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Chapter 3: Perception, Attribution, and Learning

Perception -the process by which people select, organize, interpret, retrieve, and respond to information from the

world around them

-a way of forming impressions about oneself, other people, and daily life experiences

-also serves as a screen or filter through which information passes before it has an effect on people

*Throughperception, people process information inputs into responses involving feelings and action.

*Perception and reality are not necessarily the same thing.

Factors Influencing Perception:

a. Perceiver -a persons past experiences, needs or motives, personality, and values and attitudes

b. Setting -the physical, social, and organizational context of the perceptual setting

c. Perceived -characteristics of the perceived person, object, or even such as contrast, intensity, figure-ground

separation, size, motion, and repetition or novelty

Figure-ground separation -it depends on which image is perceived as the background and which as the figure

Perceptual Process:

Influence Factors ---- Stages of Perceptual Process ---- Response

Stages of the Perceptual Process:

A. Attention and Selection

Selective Screening -lets in only a tiny proportion of all the information available

B. OrganizationSchemas -are cognitive frameworks that represent organized knowledge about a given concept or stimulus

developed through experience

Self Schema -contains information about a persons own appearance, behavior and personality

Person Schemas -refer to the way individuals sort others into categories, such as types or groups, in terms of

similar perceived features

Script Schema -knowledge framework that describes the appropriate sequence of events in a given situation

Person-in-situations schemas -combine schemas built around persons (self and person schemas) and events (script

schemas)

C. Interpretation

D. Retrieval

Response to the Perceptual Process:

A. Feelings B. Thoughts C. Actions

Common Perceptual Distortions:

Stereotypes -also called prototypes

-types or groups of individuals who sort others into categories, in terms of similar perceived features

-obscure individual differences, they can prevent managers from getting to know people as individuals

and from accurately assessing their needs, preferences and abilities

Halo Effect -occurs when one attribute of a person or situation is used to develop an overall impression of the

individual or situation

-are more likely to occur in the organizational stage of perception

-are particularly important in the performance appraisal process because they can influence a managersevaluations of subordinates work performance

Selective Perception -is the tendency to single out those aspects of a situation, person, or object that are consistent with

ones needs, values, or attitudes

-its strongest impact occurs in the attention stage of the perceptual process

-was identified in a classic research study involving executives in a manufacturing company

Projection -is the assignment of ones personal attributes to otherindividuals; it is likely to occur in the interpretation

stage of perception

-can be controlled through a high degree of self-awareness and empathythe ability to view the situation

as others see it

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Contrast Effects -occur when an individuals characteristics are contrasted with those of others recently

encountered, who rank higher or lower on the same characteristics

Self-fulfilling Prophecies -the tendency to create or find in another situation or individual that which you expected

to find in the first place

-is sometimes referred to as the Pygmalion Effect named for a mythical Greek sculptor who created a

statue of his ideal mate and then made her come to life

*Impression Management -a persons systematic attempt to behave in ways that will create and maintain desired

impressions in the eyes of others

*Distortion Management -during the attention and selection stage, managers should be alert to balancing automatic

and controlled information processing

-the various kinds of schemas as well as prototypes and stereotypes are particularly important at the

information organizing stage

-at the interpretation stage, managers need to be especially attuned to the impact of attribution on

information

-at the retrieval stage, managers should be sensitive to the fallibility of memory

Attribution Theory -is the attempt to understand the cause of an event, assess responsibility for outcomes of the

event, and assess the personal qualities of the people involved

-especially concerned with whether an individuals behavior has been internally or externally caused

Internal Causes -are believed to be under an individuals controlExternal Causes -are seen as coming from outside a person

Three Factors Influencing Internal and External Determination:

A.Distinctiveness -considers how consistent a persons behavior is across different situations

B. Consensus -take into account how likely all those facing a similar situation are to respond in the same way

C. Consistency -concerns whether an individual responds the same way across time

Attribution Errors:

A. Fundamental Attribution Error -the tendency to underestimate the influence of situational factors and to

overestimate the influence of personal factors in evaluating someone elses behavior

B. Self-serving Bias -the tendency to deny personal responsibility for performance problems but to accept personal

responsibility for performance success

*We tend to overemphasize other peoples internal personal factors in their behavior and to underemphasize externa

factors in other peoples behavior. In contrast, we tend to attribute our own success to our own internal factors and to

attribute our failure to external factors.

*In Korea, self-serving bias was found to be negative; In India the fundamental attribution error overemphasizes external

rather than internal causes for failure; US females less likely to emphasize self-serving bias than males

Learning -a relatively permanent change in behavior occurring as a result of experience

Reinforcement -is the administration of a consequence as a result of behavior

Classical Conditioning -is a form of learning through association that involves the manipulation of stimuli to influence

behavior; studied by Ivan Pavlov

Stimulus -is something that incites action and draws forth a response

Conditional Stimulus -once-neutral stimulus when it affects behavior the same way as the initial stimulusOperant Conditioning -is the process of controlling behavior by manipulating or operating on its consequences

popularized by B.F. Skinner

Antecedent -is the condition leading up to or cueing behavior

*Classical and operant conditioning differ in two ways: control in operant conditioning is via manipulation of

consequences and operant conditioning calls for examining antecedents, behavior, and consequences

Law of Effect -is the observation that behavior resulting in a pleasing outcome is likely to be repeated; behavior that

results in an unpleasant outcome is not likely to be repeated; E.I. Thorndike

Extrinsic rewards -are positively valued work outcomes that are given to the individual by some other person

Contrived rewards -planned rewards that have direct costs and budgetary implications

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Natural rewards -rewards that have no cost other than the managers personal time and efforts

OB Mod -Organizational Behavior Modification; is the systematic reinforcement of desirable work behavior and

the non-reinforcement or punishment of unwanted work behavior

Positive Reinforcement -is the administration of positive consequences that tend to increase the likelihood of repeating

the behavior in similar settings; B.F. Skinner

Recognition -is both a reward and a potential positive reinforce only if a persons performance later improves

Law of Contingent Reinforcement -is the view that for a reward to have maximum reinforcing value, it must be

delivered only if the desired behavior is exhibited

Law of Immediate Reinforcement -states that the more immediate the delivery of a reward after the occurrence of a

desirable behavior, the greater the reinforcing effect on behavior

Shaping -is the creation of a new behavior by the positive reinforcement of successive approximations to the

desired behavior

Continuous Reinforcement -is a reinforcement schedule that administers a reward each time a desired behavior

occurs

Intermittent Reinforcement -is a reinforcement schedule that rewards behavior only periodically

*Continuous reinforcement elicits a desired behavior more quickly than does intermittent reinforcement

Variable schedules -typically result in more consistent patterns of desired behavior than do fixed reinforcement

Fixed-interval schedules -provide rewards at the first appearance of a behavior after a given time has elapsed

Fixed-ratio schedules -result in a reward each time a certain number of the behaviors have occurredVariable-interval schedule -rewards behavior at random times

Variable-ratio schedule -rewards behavior after a random number of occurrences

Negative Reinforcement-avoidance; is the withdrawal of negative consequences, which tends to increase the likelihood of

repeating the behavior in a similar setting

Punishment -is intended not to encourage positive behavior but to discourage negative behavior; is the administration

of negative consequences that tend to reduce the likelihood of repeating the behavior in similar settings

Extinction -is the withdrawal of the reinforcing consequences for a given behavior

*Both positive and negative reinforcement are used to strengthen the desirable behavior of improving work quality when

it occurs.

*Punishment is used to weaken the undesirable behavior of high error rates and involves either administering negative

consequences or withdrawing positive consequences.

*Extinction is used deliberately to weaken the undesirable behavior of high error rates when it occurs and is used

inadvertently to weaken the desirable behavior if low error rates.

Social Learning Theory -an extension of reinforcement and operant conditioning

-emphasizes the existence of observational learning and the importance of perception and

attribution

Social Learning -is achieved through the reciprocal interactions among people, behavior, and environment

Modeling -vicarious learning to acquire behavior by observing and imitating others

Self Efficacy -is the persons belief that he or she can perform adequately in a situation

End.