University of Technology, Jamaica Lecturer: Oswy Gayle

College of Business and Management AY 2019-2020

School of Business Administration Date: Feb -Mar 2020
Organizational Behaviour (MAN2005)/O&M (MAN2001/3001) Group–All
Lecture 7 – Biographical Characteristics – Perception -
NB. Please note this hand-out provides only a general understanding of the material. Please read your text and
other supporting materials for an in-depth understanding.

1.0 Context of Perception in the workplace

1.1 Have you ever heard ―yu brown and ugly like‖ or ―you white and ugly like‖ but you have
heard ………..‖you black and ugly like‖
1.2 ―What white nuh gud‖; any ting black nuh gud‖
1.3 Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder
1.4 Which bag would you prefer to carry from the supermarket? ―a black, a white or it matters not to
you‖
1.5 People who are perceived as beautiful are more liked, more believable, seen as kind, competent and
trust worthy (The Barber experience!)
1.6 How do you perceive people who are slim or fat? (My story…………’A fat girl beat me up as a kid’)
2.0 Research findings
A. A myriad of studies have proposed the notion that the attractiveness of the defendant, or of the victim, can have
an impact on jury verdicts. The more attractive the defendant, the less guilty verdicts. Think of Disney films,
can you tell who is the bad guy or bad girl without them saying a word? Sometimes????
B. Asch (1946) – Suggests that when people know one good thing about a person, then a „halo‟ of pleasant
characteristics is imagined. This is true for the antithesis. This is called „the halo effect.’
C. Dion (1972) – Suggested that „what is beautiful is good.‟ Attractive people are more likely to be viewed as
having attractive personalities.
D. Beautiful People Have an Advantage from day one – The economic benefits of being beautiful -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_gx2Uc95os (The US Context)
a. Cute babies are given more affection (attention) by people and their parents;
b. In school teachers have higher expectations for better-looking children then “less attractive ones”.
c. Attractive students slightly get better grades and are more likely to get into college degree
d. Hiring managers are more likely to consider more attractive applicants
e. Many people vote based on physical attractiveness in an election
f. Attractive people get better paid in some context
g. Heavier women earn less
h. Taller men earn more
i. Attractive people are more likely to be promoted
j. Attractive people pay less fines in a court of law
E. Gender differences in effects of physical attractiveness on romantic attraction: A comparison across five research
paradigms. Evolutionary and sociocultural theories of mate selection preferences contend that men place greater value on
physical attractiveness than do women. Gender differences in effects of physical attractiveness on romantic attraction: A
comparison across five research paradigms. Feingold, Alan, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 59(5),
Nov 1990, 981-993
F. The effect of physical appearance on the judgment of guilt, interpersonal attraction, and severity of recommended
punishment in a simulated jury task
Both an opinion survey and an experimental study were conducted. The survey revealed that substantial majorities of those
polled believed (a) that a defendant's character and previous history should influence jurors' decision (79%) and (b) that the
defendant's physical appearance should not bias these decisions (93%). The hypothesis, derived from a reinforcement
model of interpersonal attraction and previous research on physical appearance, was that attractive defendants would be
more positively evaluated than unattractive ones despite the seeming irrelevance of appearance to judicial decisions. The
results of a simulated jury task were that physically attractive defendants were evaluated with less certainty of guilt (p <
.05), less severe recommended punishment (p < .005), and greater attraction (p < .005), than were unattractive defendants.
The importance of independent affective and cognitive components of the attraction process were emphasized. Requests
for reprints should be sent to Michael G. Efran, University of Toronto, Scarborough College, 1265 Military Trail, West
Hill, Ontario, Canada.
G. Findings on attractiveness; that one's attractiveness does impinge on achievement and psychological
well-being; and that status characteristics theory can be used to explain the effects of attractiveness on
well-being and achievement. Debra Umberson and Michael Hughes . The Impact of Physical
Attractiveness on Achievement and Psychological Well-BeingSocial Psychology Quarterly, Vol. 50, No. 3
(Sep., 1987), pp. 227-236

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3.0 How do we perceive things? Physical objects? And interpreting meaning of events and things? Social
Perception and physical perception.
4.0 What is Perception? (1) Perception is a process by which individuals organize and interpret their sensory
impressions in order to give meaning to their environment (Robbins and Judge, 2009).
(2) Perception is our sensory experience of the world around us and involves both the recognition of
environmental stimuli and actions in response to these stimuli. Perception not only creates our experience of
the world around us; it allows us to act within our environment.
(3) Perception is the process of creating meanings from environmental stimuli which is powered by one’s
thinking and feelings about any phenomenon (Gayle, O., 2009).
So what?
 People’s behavior is based on their perception of what reality is, not on reality itself.
 The world as it is perceived is the world that is behaviorally important.
 It is our perception of a situation that determines our behavior. In other words, what we see and
believe determines our bahviour in a given situation.
 There are several realities happening within one reality.
For example, a company spent 1 million dollars on improving the working conditions for its employees.
Whilst, a few employees perceived this as good, some thought their job was still lousy. As such, the latter
group of employees behaved accordingly, that is, their actions have nothing to do with the fact that the
company spent this money but their perception of the situation.

 The Bible puts it like this, ―As a man or woman thinketh in their heart so is he/she.
 The Movie “Vantage Point” (political action thriller) provides an excellent demonstration of how
perception can be different based on what you perceive at anytime.
5.0 Why is perception important to the study Organizational Behaviour?
Remember we say individuals come to an organization with various abilities, beliefs and from different
backgrounds. Perception is simply another difference in individuals. Therefore, it is important because
people’s behaviour is based on their perception of their environment. Thus, as a manager, you would
want to know how your peers view their jobs; how they perceive the organization as this affects
absenteeism, turnover, productivity, job satisfaction as well as the way they make decisions on the
organizations’ behalf.
Factors influencing Perception – Have you ever wondered why two people
working at the same workplace but different views of the job? Most of us have.
This is because we perceive things differently.
3.1 The perceiver – attitudes, motives, interests, experience
and expectation.
3.2 The situation – (the context) time, work setting,
social setting – you might hear some people say,
“if it were in the day I could understand, but in the night, that is gross”
3.3 The target – novelty, size, motion, background,
proximity, similarity, heat, sound
6.0 Person’s perception and how we make judgement of other people
Factors that Influence Perception
6.1 When we observe people we are always trying to explain/clarify what was the reason for the
person’s action. As such, our judgment and perception will be influenced to a great deal by the
assumptions we make about their internal capacity.
6.2 Attribution theory - When individuals observe behavior, they attempt to determine whether it is
internally or externally caused. Internally meaning individuals have control over their actions and
externally meaning, the person has little or no control.
6.3 For every behaviour we judge, we judge it differently based on what meaning/s we put to that
behaviour. Hence, Attribution theory states that when we assess people’s behaviour, we try to
see if it was internally or externally caused. We make the determination based on three (3) factors
as follows; (High and Low)
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  Distinctiveness: Here we want to find out if an individual shows different behaviors in
different situations (from task to task). If an employee hands in quality work all the time, then,
we would make the attribution internally (low). High distinctiveness would mean that the person
seems to perform extremely better/worst at this task than your normal performance expectation
of them.
 Consensus: response is the same as others to same situation – if all students behave the same
way to a challenge, then we would say it was a high consensus and therefore it was externally
attributed and vice versa.
 Consistency: This is about looking if there is consistency in people’s action over time. If you
arrive late for class/work one time, it is not viewed the same way as being late many times. Thus,
the latter scenario [being late several times] will be seen as internally attributed.
Attribution Theory

7.0 Errors in our judgments about people

Fundamental Attribution Error - The tendency to underestimate the influence of external factors and
overestimate the influence of internal factors when making judgments about the behavior of others. In
general, we tend to blame the person first, not the situation.
Self-Serving Bias - The tendency for individuals to attribute their own successes to internal factors while
putting the blame for failures on external factors.
Selective Perception - People selectively interpret what they see on the basis of their interests,
background, experience, and attitudes.
Halo Effect - Drawing a general impression about an individual on the basis of a single characteristic
Contrast Effects - Evaluation of a person’s characteristics that are affected by comparisons with other
people recently encountered who rank higher or lower on the same characteristics
Projection - Attributing one’s own characteristics to other people.
Stereotyping - Judging someone on the basis of one’s perception of the group to which that person
belongs.
6.0 Specific Applications in Organizations
 Employment Interview - Perceptual biases of raters affect the accuracy of interviewers’ judgments of
applicants.
 Performance Expectations - Self-fulfilling prophecy (Pygmalion effect): The lower or higher performance
of employees reflects preconceived leader expectations about employee capabilities.
 Ethnic Profiling - A form of stereotyping in which a group of individuals is singled out—typically on the
basis of race or ethnicity—for intensive inquiry, scrutinizing, or investigation.
 Performance Evaluations - Appraisals are often the subjective (judgmental) perceptions of appraisers of
another employee’s job performance.

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 Individual Decision Making
7.0 The Link Between Perceptions and Individual Decision Making
 Problem -A perceived discrepancy between the current state of affairs and a desired state
 Decisions - Choices made from among alternatives developed from data perceived as relevant.
 Individuals in organizations make decisions; they make choices from among two or more alternatives.
Managers determine their organization’s goals, the products and services to offer and where to get capital
to finance projects etc. Non-managerial employees also make decisions including whether or not to come
to work on any given day, how much effort to put forward once at work, and whether or not to comply
with a request made by their manager/s.
 The above-mentioned point highlights the importance of understanding how employees perceive things
as it influences how they make decisions as well as the outcome of those decisions. Every decision
requires interpretation and evaluation of information. The perceptions of the decision maker will address
these two issues.
8.0 Assumptions of the Rational Decision-Making Model
1. Define the problem. 2. Identify the decision criteria.
3. Allocate weights to the criteria. 4. Develop the alternatives.
5. Evaluate the alternatives. 6. Select the best alternative.
9.0 Improving Creativity in Decision Making
Creativity - The ability to produce novel and useful ideas.
Three-Component Model of Creativity - Proposition that individual creativity requires expertise,
creative-thinking skills, and intrinsic task motivation.
10.0 How Are Decisions Actually Made in Organizations?
Bounded Rationality - Individuals make decisions by constructing simplified models that extract the
essential features from problems without capturing all their complexity.
11.0 Common Biases and Errors
 Overconfidence Bias - Believing too much in our own ability to make good decisions.
 Anchoring Bias - Using early, first received information as the basis for making subsequent judgments.
 Confirmation Bias - Using only the facts that support our decision
 Availability Bias - Using information that is most readily at hand. (Recent; Vivid )
 Representative Bias - ―Mixing apples with oranges‖; Assessing the likelihood of an occurrence by trying
to match it with a preexisting category using only the facts that support our decision.
12. Intuitive Decision Making - An unconscious process created out of distilled experience.
– Conditions Favoring Intuitive Decision Making - A high level of uncertainty exists; There is
little precedent to draw on; Variables are less scientifically predictable; ―Facts‖ are limited; Facts
don’t clearly point the way; Analytical data are of little use; Several plausible alternative solutions
exist; Time is limited and pressing for the right decision
13. Individual Differences in Decision Making
 Personality - Aspects of conscientiousness and escalation of commitment.
 Self Esteem - High self serving bias
 Gender - Women tend to analyze decisions more than men.
14. Organizational Constraints on Decision Makers
 Performance Evaluation - Evaluation criteria influence the choice of actions.
 Reward Systems - Decision makers make action choices that are favored by the organization.
 Formal Regulations - Organizational rules and policies limit the alternative choices of decision makers.
 System-imposed Time Constraints - Organizations require decisions by specific deadlines.
 Historical Precedents - Past decisions influence current decisions.
15. Ethical Decision Criteria
– Utilitarianism - Seeking the greatest good for the greatest number.
– Rights - Respecting and protecting basic rights of individuals such as whistleblowers.
– Justice - Imposing and enforcing rules fairly and impartially.

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