4. Perception Understanding Key Concept - Uuooidata.org

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The Perceptual ProcessA spectacular completed pass during the 1982 National Football Conference championship gamehelped propell Joe Montana, former San Francisco 49er quarterback, into the legendary status heenjoys today. The reverse effect apparently occurred for Danny White, Dallas Cowboys’quarterback. He fumbled in the final minute of the same game and never obtained the status ofhis predecessor, Roger Stauback, even though White took the Cowboys to the championshipgame three years in a row.This example illustrates the notion of perception, the process by which people select, organize,interpret, retrieve, and respond to information from the world around them. This information isgathered from the five senses of sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell. As Montana, White, andStauback can attest, perception and reality are not necessarily the same thing. The perceptions orresponses of any two people are also not necessarily identical, even when they are describing thesame event.Through perception, people process information inputs into responses involving feelings andaction. Perception is a way of forming impressions about oneself, other people, and daily lifeexperiences. It also serves as a screen or filter through which information passes before it has aneffect on people. The quality or accuracy of a person’s perceptions, therefore, has a majorimpact on his or her responses to a given situation.Perceptual responses are also likely to vary between managers and subordinates. Consider Figure1.11, which depicts contrasting perceptions of a performance appraisal between managers andsubordinates. Rather substantial differences exist in the two sets of perceptions; the responses canbe significant. In this case, managers who perceive that they already give adequate attention topast performance, career development, and supervisory help are unlikely to give greater emphasisto these points in future performance appraisal interviews. In contrast, their subordinates arelikely to experience continued frustration because they perceive that these subjects are not beinggiven sufficient attention.FACTORS INFLUENCING THE PERCEPTUAL PROCESSThe factors that contribute to perceptual differences and the perceptual process among people atwork are summarized in Figure 1.12 and include characteristics of the perceiver, the setting, andthe perceived.The Perceiver A person’s past experiences, needs or motives, personality, and values andattitudes may all influence the perceptual process. A person with a strong achievement need
tends to perceive a situation in terms of that need. If you see doing well in class as a way tohelp meet your achievement need, for example, you will tend to emphasize that aspect whenconsidering various classes. By the same token, a person with a negative attitude toward unionsmay look for antagonisms even when local union officials make routine visits to theorganization. These and other perceiver factors influence the various aspects of the perceptualprocess.The Setting The physical, social, and organizational context of the perceptual setting also caninfluence the perceptual process. Kim Jeffrey, the recently appointed CEO of Nestle’s Perrier,was perceived by his subordinates as a frightening figure when he gave vent to his temper andhad occasional confrontations with them. In the previous setting, before he was promoted,Jeffrey’s flare-ups had been tolerable; now they caused intimidation, so his subordinates feared toexpress their opinions and recommendations. Fortunately, after he received feedback about thisproblem, he was able to change his subordinates’ perceptions in the new setting.The Perceived Characteristics of the perceived person, object, or event, such as contrast, intensity,figure–ground separation, size, motion, and repetition or novelty, are also important in theperceptual process. For example, one mainframe computer among six PCs or one man among sixwomen will be perceived differently than one of six mainframe computers or one of six men—-where there is less contrast. Intensity can vary in terms of brightness, color, depth, sound, andthe like. A bright red sports car stands out from a group of gray sedans; whispering or shoutingstands out from ordinary conversation. The concept is known as figure–ground separation, and itdepends on which image is perceived as the background and which as the figure. For anillustration, look at Figure 1.13. What do you see? Faces or a vase?In the matter of size, very small or very large people tend to be perceived differently and morereadily than average-sized people. Similarly, in terms of motion, moving objects are perceiveddifferently from stationary objects. And, of course, advertisers hope that ad repetition orfrequency will positively influence peoples’ perception of a product. Television advertising blitzesfor new models of personal computers are a case in point. Finally, the novelty of a situationaffects its perception. A purple-haired teenager is perceived differently from a blond or abrunette, for example.STAGES OF THE PERCEPTUAL PROCESSSo far we have discussed key factors influencing the perceptual process. Now we’ll look at thestages involved in processing the information that ultimately determines a person’s perception andreaction, as shown in Figure 1.14. The infor-mation-processing stages are divided into information
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