Organizational Behavior

Anubha Maurya
• INDIVIDUAL PROCESSES –
PERCEPTION
• The concept and need for studying
• Perceptual organization
• Perceptual interpretation
• Attribution process
• Perceiving others
• Comparison of own perception with
others’ estimation
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PERCEPTION
“ WE DON’T SEE THINGS AS THEY

ARE, WE SEE THINGS AS WE ARE.”

 What is the perceptual process?

 Perception.
– The process by which people select,
organize, interpret, retrieve, and respond to
information.
– Perceptual information is gathered from:
• Sight.
• Hearing.
• Touch.
• Taste.
• Smell.

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 Perception

“ The study of perception is concerned with

identifying the process through which we
interpret and organize sensory information to
produce our conscious experience of objects
and object relationship.”

“ Perception is the process of receiving information

about and making sense of the world around us.
It involves deciding which information to notice,
how to categorize this information and how to
interpret it within the framework of existing
knowledge.
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Perception
• The process by which
individuals select,
organize, and interpret
the input from their
senses to give
meaning and order to
the world around them.

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Components of Perception
• The perceiver is the person trying to
interpret some observation that he or
she has just made, or the input from his
or her senses.
• The target of perception is whatever the
perceiver is trying to make sense of.
– In OB terms, the target of perception is
often another person.
• The situation is the context in which
perception takes place.
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Insert Figure 4.1 here

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 What is the perceptual process?

 Stages of the perceptual process.

– Information attention and selection.

– Organization of information.

– Information interpretation.

– Information retrieval.

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• Environmental stimuli Selecting Stimuli
Observation External factors : Nature,
Location,Size, contrast,
(Taste, smell, hearing, Movement, repetition, similarity
Sight, touch) Internal factors : Personality,
Learning, Motivation

Interpreting
Perceptual Error
(Defence, Stereotyping,
Halo Effect, Projection,
Organizing
Expectancy effect)
Figure Background ,
Attribution
Perceptual Grouping
(Internal External cause,
Learning, ( similarity, proximity,
Cause for success & closure, continuity)
failure)

Response
Covert: Attitudes ,
Motivation,
Feeling Perceptual Process
Overt: Behavior
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The Perceptual Process

1.Selection 2.Organization
– Process by which people – The process which
filter out most stimuli so
people group
that they can deal with
environmental stimuli
the imp ones (external &
Internal factor) into recognizable
Eg – bell ringing, dog barking, coffee brewing

3.Interpretation
– An assessment of the
info collected for the
purpose of making
judgement.

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 What is the perceptual process?

 Factors influencing the perceptual

process.
– Characteristics of the perceiver.

- Characteristics of the perceived.

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 What is the perceptual process?

 Characteristics of the perceiver.

– The perceptual process is influenced by the
perceiver’s:
• Past experiences.
• Needs or motives.
• Personality.
• Values and attitudes.

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 What is the perceptual process?
SELECTION - EXTERNAL

 Characteristics of the perceived.

– The perceptual process is influenced by characteristics of the
perceived person, object, or event, such as:
• Contrast. (stands out against the background- colored pen on white board)

• Intensity (more intense more perceived – loud noise when student attendi lecture)

• Size. (Larger the size of external factor more likely to be perceived)

• Motion. (movement tends to receive more attention-video game)

• Repetition (repetitive are more likely to be perceived than single factor-advt)

• Novelty (familiar or novel factor in environment – elephant on road)

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 What is the perceptual process?
SELECTION - INTERNAL

 Personality – Perception shapes personality which in turn

affect how and what people perceive – locus of control (hold
external environment for failure)

 Learning – Expectation of a perception based on past

experience with same or similar stimuli. Tall building – arch, ID,
Appraiser or female ugly or beautiful

 Motivation – A persons most urgent need and desire at

particular time can influence perception. Telephone ringing while
bathing

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 What is the perceptual process?
ORGANISATION

 Continuity – tendency to perceive object as continuous

pattern (inability to detect change)

 Closure - tendency to complete an object and perceive as

constant – mgr facing complex decision may be able to develop
fairly accurate understanding even if info is not complete. With
experience they gv solution.

 Proximity – group of object may be perceived as related

because of there nearness to each other

 Similarity – more alike object greater tendency to perceive

them as a common group – team with diff color t-shirt
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 What is the perceptual process?
INTERPRETATION – Judgemental error

• Similarity – tendency to see others

having characteristic more like our own
• Contrast – to compare at same time
• First Impression error – Quick
impression that are resistant to change

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INTERPRETATION - perceptual ERROR?

 Common perceptual distortions include:

– Stereotypes or prototypes.(tendency to assign attributes to
someone solely on the basis of category in which the person has been
placed)
– Halo effects. .(Evaluation of another person solely on the basis of one
attribute, either fav or unfav)
– Selective perception.
– Projection.
– Contrast effects.
– Expectancy effect
– Self-fulfilling prophecy .(Expecting certain things to happen
shapers the beh of the perceiver in such a way that is expected to more likley
happen))

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 What are common
perceptual distortions?

 Stereotypes or prototypes.
– Combines information based on the
category or class to which a person,
situation, or object belongs.
– Strong impact at the organization stage.

– Individual differences are obscured.

– Eg an alcoholic, a doctor, president

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 What are common
perceptual distortions?

 Halo effects.
– Occur when one attribute of a person or
situation is used to develop an overall
impression of the individual or situation.
– Likely to occur in the organization stage.
– Individual differences are obscured
(hidden).
– Important in the performance appraisal
process.
– Eg excellent attendance dosnt mean productive

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 What are common
perceptual distortions?

 Projection.
– The assignment of one’s personal attributes
to other individuals.ie see their own trait in
other people
– Especially likely to occur in interpretation
stage.
– Projection can be controlled through a high
degree of self-awareness and empathy.
– Eg an empl frightened by rumor on org change may not only judge
others to be more frightened than they are but also assess various
policy decision as more threatening than they really are

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 What are common
perceptual distortions?

 Self-fulfilling prophecy.
– The tendency to create or find in another
situation or individual that which one
expected to find.
– Also called the “Pygmalion effect.”
– Can have either positive or negative
outcomes.
– Managers should adopt positive and
optimistic approaches to people at work.

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 The Pygmalion Effect
• Pygmalion was an
ancient king who carved
a beautiful female statue
• He loved the statue so
much that she came to
life

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 Self-fulfilling Prophecy
• When one’s expectations for certain
behavior in another person lead to that
person behaving as expected
• The Pygmalion effect is self-fulfilling
prophecy in the teacher/student
relationship

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 The Pygmalion Effect
• A teacher’s high or low expectations
eliciting high or low achievement from
their students
• Also known as “teacher expectation
effects” (Trouilloud, Sarrazin, Bressoux,
& Bois, 2006)

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 How can the perceptual
process be managed?

 Impression management.
– A person’s systematic attempt to behave in
ways that create and maintain desired
impressions in others’ eyes.
– Successful managers:
• Use impression management to enhance
their own images.
• Are sensitive to other people’s use of
impression management.

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 How can the perceptual
process be managed?

 Distortion management.
– Managers should:
• Balance automatic and controlled information
processing at the attention and selection stage.
• Broaden their schemas at the organizing stage.
• Be attuned to attributions at the interpretation
stage.

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Factors influencing perception

A number of factors operate to shape and sometimes

distort perception. These factors can reside in the

perceiver, in the object or target being perceived or in

the context of the situation in which the perception is

made.

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• Factors influencing Perception
Factors in the perceiver
• Attitudes
• Motives
• Interests
• Experience
• Expectations

Factors in the situation

Perception
• Time
• Work Setting
• Social Setting
Factors in the Target
• Novelty
• Motion
• Sounds
• Size
• Background
• Proximity
• Similarity
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 What is attribution theory?

 Attribution theory aids in perceptual

interpretation by focusing on how people
attempt to:
– Understand the causes of a certain event.
– Assess responsibility for the outcomes of
the event.
– Evaluate the personal qualities of the
people involved in the event.

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 What is attribution theory?

 Internal versus external attributions of

causes of behavior.
– Internal causes are under the individual’s
control (personality trait, emotion, motive, or
ability)
– External causes are within the person’s
environment. (people, situation, chance)

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 What is attribution theory?

 Factors influencing internal and external

attributions.
– Distinctiveness — consistency of a person’s
behavior across situations. Good
attendance and performer, even if late its
ascribed
– Consensus — likelihood of others
responding in a similar way (traffic jam)
– Consistency — whether an individual
responds the same way across time.
(person coming late)
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 What is attribution theory?

 Fundamental attribution error.

– Applies to the evaluation of someone’s else behavior.
– Attributing success to the influence of situational
factors.
– Attributing failure to the influence of personal factors.
– THE CAUSE OF POOR PERFORMANCE (BY
OTHERS) IS DUE TO PERSONAL FACTORS
(LAZY…DIDN’T TRY VERY HARD)
– Eg Terrorist– what circumstance makes him

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 What is attribution theory?

 Self-serving bias.
– Applies to the evaluation of our own behavior.

– Attributing success to the influence of personal

factors.
– Attributing failure to the influence of situational
factors.
– THE CAUSE OF POOR PERFORMANCE (BY
MYSELF) IS DUE TO SITUATIONAL FACTORS
(POOR SUPPORT), NOT BECAUSE OF A LACK OF
EFFORT
Eg aeroplane – cockpit problem – u blame others 2-35
 What is attribution theory?

 Attributions across cultures.

– The fundamental attribution error and self-
serving bias operate differently in different
cultures.

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