Person perception refers to the mental processes we use to form judgments about

Question

Person perception refers to the mental processes we use to form judgments about other people.

Sometimes we need to make split-second decisions about strangers.

For example, deciding where to sit in a subway car or the bus involves rapidly evaluating people who are complete strangers.

What kinds of factors affect your first impressions of other people?

Do your impressions of others seem to result from deliberate or automatic thoughts?

Are your first impressions generally accurate?

If you have any neat stories that you would to share I’m sure both myself and your fellow students would enjoy hearing them.

I guess I don’t remember a story where I mistook someone in a situation, but I’m sure it has happened, but here’s one that that happened to me. Back when I was studying in Rome I had a chance to spend about a month during the summer studying French in Paris, or at least that was my excuse to get to Paris :-)

One morning when I was taking the subway to get downtown from where I was staying I was standing in front of two young French girls (actually probably in their 20s) who started giggling and whispering to each other. While I couldn’t hear and/or understand everything they said it was obvious that this “amerloc” (French slang for an American) dressed in black pants and white shirt (our travel clothes whereas in Rome we always wore a cassock) was the cause of their frivolity.

As the subway was pulling into my station, I turned to them and in reasonably good French thanked them for having made my 15-minute subway ride pass more quickly and in their stunned silence I stepped off the subway.

Explanation / Answer

I was traveling to my home place by a train and it was a long journey of 12 hours. I got my seat near a group of girls whom I guessed to be college students. As I had no other options than to listen to their conversation and chatting ,my first guess for them that they were college going students was right. They were going to their home towns for the semester break. They were all energetic, chatting ,paid no attention to their surroundings just enjoying their way back to home and were full of life as any other teenager. These things made me go back to my own college days. Now, the thing that astonished me was as the destination was approaching these girls became silent,more cautious,and showed more mannerism while talking and I couldn't understand this sudden change until they took up their traditional hijab and wore it just an hour before the destination. The things that perplexed me was that how we easily draw conclusions on others and how deeply we are influenced by the cultural norms and values in our daily life.

Related Questions

Navigate

• Browse (All)
• Browse P
• Subjects

Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.