Knowing one person by another is always accompanied by an emotional assessment of the partner, an attempt to understand his actions, a forecast of changes in his behavior and modeling of his own behavior. Since at least two people participate in this process and each of them is an active subject, in constructing the interaction strategy, each should take into account not only the motives and needs of the other, but also his understanding of the motives and needs of the partner. The process of interpersonal perception is also called social perception.
The mechanism of interpersonal perception is a way by which a person interprets and evaluates another. There can be quite a lot of such methods. Today we will consider the main mechanisms of interpersonal perception: identification, empathy, egocentrism, attraction, reflection, stereotype and causal attribution.
Identification
The first and main mechanism of interpersonal perception is the identification of a person by person. From the point of view of social psychology, it confirms the fact that the simplest way to understand a partner is to liken himself to him.
In general, identification has several implications:
- Identification of oneself with another individual based on an emotional connection.
- The assimilation of the values, roles and moral qualities of another person.
- Copying the thoughts, feelings or actions of another person.
The most comprehensive definition of identification is as follows. Identification is the understanding of a partner through his conscious or unconscious identification with himself, an attempt to feel his condition, mood and attitude to the world, putting himself in his place.
Empathy
The second mechanism of interpersonal perception is closely related to the first. Empathy is the emotional desire to respond to the problems tormenting another person, to empathize with him and empathize.
Empathy is also interpreted as:
- Comprehension of the states of another individual.
- The mental process aimed at identifying other people's experiences.
- An action that helps the individual to build communication in a special way.
- The ability to penetrate the mental state of another person.
The ability to empathy increases in case of similarity of the interlocutors, as well as when an individual gains experience. The higher the empathy, the more colorful the person imagines the influence of one and the same event on the life of different people, and the more he realizes the existence of different views on life.
An individual prone to empathy can be recognized by these signs:
- Tolerance of other people's emotions.
- The ability to penetrate into the inner world of the interlocutor, without revealing his worldview.
- Adapting your worldview to the worldview of another person in order to achieve mutual understanding.
The similarity of empathy with identification
The empathy mechanism has some similarities with the identification mechanism. In both cases, there is a person’s ability to look at things from the point of view of another person. However, empathy, unlike identification, does not imply identifying oneself with the interlocutor. By identifying himself with a partner, a person accepts his model of behavior and builds a similar one. While showing empathy, the individual simply takes into account the line of behavior of the interlocutor, while continuing to build his behavior independently of him.
Empathy is considered one of the most important professional skills of a psychologist, doctor, teacher and leader. Empathic attention (listening), in the opinion of C. Rogers, is a special attitude towards a partner based on a synthesis of identification and empathy. Inclusion in another person, allowing to achieve openness of contact - identification function. Such “immersion in the interlocutor” in its pure form has negative consequences - the psychologist “binds” to the client’s difficulties and begins to suffer from his problems himself. Here the empathic component comes to the rescue - the ability to remove from the state of the partner. Thus, the totality of mechanisms such as person-to-person identification and empathy allows the psychologist to provide real help to clients.
Types of Empathy
Empathic experiences can be adequate and inadequate. For example, the grief of others causes sadness, and the joy of another.
In addition, empathy may be:
- Emotional . It is based on the mechanism of projection and imitation of the effective and motor reactions of the interlocutor.
- Cognitive . Based on intelligent processes.
- Predicative . Expresses a person’s ability to predict the interlocutor’s reactions in a given situation.
Empathy is an important form of empathy - the experience by one individual of feelings, emotions, and states that another experiences. This happens through identification with the interlocutor and sympathy for him.
Egocentrism
The third mechanism of interpersonal perception, in contrast to the two previous ones, complicates individuals' cognition of each other, but does not facilitate it. Self-centeredness is the concentration of a person on his personal experiences and interests, which leads to the fact that he loses the ability to understand people with a different worldview.
Self-centeredness happens:
- Cognitive . It manifests itself in the process of thinking and perception.
- Moral . Illustrates the inability of a person to understand the causes of the behavior of others.
- Communicative . Expressed in disrespect for the semantic concepts of the interlocutor.
Interpersonal attraction
Attraction is the attraction or attraction of one person to another, due to mutual interest. In psychology, an interpersonal attraction means a friendly relationship between people and an expression of sympathy for each other. The development of attachment of one subject to another arises as a result of an emotional attitude, the evaluation of which causes a whole series of feelings and is expressed as a social attitude towards another person.
Reflection
Considering the psychological mechanisms of interpersonal perception, one cannot but mention reflection. Reflection is a person’s awareness of how other individuals evaluate and perceive him. That is, this is a person’s idea of what the interlocutor thinks of him. This element of social cognition, on the one hand, means a person’s knowledge of the interlocutor through what he thinks about him, and on the other hand, knowledge of himself through it. Thus, the wider the circle of communication of an individual, the more ideas about how others perceive him, and the more a person knows about himself and others.
Stereotype
This is a very important and rather capacious mechanism of interpersonal perception. A stereotype in the context of interpersonal attraction is the process of forming an opinion about a person based on personal prejudices (stereotypes).
In 1922, V. Limpan introduced the term “social stereotype” to denote ideas related to inaccuracy and falsehood. As a rule, the formation of stable patterns of a social object occurs unnoticed even for the individual.
It is believed that it is precisely because of the weak meaningfulness that stereotypes are firmly entrenched in the form of stable standards and have gained power over people. The stereotype arises in the absence of information or is the result of a generalization of the individual’s own experience. To the experience is often added information obtained from cinema, literature and other sources.
Thanks to the stereotype, a person can quickly and, as a rule, reliably simplify the social environment, arrange it into certain standards and categories, make it more understandable and predictable. The cognitive basis of stereotyping is formed by such processes as restriction, selection, and categorization of a large flow of social information. As for the motivational basis of this mechanism, it is formed by the processes of evaluative popularization in favor of one or another group, which give a person a sense of belonging and security.
Stereotype Functions:
- Selection of information.
- Formation and support of a positive image of "I".
- Creation and support of group ideology justifying and explaining the behavior of the group.
- Formation and support of a positive image of "We".
Thus, stereotypes are regulators of public relations. Their main features are: saving thinking, justification of one’s own behavior, satisfaction of aggressive tendencies, stability and exit of group tension.
Classification of stereotypes
There are several classification stereotypes that take place at once. According to the classification of V. Panferov, stereotypes are: social, anthropological, and ethnonational.
Let us dwell on the classification of A. Rean, according to which, stereotypes are:
- Anthropological. Manifest in the case when the assessment of the psychological qualities of a person and his personality depends on the features of his appearance, that is, anthropological signs.
- Ethnic Relevant in the case when a person’s psychological assessment is influenced by his belonging to a particular ethnic group, race or nation.
- Social status. They take place in the event that the assessment of the individual qualities of an individual depends on his social status.
- Social role-playing. In this case, the assessment of personality is subordinate to the social role and role functions of the individual.
- Expressive-aesthetic. The psychological assessment of personality is mediated by the external attractiveness of a person.
- Verbal Behavioral. A criterion for assessing a personality is its external features: facial expressions, pantomimics, language, and so on.
There are other classifications. In them, in addition to the previous ones, such stereotypes are considered: professional (a generalized image of a representative of a particular profession), physiognomic (appearance traits are connected by a person), ethnic and others.
The most studied are considered national stereotypes. They illustrate the relationship of people to one or another ethnic group. Such stereotypes often serve as part of the mentality of the nation and its identity, and also have a clear connection with the national character.
Stereotyping arising in the absence of information, as a mechanism of interpersonal perception, can play a conservative and even reactionary role, forming in people an incorrect idea of others and deforming the processes of interpersonal interaction and understanding. Therefore, to determine the truth or fallacy of social stereotypes should be purely based on the analysis of specific situations.
Causal attribution
When considering the mechanisms of social perception, one should not ignore such a fascinating phenomenon as causal attribution. Not knowing or insufficiently understanding the true motives of the behavior of another individual, people who find themselves in conditions of a lack of information can attribute to him unreliable causes of behavior. In social psychology, this phenomenon is called "causal attribution."
Considering how people interpret the behavior of others, scientists have discovered the so-called fundamental attribution error. It is due to the fact that people overestimate the value of the personality traits of others, and underestimate the influence of the situation. Other researchers have discovered the phenomenon of “egocentric attribution.” It is based on the property of people to attribute success to themselves, and failures to other people.
Mr. Kelly identified three types of attribution:
- Personal. The reason is attributed to the one who committed the act.
- Objective. The reason is attributed to the object on which the action is directed.
- Attribution related to circumstances. The reason for what is happening is attributed to circumstances.
The observer usually resorts to personal attribution, and the participant, as a rule, attributes everything to circumstances. This feature is clearly seen in attributing successes and failures.
An important issue in the consideration of causal attribution is the issue of the installation that accompanies the process of perception of a person by a person, especially in the formation of an impression of an unknown person. This was discovered by A. Bodylev through experiments in which different groups of people were shown photos of the same person, accompanied by his characteristics such as “writer”, “hero”, “criminal” and so on. When the installation was triggered, the verbal portraits of the same person were different. It was revealed that there are people who defy stereotypical perception. They are called selectively stereotypical. Having examined the mechanisms of social perception, now let's talk briefly about its effects.
Effects of Interpersonal Perception
The effect of interpersonal perception is always formed on the basis of stereotypes.
There are three effects in total:
- Halo effect. It is expressed when one person exaggerates the uniformity of the personality of another, transferring the impression (favorable or not) of one quality to all other qualities. During the formation of the first impression, the halo effect manifests itself when a general positive impression of a person leads to a positive assessment of all his qualities, and vice versa.
- Primary effect. It appears when evaluating a stranger. The role of the installation in this case is played by the information that was presented earlier.
- The effect of novelty. This effect of interpersonal perception acts when evaluating a familiar person, when the latest information about him becomes the most significant.
The formation of the idea of the interlocutor always begins with an assessment and perception of his physical appearance, appearance and manner of behavior. In the future, this information forms the basis of the perception and understanding of this person. It may depend on a number of factors: individual characteristics of a person, his level of culture, his social experience, aesthetic preferences, and so on. An important issue is also the age characteristics of the person who perceives.
For example, a child who has just started going to kindergarten, in communicating with people, relies on primary ideas about them, which he formed when communicating with parents. Depending on how the child developed the relationship earlier, he shows irritability, distrust, obedience, pliability or stubbornness.
Conclusion
Summarizing the above, it is worth noting that the mechanisms of interpersonal perception include methods of interpretation and evaluation of one person by another. The main ones are: identification, empathy, egocentrism, attraction, reflection, stereotype, and causal attribution. Different mechanisms and types of interpersonal perception, as a rule, work in tandem, complementing each other.