Perceiving Others' Personalities: Examining the Dimensionality, Assumed Similarity to the Self, and Stability of Perceiver Effects

• Published in: Journal of personality and social psychology 2010-03, Vol.98 (3), p.520-534
• Main Authors: Srivastava, Sanjay, Guglielmo, Steve, Beer, Jennifer S
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Attachment style; Biological and medical sciences; Comparative analysis; Correlation analysis; Evaluation; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Group stereotypes; Halo Effect; Human; Humans; Male; Models, Psychological; Perceptions; Personality; Personality Assessment; Personality tests; Personality Traits; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Psychopathology; Self; Self Concept; Self-Perception; Social attribution, perception and cognition; Social Perception; Social psychology; Stereotypes; Surveys and Questionnaires
• ISSN: 0022-3514; 1939-1315
• DOI: 10.1037/a0017057

In interpersonal perception, "perceiver effects" are tendencies of perceivers to see other people in a particular way. Two studies of naturalistic interactions examined perceiver effects for personality traits: seeing a typical other as sympathetic or quarrelsome, responsible or careless, and so forth. Several basic questions were addressed. First, are perceiver effects organized as a global evaluative halo, or do perceptions of different traits vary in distinct ways? Second, does assumed similarity (as evidenced by self-perceiver correlations) reflect broad evaluative consistency or trait-specific content? Third, are perceiver effects a manifestation of stable beliefs about the generalized other, or do they form in specific contexts as group-specific stereotypes? Findings indicated that perceiver effects were better described by a differentiated, multidimensional structure with both trait-specific content and a higher order global evaluation factor. Assumed similarity was at least partially attributable to trait-specific content, not just to broad evaluative similarity between self and others. Perceiver effects were correlated with gender and attachment style, but in newly formed groups, they became more stable over time, suggesting that they grew dynamically as group stereotypes. Implications for the interpretation of perceiver effects and for research on personality assessment and psychopathology are discussed.