Mental Representation: Structure and Process 259creativity with which researchers have gone about mapping
the workings of the social mind testifies to the possibility of
approaching the subject with a respectable measure of scien-
tific rigor and objectivity, unhampered by the limitations of
introspective methods.
The study of the social mind inevitably proceeds from a
set of (often implicit) assumptions about its fundamental
character. The major theoretical precursors of contemporary
social cognition research lie in the seminal research on social
perception and attribution conducted by such pioneers as Asch
(1946) and Heider (1958). Embodied within these historical
approaches is a view of the human mind as largely rational and
even—in its own naive way—scientific. Attributional models
such as Heider’s were grounded in the assumption that per-
ceivers seek out cues pertaining to issues such as the control-
lability, foreseeability, or desirability of others’ behavior;
perceivers then use these cues to logically derive assumptions
about their mental states and about the reasons for their ob-
served behavior. Classic models of impression formation
(e.g., Anderson, 1965) assumed that social perceivers ascer-
tain the likelihood that various characteristics or traits apply to
a given target, and they then assess the favorableness of these
traits, combining them into a composite impression in a man-
ner dictated by familiar expectancy-value models of human
judgment. Contemporary social-cognitive research calls this
optimistic view of humans as rational actors into question and
suggests a set of alternative metaphors. We mention several of
these newer metaphors here, as a way to anticipate many of the
major themes of the rest of this review.
- Humans as automatons. Whereas classic social-
psychological theories emphasized the role of rational
analysis and active reasoning in guiding human behavior,
much of contemporary social cognition research has em-
phasized the role of automatic and implicit processes in
shaping social conduct. This work certainly casts into
doubt the assumption of pervasive rationality, and it sug-
gests that in many (if not most) circumstances, we may be
the slaves of mental processes that occur outside the realm
of our ratiocinations. - Humans as motivated tacticians.Even when engaging in
active thought, there is ample reason to believe that people
seek out and use mental shortcuts rather than engage in
a thorough and systematic analysis of relevant data.
Because of the inherent limitations of our attentional
capacity (Miller, 1956) and epistemic motivation (Simon,
1967), humans are likely to be quite strategic in allocat-
ing their mental resources to the tasks confronting them
(Fiske & Taylor, 1991). A major theme of the research we
review in this chapter concerns the specification of the
conditions under which social cognition will be likely to
be relatively more analytical versus superficial.- Humans as intuitive lawyers.Whereas an intuitive scien-
tist would be expected to be a truth-seeker, objectively
seeking and using data concerning the state of the social
environment, an abundant research literature shows that
social cognition actually is subject to a wide range of
powerful motivational biases. Rather than seeking to
know the world as it is, we often see the world in the way
we want it to be (e.g., Kunda, 1990). Much as a lawyer
manipulates the available facts in a manner that is most
flattering to a preferred conclusion, social perceivers also
often show a rather shameless partiality in their dealings
with the evidence relevant to their judgments, impres-
sions, and choices. - Humans as affect-driven agents.The historical metaphor
of the rational actor leaves relatively little room for the
world of emotions, moods, and other feeling-states that
form the real-life context of all social thought and action.
In recent years, the importance of affective states in influ-
encing social cognition and social behavior has been
undeniably established (e.g., Forgas, 2001). It has thus
become clear that affect is of integral importance in shap-
ing the character of social cognition. In the remainder of
this chapter, we trace the developments that have led re-
searchers toward new conceptions of the social mind.
MENTAL REPRESENTATION: STRUCTURE
AND PROCESSWith the advent of powerful technologies for studying the
functioning of the brainin vivo,there have been many impor-
tant advances in our understanding of the neural basis of in-
formation processing (e.g., Gazzaniga, 2000). Nevertheless,
there continues to be a sizable gap between our understanding
of the low-level functioning of the central nervous system and
the development of a satisfying theoretical account for the
higher-order mental phenomena that are the focus of social
cognition research. To fill the gap, theorists have hypothesized
the existence of mental structures such as schemas and asso-
ciative networks that can provide a relatively parsimonious
account of how information is organized and used to meet the
demands of a complex social world. These hypothetical repre-
sentational constructs are best thought of as metaphors that
capture theoretically or empirically important properties of
social information processing. Although in a literal sense the
nervous system may not contain schemas or other sorts of hy-
pothesized mental structures, such constructs can be scientifi-
cally useful to the extent that they capture some important