information, they try to simplify it to make it more meaningful and understandable. In the process of simplification, the perceiver subtracts less salientinformation and concentrates on important one.
IIIorganized are interpreted by the perceiver so that he can sense and extract some meaning of what is PERCEPTUAL INTERPRETATION: Uniquely individual.The perceptual inputs that have been going on in the situation. Interpretation of stimuli is affected by:
- characteristics of stimuli,
- situation under which the perception takes place and
- characteristics of the perceiver.
There are often chances of misinterpretation and the perceiver may commit a mistake in perceiving because of several reasons. These are called perceptual errors and distortions. A) Selective perception: -People tend to perceive what is in accordance with their needs, motives, interests, background, experience and interests; they may distort meanings so that they may fit what they want.
People evaluate others on the basis of the first impression. This may/may not be a true reflection of people being perceived.
v) Jumping to conclusions:Many people tend to jump to conclusions before examining all the relevant evidence.
vi) Inference:This happens when there is a tendency to judge others on limited information.
vii) Halo Effect: Under the halo effect, a person, product, situation etc is perceived on the basis of one trait. Whatever the single trait is, it may override all other traits in forming the perception.
- factors of the organization are negated, in the perception of the employees. The phenomenon of “reverse halo effect” case occur when due to one factor only all others positive
viii) Perceptual set: Previously held beliefs about objects influence an individual’s perception of similar objects. So subsequent perceptions will be influenced by this set. ix) Projection: Assigning one’s own thoughts and feelings to a person being perceived.
x) Attribution : Using observations and inferences to explain people’s behaviour.
xi) Contrast effect : A perceptual error that involves perceiving something as larger or smaller than it really is because itdiffers significantly from the reference point used to interpret it.
- Evaluations of a person’s characteristics that are affected by comparisons with other people recently encountered who rank higher or lower on the same characteristics.
xii) Assimilation effect: The judgments a person has made in the past influence the way the person will perceive stimuli in the future.
- Assimilation takes place through a combination of: a) Priming:Asking people to recall a set of events before asking them to make a judgment that may be related to those events. b) Confirmation bias: information that would contradict past judgments.The tendency to give heavy weight to information that reaffirms past judgments and to discount
Distortion management. Managers should: Balance automatic and controlled information processing at the attention and selection stage. Broaden their schemas at the organizing stage. Be attuned to attributions at the interpretation stage. ( For further details please refer to the Richard W. Woodman-8th (^) edition, Thomson South-Western) figure from Organizational behavior by Don Hellriegel; John W. Slocum;
APPLICATION OF PERCEPTION CONCEPTS TO OB: PERSON PERCEPTION
1. SOCIAL PERCEPTION
2.IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT
3. ATTRIBUTION THEORY
SOCIAL PERCEPTION:
It consist of those processes by which we interpret other people, how we categorize them and how weform impressions of them. The social aspects of perception play a very important role in OB.
3 basic categories of influence on the way we perceive other people:
secretly tell the boss that they fought for the right thing but were overruled. Eg. They are a member of a committee that made a wrong decision- such people try to remove themselves both from the group andfrom the responsibility for the problem.
b) Promotion enhancing Strategy: try to seek maximum responsibility for a positive outcome or to look better than they really are.1. Entitlements: Employees feel that they have not been given credit for the positive outcome.
- Enhancements: Here employees may have received the credit, but they point out that they really didmore and had a bigger impact than originally thought.
- Obstacle disclosures: Here employees identify either personal (health or family) or organization (lack of resources or cooperation) obstacles they had to overcome to accomplish an outcome. - i.e. try tocreate an impression that they obtained the positive outcome despite the big obstacles and so they deserve a lot of credit.
- Association: The employees make sure to be seen with the right people at the right times, thus creating an impression that the employee is well-connected and associated with successful projects.
ATTRIBUTION THEORY behavior is an area of study known as the attribution theory. Attribution theory aids in perceptual: The cognitive process by which people interpret the reasons or causes for their interpretationevent(2)Assess responsibility for the outcomes of the event(3)Evaluate the personal qualities of the by focusing on how people attempt to(1)Understand the causes of a certain people involved in the event.
When individuals observe behavior, they attempt to determine whether it is internally or externally caused.
individual.Internally caused behaviors are those that are believed to be under the personal control of the Externally caused behaviors is seen as resulting from outside causes
How causes? do people go about judging whether someones’ actions were caused by internal or external
- Kelly’s Theory of Causal Attribution. According to him, we base our judgments of internal and external causality on three types of information:
- Consensus
- Consistency
- Distinctiveness
- Consensus: the extent to which other people behave in the same manner as the person we are judging. If everyone who is faced with a similar situation responds in the same way, we can say the behaviorshows consensus.
If others do behave similarly, consensus is considered high; if they do not, consensus is considered low.
- Consistency: the extent to which the person we are judging acts the same way at other times. Does the person respond the same way over time? If the person does acts the same at other times, consistency is high; if he or she does not, thenconsistency is low.
- Distinctiveness: the extent to which this person behaves in the same manner in other contexts. If he or she behaves the same way in other situations, distinctiveness is low; if he or she behavesdifferently, distinctiveness is high.
Attribution of Causality: When consensus is high, consistency is low and distinctiveness is high, the person’s behavior is said to have stemmed from external causes: SITUATIONAL ATTRIBUTIONS.
When consensus is low, consistency is high and distinctiveness is low, the person’s behavior is said to have stemmed from internal causes: DISPOSITIONAL ATTRIBUTION.
B.Different panel members views differ often regarding the evaluation of the same candidate. C.Agreement among interviewers is often poor; that is different interviewers see different things in the same candidate and thus, arrive at different conclusions about the applicant. Problem solving and decision-making:
- A committee will blame other groups or departments when problems occur: the self-serving bias.
- when faced with identifying problems to be solved in a complex business situation, managers have atendency to define the problem in ways that reflect their own functional competence than other functional areas: to interpret them in terms of our own experiences and capacity to solve problems.
Self-fulfilling prophecy: - if a manager expects big things from his people, they are not likely to let himdown. If a manager expects people to perform minimally, they will tend to behave so as to meet those low expectations. Result: Expectations become reality.
Pygmalionexpectations, it causes the second person to behave in ways consistent with the original perception. Effect: When one person inaccurately perceives a second person and the resulting
Ethnic Profiling:-a form of stereotyping in which a group of individuals is singled out, typically on the basis of race or ethnicity, for intensive inquiry, scrutinizing, or investigation.
Questions:
- What is Perception? Describe in details with examples from daily life the Perceptual process
- what are Perceptual selectivity and Perceptual organization? What are the Perceptual errors and distortions connected with these two processes? State ways of reducing perceptual errors
- What is Social perception? Explain the relevance of Attribution theory for understanding social perception.
- Write short notes on (a) Impression management (b) Attribution errors.
