Week 1

lecture 1 is about perception (Wahrnehmung)

• Stereotyping

• blind spot bias

• self serving bias

• halo effect

• funamental attribution error

• projection bias

• defensiveness

  
  

Perception is the process by which individuals organize and interpret their sensory impressions to give meaning to their environment.

So it is a active role of the preceiver.

• People's behavior is based on their perception of what reality is, not reality itself.

• context of the perception

• our expectations

• mental state (how do i feel)

We as humans react to the world we perceive, not how it actually is

• Situation

  • where is it

  • how is the situation

• Target

  • Size

  • Novelty

  • Motion

• Perceiver

  • needs

  • individuals thoughts

  • motivation

• by stereotyping people in the context of perception, we judge someone based on our perception of the group of stereotype (someone looks like a posh student, I don’t like them, even if he might be very nice)

• Halo effect: we misjudge the person in a good way, but objectively seen, the personality traits may not be related

  • person is good looking and smiling, he must be nice

Defensiveness means people do not want to hear bad things about themselves. They criticize, attack, or ignore negative information about themselves.

People tend to interpret situations in a way that makes them feel good about themselves.

Projection means that we tend to attribute our own characteristics to other people, even though they are not like us

People are using attributes to state the reason for behavior:

• internal attribution: behavior from inside the person

• external attribution: behavior as a result of the situation

Attribution can be seen by:

• Donsistency: how people behave over time

• Distinctiveness: looking at a person’s behavior in different situations

• Consensus: comparing behavior to other people’s behavior

1. fundamental attribution error

   • underestimate external factors and overestimate internal factors

2. Self-serving bias

   • attributing own successes to internal factors and blaming external factors for failures

Blind spot bias:

• We can identify biases easily for other people, but it is hard for ourselves