Social Perception

Understanding Social Perception and Managing

Diversity

Chapter Four

Copyright © 2010 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.McGraw-Hill/Irwin

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After reading the material in this chapter, you should be able to:

• Describe perception in terms of the social information processing model.

• Identify and briefly explain six managerial implications for social perception.

• Explain, according to Kelley’s model, how external and internal causal attributions are formulated.

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After reading the material in this chapter, you should be able to:

• Demonstrate your familiarity with the demographic trends that are creating an increasingly diverse workforce.

• Identify the barriers and challenges to managing diversity.

• Discuss organizational practices used to manage diversity

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A Social Information Processing Model of Perception

• Perception - the process of

interpreting one’s environment.

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Social Perception: A Social Information Processing Model

Figure 4-1

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Stage 1: Selective Attention/Comprehension

• Attention - being consciously aware of

something or someone

People pay attention to salient stimuli• Salient

- something that stands out from context

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Question?

Beverly has $11,000 for investment. She speaks with various friends and neighbors to find out what stocks they have invested in. Beverly can be described as being on which stage of the social information processing model?

A.Selective attention; comprehensionB.EncodingC.SimplificationD.Storage and Retention

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Stage 2: Encoding and Simplification

• Stereotype - beliefs about the characteristics of a group

• Not always negative• May or may not be accurate

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Stereotyping Process

1. Categorize people into groups according to various criteria

2. Infer that all people within a category possess the same traits

3. Form expectations of others and interpret their behavior according to our stereotypes

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Stereotyping Process

4. Stereotypes are maintained by:– Overestimating the frequency of stereotypic

behavior exhibited by others– Incorrectly explaining expected and

unexpected behaviors– Differentiating minority individuals from

oneself

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Stage 3: Storage and Retention

• Event memory - information about both specific and general

events• Semantic memory

- general knowledge about the world, mental dictionary of concepts

• Person memory - information about a single individual or groups

of people

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Stage 4: Retrieval and Response

• Decisions are based:- On the process of drawing on, interpreting,

and integrating categorical information stored in long-term memory

- Retrieving a summary judgment that was already made

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Managerial Implications: Hiring

• Interviewers make hiring decisions based on their impression of how an applicant fits the perceived requirements of a job

• Inaccurate impressions in either direction produce poor hiring decisions

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Managerial Implications: Performance Appraisal

• Important for managers to accurately identify the behavioral characteristics and results indicative of good performance

• Characteristics serve as the benchmarks for evaluating employee performance

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Managerial Implications: Leadership

Good leaders exhibit the following behaviors:

- Assigning specific tasks to group members- Telling others they had done well- Setting specific goals for the group

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Managerial Implications: Leadership

• Poor leaders exhibit the following behaviors:

- Telling others they had performed poorly- Insisting on having their own way- Doing things without explaining themselves

Question?

Which of these is (are) managerial implication(s) of perception?

A.Interviewers with racist and sexist schemata can undermine the accuracy and legality of hiring decisions.

B.Faulty schemata about what constitutes good versus poor performance can lead to inaccurate performance appraisal, which can erode work motivation, commitment, and loyalty.

C.Research demonstrates that employees' evaluations of leader effectiveness are influenced strongly by their schemata of good and poor leaders.

D.All of these. 4-17

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Causal Attributions

• Causal Attributions

- suspected or inferred causes of behavior

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Performance Charts

Figure 4-2

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Kelley’s Model of Attribution

• Internal factors - personal characteristics that cause behavior

• External behavior - environmental characteristics that cause

behavior

Kelley’s Model of Attribution

• Consensus - involves a comparison of an individual’s behavior

with that of his peers.• Distinctiveness

- involves comparing a person’s behavior on one task with the behavior from other tasks.

• Consistency - determined by judging if the individual’s

performance on a given task is consistent over time.

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Question?

Francesca has had stable performance and high quality from one task to another. This refers to:

A.Low consensus.B.High distinctiveness.C.High consensusD.Low distinctiveness.

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Attributional Tendencies

• Fundamental attribution bias - ignoring environment factors that affect

behavior• Self-serving bias

- taking more personal responsibility for success than failure

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Managerial Implications

• Managers tend to disproportionately attribute behavior to internal causes

• An employee’s attributions for his own performance have dramatic effects on subsequent motivation, performance, and self-esteem

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Defining and Managing Diversity

• Diversity - the host of individual differences that make

people different from and similar to each other

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Four Layers of Diversity

Figure 4-3

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Defining and Managing Diversity

• Affirmative action - voluntary and involuntary efforts to achieve

equality of opportunity for everyone• Managing diversity

- creating organizational changes that enable all people to perform up to their maximum potential

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Increasing Diversity in the Workforce: Demographic Trends

• Women and minorities are experiencing a glass ceiling

• Racial groups are encountering perceived discrimination

• Mismatch between educational attainment and occupational requirements

• The workforce is aging

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Increasing Diversity in the Workforce: Demographic Trends

• Glass ceiling- invisible barrier

blocking women and minorities from top management positions

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Increasing Diversity in the Workforce: Demographic Trends

• Underemployment - the result of taking a job that requires less

education, training, or skills than possessed by a worker

Question?

Mary Grace has a degree in nuclear engineering, but has been unable to find a job in her field. She is currently working at the drive-thru at McDonald’s. This is an example of __________.

A.Degree inflationB.Over-employmentC.Under-employmentD.Hyper-employment

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What Organizations Are Doing to Capture Retiring Workers’ Knowledge

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Insert Figure 4.4

Barriers and Challenges to Managing Diversity

1. Inaccurate stereotypes and prejudice2. Ethnocentrism3. Poor career planning4. An unsupportive and hostile working

environment for diverse employees5. Lack of political savvy on the part of

diverse employees

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Barriers and Challenges to Managing Diversity

6. Difficulty in balancing career and family issues7. Fears of reverse discrimination8. Diversity is not seen as an organizational

priority9. The need to revamp the organization’s

performance appraisal and reward system10. Resistance to change

Question?

Jacques, a French national, is the CEO of French Global Empire with significant operations in Japan and the United States. Jacques recently announced that all employees of the company, no matter which part of the world they may be in, must learn French and communicate in French only. Which challenge to diversity does this represent?

A.Cultural flexibilityB.Polychronic timeC.Cultural relativismD.Ethnocentrism

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Organizational Practices Used to Effectively Manage Diversity

• Option 1: Include/Exclude• Option 2: Deny• Option 3: Assimilate• Option 4: Suppress

Organizational Practices Used to Effectively Manage Diversity (cont.)

• Option 5: Isolate• Option 6: Tolerate• Option 7: Build Relationships• Option 8: Foster Mutual Adaptation

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Question?

A group of minority employees complained about alleged discriminatory practices to their manager. She told them to quit whining and get back to work. This is the use of _________ to manage diversity.

A.DenialB.SuppressionC.IsolationD.Building relationships

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Supplemental Slides

• Slides 40-45 contain extra non-text examples to integrate and enhance instructor lectures

- Slide 40: Positive Contributory Value of Older Workers

- Slides 41: How do gender stereotypes affect work-related decisions?

- Slide 42: Women in Gender-Typed Jobs- Slide 43: Glass Ceiling- Slide 44-45: Video discussion slide

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Positive Contributory Value of Older Workers

• Myth #1: Older workers are not top learners.

• Myth #2: Older workers are not top performers

• How to retain older worker human capital- Flexibility in HR policies- Attitude Change- Knowledge Transfer Programs

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How do gender stereotypes affect work-related decisions?

• Stereotype: Women are more interpersonally savvy- Women 7 on 9-point scale- Men 5 on 9-point scale

• Scenario: - Male applicant for COO job is perceived to be a 5

on a 9-point scale- Female applicant is perceived to be a 6 on a 9-

point scale.• Who is perceived to be more qualified on that

dimension?

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Women in Gender-Typed Jobs

• Bias against women often results in their competence being denied. But what happens when their competence is acknowledged?- Recent research suggests that successful

women in male gender-typed jobs are less liked, personally derogated

- This social rejection affects promotions, raises, and other rewards.

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Glass Ceiling

See an article on “Breaking the Glass Ceiling” by Wirth

Video Case: Andre Thornton

• What attributes or experiences help Andre Thorton in being successful at GPI?

• In what ways can Thorton serve as an example for all minority individuals?

• Does GPI’s size help or hinder them in serving the needs of their clients?

• Can you draw correlations between sports and business? What are they?

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Video Case: Wal-Mart Faces Discrimination Lawsuit

• How could sex-role stereotypes influence the hiring, evaluation, and promotion of employees at large retail stores such as Wal-Mart?

• In what ways could a giant corporation like Wal-Mart, with 5,000-some outlets worldwide, prevent or at least minimize sex discrimination throughout the organization?

• In Wal-Mart stores, women hold 93% of the cashier jobs, the lowest wage category. To what extent might the self-fulfilling prophecy affect female employees’ performance in a corporation where the lowest-paid jobs are done mostly by women?

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