Social Perception Essay, Research Paper

Our own beliefs and principles that are cultivated by our culture, in which we were brought up, govern our perceptions of others. These ideologies or theories are often not shared by others and in most of the time, not plausible or even untrue. These inaccurate interpretations and conclusions of others have dire consequences such as, not being able to recognise the unique characteristics or qualities the individual possesses and may also perceive certain qualities to be present while they, in fact, do not. The self-fulfilling prophecy may also affect the other party into conforming to our prophecies, which in most cases are negative. Several misunderstandings may arise from these misperceptions.

My physical appearance, having long hair, often denotes extroversion and other mostly negative qualities. But in reality, I am more of an introvert than the opposite. I do not drink, neither do I smoke.

Despite my academic achievements and fluency in the English language, several people still stereotype me as an “Ah-Beng”, which is basically the Hokkien translation of a punk. From my feedback, some people actually consider me quite a benevolent person. I’m amiable by nature, even I do not realise it. Even so, I sometimes, am still discriminated because I have long hair. Many young people out there have similar hairstyles as I do, but my relatives and parents don’t seem to understand that a person’s characteristics, personality or academic capabilities, has no relation, whatsoever, with an individual’s outward demeanour. I guess its human nature to stereotype people. No matter how conscious we are to the fact that stereotyping may not conclude who an individual really is, we still do so.

Attribution is basically mind reading and mind reading is basically inaccurate. Many are aware that their mind reading of another person could most probably be wrong judgements, but why do we still make these attribution errors? When I reflected the theory of attribution to myself, I realized that the less time I spend with the person, the more I mind-read their personalities. The “we-knew-it-all-along” mentality does not help too, because it further concludes that our mind reading can be accurate, which in a way encourages several more instances of misattributions. A way to prevent misattribution, since mind reading is seemingly unavoidable, is to consult others on their opinion about the situation and evaluating our own conclusions with several others. We must also try to think of reasons why our judgements could be wrong

The Self-fulfilling prophecy really did make me think. Student’s academic success or failure in school is due not to a teacher’s teaching methods, but are due to the teacher’s expectations to their students. Initially, I really found it improbable, but realized after much thought, that it did happen to me when I got a “boost” from my dad when he told me, before my ‘O’ levels, that he’s sure I could make the mark even just studying a month before the exams. I studied for just a month, and I got five A’s. Ironically, another so-called self-fulfilling prophecy “event” occurred to me just two days ago. My neighbour has this huge Bull Terrier and two days before this very day, I overheard a congregation of maids talk of how ferocious and mean the dog is (not realizing that it actually isn’t). And from that day on, I acted hesitant and wary towards the dog. It could be a coincidence, but because of the way I behaved towards the dog, it stared back at me in a somewhat blank and unfriendly way. However, I learnt from my mom that Puffy (the dog’s name), has quite a pleasant character. He wags his tail so hard (a sign of happiness in dogs), in front of people, that his whole backside shakes from left to right. I guess because of my behaviour towards Puffy, I fulfilled my expectations of it.

A great example of a self-fulfilling prophecy, which can be applied to almost everyone, is the Y2K problem. An overreaction to the prospect that computers might malfunction on January 1st, year 2000, may actually pose a greater threat to humanity’s well being than the technical challenge itself. The panic may invigorate the problem because widespread withdrawal of funds from banks, lack of airline profits and the postponing of important construction projects may have a detrimental effect on the international economy. Asia, being as inept with finances as the Y2k problem, may lose more money, thus not having sufficient funds to eradicate the problem totally before the “techo-dooms-day” deadline.

In conclusion, the potential barriers these processes come along with can be avoided by disallowing ourselves from making predictions or evaluations according to our chauvinistic beliefs. Instead, we should allow the individual to project himself and also get to know him or her in depth, by which, we would then, evaluate a more accurate picture of the individual.