Question 1

According to Kelley's model of attribution, distinctiveness a comparison of an individual's behavior with that of his or her peers.

Accepted Answer

Distinctiveness is determined by comparing a person's behavior on one task with his or her behavior on other tasks. High distinctiveness means the individual has performed the task in question in a significantly different manner than he or she has performed other tasks.

Question 2

Men typically believe that promotions are based on luck and connections whereas women typically believe that promotions are based more on hard work.

Accepted Answer

Results from a recent survey of 140,000 people from 80 countries revealed that men and women had different attributions about what it takes to be promoted to a senior-level position. Men concluded that promotions were based on hard work whereas women reported that promotions were based more on luck and connections.

Question 3

_____ is necessary because people do not have the mental capacity to fully comprehend all the physical and social stimuli bombarding them from the environment.

Accepted Answer

People are constantly bombarded by physical and social stimuli in the environment. Since they do not have the mental capacity to fully comprehend all this information, they selectively perceive subsets of environmental stimuli.

Question 4

There is high consensus when one acts like the rest of the group and low consensus when one acts differently.

Accepted Answer

Consensus involves a comparison of an individual's behavior with that of his or her peers. There is high consensus when one acts like the rest of the group and low consensus when one acts differently.

Question 5

The fundamental attribution bias represents one's tendency to take more personal responsibility for success than for failure.

Accepted Answer

The fundamental attribution bias reflects one's tendency to attribute another person's behavior to his or her personal characteristics, as opposed to situational factors. This bias causes perceivers to ignore important environmental forces that often significantly affect behavior.

Question 6

_____ involves interpreting and translating raw information into mental representations or categories.

Accepted Answer

Observed information is not stored in memory in its original form. Encoding is required; raw information is interpreted or translated into mental representations.

Question 7

Managers tend to disproportionately attribute behavior to external causes.

Accepted Answer

Managers tend to disproportionately attribute behavior to internal causes. This can result in inaccurate evaluations of performance, leading to reduced employee motivation.

Question 8

A woman's promotional track generally resembles more of a labyrinth than a straight upward path.

Accepted Answer

A woman's promotional track resembles more of a labyrinth than a straight upward path. Managers thus are encouraged to help women develop social capital and to promote people on the basis of job-related criteria that are accurately measured.

Question 9

Kelly found that she was the only woman in her advanced statistics course, which had 30 students. Which of the following best describes Kelly's situation?

Accepted Answer

Something is salient when it stands out from its context. Research has shown that people tend to pay attention to salient stimuli. Here, Kelly stands out from her class, and will be perceived as a salient stimulus by her classmates.

Question 10

_____ consists of three compartments containing categories of information about events, semantic materials, and people.

Accepted Answer

Long-term memory consists of separate but related categories. It is made up of three compartments containing categories of information about events, semantic materials, and people.

Question 11

You are trying to concentrate during an examination but you get distracted by the sound of another student tapping her pencil on her desk. Which of the following stages of the information processing model are you in?

Accepted Answer

Attention is the process of becoming consciously aware of something or someone. Attention can be focused on information either from the environment or from memory.

Question 12

The study of how people perceive one another is called _____.

Accepted Answer

Social cognition is the study of how people make sense of other people and themselves. It focuses on how ordinary people think about people and how they think they think about people.

Question 13

High consistency implies that a person performs a certain task better than others.

Accepted Answer

Consistency is determined by judging if the individual's performance on a given task is consistent over time. High consistency implies that a person performs a certain task the same, time after time.

Question 14

The self-serving bias is evident when students attribute their high grades to hard work and ability but attribute low grades to unfair tests, bad luck, or poor teaching.

Accepted Answer

The self-serving bias represents one's tendency to take more personal responsibility for success than for failure. The self-serving bias suggests employees will attribute their success to internal factors and their failures to uncontrollable external factors.

Question 15

Employees can usually be taught to attribute their failures to a lack of effort rather than to a lack of ability.

Accepted Answer

Research shows that employees can be taught to attribute their failures to a lack of effort rather than to a lack of ability. This attributional realignment paves the way for improved motivation and performance.

Question 16

A _____ represents a person's mental picture or summary of a particular event or type of stimulus.

Accepted Answer

A schema represents a person's mental picture or summary of a particular event or type of stimulus. Cognitive-category labels are needed to make schemata meaningful.

Question 17

Which of the following stimuli would be most salient?

Accepted Answer

Something is salient when it stands out from its context. Research has shown that people tend to pay attention to salient stimuli. A twelve-year-old student stands out in an MBA class.

Question 18

_____ is a cognitive process that enables us to interpret and understand our surroundings.

Accepted Answer

Perception is a cognitive process that enables us to interpret and understand our surroundings. Recognition of objects is one of this process's major functions.

Question 19

_____ refers to general knowledge about the world.

Accepted Answer

Semantic memory refers to general knowledge about the world. In so doing, it functions as a mental dictionary of concepts.

Question 20

According to Kelley's model of attribution, the concept of consensus relates to other people while distinctiveness relates to other tasks.

Accepted Answer

According to Kelley's model of attribution, the concept of consensus relates to other people while distinctiveness relates to other tasks.

Quiz 7: Social Perception and Attributions

According to Kelley's model of attribution, distinctiveness a comparison of an individual's behavior with that of his or her peers.

Men typically believe that promotions are based on luck and connections whereas women typically believe that promotions are based more on hard work.

_____ is necessary because people do not have the mental capacity to fully comprehend all the physical and social stimuli bombarding them from the environment.

There is high consensus when one acts like the rest of the group and low consensus when one acts differently.

The fundamental attribution bias represents one's tendency to take more personal responsibility for success than for failure.

_____ involves interpreting and translating raw information into mental representations or categories.

Managers tend to disproportionately attribute behavior to external causes.

A woman's promotional track generally resembles more of a labyrinth than a straight upward path.

Kelly found that she was the only woman in her advanced statistics course, which had 30 students. Which of the following best describes Kelly's situation?

_____ consists of three compartments containing categories of information about events, semantic materials, and people.

You are trying to concentrate during an examination but you get distracted by the sound of another student tapping her pencil on her desk. Which of the following stages of the information processing model are you in?

The study of how people perceive one another is called _____.

High consistency implies that a person performs a certain task better than others.

The self-serving bias is evident when students attribute their high grades to hard work and ability but attribute low grades to unfair tests, bad luck, or poor teaching.

Employees can usually be taught to attribute their failures to a lack of effort rather than to a lack of ability.

A _____ represents a person's mental picture or summary of a particular event or type of stimulus.

Which of the following stimuli would be most salient?

_____ is a cognitive process that enables us to interpret and understand our surroundings.

_____ refers to general knowledge about the world.

According to Kelley's model of attribution, the concept of consensus relates to other people while distinctiveness relates to other tasks.