Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

MHR405 Chapter 3 Notes

Learning Objectives

 Define perception and discuss some of the general factors that influence perception.
 Explain social identity theory and Bruner’s model of the perceptual process.
 Describe the main biases in person perception.
 Describe how people form attributions about the causes of behaviour and various biases in
attribution.
 Discuss the concepts or workforce diversity and valuing diversity and how racial, ethnic, religious,
gender, age, and LGBTQ stereotypes affect organizational behaviour and what organizations can
do to manage diversity.
 Define trust perceptions and perceived organizational support and describe organizational
support theory.
 Discuss person perception and perceptual biases in human resources management.

What Is Perception?

The process of interpreting the messages of our senses to provide order and meaning to the
environment. Why is it important? People base their actions on the interpretation or reality that their
perceptual system provides, rather than on reality itself.

Components of Perception

 Perception has three components:

o A perceiver
o A target that is being perceived
o Some situational context in which the perception is occurring
 Each component influences the perceiver’s impression or interpretation of the target.

1
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

The Perceiver

 Past experiences lead the perceiver to develop expectations that affect current perceptions.
 Needs unconsciously influence perceptions by causing us to perceive what we wish to perceive.
 Emotions, such as anger, happiness, or fear, can influence our perceptions.

Perceptual Defence

 The tendency for the perceptual system to defend the perceiver against unpleasant emotions.
o People often “see what they want to see” and “hear what they want to hear.”
o Our perceptual system works to ensure we do not see or hear things that are
threatening.

The Target

 Ambiguous targets are especially susceptible to interpretation and the addition of meaning.
 Perceivers have a need to resolve ambiguities.
 The perceiver does not or cannot use all the information provided by the target.
o A reduction in ambiguity (providing more information) might not be accompanied by
greater accuracy.

The Situation

 Perception occurs in some situational context, and this context can affect what is perceived.
o The most important effect that the situation can have is to add information about the
target.
o The perception of a target can change with the situation when even the perceiver and
target remain the same.

Social Identity Theory

 People form perceptions of themselves based on their personal characteristics and memberships
in social categories.
o Our sense of self is composed of a personal identity and social identity.
 Personal identity is based on our unique personal characteristics.
 Social identity is based on our perception that we belong to various social groups, such as
gender.
 Personal and social identities help us answer the questions: “Who am I?”
 We perceive ourselves and others embodying the most typical attributes of a category or what
are called “prototypes.”
 We also form perceptions of other based on their membership in social categories.
 Social identities are relational and comparative.
 People tend to perceive members of their own social categories in more positive and favourable
ways.

Bruner’s Model of the Perceptual Process

2
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 When the perceiver encounters an unfamiliar target, the perceiver is very open to the
informational cues in the target and the situation.
 The perceiver will actively seek out cues to resolve ambiguity.
 As the perceiver encounters some familiar cues, a crude categorization of the target is made.
 The search for cues then becomes less open and more selective.
 The perceiver will search for cues that confirm the categorization of the target.
 As the categorization becomes stronger, the perceiver will ignore or even distort cues that
violate initial perceptions.

Characteristics of the Perceptual Process

 Bruner’s model demonstrates three important characteristics of the perceptual process:

o Perception is selective
o Perceptual constancy
o Perceptual consistency

Perception is selective

 Perceivers do not use all of the available cues, and those they do use are given special emphasis.
 Perception is efficient but this can aid and hinder perceptual accuracy.

Perceptual Constancy

 The tendency for the target to be perceived in the same way over time and across situations.
o The experience of “getting off on the wrong foot.”
o “That guy who farted in the elevator” type of experience.

Perceptual Consistency

3
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 The tendency to select, ignore, and distort cues so that they fit together to form a homogenous
picture of the target.
o We strive for consistency in our perception of people.

Basic Biases in Person Perception

 The impressions we form of others are susceptible to a number of perceptual biases:

o Primacy and recency effects
o Reliance on central traits
o Implicit personality theories
o Projection
o Stereotyping

Primary Effect

 The reliance on early cues or first impressions is known as the primacy effect.
 Primacy can have a lasting impact.
 Primacy is a form of selectivity and its lasting effects illustrate the operation of constancy.

Recency Effect (availability bias)

 The tendency for a perceiver to rely on recent cues is known as the recency effect.
o Recent cues count most because they are more salient in our memory.
o Also cues that we receive more frequently are more salient.
 What is the number one cause of death in Unites Stated? Heart Disease.

Reliance on Central Traits

People tend to organize their perceptions around central traits.

 Central traits are personal characteristics of a target person that are of particular interest to a
perceiver.
 Central traits often have a very powerful influence on out perceptions (why?).
 Centrality of traits depends on the perceiver’s interest and the situation.
o Ex: In work settings, physical appearance is a common central trait that is related to a
variety of job-related outcomes.
 Physical appearance is a common central trait in work settings.
 Conventionally attractive people fare better than unattractive people in terms of a variety of job-
related outcomes (e.g., getting hired).
 Physical height is an obvious aspect of physical appearance that is related to job performance,
promotions, and career success.
 Individuals who are overweight tend to be evaluated negatively on a number of workplace
outcomes.

Implicit Personality Theories

 Personal theories that people have about which personality characteristics go together.

4
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

o Ex. Perhaps you expect hardworking people to be honest, or people of average

intelligence to be friendly. Or tall people are arrogant.
 If such implicit theories are inaccurate, they provide a basis for misunderstanding.

Projection

 The tendency for perceivers to attribute their own thoughts and feelings to others.
 In some cases, projection is an efficient and sensible perceptual strategy.
 Projection can lead to perceptual difficulties and can serve as a form of perceptual defence.

Stereotyping

 The tendency to generalize about people in a social category and ignore variations among them.
 Categories on which people might base a stereotype include race, religion, age, gender, ethnic
background, social class, and occupation.
 It creates an accurate perception
o Ex. German people, we assume all members are punctual, perceive any German
individual as a punctual person.
 These are three specific aspects to stereotyping:
o We distinguish some category of people.
o We assume that the individuals in this category have certain traits.
o We perceive that everyone in this category possesses these traits.
 People can evoke stereotypes with very little information.
 Stereotypes help us develop impressions of ambiguous targets.
 Most stereotypes are inaccurate, especially when we use them to develop perceptions of
specific individuals.

Why Do Stereotypes Persist (although they are not accurate)?

 Several factors wok to reinforce inaccurate stereotypes.

 Even incorrect stereotypes help us process information about others quickly and efficiently.
 Inaccurate stereotypes are often reinforced by selective perception.

Attribution: Perceiving Causes and Motives

Attribution is the process by which we assign causes or motives to explain people’s behaviour.

 Rewards and punishments in organizations are based on judgments about what really caused a
target person to behave in a certain way.
 An important goal is to determine whether some behaviour is caused by dispositional or
situational factors.

Dispositional vs. Situational Attributions

 Dispositional attributions suggest that some personality or intellectually characteristic unique to

the person is responsible for the behaviour.
o Intelligence, greed, friendliness, or laziness.

5
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 Situational attributions suggest that the external situation or environment in which the target
person exists was responsible for the behaviour.
o Bad weather, good luck, proper tools, or poor advice.

Attribution Cues

 We rely on external cues and make inferences from these cues when making attributions.
 Three implicit questions guide our decisions as to whether we should attribute some behaviour
to dispositional or situational causes.

Three Attribution Questions

 Does the person engage in the behaviour regularly and consistently? (Consistency cues).
o High consistency over time = Disposition
 Do most people engage in the behaviour, or is it unique to this person? (Consensus cues).
o Low consensus = Disposition
 Does the person engage in the behaviour in many situational, or is it distinctive to one situation?
(Distinctiveness cues).
o Low distinctiveness = Disposition
 Ex. Someone arrives late in class all the time, high consistency. Everyone else arrives in class on
time, low consensus. That person arrives late everywhere, low distinctiveness.

Consistency Cues

 Attribution cues that reflect how consistently a person engages in a behaviour over time.
 High consistency behaviour leads to dispositional attributions.
 When behaviour occurs inconsistently, we begin to consider situational attributions.

Consensus Cues

 Attribution cues that reflect how a person’s behaviour compares with that of others.
 Low consensus behaviour leads to dispositional attributions.
 When behaviour occurs inconsistently, we begin to consider situational attributions.

Distinctiveness Cues

 Attribution cues that reflect the extent to which as person engages in some behaviour across a
variety of situations.
 Low distinctiveness behaviour leads to a dispositional attribution.
 When a behaviour is highly distinctive, in that it occurs in only one situation, we are likely to
assume that some aspect of the situation caused the behaviour.

Attribution in Action

 Observers put information about consistency, consensus, and distinctiveness together to form
attributions.
 Consider three employees who are absent from work.
 A manager must develop an attribution about the cause to decide which action is warranted.

6
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 Roshani is absent a lot, her co-workers are seldom absent, and she was absent a lot in her
previous job.
 Mika is absent a lot, her co-workers are also absent a lot, but she was almost never absent in her
previous job.
 Sam is seldom absent, her co-workers are seldom absent, and she was seldom absent in her
previous job.

Biases in
Attribution

 Although observers often operate in a rational, logical manner in forming attributions about
behaviour, this does not mean that such attributions are always correct.
 Three biases in attribution:
o Fundamental attribution error
o Actor-observer effect
o Self-serving bias

Fundamental Attribution Error

 The tendency to overemphasize dispositional explanations for behaviour at the expense of

situation explanations.
o We often discount the strong effects that social cues can have on behaviour.
o We often observe people in constrained and constant situations and fail to realize that
observed behaviour is distinctive to a particular situation.

Actor-Observer Effect

 The propensity for actors and observers to view the causes of the actor’s behaviour differently.
o Actors are prone to attribute much of their own behaviour to situational factors while
observers are more likely to invoke dispositional causes.
o Why are actors prone to attribute much of their own behaviour to situational causes?

Self-Serving Bias

 The tendency to take credit for successful outcomes and to deny responsibility for failures.
o People will attribute the very same behaviour differently on the basis of events that
happened after the behaviour occurred.
o Self-serving bias can reflect intentional self-promotion or excuse making or it might
reflect unique information on the part of the actor.

Person Perception and Workforce Diversity

7
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 Workforce diversity refers to differences among recruits and employees in characteristics, such
as gender, race, age, religion, cultural background, physical ability, or sexual orientation.
o The workforce is becoming more diverse.
o Many organizations have not successfully managed workforce diversity.

The Changing Workplace

 The Canadian population and labour force is becoming increasingly multicultural and
multiethnic.
 By 2031, 30.6 percent of the population will be visible minorities.
 By 2021 one in four employees will be 55 or older, and by 2031 persons over 65 will make up
about 23 percent of the population.
 Many organizations are seeking to recruit more representatively from the labour pool.
 Many employees are required to interact with people from substantially different national or
corporate cultures.
 The increased emphasis on teamwork as a means of job design and quality enhancement also
requires people from different cultures to work together.

Valuing diversity

 Some have argued that organizations should value diversity not just tolerate it.
 A critical motive is the basic fairness of valuing diversity.
 Diversity and its proper management can yield strategic and competitive advantages:
o Improved problem solving and creativity.
o Improved recruiting and marketing.
o Improved competitiveness in global markets.
 Organizations are adopting diversity as part of their corporate strategy to improve their
competitiveness in global markets.
 A diversity climate is related to business-unit performance.
 Retail stores have higher customer satisfaction and productivity when their employees represent
the ethnicity of their customers.
 A match between racial diversity in a store and racial diversity in the community is positively
related to sales performance.
 Organizations with more gender-diverse management teams have superior financial
performance.

Competitive advantages to Valuing and Managing a Diverse Workforce

 Cost
 Resource-Acquisition
 Marketing
 Creativity
 Problem-Solving
 System Flexibility

Cost Argument

 As organizations become more diverse, the cost of a poor job in integrating workers will
increase. Those who handle this well will thus create cost advantages over those who don’t.

8
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

Resource-Acquisition Argument

 Companies develop reputations on favourability as prospective employers for women and ethnic
minorities. Those with the best reputations for managing diversity will win the competition for
the best personnel. As the labour pool shrinks and changes composition, this edge will become
increasingly important.

Marketing Argument

 For multinational organizations, the insight and cultural sensitivity that members with roots in
other countries bring to the marketing effort should improve these efforts in important ways.
The same rationale applies to marketing to subpopulations within domestic operations.

Creativity Argument

 Diversity of perspectives and less emphasis on conformity to norms of the past (which
characterize the modern approach to management of diversity) should improve the level of
creativity.

Problem-Solving Argument

 Heterogeneity in decision and problem-solving groups potentially produces better decisions

through a wider range of perspectives and more thorough critical analysis of issues.

System Flexibility Argument

 An implication of the multicultural model for managing diversity is that the system will become
less determinant, less standardized, and therefore more fluid. The increased fluidity should
create greater flexibility to react to environmental changes (i.e., reactions should be faster and at
less cost).

Stereotypes and Workforce Diversity

 A major barrier to valuing diversity is the stereotype.

o The tendency to generalize about people in a certain social category and ignore
variations among them.
o Common workplace stereotypes are based on gender, age, race, religion, ethnicity, and
sexual orientation.
o Stereotypes can have negative effects on how individuals are treated in organizations.

Stereotype Threat

 Occurs when members of a social group feel they might be judged or treated according to a
stereotype and consequently, their behaviour and/or performance will confirm the stereotype.
o The activation of salient negative stereotypes threat (e.g., asking test takers to report
their demographics prior to taking the test) in a testing situation has been found to

9
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

result in lower cognitive ability and math test performance scores of minorities and
women.
o Workers are often pressured to cover up or downplay their membership in a particular
group leading to a negative effect on employees’ physical and psychological health and
work-related outcomes.
o Research indicates that both subtle and overt discrimination have a negative effect on
employees’ physical and psychological health and work-related outcomes.

Racial, Ethnic, and Religious Stereotypes

 Racial, ethnic, and religious stereotypes are pervasive, persistent, frequently negative, and often
contradictory.
 Whites have been found to advance further in the hiring process than blacks.
 One study found that female job applicants who appeared to be Muslim experienced more
negative interpersonal behaviour and discrimination.
 Visible minorities are underrepresented in leadership roles.
 Discrimination in hiring has been found to occur when job applicants have an ethnic-sounding
name (Study done in Ryerson).
 Many minority applicants engage in “resumé whitening” by changing their name to sound
anglicized or by removing experience with an ethnic group or organization.
 Career advancement based on racial or ethnic stereotyping is common.
 Visible minorities perceive more barriers in their career advancement, including a lack of fairness
in the process, and report less career satisfaction than white colleagues.
 Attributions can play an important role in determining how job performance is interpreted.

Gender Stereotypes

 One of the most problematic stereotypes for organizations is the gender stereotype.
 Women are severely underrepresented in managerial and administrative jobs.
 Women in Canada hold only 25 percent of vice-president positions and 15 percent of CEO
positions.
 Stereotypes of women do not correspond well with stereotypes of business people or managers.
 What is the nature of gender stereotypes?
 Successful managers are perceived as having traits and attitudes that are generally ascribed to
men.
o Successful managers are seen as more similar to men in qualities such as leadership
ability, competitiveness, self-confidence, ambitiousness, and objectivity.
o Stereotypes of successful middle managers do not correspond to stereotypes of women.
 The stereotype of a leader is culturally masculine.
 Gender stereotypes lead to biased human resource decisions.
 Women suffer from a stereotype that is detrimental to their hiring, development, promotion,
and salaries.
 Even women with MBAs earn less than men in their first year of work and start in more junior
positions.
 The detrimental effects of gender stereotypes are reduced or removed with increased
experience and training of decision makers and when decision makers”
o Are help accountable for their decisions

10
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

o Have good job-related information about the qualifications, competence, and

performance of particular women
o Have an accurate picture of the job and its requirements
 Women do not suffer from gender stereotypes in performance evaluations that their supervisors
provide.
 A review of research on gender differences in job performance ratings found that females scored
slightly higher than males, while males received higher ratings of promotion potential.

Age stereotypes

 Knowing that a person falls into a certain age range or belongs to a particular age generation, we
tend to make certain assumptions about the person’s physical, psychological, and intellectual
capabilities.
 What is the nature of work-related age stereotypes?
 Older workers are seen as having less capacity for performance.
 They are viewed as less competent, adaptable, productive, creative, logical, and capable of
performing under pressure, and as having lower performance and less potential for
development.
 They are perceived as more rigid and dogmatic, and less adaptable to new corporate cultures.
 They are perceived as more honest, dependable, and trustworthy.
 Younger workers are judged more negatively and experience age discrimination more frequently
than older workers.
 They tend to be viewed as less loyal, inexperienced, unmotivated, immature, and selfish
compared to older workers.
 They are perceived less favourable than older workers in terms of initiative, stability, and work
experience.
 These stereotypes are inaccurate.
 Age seldom limits the capacity for development until post-employment years.
 Research has found that age is not related to task performance or creativity.
 However, age is related to other forms of job performance.
 Older workers exhibit less workplace aggression, on-the-job substance use, tardiness, and
absenteeism.
 Do age stereotypes affect human resources decisions?
 Age stereotypes affect human resource decisions regarding hiring, promotion, and skills
development.
 Older workers are often passed over for merit pay and promotions and pressured to take early
retirement.
 Research has found that younger workers (ages 18-30) experience the highest rates of age
discrimination, followed by older workers (50 or older), and then middle-aged workers (ages 31-
49).
 Discriminatory behaviour experienced by both younger and older workers is associated with
lower job attitudes and greater intentions to quit.
 Some organizations have implemented programs to promote the hiring of older and younger
workers.

LGBTQ Stereotypes

11
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 LGBTQ employees face barriers and discrimination in the workplace that can limit their career
advancement.
 Many LGBTQ employees do not come out at work for fear of potential repercussions and
negative consequences to their career and personal safety.
 Why do LGBTQ employees face these barriers and fear coming out at work?
 Lack of education and awareness and the reliance on stereotypes.
 Misperceptions and stereotypes lead to discriminatory behaviour towards LGBTQ employees.
 LGBTQ employees who do not feel safe to come out at work are less productive and more likely
to suffer from depression and stress and are more likely to quit.
 An increasing number of organizations have begun to make their workplaces more inclusive for
LGBTQ employees.
 LGBTQ-inclusive workplaces can increase employee engagement and reduce turnover.
 Organizations that implement programs to create an LGBTQ-inclusive workplace LGBTQ
employee relationship with co-workers, and increase perceptions of fairness, organizational
commitment, and career satisfaction which can lead to increased productivity.

Managing Workforce Diversity

 Diversity needs to be managed to have a positive impact on work behaviour and an organization.
 What can organizations do to achieve and manage a diverse workforce?
 Select enough minority members to get them beyond token status.
 Develop an employment equity plan.
 Provide a flexible work environment.
 Encourage teamwork that brings minority and majority members together.
 Ensure that those making career decisions about employees have accurate information about
them.
 Train people to be aware of stereotypes and to value diversity.

Diversity Training Programs

 One of the most common approaches for managing diversity.

 They can activate bias and cause disruption and bad feelings when all they do is get people to
open up and voice their stereotypes.
 Diversity training should be accompanied by skills training that is relevant to the particular needs
of the organization.

Diversity Programs

 Organizations should use a number of tactics in addition to training. What is most important is
that they integrate diversity into all of its policies and practices rather than treat diversity as a
stand-alone practice.
 Organizations that have been successful in managing diversity have an inclusive culture that
values individual differences.

Perceptions of Trust

 Do you trust your boss and organization?

12
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 Employee trust in top organization leaders is at an all-time low.

 Employee trust toward management is on the decline.
 Trust perceptions influence organizations processes and outcomes.
 What is trust?
 Trust is a psychological state in which one has a willingness to be vulnerable and to take risks
with respect to the actions of another party.
 Trust perceptions toward management are based on three distinct perceptions:
o Ability (Are they competent and skillful?)
o Benevolence (Are they caring and concerned?)
o Integrity (Will they adhere to values and principles?)
 The combination of these three factors influences perceptions of trust.
 Higher perceptions of management ability, benevolence, and integrity are related to greater
perceptions of trust.
 Perceptions of fairness are related to trust perceptions.
 Trust in leader at lower levels of an organizations influences trust perceptions of leaders at
higher-levels of the organization.
 Perceptions of trust in management and leaders are positively related to job attitudes and job
performance, and negatively related to turnover intentions.
 Trust among co-workers is also important and has been found to be related to fewer physical
symptoms and less withdrawal from work.
 Trust is considered to be the most critical factor when judging the best workplaces in Canada.

Perceived Organizational Support (POS)

13
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 Employees’ general belief that their organization values their contribution and cares about their
well-being.
 When employees have positive POS, they believe their organization will provide assistance when
they need it.

Organizational Support Theory

 Employees who have strong POS feel an obligation to care about the organization’s welfare and
to help the organization achieve its objectives.
 Employees feel a greater sense of purpose and meaning and a strong sense of belonging to the
organization.
 Employees feel obligated to reciprocate the organization’s care and support – the norm of
reciprocity.

Perceived Organizational Support (POS) – Continued

 Employees who have greater POS have higher trust toward the organization and management.
 POS has a number of positive consequences for employees and organizations, such as high job
satisfaction, organizational commitment, and job performance and lower absenteeism and
turnover.
 Employees with high POS have a more positive mood at work and are more involved in their job
and less likely to experience stress and strain symptoms.
 Factors that contribute to POS include:
o Favourable treatment, support, and concern for one’s well-being from supervisors or
what is know as perceived supervisor support (PSS).
o Fair organizational procedures.
o Favourable rewards and job conditions.
o Job enrichment.
o Human resource practices such as developmental opportunities and flexible work
schedules.

 What can organizations do to improve employee POS?

14
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

 Supportive human resource practices that demonstrate an investment in employees and

recognition of employee contributions are most likely to lead to the development of greater
POS.
 Supportive human resources practices that improves employee POS include:
o Participation in decision making
o Opportunities for growth and development
o Fair reward and recognition system
o Equality and diversity programs

Person Perception in Human Resources Management

 Job applicants form perceptions during the recruitment and selection process, and their
perceptions influence their attraction to an organization and whether or not they decide to
accept a job offer.
 Perceptions play an important role in three areas of human recourses
o Recruitment and selection
o Employment interview
o Performance appraisal

Perceptions of Recruitment and Selection

 How job applicants are treated during the recruitment and selection process and their reactions
to selection procedures influences their perceptions toward the organization and their likelihood
of accepting a job offer.
 Job applicants also form perceptions toward organizations based on the selection tests they are
required to complete.
 Job applicants form more positive perceptions of the selection process when selection
procedures are perceived to be fair.
 Applicants who have more positive perceptions of selection fairness are more likely to view the
organization as attractive and to have stronger intentions to accept a job offer, and to
recommend the job and organization to others.
 Applicant reactions can also influence performance on selection tests.
 The most to leave favourable tests:
o Employment interviews and work samples
o Cognitive ability tests
o Personality and honesty tests

Signalling Theory

 According to the signalling theory, job applicants have incomplete information about jobs and
organizations so they interpret their recruitment and selection experiences as cues or signals
about unknown characteristics of an organization and what it will be like to work in an
organization.
 Job applicants’ perceptions can influence the likelihood of remaining in the selection process and
accepting a job offer.

15
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

Perceptions in the Employment Interview

 The employment interview is one of the most common organizational selection devices.
o The interview is a valid selection device although it is far from perfectly accurate,
especially when it is unstructured
o Validity improved when the interview is structured
 What factors threaten the validity of the interview?

Factors that Threaten Interview Validity

 Applicants are motivated to present a favourable impression of themselves.

 Interviewers compare applicants to a stereotype of the ideal applicant.
 Interviewers tend to exhibit primacy reactions.
 Interviewers give less important to positive information about the applicant so negative
information has undue impact on the decision.

Contrast Effects

 Previously interviewed job applicants affect an interviewer’s perception of a current applicant,

leading to an exaggeration of differences between applicants.

Structured Employment Interviews

 Validity improves when the interview is structured.

 What is a structured interview?
 Interview structure involves four dimensions:
o Evaluations standardization – The extent to which the interviewer uses standardized and
numeric scoring procedures
o Question sophistication – The extent to which the interviewer uses job-related
behavioural questions and situational questions

16
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

o Question consistency – The extent to which the interviewer asks the same questions in
the same order of every candidate
o Rapport building – The extent to which the interviewer does not ask personal questions
that are unrelated to the job
 Interviews are more likely to be structured when the interviewer has had formal interview
training and the focus on the interview is on selection rather than recruitment.

Perceptions and the Performance Appraisal

 Once a person is hired, further perceptual tasks confront organization members.

 An index of a person’s job performance is required for decisions regarding pay raises,
promotions, transfers, and training needs.
o Examples: Employees with late start times receive lower job performance ratings from
their supervisors due to a negative stereotype in which employees with late start times
are less conscientious – this is known as a morning bias.

Objective and Subjective Measures

 It is possible to find objective measures of performance for some jobs.

 However, as we move up the organizational hierarchy, it becomes more difficult to find objective
indicators or performance.
 Organizations often rely on subjective measures of employees’ performance provided by
managers.

Subjective Measures

 Managers are confronted by a number of perceptual roadblocks.

 Managers might not be in a position to observe many instances of effective and ineffective
performance.
 As a result, the target is frequently ambiguous
 Employees often alter their behaviour so that they look good when their manager is around.

Perceptual Biases in Subjective Performance Appraisals

 A subjective performance appraisal is susceptible to some of the perceptual biases discusses

earlier:
o Primacy
o Recency
o Stereotypes
 A number of other perceptual tendencies occur in performance evaluations that are known as
rater errors.

Rater Errors

 Rater errors in performance evaluation include the following:

o Leniency – The tendency to perceive the job performance of ratees as especially good.
Lenient raters tend to give “good” ratings.
o Harshness - The tendency to perceive the job performance of ratees as especially
ineffective. Harsh raters tend to give “bad” ratings.

17
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

o Central tendency – The tendency to assign most ratees to middle-range job performance
categories. The extremes of the rating categories are not used.
 These rating tendencies (previous three) are partially a function of the rater’s personal
experiences.
 However, not all instances on leniency, harshness, and central tendency necessarily represent
perceptual errors.
 In some cases, raters intentionally commit these errors.
o Halo effect – The rating of an individual on one trait or characteristic tends to colour
ratings on other traits or characteristics. The halo effect tends to be organized around
central traits the rater considers important.
o Similar-to-me effect – The rater gives more favourable evaluations to people who are
similar to the rater in terms of background or attitudes. Stems from a tendency to view
our own performance, attitudes, and background as “good”. Managers with diverse
employees should be especially concerned about this error.

Techniques for Reducing Perceptual Errors and Biases

 It is difficult to obtain good subjective evaluations of employee performance.

 Human resources specialists have developed techniques for reducing perceptual errors and
biases. Two examples of this are”
o Behaviourally anchored rating scale (BARS)
o Frame-of-reference (FOR) training

Behaviourally Anchored Rating Scaled (BARS)

 Rating scales that give very specific behavioural examples of good, average, and poor
performance.
o With such an aid, the rater may be less susceptible to perceptual errors.
 Ex. Rating customer service

18
Syed Ahad Rizvi Perception, Attribution, and Diversity MHR405 Chapter 3

Frame-of-Reference (FOR) Training

 A training method to improve rating accuracy that involves providing raters with a common
frame-of-reference to use when rating individuals.
o Raters learn what behaviours reflect different levels of performance on each
performance dimension and to use the same frame-of-reference when rating all
individuals.
o Research on FOR training has shown that it is an effective method for improving rating
accuracy.

19