1. Perception and Communication Chapter 3

2. The Process of Human Perception Perception: the active process of creating meaning by selecting, organizing, and interpreting people, objects, events, situations and other phenomena

3. Selection We select to attend to certain stimuli based on a number of factors:  The qualities of the phenomena  Self-indication  Our motives and needs  Culture

4. Organization Constructivism – we organize and interpret experience by applying cognitive structures called schemata  Prototype  Personal construct  Stereotype  Script

5. Interpretation The subjective process of explaining our perceptions in ways that make sense to us Attributions  Locus  Stability  Specificity  Responsibility

6. Interpretation Continued Attributional Errors  Self-serving bias  Fundamental attribution error Fundamental attribution error

7. Influences On Perception Physiology Age Expectations Culture  Social location  Roles

8. Influences On Perception Continued Cognitive abilities  Cognitive complexity  Person-centeredness Self

9. Implicit Personality Theory A collection of unspoken and sometimes unconscious assumptions about how various qualities fit together in human personalities

10. Guidelines for Improving Perception And Communication Recognize that all perceptions are partial and subjective Avoid mind reading Check perceptions with others Distinguish between facts and inferences Guard against the self-serving bias Guard against the fundamental attribution error Monitor labels

11. The Ladder of Abstraction