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We summarize and integrate a large body of research showing that agency and communion constitute two fundamental dimensions of content in social cognition. Agentic content refers to goal-achievement and task functioning (competence, assertiveness, decisiveness), whereas communal content refers to the maintenance of relationships and social functioning (benevolence, trustworthiness, morality). We present a Dual Perspective Model of Agency and Communion (DPM-AC) developed to show that the two dimensions are differently linked to the basic perspectives in social interaction, that is, the actor versus the observer/recipient perspectives. We review numerous research confirming three general hypotheses of the DPM. First, communal content is primary among the fundamental dimensions. Second, in the observer/recipient perspective (perception of others), communal content receives more weight than agentic content. Third, in the actor perspective (self-perception), agentic content receives more weight than communal content. We then discuss the complex issues of relations of agency and communion to valence as well as associations between agency and communion. Although they are logically independent and their inferences are based on different cues, the two content dimensions of meaning frequently function as psychological alternatives in social cognition.

The distinction between individualistic (IV) and collectivistic (CV) instrumental values was compared to the distinction between competence-related and moral personality traits. Study 1 (N=89 students) showed that IV referred mostly to competence and were self-profitable, whereas CV referred mostly to morality and were other-profitable in their nature. Therefore, IV were predicted to reach a relatively higher position in the value hierarchy formulated for the self, whereas CV were predicted to rank higher in the value hierarchy formulated for other people. Both hypotheses were confirmed in study 2 (N=118 high school students) in which subjects ordered 18 instrumental values of the Rokeach Value Survey according to their importance either for themselves, or for other people.

Motor movements increase the accessibility of the thought content and processes with which they typically co-occur. In two studies, we demonstrate that putting a hand on one’s heart is associated with honesty, both perceived in others and shown in one’s own behavior. Target persons photographed when performing this gesture appeared more trustworthy than the same targets photographed with both hands down (Study 1). Participants who put their hand on their hearts were more willing to admit their lack of knowledge (Study 2), compared to when they performed a neutral gesture. These findings replicate and extend the notion that bodily experience related to abstract concepts of honesty can influence both perceptions of others, and one’s own actions.

Multiplicity of behavior features gives rise to its different interpretations (in addition to behavior vagueness and ambiguity typically studied in social cognition research). Particularly, identical actions are construable both in moral and competence-related categories due to distinct behavioral features underlying each of these interpretations. It was hypothesized that the two construals are alternatively used by the perceiver. Because of perspective-dependent differences in accessibility and applicability of competence and moral categories, it was hypothesized that actors interpret their own behavior in competence terms, whereas observers interpret it in moral categories, and that within the actor perspective, competence construal is used to a higher degree by male than female perceivers, but the opposite is true for moral construal

In two experiments subjects inferred perceivers attitudes toward target girls of varied physical attractiveness. Subjects could select traits from a provided list and ask whether the perceiver ascribed to the target each of those traits. After each question they received feedback about the perceiver s trait ascriptions. The nature of the traits being asked for was analysed. It was predicted and found that subjects searched for information on ascriptions of extremely rather than mildly evaluative traits (the diagnosing strategy) and for ascrrptions of traits highly probable under implicit hypotheses based on the target's attractiveness (desirable traits when the target was attractive but undesirable ones when she was unattractive — the positive-test strategy) Experiment 2 also showed that attractiveness-based hypotheses governed information gathering only in an initial phase of this process and were later replaced by newly developed hypotheses based on the feedback information. Implications of these findings for information gathering in general, and for inferring interpersonal attitudes in particular were discussed.

In Study 1, 60-item sets of behavioural acts exemplifying a personality trait were elicited for each of 40 traits. Each set of behaviours was then rated by 66 students for their inferential meaning (prototypicality) and evaluative meaning (valence). As predicted, the traits differed in the degree of congruence between the two meanings of their exemplifications. In Study 2, 80 subjects were presented with behaviour descriptions varying in their prototypicality for congruent or incongruent traits, and were asked for trait inferences and evaluations. The higher prototypicality, the more the inferred traits were similar to the original ‘criterion’ traits and the more extreme were the ascriptions of those freely inferred traits. As predicted on the basis of accentuation theory, behaviours exemplifying congruent traits led to more extreme trait inferences and evaluations than behaviours exemplifying incongruent traits. We conclude that trait inferences and evaluations are based both on prototypicality of behavioural acts and on structural properties of the traits examplified by these acts.

This article extends models that assume that the integration of mixed (positive and negative) information results in a negativity bias in the morality domain but a positivity bias in the competence domain. Using functional analysis, this study predicted a positivity bias for moderately evaluated information and a negativity bias for extremely evaluated information. Content domain (competence vs. morality) and evaluative extremity produced main effects in a 2 x 2 experiment where 108 Ss were provided with descriptions of negative and positive behaviors of fictitious targets. As expected, the negativity effect in the morality domain was strong for extremely evaluated information but weak or nonexistent for moderately evaluated information. In contrast, the positivity effect in the competence domain was stronger for moderately than for extremely evaluated information. We suggest that positive and negative evaluations serve as approach and avoidance cues in interpersonal perception. The border between good and evil is located within rather than between persons: Usually, the same person shows both positive and negative attributes. An exception may be characters in the trivial literature, but this literature is considered trivial exactly because it is populated with "black" and "white" characters. According to the well-known averaging model of information integration (N. H. Anderson, 1981), observers' impressions of a person should be neutral if this person shows the same number of positive and negative attributes, each to the same extent. Numerous studies reveal, however, that even if the relative number of positive and negative attributes is controlled and balanced, negative impressions tend to emerge (e.g., Birnbaum, 1973; Fiske, 1980; Oden & Anderson, 1971; Reeder & Coovert, 1986; Reeder & Spores, 1983; Roskey & Birnbaum, 1974; Van der Pligt & Eiser, 1980; Warr, 1974). This suggests that negative information, even if equal in extremity to positive information, is given more weight in information integration, thus yielding a negativity effect. This effect has been explained in terms of the relative novelty of negative information (Fiske, 1980), its lower ambiguity (Birnbaum, 1972; Wyer, 1973), or its greater discrepancy with the general positivity of the typical or average person (Simpson & Ostrom, 1976). According to Skowronski and Carl

In four experiments mood was measured before and after complaining or affirmation. Participants complained or affirmed either themselves or listened to such communications of another person. Mood decreased after complaining and increased after affirmation – a “saying is experiencing” (SIE) effect. This effect was found also in the cognitive load condition suggesting that automatic mood contagion underlies the SIE effect rather than mechanisms based on self-perception or self-awareness. Appropriateness of a topic for complaining appeared a boundary condition of the SIE effect: When a topic was considered by participants the most appropriate for complaining, the act of showing dissatisfaction with the topic led to mood improvement.

Despite many convergences in theorizing and research on the two fundamental dimensions of social judgment the operationalizations differ considerably across studies and possible confounds (valence, frequency of word occurrence) are not always controlled. The present study was meant as a first step towards a more standardized operationalization by providing trait words which are clearly distinct in content (agency and communion) but comparable in valence and frequency of word occurrence in written language across different countries. We created a pool of 304 trait adjectives and reduced this pool in several pretests to a list of 69 trait words. These were clearly different in content and covered a large range of valence. In the main study N = 548 participants from five countries (Belgium, Germany, Italy, Poland and USA) rated the 69 trait words on agency, communion and valence. The results were quite consistent across countries. The trait adjectives' agency ratings and communion ratings were negatively correlated; valence was correlated with communal content, but not with agentic content; word frequency was barely related to the content ratings. Cluster analyses suggest four clusters of trait words. Based on these findings we propose sets of agentic and communal trait words which do not differ in valence and word frequency. These item-sets can serve as a first step towards a standardized operationalization of the two fundamental content dimensions across languages. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

One of the most significant developments in research on social judgment was the realization that the same two fundamental content dimensions underlie judgments of the self, others, social groups, nations, cultures, faces, etc. These two fundamental dimensions are also called the “Big Two.” They denote two “modes of existence” (Bakan, 1966), namely, social relatedness (“communion”; alsocalled warmth, morality, expressiveness, affiliation) and individual strivings (“agency,” also-called competence, instrumentality, power). These “Big Two” have the potential to integrate different lines of research in psychology, and they are also relevant in numerous applied contexts. Most important for research on social information processing, the “Big Two” advance our knowledge on the role that content plays in information processing. This special issue of Social Psychology stems from a conference on the “Big Two” held in Erlangen, Germany, in 2010, and it continues a special issue of the European Journal of Social Psychology that was also devoted to the fundamental dimensions of social judgment (guest editors: Andrea E. Abele, Amy Cuddy, Charles Judd, and Vincent Yzerbyt). Our call for papers to the present special issue resulted in 26 submissions – and it proved very difficult to select only those 12 papers that seemed best suited for the present volume and could finally be accepted in October/ November 2012. Bruckmuller and Abele study the representation of agency and communion terms and show that negative terms related to the communion dimension are more densely clustered than both positive communion items and agency items in general. Radkiewicz, Skarzynska, and Hamer show that general opinions about people’s communion and agency are strongly related to how negativistic worldviews are, with the latter being most negative among respondents who think that people are highly agentic but low in communion/morality. The two papers by Abele and Brack as well as Wojciszke and Sobiczewska are concerned with a theoretical model assuming actor/observer differences in the “profitability” of agentic and communal traits, that is, that agentic traits are mainly profitable for the trait possessor (actor), while communal traits are profitable for the surrounding others (observers; see Peeters, 1992). Abele and Brack show that the communal trait of “trustworthiness” is of special importance when interacting with another person, and that the valuation of others’ agentic traits varies with the kind of relationship. Wojciszke and Sobiczewska show that self-evaluations are dominated by agentic content, whereas other evaluations rely on both kinds of content. Bi, Ybarra, and Zhao show that this agency-dominated perspective on self-esteem also holds in the cultural context of China. Moreover, these authors combine the agency/communion perspective with the perspective of genderstereotypic traits. Gender-stereotypic traits are also the focus of De Lemus, Spear, Bukowski, Moya, and Lupianez, who demonstrate a somewhat counterintuitive effect that women exposed to traditional gender roles activate stereotype-inconsistent traits faster than stereotype-consistent ones. Bertolotti, Catellani, Douglas, and Sutton show how defensive communication (involving downward and upward counterfactuals) influences the perception of politicians’ agency and morality, and how this influence is moderated by the participants’ level of political sophistication. Siman Tov-Nachlieli, Schnabel, and Nadler show that, following transgressions, victimized groups or individuals experience threats to their agency (and attempt to restore this facet of their identity), while perpetrating groups or individuals experience threats to their communion (and are motivated to restore this aspect of their identity). Cislak extends the Big Two to power relations showing that high power increases interest in and preference for agentic virtues in others which is mediated by increases in a task (versus relationships) orientation. The final three papers connect the Big Two with embodied information processing. In a series of experiments, Schubert, Schubert, and Topolinski show that spatial elevation can both increase and decrease respect (an agency-based attitudinal response) depending on whether the elevation is substantiated by the elevated person’s achievement or not. Building on previous findings that physical warmth induces prosociality, IJzerman, Karremans, Thomsen, and Schubert show that children with a secure attachment to their friends tend to be more generous

Two experiments were conducted to examine the role of the ‘idealism’ variable and sew-focus in value-behaviour consistency. The idealism variable was measured by means of a questionnaire (Idealism Scale–IS) devised by the author. The scale is based on the assumption that although every individual is able to declare his or her ideal-self if requested, only some of them actually develop such a structure and use it in their behavioural choices. The first experiment revealed that the level of defensive attribution was a predictable function of the content of the ideal-self for individuals with high scores on the IS to a greater extent than it was for low scorers. The second experiment showed that both high ‘idealism’ and situationally induced sew-focus were necessary to obtain a predictable influence of the preference of the value ‘honesty’ on cheating behaviour. Processes which are likely to mediate between ideal-self content and behaviour are discussed.

Conceptual representations of warmth have been shown to be related to people’s perceptions of ambient temperature. Based on this premise, we hypothesized that merely thinking about personality traits related to communion (but not agency) influences physical experience of warmth. Specifically, the three studies revealed that (a) perceptions of temperature are influenced by both positive and negative attributes within the communion but not agency dimension, (b) the effect is stronger when traits indicate sociability rather than morality subdimension of communion, and (c) communion activation affects temperature perceptions independently of target’s or self-perceptions.Keywords: agency, communion, warmth, temperature, embodiment

This thesis presents a series of six studies which concentrate on the perception of sexual harassment (SH) and the perception of victims and perpetrators of SH. Numerous studies show that men can become victims of SH and suffer from SH (ex. Kearney et Rochlen, 2011; Waldo, Berdahl, et Fitzgerald, 1998), however the lay perceptions of SH seem to be far from the reality. I hypothesized that:1o. In social perception the suffering of male victims of SH is less severe than that of female victims 2A. The perpetrators whose victims are female are evaluated worse than those whose victims are male Due to the results obtained in Study 4, I suggested an alternative to hypothesis 2A (2B) namely, that the female perpetrators of SH are evaluated better. The results support the hypothesis that the perception of the victims and perpetrators of SH depends on their sex. Female victims are perceived as suffering more than the male victims. Male perpetrators are seen as less agentic and less respectable than female perpetrators and deserving a higher punishment. When participant's anger mediates the relationship between the victim’s sex and the perception of the perpetrator, the perpetrator of SH on a woman is perceived as guiltier, deserving a higher punishment and as being less of a moral agent., Cette thèse présente une série de 6 études qui s’articule autour de la perception du harcèlement sexuel (HS), de la perception de la souffrance des victimes du HS et de la perception des auteurs du HS. De nombreuses études démontrent que les hommes peuvent devenir les victimes de HS (ex. Kearney et Rochlen, 2011 ; Waldo, Berdahl, et Fitzgerald, 1998). Cependant, la perception du HS par des personnes qui ne l’ont pas subis, semble être loin de la réalité. Je fais l’hypothèse que 1. La perception sociale de la souffrance des hommes victimes de HS est perçue comme moindre en comparaison de celle des femmes victimes HS. 2A. Par rapport aux auteurs de HS avec une victime féminine, les auteurs de HS dont la victime est masculine, sont mieux évalués. Suite aux résultats obtenus dans l’étude 4, j’ai proposé une alternative à l’hypothèse 2A (2B), que les auteures de HS féminins sont mieux évaluées. Les résultats soutiennent les hypothèses que la perception des individus impliqués dans le HS dépend de leur sexe. Les victimes féminines sont perçues comme ayant plus de souffrance que les victimes masculines. Les auteurs masculins sont perçus comme moins agentiques et moins respectables que les auteurs féminines et méritent une punition plus sévère. Quand la colère des participants détermine la relation entre le sexe de la victime et la perception de l’auteur, l’auteur de HS sur une femme est perçu comme étant plus coupable, méritant une punition plus sévère et étant moins un agent moral., Załączona rozprawa przedstawia serię badań dotyczących społecznej percepcji molestowania seksualnego (MS), percepcji cierpienia ofiar molestowania oraz percepcji sprawców molestowania. MS to każde niepożądane zachowanie werbalne lub niewerbalne odnoszące się do seksualności lub płci adresata, które skutkuje naruszeniem jej godności, poprzez tworzenie „onieśmielającej, wrogiej, poniżającej, upokarzającej lub agresywnej atmosfery” (Śledzińska-Simon, 2011). W przedstawionych badaniach odwołuję się do typologii MS zaproponowanej przez Fitzgerald, Gelfand i Drasgow (1995), a następnie poszerzonej przez Waldo, Berdahl i Fitzgerald (1998). W typologii tej wyróżniono trzy rodzajów MS są to: 1. przymus seksualny (sexual coercion) – grożenie ofierze lub zapewnianie ofiary, że jeśli zgodzi się na kontakt seksualny, otrzyma pewne przywileje (np. awans, lepszą ocenę na egzaminie) lub uniknie negatywnych konsekwencji (np. zwolnienie z pracy, ocena niedostateczna) 2. niepożądane zainteresowanie seksualne (unwanted sexual attention) – częste dotykanie ofiary lub napastliwe próby stworzenia intymnego lub seksualnego związku z ofiarą 3. molestowanie z uwagi na przynależność do danej płci (gender harassment): 3a. obsceniczne komentarze (lewd comments) – na przykład: żarty odnoszące się do seksualności; obraźliwe komentarze na temat wyglądu lub życia seksualnego; pokazywanie pornograficznych zdjęć 3b. wymuszanie zachowań zgodnych ze stereotypową rolą płciową (enforcement of gender role) – na przykład: żarty z mężczyzny, który bierze zwolnienie w celu zajmowania się dzieckiem; komentarze skierowane do kobiety, że powinna robić sobie makijaż, żeby wyglądała bardziej kobieco 3c. negatywne komentarze dotyczące danej płci (negative gender related remarks) - na przykład: powiedzenie, że wszyscy mężczyźni myślą tylko o jednym; stwierdzenie, że kobiety nie nadają się do zarządzania