TERM PROJECT- WEIGHS 40% OF FINAL GRADE Step-by-step1: Identify a Failed Collaboration with Significant Issues/Stakes Identify a specific case of collaboration failure for an in-depth analysis. The ca

CHAPTER 2:

FACTORS INFLUENCING PERCEPTION

Our perception can be influenced by a plethora of factors. In general, these factors can be grouped into three categories:

• The perceiver: Attitudes, motives, interests, experiences, and expectations

• The target: Novelty, motion, sounds, size, background, and proximity

• The situation: Time, working setting, and social setting

PERCEPTUAL ERRORS

Although we strive to be accurate in forming perceptions of others, our perception is notoriously susceptible to the influence of external and internal factors, as our discussion on the previous page demonstrates. Collectively, these influences give rise to a series of perceptual errors that lead to inaccurate perceptions, as the counting exercise at the beginning of this section demonstrates. Here we discuss several of these perceptual errors. Specifically, we focus on the following six:

• Fundamental attribution error

• Selective perception

• Halo effect

• Contrast effects

• Projection

• Stereotyping

Attribution Theory

When it comes to perceiving behaviors, individuals often seek to determine whether a given behavior is internally or externally caused. According to the attribution theory,  a theory formulated to describe how individuals SHOULD make such attributions, we should pay attention to distinctiveness, consensus, and consistency. 

Distinctiveness

To determine distinctiveness, one should ask the question "How often does the person do this in other situations?". If the answer is NOT often, then the behavior is HIGH in distinctiveness, which results in the attribution that the situation is probably responsible for the behavior (also known as external attribution). If the answer is VERY often, then the behavior is LOW in distinctiveness, which results in the attribution that the person him- or herself is responsible for the behavior (also known as internal attribution).

Consensus

To determine consensus, one should ask the question "How often do other people do this in similar situations?". If the answer is VERY often, then the behavior is HIGH in consensus, which results in the attribution that the situation is responsible for the behavior. If the answer is NOT often, then the behaviour is LOW in consensus, which results in the attribution that the person is responsible for the behavior.

Consistency

To determine consistency, one should ask the question "How often did the person do this in the past?". If the answer is VERY often, then the behavior is HIGH in consensus, which results in the attribution that the person is responsible for the behavior. If the answer is NOT often, then the behavior is LOW in consensus, which results in the attribution that the situation is responsible for the behavior.

Fundamental Attribution Error

Attribution theory describes how people should make attributions for behaviors. However, research has repeatedly demonstrated that attributions of this kind are often biased in one or the other, depending on whether we make attributions of our own behaviors or the behaviors of others. 

Attributions for the self - Self-serving bias

When we make attributions of our own behaviors, we tend to exhibit the self-serving bias, defined as the tendency to attribute one’s successes to internal factors while putting the blame for failures on external factors. For example, if I scored an A+ in the final exam, I will attribute that to myself, such as my talent or hard work. In contrast, if I scored an F in the final exam, I will attribute that to external factors, such as the exam was too difficult or the professor did not do a good job explaining to me those complex concepts.

Attributions for others - Fundamental attribution error

When we make attributions of the behaviors of others, we tend to exhibit the fundamental attribution bias, defined as The tendency to underestimate external factors and overestimate internal factors when making judgments about others’ behavior. Using the same example above, if Peter scored an A+ in his final exam, I will attribute that to some external factor, such as his luck. In contrast, if he scored an F in the final exam, I will attribute that to himself, such as his lack of talent.

Selective Perception

Selective perception refers to people's tendency to selectively interpret what they see based on their interests, background, experience, and attitudes.

Halo Effect

Halo effect refers to people's tendency to draw a general impression about an individual based on a single characteristic, such as intelligence, likeability, or appearance.

Contrast Effect

Contrast effect refers to the phenomenon in which a person’s evaluation is affected by comparisons with other individuals recently encountered.

Projection refers to people's tendency to attribute one’s own characteristics to other people. For example, if I like spicy food I'd also expect other people to also like spicy food. Sometimes this expectation remains implicit (that is, we are not aware of it). But sometimes we are fully aware of this expectation but still choose to believe that others like spicy food because, for example, they are so delicious. Again, by defending our expectations with reasons such as spicy foods are delicious, we are projecting our preference onto others.

Stereotyping refers to people's tendency to judge someone on the basis of our perception of the group to which that person belongs. For example, people often make the assumption that bankers must be good at math and professors must have read a lot of books. While these assumptions are true in many cases, they are not universally true. By thinking every banker we meet as being good at math, we allow our perception of that particular banker that we meet to be distorted by our overall impression of most bankers. It may still be true that the banker you meet is good at math, but by focusing on our stereotype of bankers, we lose the motivation to get to know the individual banker that we meet, who may be good at math or something that's entirely different. That being said, stereotyping also has its positive aspect: it allows us to quickly form impressions of others we meet based on their membership in different social groups. This can be particularly useful when we are under time pressure to get to know someone.

Prejudice refers to an unfounded dislike of a person or group based on their belonging to a particular stereotyped group. People often treat stereotyping and prejudice as equals. While stereotyping and prejudice are related, they are not the same. They are related because prejudice is rooted in the perceiver's negative feelings toward a stereotyped group. Therefore, without stereotyping, there will not be prejudice. However, this does not mean that all stereotypes are prejudiced. The key distinction between stereotype and prejudice is that prejudice is negative (remember "unfounded dislike") and often leads to disastrous consequences, such as hatred and violence. In contrast, stereotypes can be neutral or even positive.

WHAT DETERMINES PERSONALITY?

In general, our personality is shaped by factors that can be subsumed into three broad categories:

• Heredity

• Environmental factors

• Situational factors 

Heredity

An approach that argues that the ultimate explanation of an individual's personality is the molecular structure of the genes, located in the chromosomes. The most persuasive research on this comes from studying monozygotic twins who were separated at birth and raised in very different environments. Different research studies with these kinds of twins have determined that genetics accounts for about half of the personality differences in people.

Environmental factors

The culture in which we are raised, our early conditioning, the norms among our family, friends, and social groups, and other influences that we experience play a critical role in shaping our personalities.

Situational factors

The situation influences the effects of heredity and environment on personality. Personality can be subdued in some situations. A person will be different in a job interview as compared to being at dinner with friends. We cannot look at personality patterns in isolation.

The Big Five Personality Inventory and MBTI seek to assess personality globally, which explains that there are multiple aspects to both of those surveys. In addition to this global approach, researchers have also identified a host of personality traits that focus one or a few specific aspects of people's self-concept. In this section, we examine the following six:

• Machiavellisnism

• Narcissism

• Psychopathy

• Proactive personality

• Core self-evaluation

• Self-monitoring

• Machiavellisnism captures the degree to which an individual is pragmatic, maintains emotional distance, and believes that the ends justifies the means.

• People can be categorized as high Machs and low Machs. Compared to their low Mach counterparts, high Machs tend to manipulate more, win more, are persuaded less, and more likely to persuade others more.

• Narcissism refers to the tendency to be arrogant, have a grandiose sense of importance, require excessive admiration, and have a sense of entitlement.

• Narcissists tend to think that they are better leaders than their colleagues; but, their supervisors tend to rate them as worse.

• In OB, psychopathy does NOT mean insanity, although they may share some common components.

• Psychopathy in the OB context refers to the lack of concern for others and a lack of guilt and remorse when one’s actions cause harm to others

A person who identifies opportunities, shows initiative, takes action, and perseveres until meaningful change occurs.

Core self-evaluation refers to how people evaluate themselves, which consists of self-esteem and self-efficacy:

• Self-esteem: whether people like or dislike themselves 

• Self-efficacy: whether people see themselves as effective, capable, and in control of their environment

People with positive CSEs perform better because they:

• Set more ambitious goals

• Are more committed to their goals

• Persist longer at attempting to reach those goals

Self-monitoring refers to an individual’s ability to adjust behaviour to external, situational factors.

High self-monitors tend to:

• Pay closer attention to the behaviour of others

• Are more capable of conforming than low self-monitors

• Tend to be more mobile in their careers

• Receive more promotions

• More likely to occupy central positions in an organization