Saylor URL: http://www.saylor.org/books Saylor.org
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[3] Sidman, J. (2006, June 26). A college student’s death may help save lives. USA Today. Retrieved
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14.1 Social Cognition: Making Sense of Ourselvesand Others
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
- Review the principles of social cognition, including the fundamentals of how we form judgments about other people.
- Define the concept of attitude and review the ways that attitudes are developed and changed, and how attitudes
relate to behavior.
One important aspect of social cognition involves forming impressions of other people. Making
these judgments quickly and accurately helps us guide our behavior to interact appropriately with
the people we know. If we can figure out why our roommate is angry at us, we can react to
resolve the problem; if we can determine how to motivate the people in our group to work harder
on a project, then the project might be better.
Perceiving Others
Our initial judgments of others are based in large part on what we see. The physical features of
other people, particularly their sex, race, age, and physical attractiveness, are very salient, and we
often focus our attention on these dimensions (Schneider, 2003; Zebrowitz & Montepare,
2006). [1]
Although it may seem inappropriate or shallow to admit it, we are strongly influenced by the
physical attractiveness of others, and many cases physical attractiveness is the most important
determinant of our initial liking for other people (Walster, Aronson, Abrahams, & Rottmann,
1966). [2] Infants who are only a year old prefer to look at faces that adults consider to be
attractive than at unattractive faces (Langlois, Ritter, Roggman, & Vaughn,
1991). [3] Evolutionary psychologists have argued that our belief that “what is beautiful is also