The many faces of assumed similarity in perceptions of personality

We propose that most coefficients of assumed similarity in acquaintance ratings are based on actual similarity between observer and target rather than any bias to project self onto other. We assessed assumed similarity, actual similarity, and rater accuracy in 62 university roommate dyads who rated each other on 74 personality-related variables. Our findings indicate that our roommates (a) were actually alike on many variables, (b) knew this, rather than assumed it, and (c) applied this knowledge to enhance the accuracy of their ratings. We outline a model of judgment that urges three distinct concepts: true assumed similarity, known similarity, and spurious similarity. We conclude that personality ratings among acquaintances reflecting true assumed similarity are probably rare.     

Favouritism as a function of assumed similarity and anticipated interaction

Discussions of intergroup behavior (e.g., Rabbie and Wilkens, 1971; Tajfel, Flament, Billig and Bundy, 1971) have drawn attention to the influence of both assumed similarity and anticipated future interaction between an individual and other members of his group on his tendency to assign more favourable outcomes to members of his own group than to members of another group. This note examines whether similar processes may also affect an individual's tendency to make intragroup discriminations between different members of a group to which he himself does not belong, in a situation where the variables of similarity and anticipated interaction may be treated as independent factors.     

Two kinds of reasoning

According to one view of reasoning, people can evaluate arguments in at least two qualitatively different ways: in terms of their deductive correctness and in terms of their inductive strength. According to a second view, assessments of both correctness and strength are a function of an argument's position on a single psychological continuum (e.g., subjective conditional probability). A deductively correct argument is one with the maximum value on this continuum; a strong argument is one with a high value. The present experiment tested these theories by asking participants to evaluate the same set of arguments for correctness and strength. The results produced an interaction between type of argument and instructions: In some conditions, participants judged one argument deductively correct more often than a second, but judged the second argument inductively strong more often than the first. This finding supports the view that people have distinct ways to evaluate arguments.     

Personality judgment at zero acquaintance: agreement, assumed similarity, and implicit simplicity

Previously unacquainted participants (N = 218) were assessed in small-group sessions in which they rated themselves and each other on (a) the Big Five (e.g., Costa & McCrae, 1992) and (b) an instrument assessing various traits not traditionally measured in the Big Five taxonomy as well as sociopolitical attitudes. Replicating earlier research, we obtained a significant self-stranger correlation on Extraversion; in addition, we found significant agreement on ratings of thriftiness, athleticism, traditionalism, conservatism, and attractiveness. Assumed similarity correlations were substantial for Neuroticism, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness; furthermore, consistent with previous findings, there was a strong inverse relation between agreement and assumed similarity across the assessed characteristics. Finally, the correlations between Neuroticism, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness were significantly greater in the strangers' ratings than in the self-ratings, indicating that these peer judgments are less complex. We also compared our Big Five findings with those from previous samples of varying acquaintanceship; these analyses indicated that the strangers' ratings were characterized by lower levels of self-other agreement (for all traits except Extraversion) and somewhat higher levels of assumed similarity (for ratings of Neuroticism and Agreeableness).     

Two kinds of identity crisis

In order to outline a model of identity crisis, it is necessary to distinguish two types. In an identity deficit ("motivation crisis"), the individual experiences a lack of guiding commitments but struggles to establish personal goals and values. In an identity conflict ("legitimation crisis"), the person has several commitments which prescribe conflicting behavioral imperatives in some situations, such that at least one commitment may have to be betrayed. The literature on identity crisis is reviewed in connection with this distinction, and an attempt is made to delineate the causes, the subjective experiences, behavioral consequences, and modes of resolution of each type of crisis.     

Two kinds of first-person-oriented content

In this paper, I will argue that two kinds of first-person-oriented content are distinguished in more ways than usually thought and I propose an account that will shed new light on the distinction. The first kind consists of contents of attitudes de se (in a broad sense); the second kind consists of contents that give rise to intuitions of relative truth. I will present new data concerning the two kinds of first-person-oriented content, together with a novel account of propositional content in general, namely based on the notion of an attitudinal object. That notion solves two major problems with Lewis’s account of contents of attitudes de se and clarifies the difference between contents of attitudes de se and contents that give rise to intuitions of relative truth. I will propose an analysis of contents of the second kind in terms of what I call first-person-based genericity, a form of genericity most explicitly expressed by sentences with generic one. I show how the overall account explains the particular semantic properties of sentences giving rise to intuitions of relative truth that distinguish them from sentences with expressions interpreted de se. I will start by introducing Lewis’s account of attitudes de se and the problems that go along with that account. Introducing the notion of an attitudinal object, I will extend the account by an account of the truth conditions of the content of attitudes de se. I then discuss the second kind of first-person-oriented content, which is associated with intuitions of relative truth, and give an account of such contents on the basis of an analysis of generic one. Again making use of attitudinal objects, I will make clear what exactly distinguishes those contents from first-person-oriented contents of the first sort.     

Through the looking glass clearly: accuracy and assumed similarity in well-adjusted individuals' first impressions

Do well-adjusted individuals have particularly accurate insight into what others are like or are they biased, primarily seeing their own characteristics in others? In the current studies, the authors examined how psychologically adjusted individuals tend to see new acquaintances, directly comparing their levels of distinctive accuracy (accurately perceiving others' unique characteristics), normative accuracy (perceiving others as similar to the average person), and assumed similarity (perceiving others as similar to the self). Across two interactive, round-robin studies, well-adjusted individuals, compared with less adjusted individuals, did not perceive new acquaintances' unique characteristics more accurately but did perceive new acquaintances, on average, as similar to the average person, reflecting an accurate understanding of what people generally tend to be like. Furthermore, well-adjusted individuals had a biased tendency to perceive their own unique characteristics in others. Of note, both pre-existing perceiver adjustment and target-specific liking independently predicted greater accuracy and assumed similarity in first impressions. In sum, well-adjusted individuals see through the looking glass clearly: although they erroneously see others as possessing their own unique characteristics, they accurately understand what others generally tend to be like.     

Two approaches to natural kinds

Philosophical treatments of natural kinds are embedded in two distinct projects. I call these the philosophy of science approach and the philosophy of language approach. Each is characterized by its own set of philosophical questions, concerns, and assumptions. The kinds studied in the philosophy of science approach are projectible categories that can ground inductive inferences and scientific explanation. The kinds studied in the philosophy of language approach are the referential objects of a special linguistic category—natural kind terms—thought to refer directly. Philosophers may hope for a unified account addresses both sets of concerns. This paper argues that this cannot be done successfully. No single account can satisfy both the semantic objectives of the philosophy of language approach and the explanatory projects of the philosophy of science approach. After analyzing where the tensions arise, I make recommendations about assumptions and projects that are best abandoned, those that should be retained, and those that should go their separate ways. I also recommend adopting the disambiguating terminology of “scientific kinds” and “natural kinds” for the different notions of kinds developed in these different approaches.

     

Two kinds of naturalism in ethics

What are the conditions on a successful naturalistic account of moral properties? In this paper I discuss one such condition: the possibility of moral concepts playing a role in good empirical theories on a par with those of the natural and social sciences. I argue that Peter Railton’s influential account of moral rightness fails to meet this condition, and thus is only viable in the hands of a naturalist who doesn’t insist on it. This conclusion generalises to all versions of naturalism that give a significant role to a dispositional characterisation of moral properties. I also argue, however, that the epistemological and semantic motivations behind naturalism are consistent with a version of naturalism that doesn’t insist on the explanatory condition. The conclusion is that those naturalists who are attracted to accounts of moral properties such as Railton’s would do better not to insist on this\break condition.     

Two kinds of a priori infallibility

On rationalist infallibilism, a wide range of both (i) analytic and (ii) synthetic a priori propositions can be infallibly justified (or absolutely warranted), i.e., justified to a degree that entails their truth and precludes their falsity. Though rationalist infallibilism is indisputably running its course, adherence to at least one of the two species of infallible a priori justification refuses to disappear from mainstream epistemology. Among others, Putnam (1978) still professes the a priori infallibility of some category (i) propositions, while Burge (1986, 1988, 1996) and Lewis (1996) have recently affirmed the a priori infallibility of some category (ii) propositions. In this paper, I take aim at rationalist infallibilism by calling into question the a priori infallibility of both analytic and synthetic propositions. The upshot will be twofold: first, rationalist infallibilism unsurprisingly emerges as a defective epistemological doctrine, and second, more importantly, the case for the a priori infallibility of one or both categories of propositions turns out to lack cogency.     

Accuracy and assumed similarity in first impressions of personality: Differing associations at different levels of analysis

How are accuracy and assumed similarity associated in first impressions of personality? In a large-scale video perception study, accuracy and assumed similarity were strongly negatively associated across traits, consistent with past research (e.g., Beer & Watson, 2008). However, across perceivers and perceiver-target dyads, the ability to perceive others accurately was independent of the tendency to assume similarity with others. Thus, viewing others in general or specific others as overly similar to the self does not imply viewing them inaccurately. In sum, accuracy and assumed similarity are inversely related when examined across traits but are independent across perceivers and dyads.     

Two kinds of visual perspective taking

Visual perspective taking can be used to determine where objects are located relative toanother agent, or whether the agent can see a particular object. Four experiments indicated that different processes provide these different kinds of information. When participants were asked to report whether an object was to the left or to the right of another agent, response times (RTs) increased with increasing angular distance between the participant and the agent, suggesting that participants mentally transformed their perspective to align it with that of the agent. For visibility judgments, RTs were independent of the angle between the participant and the agent but increased with the distance between the agent and the object, suggesting that participants traced the agent's line of sight. Together, these data suggest that perspective taking encompasses at least two qualitatively different computational processes: one that updates the viewer's imagined perspective, and one that traces a line of sight.