Perception through a perspective-taking lens: Differential effects on judgment and behavior

In contrast to the view that social perception has symmetric effects on judgments and behavior, the current research explored whether perspective-taking leads stereotypes to differentially affect judgments and behavior. Across three studies, perspective-takers consistently used stereotypes more in their own behavior while simultaneously using them less in their judgments of others. After writing about an African-American, perspective-taking tendencies were positively correlated with aggressive behavior but negatively correlated with judging others as aggressive. Similarly, after writing about an elderly man, perspective-takers walked more slowly and became more conservative, but judged others as less dependent. These divergent effects of perspective-taking on judgment and behavior occurred regardless of whether perspective-taking was manipulated or measured, whether judgments were measured before or after behavior, the stereotype that was activated, and participants’ culture (American, Singaporean). These findings support theorizing that judgments and behavior can diverge when individuals’ social strategies are geared towards establishing and maintaining social bonds, as well as provide insight into how perspective-taking helps individuals manage diversity.     

Interpersonal similarity as a social distance dimension: Implications for perception of others’ actions

Building on the assumption that interpersonal similarity is a form of social distance, the current research examines the manner in which similarity influences the representation and judgment of others’ actions. On the basis of a construal level approach, we hypothesized that greater levels of similarity would increase the relative weight of subordinate and secondary features of information in judgments of others’ actions. The results of four experiments showed that compared to corresponding judgments of a dissimilar target, participants exposed to a similar target person identified that person’s actions in relatively more subordinate means-related rather than superordinate ends-related terms (Experiment 1), perceived his or her actions to be determined more by feasibility and less by desirability concerns (Experiment 3), and gave more weight to secondary aspects in judgments of the target’s decisions (Experiment 2) and performance (Experiment 4). Implications for the study of interpersonal similarity, as well as social distance in general, are discussed.     

Cognition as coordinated non-cognition

We propose that cognition is more than a collection of independent processes operating in a modular cognitive system. Instead, we propose that cognition emerges from dependencies between all of the basic systems in the brain, including goal management, perception, action, memory, reward, affect, and learning. Furthermore, human cognition reflects its social evolution and context, as well as contributions from a developmental process. After presenting these themes, we illustrate their application to the process of anticipation. Specifically, we propose that anticipations occur extensively across domains (i.e., goal management, perception, action, reward, affect, and learning) in coordinated manners. We also propose that anticipation is central to situated action and to social interaction, and that many of its key features reflect the process of development.     

Perceived threat of infectious disease and its implications for sexual attitudes

A study (n = 411) investigated the relationship between chronic individual differences in germ aversion and sociosexual attitudes (short-term mating orientation, long-term mating orientation, and anticipated future sexual promiscuity), and also tested whether the magnitudes of these relations differ depending on the temporary perceptual salience of disease threat. Results revealed person-by-situation interactions. When the threat of disease was temporarily salient, germ aversion correlated negatively with short-term mating orientation and with future sexual promiscuity, and correlated positively with long-term mating orientation; these effects were either weaker or nonexistent under control conditions. These effects emerged most clearly among women.     

Breaking the ice: How physical warmth shapes social comparison consequences

Social judgments take place in a concrete physical context. Recent research has explored how incidental physical experiences such as warmth influence social perception and behavior. However, we do not yet know if warmth affects self-evaluation. The present research seeks to examine this possibility by focusing on a central self-evaluative mechanism, namely social comparison. We hypothesized that physical warmth induces a general similarity focus that in turn fosters assimilative social comparison consequences and tested this in three studies. Study 1 established that warmth increases the perceived similarity of object pairs. In Study 2, participants compared themselves to a physically strong or weak standard. On warmer but not on colder days, they assimilated self-evaluations towards the target. Study 3 showed a similar pattern in a controlled laboratory setting. Together, these findings demonstrate that physical warmth shapes social comparison processes and as a consequence influences self-evaluation.     

Perceiving others is so simple: Implicit simplicity of personality perceptions in a dyadic design

People judge others on simplified trait structures when evaluating the Big Five, which is referred to as implicit simplicity (IS: Beer & Watson, 2008). The present study investigated IS in minimally acquainted informal dyads. Hundred and eighty-six participants interacted for a short time on a task, and then provided self- and peer-ratings on the IASR-B5 (Trapnell & Wiggins, 1990). IS manifested in a global evaluative “halo-factor” with some accuracy and was related to perceivers’ interpersonal attraction ratings and personality traits. The driving forces behind IS are discussed.     

Interpersonal attachment predicts identification with groups

We propose a model documenting the relationship between interpersonal attachment style and identification with groups. We hypothesized that following threat to a romantic interpersonal relationship higher attachment anxiety would be associated with lowered tendencies to identify with groups. In two studies using varied social groups we observed support for this hypothesis. In Experiment 1 we found that participants higher in attachment anxiety identified less with a salient ingroup after imagining a distressing argument with their romantic partner. In Experiment 2 we replicated these findings using an implicit measure of social identification and additionally observed a moderating role for attachment avoidance. We discuss the implications of these findings for theoretical models of interpersonal attachment and social identification.     

Exploring metaphor's epistemic function: Uncertainty moderates metaphor-consistent priming effects on social perceptions

Consistent with conceptual metaphor theory's claim that metaphors operate at a conceptual, and not just linguistic, level, prior research shows that priming perceptions related to concrete concepts influences perceptions related to dissimilar, more abstract concepts in metaphor-consistent ways. However, the theory's claim that metaphors function to reduce uncertainty about abstract concepts has yet to be experimentally assessed. Two studies tested whether situational variation in uncertainty moderates metaphor-consistent priming effects. Study 1 focused on the metaphor life is a path and showed that priming path perceptions (vs. literal representations) increased perceived autobiographical continuity only if uncertainty about personal identity was salient. Study 2 focused on verticality metaphors and showed that vertical orientation primes influenced satisfaction with the decision to attend one's current university in both directions (up is good, bad is down) only if uncertainty about the value of the college experience was salient.     

Motion coordination affects movement parameters in a joint pick-and-place task

This study examined influences of social context on movement parameters in a pick-and-place task. Participants' motion trajectories were recorded while they performed sequences of natural movements either working side-by-side with a partner or alone. It was expected that movement parameters would be specifically adapted to the joint condition to overcome the difficulties arising from the requirement to coordinate with another person. To disentangle effects based on participants' effort to coordinate their movements from effects merely due to the other's presence, a condition was included where only one person performed the task while being observed by the partner. Results indicate that participants adapted their movements temporally and spatially to the joint action situation: Overall movement duration was shorter, and mean and maximum velocity was higher when actually working together than when working alone. Pick-to-place trajectories were also shifted away from the partner in spatial coordinates. The partner's presence as such did not have an impact on movement parameters. These findings are interpreted as evidence for the use of implicit strategies to facilitate movement coordination in joint action tasks.     

A social validation explanation for mutual enhancement

Group members experience mutual enhancement when they evaluate one another’s task capabilities more positively because they are discussing shared as compared to unshared information. Two experiments investigated a social validation explanation for mutual enhancement. In Experiment 1, members of dyads read and discussed either shared or unshared information and collectively recalled this information under conditions where accuracy was important or not. Mutual enhancement occurred when need for accuracy was higher, but not when it was lower. In Experiment 2, members of dyads read validating or non-validating information from an outsider after they collectively recalled shared or unshared information. Members who discussed unshared information and received no validating communication from the outsider gave one another the lowest task capability ratings compared to members who discussed shared information and/or received validating communication from the outsider. All of these results are consistent with a social validation explanation for mutual enhancement.     

Destigmatization by Association: Improving Children's Reactions to an Obese Storybook Character

Second- through fourth-grade students were read a storybook that described a typical boy who interacted with an obese boy for one of four reasons (sympathy, curiosity, teacher instructed, or no reason) to explore the manner in which a typical storybook character's reason for associating with an obese storybook character influences children's responses to both characters. Results revealed that the children responded more favorably to the obese storybook character after than before learning about the typical storybook character's association with him, especially when the typical storybook character's reason for association was presented as internally motivated (sympathy or curiosity). In contrast to “stigma by association” findings reported in prior research, the children also responded more favorably to the typical storybook character after than before his association with the obese storybook character.     

Stuttering and social anxiety

The aim of the present study was to investigate the presence of social anxiety in adults who stutter. This was done by administering the Inventory of Interpersonal Situations (IIS) (Van Dam-Baggen & Kraaimaat, 1999), a social anxiety inventory, to a group of 89 people who stuttered and 131 people who did not stutter. Two components of social anxiety were measured by the ISS, the extent to which emotional tension or discomfort is perceived in social situations and the frequency with which social responses are executed. The people who stuttered displayed significantly higher levels of emotional tension or discomfort in social situations. They also reported a significantly lower frequency of social responses compared to their nonstuttering peers. In addition, about 50% of the scores of the people who stuttered fell within the range of a group of highly socially anxious psychiatric patients. The results of the study suggest that the measurement of social anxiety is an important element in the assessment of adults who stutter. EDUCATIONAL OBJECTIVES: The reader will learn about and be able to describe (1) the IIS as an assessment procedure for evaluating social anxiety, (2) the level of discomfort expressed by adult stutterers in social situations, and (3) the effect of social anxiety on stutterers' responsiveness in social situations.     

Moving memories: Behavioral synchrony and memory for self and others

Establishing and maintaining connections with others is central to a fulfilling social life. In this respect, behavioral coordination provides one avenue by which interpersonal linkages can be formed. Drawing from the dynamical systems approach, the present research explored whether temporary interpersonal connections founded on coordinated behavior influence memory for self and others. To do so, we measured participants’ incidental recall of self and other-relevant information after a period of either in-phase or anti-phase interpersonal coordination. While participants in the less stable anti-phase condition demonstrated the typical memory advantage for self-related compared to other-related information, this effect was eliminated when participant and confederate movements displayed in-phase coordination. These results are discussed with respect to the interplay between the systems that support interpersonal synchrony and basic social-cognitive processing.     

Young children's interpersonal trust consistency as a predictor of future school adjustment

Young children's interpersonal trust consistency was examined as a predictor of future school adjustment. One hundred and ninety two (95 male and 97 female, M_age = 6 years 2 months, SD_age = 6 months) children from school years 1 and 2 in the United Kingdom were tested twice over one year. Children completed measures of peer trust and school adjustment and teachers completed the Short-Form Teacher Rating Scale of School Adjustment. Longitudinal quadratic relationships emerged between consistency of children's peer trust beliefs and peer-reported trustworthiness and school adjustment and these varied according to social group, facet of trust, and indicator of school adjustment. The findings support the conclusion that interpersonal trust consistency, especially for secret-keeping, predicts aspects of young children's school adjustment.     

Reinventing the University to Teach Both Mind and Heart (Part I)

The objectives of this special two-part issue are summarized, and the articles within the issue are shown to contribute to the theme. The university must serve adults of all ages who are developing within a global society. Interpersonal interactions are important processes for development. The university might respond to current criticisms of it as an institution, in part, by teaching and studying interpersonal and emotional skills in combination with intellectual skills that are already emphasized. A better balance such as this would make the university, its research, and its students more viable in the next century.     

Social anxiety and interpersonal perception: a social relations model analysis

Cognitive models of social phobia posit that an individual's negative beliefs about the way he or she is perceived by others (metaperceptions) are a core feature of the disorder. The social relations model () was used to analyze interpersonal perception data collected following unstructured social interactions in 62 socially anxious (SA) and 62 not socially anxious (NSA) individuals. Using this model, the interpersonal perceptions were analyzed to evaluate whether pathological levels of social anxiety are associated with self-perceptions, metaperceptions, and perceptions from others. SA participants saw themselves negatively and believed others saw them negatively. Although seen as more nervous by others, SA participants were not seen as less likeable. A mediational model demonstrated that the negative metaperceptions of SA individuals were more a function of their own self-perceptions than the negative perceptions of others. These findings were not attributable to depressive symptoms. Implications for theory and treatment of social phobia are discussed.     

Agnosticism gone awry: Why developmental robotics must commit to an understanding of embodiment and shared intentionality

We argue that developmental robotics, in its integration of developmental psychology and robotics, has the potential to encounter unexpected and unexamined conceptual difficulties. In particular, the various uses of embodiment and shared intentionality single out certain robots and behaviors as more or less relevant for the modeling of social cognition. As these terms have relatively orthogonal histories, there is no account for how their use will interact to shape methodology. We provide a brief discussion of how they may do so. Moreover, theorists often avoid explicit endorsement of some use or another. Although this agnosticism is understandable, we use the model of Dominey and Warneken (2011) as an illustrative example of why it is potentially dangerous. While Dominey and Warneken have succeeded in encouraging theorists to adopt clearer formulations of shared intentionality, their model suffers from important difficulties in interpretation, which, we argue, are a consequence of their uses of embodiment and shared intentionality respectively.     

The exemplary social emotion guilt: Not so relationship-oriented when another person repairs for you

Guilt is considered by many researchers to be the hallmark social emotion. Guilt theories perceive guilt to be a negative emotion with positive interpersonal consequences, and empirical research has shown guilt to motivate prosocial behaviours aimed at restoring the relationship with one's victims. The current research questions the relationship-oriented nature of this emotion. Five experiments reveal that when a person repairs the transgressor's damage caused to a victim, the transgressor's guilt feelings, reparative intentions, and prosocial behaviour decrease. These findings suggest that it is not the relationship with the victim that is important in the regulation of guilt feelings, but rather the reparative actions that have been undertaken. Implications for theory and behavioural research on guilt are discussed.     

Implicit learning of social predictions

Humans exchange a range of nonverbal social signals in every interaction. It is an open question whether people use these signals, consciously or unconsciously, to guide social behavior. This experiment directly tested whether participants could learn to predict another person’s behavior using nonverbal cues in a single interaction, and whether explicit knowledge of the cue-outcome relationship was necessary for successful prediction. Participants played a computerized game of rock-paper-scissors against an avatar they believed was another participant. Sometimes the avatar generated a predictive facial cue before the play. On these trials, participants’ win-frequency increased over time, even if they did not acquire explicit knowledge of the predictive cue. The degree to which participants could predict the avatar (wins on cued trials) related to their self-reported liking of the avatar. These findings demonstrate the importance of implicit associative learning mechanisms in guiding social behavior on a moment-to-moment basis during interaction.