The literature on correspondence bias suggests that the bias is increased when perceivers depend on an actor because they are motivated to know the actor’s dispositions and predict future behavior. However, outcome dependency produces enhanced attention and accuracy motivation, which should facilitate situational correction and reduce the correspondence bias. An experiment was conducted in which both participants’ dependency on an actor and the actor’s behavioral freedom were manipulated. The correspondence bias was reduced among dependent participants but only in judgments that were highly relevant to predicting behavior that could affect their own outcomes. This reduction of the correspondence bias was associated with longer reading times. Furthermore, it was more pronounced in conditions in which the potential costs of an inaccurate dispositional inference were higher.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Berscheid, E. , Graziano, W., Monson, T., & Dermer, M. (1976). Outcome dependency: Attention, attribution, and attraction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 34, 978-989.
2.
Cantor, N. , Pittman, T. S., & Jones, E. E. (1982). Choice and attitude attributions: The influence of constraint information on attributions across levels of generality. Social Cognition, 1, 1-20.
3.
Fiske, S. T. , & Taylor, S. E. (1991). Social cognition. New York: McGraw-Hill.
4.
Funder, D. C. (1987). Errors and mistakes: Evaluating the accuracy of social judgment. Psychological Bulletin, 101, 75-90.
5.
Gilbert, D. T. , Krull, D. S., & Pelham, B. W. (1988). Of thoughts unspoken: Social inference and the self-regulation of behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 55, 685-694.
6.
Gilbert, D. T. , & Malone, P. S. (1995). The correspondence bias. Psychological Bulletin, 117, 21-38.
7.
Gilbert, D. T. , Pelham, B. W., & Krull, D. S. (1988). On cognitive busyness: When person perceivers meet persons perceived. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54, 733-740.
8.
Heider, F. (1958). The psychology of interpersonal relations. New York: John Wiley.
9.
Jones, E. E. (1990). Interpersonal perception. New York: Freeman.
10.
Jones, E. E. , & Harris, V. A. (1967). The attribution of attitudes. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 3, 1-24.
11.
Kelley, H. H. , & Thibaut, J. W. (1978). Interpersonal relations: A theory of interdependence. New York: John Wiley.
12.
Klein, W. M. , & Kunda, Z. (1992). Motivated person perception: Constructing justifications for desired beliefs. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 28, 145-168.
13.
Kruglanski, A. W. (1989). The psychology of being “right”: The problem of accuracy in social perception and cognition. Psychological Bulletin, 106, 395-409.
14.
Krull, D. S. (1993). Does the grist change the mill? The effect of the perceiver’s inferential goal on the process of social inference. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 19, 340-348.
15.
Krull, D. S. , & Dill, J. C. (1996). On thinking first and responding fast: Flexibility in social inference processes. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 22, 949-959.
16.
Kunda, Z. (1990). The case for motivated reasoning. Psychological Bulletin, 108, 480-498.
17.
Messick, D. M. & Brewer, M. B. (1983). Solving social dilemmas: A review. In L. Wheeler & P. Shaver (Eds.), Review of Personality and Social Psychology, 4, 11-44. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
18.
Miller, D. T. , & Norman, S. A. (1975). Actor-observer differences in perceptions of effective control. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 31, 503-515.
19.
Miller, D. T. , Norman, S. A. & Wright, E. (1978). Distortions in person perception as a consequence of the need for effective control. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 36, 598-602.
20.
Neuberg, S. L. , & Fiske, S. T. (1987). Motivational influences on impression formation: Outcome dependency, accuracy-driven attention, and individuating processes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 53, 431-444.
21.
Pittman, T. S. , & D’Agostino, P. R. (1985). Motivation and attribution: The effects of control deprivation on subsequent informationprocessing. In J. Harvey & G. Weary (Eds.), Attribution: Basic issues and applications (pp. 177-141). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.
22.
Pittman, T. S. , & Pittman, N. L. (1980). Deprivation of control and the attribution process. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39, 377-389.
23.
Rapoport, A. , & Chammah, A. M. (1965). Prisoner’s dilemma: A study in conflict and cooperation. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
24.
Reeder, G. D. (1993). Trait-behavior relations and dispositional inference. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 19, 586-593.
25.
Reeder, G. D. , & Spores, J. M. (1983). The attribution of morality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 44, 736-745.
26.
Swann, W. B. (1984). Quest for accuracy in person perception: A matter of pragmatics. Psychological Review, 91, 457-477.
27.
Vonk, R. (1998). Effects of cooperative and competitive outcome dependency on attention and impressions. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 34, 265-288.
28.
Vonk, R. , & Konst, D. (1998). Intergroup bias and correspondence bias: People engage in situational correction when it suits them. British Journal of Social Psychology, 37, 379-385.
29.
Vonk, R. , & Van Knippenberg, A. (1994). The sovereignty of negative inference: Suspicion of ulterior motives does not reduce the negativity effect. Social Cognition, 12, 169-186.
30.
Wright, J. C. , & Dawson, V. L. (1988). Person perception and the bounded rationality of social judgment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 55, 780-794.
