The role of goal categories in person impression

After being primed by family terms, or by socially neutral terms, female subjects were provided with characteristics of several women. The characteristics described a target woman in a mother/wife role or in a career woman role and were related to goals, or to means-to-goals typical for these roles. In two studies it appeared that charccteristics with goals, as opposed to means-to-goals information resulted in a better memory for the input (Study 1) and in more elaborated and confident impressions (Study 2). This finding was strongest when there was a congruence between the priming and the characteristics, i.e., when family priming was followed by the family relevant characteristics. The data supported the hypothesis that mental representations structuring the formation of impressions in natural contexts have an action-oriented character, with actor's goal categories as the dominant elements.