Perception Processes

Interpersonal perception processes are influenced by the information we have about people; our expectations, experiences, behavior, the relationship between us and other people and the social and cultural contexts of the interaction.

Four Stages in Perception Processes

Differences in people’s perceptions begin during the first stage of the perception process, stimulation. The environment contains more sources of stimulation than anyone could possibly attend to. Through the five senses, people take in approxi­mately 10 million bytes of information a second; however, people can only proc­ess between one and 40 bytes ofinformation a second (Berscheid & Ragan, 2005, p. 163). These numbers indicate that people can consciously process only a very tiny fraction of what their senses are receiving (.000,000,001 to.000,000,040). These numbers clearly show that people are poor sensory data collectors and even poorer computers.

As a result of an inability to process most sensory data, people must focus on particular stimuli and overlook others. Not surprisingly, two people in an inter­action—even a calm one—pay attention to different perceptual data points that each person identifies as relevant. This is the first stage of information percep- tion—the selection of information. During conflict situations, people’s selectiv­ity increases; the greater the intensity, the more selective people become (Sillars et al., 2000). People also select and process certain messages and not others because of subjective factors, including mood and preconceptions they bring to the cur­rent situation (Chapter 4).

During organization, the second stage, people must somehow manage their selected information. Without this stage, people would have to deal with myriad separate pieces of information about an interaction.

People use various schemata as means to guide and interpret behavior (Fiske & Taylor, 1984). One type, “role schemata” refers to the behaviors one would expect from a person given their role relationship to you. For example, people holding a traditional view of the doctor-patient relationship believe that com­munication should come primarily from the physician and that physician advice should not be questioned. Yet people holding a consumer schemata treat their physician as a peer, asking questions and requiring answers. Likewise, schemata people have for marriage and conflict in marriage influences how they handle interactions including conflict (Solomon, Knobloch, & Fitzpatrick, 2004).

Interpretation and evaluation of information constitute the third stage of percep­tion. People attempt to understand the information they have organized. Both processes are inherently subjective and reflect past experiences as well as present moods and emotions. At this stage, people decide if an event is good or bad, strange or familiar, and other judgments. Because people have noticed different information, they will also interpret and evaluate people and events differently. In the next section of this chapter, we develop this stage more fully in terms of attribution theory.

The fourth stage is committing the information to memory. Our schematas and scripts as well as our interpretations and evaluations influence how we store infor­mation. These factors influence what information is stored and how it is stored (fairly objectively or fairly subjectively). People file in memory information that fits their existing ideas and forget what doesn’t fit (Hinton, 1993).

During the final stage, recall, we access the information we have stored in our memory. However, recall does not simply pluck a whole memory from storage; rather, people must reconstruct the information into a meaningful idea. As people rebuild their ideas, they cannot recall information equally easily. They readily recall information that coincides with their schema; but they don’t readily recall information that is inconsistent with their schema.

Unfortunately, people’s recall of interaction content is unreliable at best. Research that compares transcripts of people’s conversations to people’s recall of those same conversations shows that people on average cannot recall approxi­mately 90% of their conversation within an hour after it occurred and they forget over 95% of what was said a month later (Stafford, Burggraf, & Sharkey, 1987). People do recall more important interaction episodes. They recall about 33% of what was said in a conflict interaction within an hour after it occurred (Sillars et al., 1990). Still, a large majority of interaction content (67%) is immediately forgotten. So although people might believe that they have excellent conversa­tional memory and will stubbornly argue that they know exactly what happened during an argument, they are probably deluded. More accurately, after interac­tion people’s recall affects their conceptions of the other person and how they reconstruct the event.

As an example, let us look at how people’s schemata operate in families. Exam­ining different schemata that people hold for families, Fitzpatrick and Ritchie (1994; Koerner & Fitzpactick, 2002, 2006) used two dimensions: conversational- orientation (i.e., high vs. low value for openness of communication) and conform­ity orientation (i.e., the extent to which family members share beliefs). Families that have high conversational orientation and high conformity orientation are consensual families, where members negotiate the tension between openness and obedience, and where children are expected to share their thoughts but conform at the end of the day.

Koerner and Fitzpatrick (2002) found that people with a consensual schemata reported greater use of aggression and confrontation during conflicts with roman­tic partners. Consensual schemata suggest that one should conform but at the same time be vocal, indicating that disagreement should be avoided but when it arises then one should engage in competitive verbal and nonverbal behavior (Koerner & Fitzpatrick, 2002). In a contrary manner, people with a pluralistic schemata reported that they engaged in conflict and did so in a cooperative manner. This finding makes sense; people with a schemata that values openness and deviation would come from a family that sees conflict as natural to relationships and com­munication as a means of negotiating alternative realities. People with a protective schemata (i.e., low conversation/high conformity) reported greater than average levels of negative behaviors and negative complementary behaviors (e.g., avoiding the partner, resisting the partner). As Koerner and Fitzpatrick said, “This pattern is consistent with persons who have learned that conflict is negative and to avoid it if possible” (p.

As people move through the stages of the process, their perceptions likely become increasingly different. People begin perceiving different sets of informa­tion, even though some points overlap. They then organize information differ­ently. These differences increase when people interpret and evaluate their ver­sions of the event. By the time they store their versions in memory, they believe that their versions of the conflict are accurate. Finally, reconstructing the conflict during recall omits most information and adds further changes, until the two ver­sions held by the two conflict parties appear so different that each person wonders how and why the other person explains the event so badly. The extent to which you insist that your version is accurate constitutes the extent to which you are wrong. Instead of being the purveyor of accuracy, in truth you hold only one highly selective, schematically affected, and poorly recalled idea of what happened. This discussion leads to the following principle.

Conclusion 9.1: People hold different views of conflict that appear valid to them but are entirely subjective.

Suggestion 9.1: Interpret conflict wisely: Be mindful that people hold different views of conflict that are reasonable to them.