An experiment was conducted to test the hypothesis that finer levels of behavior analysis may lead to greater liking for an observed other. A sample of 30 male and female college students were instructed to analyze an actor's behavior into either fine, natural, or gross units of action. As predicted, fine-unit subjects subsequently liked the actor more than did natural-unit subjects who, in turn, liked the actor more than did gross-unit subjects, as measured by both behavior and self-reports. It is argued that these results are consistent with the notion that level of analysis regulates the amount of information gained from the observation of behavior. Some boundary conditions suggested by this interpretation are discussed.
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