Search

People’s reports on their own characteristics are facilitated by matches with their relationship partner’s or in-group’s perceived characteristics and inhibited by mismatches. These results suggest that mental representations of the self, partner, and in-groups overlap. A previously untested implication is that judgmental facilitation or inhibition should operate in the reverse direction as well. The authors find that reports on the characteristics of a relationship partner or in-group are facilitated or inhibited by matches or mismatches with the participant’s own characteristics. The size of the effect for the partner is linearly related to perceived relationship closeness. These findings, in combination with the previous ones, suggest that representations of self, other people, and social groups are constructed on-line rather than being stable, static entities, and the authors advance a connectionist model of this construction process.

People’s perceptions of gender subtypes were explored by investigating the extent to which these perceptions are context sensitive. Traditional views regard stereotypes as stable structures that are retrieved from memory intact, whereas more recent views contend that stereotypes are constructed at the time that they are evoked and are thus relatively flexible. Context sensitivity was demonstrated by having participants list characteristics of subtypes after being exposed to one of two dissimilar exemplars of the subtypes. As predicted, descriptions of subtypes were found to differ between exemplar conditions. The authors also hypothesized that exemplars would have a stronger effect for participants describing in-group (same-gender) subtypes than for participants describing out-group subtypes, and this hypothesis was confirmed. The role of exemplar information in judgments about in-groups and out-groups is discussed.

The current set of studies examined regret involving action and inaction in the realm of romantic relationships by testing whether such regret is associated with the characteristics of one's mate. In study 1, 394 participants reported on a previous casual sexual encounter, and in study 2, 358 participants reported on a previous romantic relationship. In both, instances of actual engagement and instances of passing up opportunities were studied. Study 3 was experimental and elicited reactions to hypothetical scenarios from 201 participants. Regret reported by men in both study 1 and study 2 varied as a function of the perceived attractiveness of the participants' actual and potential mate. Regret reported by women in study 2 varied as a function of the perceived stinginess of the participant's mate and perceived wealth of the participants' potential mate. Study 3 found that sex differences in type of regret (with men regretting inaction more than women) occurred only when the mate presented in the scenario was described in ways consistent with mate preferences. Together these findings suggest that regret differs between the sexes in ways consistent with sex differences in mate preferences.

In 2 experiments, implicit evaluation of novel and familiar concepts was assessed using a sequential priming procedure that enabled estimates of evaluative priming effects at low levels of detectability. In Experiment 1, the novel concepts referenced common names, and in Experiment 2 they referenced nonsense words. Whereas familiar concepts yielded priming effects at low levels of detectability in both experiments, novel concepts did not elicit any priming effect. Implicit evaluation of novel concepts has been documented in related research but under conditions that differ from those investigated here. The present results identify important limiting conditions associated with the implicit evaluation effect.

The current research explores the effects of exemplars on the stereotype representation of one's ingroup. Previous research demonstrated that exposure to an ingroup exemplar affects the stereotype one holds of one's ingroup (CoatsSmith, 1999). The primary purpose of the present study was to examine whether this effect is moderated by relative ingroup size. Participants were placed into either a minority or majority group situation and exposed to 1 of 2 dissimilar exemplars of their ingroup. Later, they rated their ingroup. Ratings of the ingroup differed between exemplar conditions in unexpected ways, indicating that the exemplar affected participants' stereotype of their ingroup. Furthermore, exemplars had a stronger effect on participants in the minority group than those in the majority group. Finally, relative ingroup size and, to a marginal extent, exemplars were found to affect ratings of ingroup variability.

The relative strength of similarity to self and category typicality as predictors of proximity attitudes (social distance) toward people of varying race and objects associated with people of varying race was investigated. Similarity to self and category typicality were significant predictors of proximity attitudes toward both objects and people, but similarity to self was the significantly stronger predictor. The predictive utility of similarity to self was greater for object judgments than person judgments, but category typicality was a better predictor of person judgments than object judgments. Although the results provide evidence of ingroup favoritism in proximity attitudes toward people, the ingroup bias did not extend to objects associated with people. Category typicality was positively related to attitudes, even for distanced groups. The role of predictability of the target in determining proximity attitudes is discussed.

The relative strength of similarity to self and category typicality as predictors of proximity attitudes (social distance) toward people of varying race and objects associated with people of varying race was investigated. Similarity to self and category typicality were significant predictors of proximity attitudes toward both objects and people, but similarity to self was the significantly stronger predictor. The predictive utility of similarity to self was greater for object judgments than person judgments, but category typicality was a better predictor of person judgments than object judgments. Although the results provide evidence of ingroup favoritism in proximity attitudes toward people, the ingroup bias did not extend to objects associated with people. Category typicality was positively related to attitudes, even for distanced groups. The role of predictability of the target in determining proximity attitudes is discussed.