Social Roles, Social Control and Biases in Social Perception Processes

L. D. Ross; T. M. Amabile; J.  Steinmetz

Article | Journal of Personality and Social Psychology | July 1977

Social Roles, Social Control and Biases in Social Perception Processes

by L. D. Ross, T. M. Amabile and J. Steinmetz

Abstract

To make accurate social judgments, an individual must both recognize and adequately correct for the self-presentation advantages or disadvantages conferred upon actors by their social roles. Two experiments using 120 undergraduates examined social perceptions formed during an encounter in which one participant composed difficult general knowledge questions and another participant attempted to answer those questions. As predicted, perceivers failed to make adequate allowance for the biasing effects of these "questioner" and "answerer" roles in judging the participants' general knowledge. Questioners, allowed to display their personal store of esoteric knowledge in composing questions, were consistently rated superior to their partners, who attempted to answer the questions. This bias was stronger for the answerers and the uninvolved observers than for the questioners. Implications for our understanding of the biased perceptions of the powerful and the powerless in society are noted. More general implications for an understanding of the shortcomings of the "intuitive psychologist" are also discussed.

Keywords: Perception; Prejudice and Bias; Social Psychology; Judgments; Power and Influence; Status and Position; Situation or Environment;

Format: Print

10 pages

Find at Harvard Purchase

Citation:

Ross, L. D., T. M. Amabile, and J. Steinmetz. "Social Roles, Social Control and Biases in Social Perception Processes." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 35, no. 7 (July 1977): 485–494.

Over time, the field of creativity research has seen a gradual shift away from an almost exclusive emphasis on the creative person towards a more balanced inquiry that centers both on individual difference issues and questions about the nature of creative products and the conditions that facilitate the creation of those products. The consensual assessment technique (CAT) allows for the assessment of the relative creativity of products and is based on the assumption that a panel of independent raters, persons who have not had the opportunity to confer with one another and who have not been trained by the researcher, are best able to make such judgments. Over 40 years of research have clearly established that product creativity can be reliably and validly assessed based on the consensus of experts. Although creativity in a product may be difficult to characterize in terms of specific features, it is something that people can recognize and agree upon when they see it.

There have been dozens of high-profile mass shootings in recent decades. This paper presents three main findings about the impact of mass shootings on gun policy. First, mass shootings evoke large policy responses. A single mass shooting leads to a 15% increase in the number of firearm bills introduced within a state in the year after a mass shooting. This effect increases with the extent of media coverage. Second, mass shootings account for a small portion of all gun deaths but have an outsized influence relative to other homicides. Third, when looking at bills that were actually enacted into law, the impact of mass shootings depends on the party in power. The annual number of laws that loosen gun restrictions doubles in the year following a mass shooting in states with Republican-controlled legislatures. We find no significant effect of mass shootings on laws enacted when there is a Democrat-controlled legislature, nor do we find a significant effect of mass shootings on the enactment of laws that tighten gun restrictions.

Faculty & Research

Social Roles, Social Control and Biases in Social Perception Processes

Abstract

Citation:

About the Author

More from the Author