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Cited by 1,088Social and Intergroup PsychologyPersonality Traits and PsychologyPsychological Testing and Assessment

On cognitive busyness: When person perceivers meet persons perceived.

Gilbert, Daniel T., Pelham, Brett W., Krull, Douglas S.·1988·Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
DOI 10.1037/0022-3514.54.5.733
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Abstract

Person perception includes three sequential processes: categorization (what is the actor doing?), characterization (what trait does the action imply?), and correction (what situational constraints may have caused the action?). We argue that correction is less automatic (i.e., more easily disrupted) than either categorization or characterization. In Experiment 1, subjects observed a target behave anxiously in an anxiety-provoking situation. In Experiment 2, subjects listened to a target read a political speech that he had been constrained to write. In both experiments, control subjects used information about situational constraints when drawing inferences about the target, but cognitively busy subjects (who performed an additional cognitive task during encoding) did not. The results (a) suggest that person perception is a combination of lower and higher order processes that differ in their susceptibility to disruption and (b) highlight the fundamental differences between active and passive perceivers. Many of us can recall a time when, as students, we encountered a professor at a party and were surprised to find that he or she seemed a very different sort of person than our classroom experience had led us to expect. In part, such discrepant impressions reflect real discrepancies in behavior: Professors may display greater warmth or less wit at a party than they do in the classroom. However, just as the object of perception changes across situations, so too does the perceiver.…

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Crossref · 10.1037/0022-3514.54.5.733

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  • Because perceivers often have too few cognitive resources to devote to correction, the outcome of the correction process tends to reflect the correspondence bias.

    “because perceivers often have too few cognitive resources to devote to the relatively arduous process of correction, the outcome of this process will tend to reflect the correspondence bias”

    From Suspicion and Dispositional Inference (1993) · cites this paper as Gilbert et al., 1988

  • The numerous studies that demonstrate the correspondence bias typically manipulate the potential role of situational constraints rather than the potential role of ulterior motivation.

    “the numerous studies that demonstrate the correspondence bias (e.g., Gilbert, Pelham, & Krull, 1988; Jones, 1979; Jones & Harris, 1967; Ross, Amabile, & Steinmetz, 1977; Snyder &Jones, 1974) typically manipulate the potential role of situational constraints rather than the potential role of ulterior motivation.”

    From Suspicion and Dispositional Inference (1993) · cites this paper as Gilbert, Pelham, & Krull, 1988

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Authors
Gilbert, D. T., Pelham, B. W., & Krull, D. S.
Affiliations
The University of Texas at Austin (US)
ORCID
Venue
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
Publisher
American Psychological Association (APA)
Published
1988-05
Volume
54
Issue
5
Pages
733-740
ISSN
  • 0022-3514 (ISSN-L)
  • 1939-1315
DOI
10.1037/0022-3514.54.5.733
OpenAlex
W2097936794
Cited by
1,088
References
5
Citations by year
2026: 14 · 2025: 15 · 2024: 22 · 2023: 20 · 2022: 24 · 2021: 26 · 2020: 22 · 2019: 41 · 2018: 27 · 2017: 26 · 2016: 35 · 2015: 44 · 2014: 37 · 2013: 40 · 2012: 37
FWCI
49.85
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Personality Traits and Psychology
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Psychological Testing and Assessment
Keywords
person perception, situational constraints, categorization, characterization, dual-process models, cognitive load, impression formation

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