Impression management, cognitive demand, and interpersonal sensitivity

Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to examine the effect of cognitive demand on interpersonal sensitivity in initial interactions between unacquainted subjects. It was hypothesized that the increased cognitive demand created by initiating an unfavorable (vs. favorable) impression would lead to decreased accuracy in inferences made about an interaction partner. Forty-six pairs of subjects were run in a 2 (favorable or unfavorable impression) × 2 (male dyad or female dyad) factorial design. One member of each subject pair was randomly assigned the perceiver role and given the impression-management instructions. When the interaction was finished, subjects rated themselves and their partner on seven dimensions (e.g., comfortable, friendly, dominant, etc.). Subjects also rated how they thought their partners perceived them on these same dimensions. Two accuracy scores were determined within pairs by correlating: (a) the perceiver’s ratings of the target with the target’s rating of self (direct perspective), and (b) the perceiver’s rating of “my partner thought I felt” with the target’s rating of the perceiver (meta-perspective). The hypothesis was supported in that favorable impression perceivers were significantly more accurate on the meta-perspective judgments than were the unfavorable impression perceivers. In addition, the favorable impression perceivers recalled more descriptive characteristics of the targets than did the unfavorable impression perceivers. The results of the study indicate that a more difficult, impression-management task reduced accuracy in interpersonal perception.