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Self-perception following social interaction

Article in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · August 1981

DOI: 10.1037/0022-3514.41.2.232

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Journal of Personality and Social Psychology Copyright 1981 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.
1981, Vol. 4], No. 2,232-242 0022-3514/81 /4102-0232S00.75

Self-Perceptions Following Social Interaction

Russell H. Fazio, Edwin A. Effrein, and Victoria J. Falender
Indiana University

Recent research has indicated that a perceiver's expectancies about a target

person can lead that perceiver to channel social interaction with the target in
such a way that the target person's behavioral response may confirm the original
expectancy, thus producing a self-fulfilling prophecy. It is suggested that once
the target person behaves, the target may undergo a self-perception process and
internalize the very disposition that the perceiver expected him or her to possess.
Such a change in the target person's self-concept is apt to affect his or her
behavior in future and different situations not involving the original perceiver.
To test this hypothesis, subjects first participated in an initial interaction with
the experimenter, which purposefully was biased to produce either introverted
or extraverted behavior on the part of the target subject. On both a subsequent
self-description measure and on a variety of behavioral measures involving a
subsequent interaction with a confederate, the subjects displayed evidence of
having internalized the dispositions implied by their earlier responses during this
initial interaction. The implications of this rinding for the self-fulfilling prophecy
are discussed.

Over the last two decades, research has
sought to establish the links between social
perception and social interaction. Thus, var-
ious models of person perception have elu-
cidated the process by which individuals
draw inferences about a target person after
observing or interacting with that person
(e.g., Heider, 1958; Jones & Davis, 1965;
Jones et al., 1972; Kelley, 1967). In essence,
these models and their associated research
address the impact of aspects of social in-
teraction on social perception. For example,
Ross, Amabile, and Steinmetz (1977) have
demonstrated that individuals who are
knowingly assigned to advantageous or dis-
advantageous roles on an arbitrary basis fail
to make adequate allowances for that arbi-
trary role assignment when evaluating each
other. Instead, in a manner congruent with
Heider's notion of "behavior engulfing the
field," the individuals draw inferences from
each other's behavior despite the fact that
this behavior was mostly due to the arbitrary
role the person had been assigned.
The authors wish to thank Laurie Chassin, Paul Herr,
Elizabeth McDonel, and Steven J. Sherman for their
helpful comments on an earlier version of this manu-
script.
Requests for reprints should be sent to Russell H.
Fazio, Department of Psychology, Indiana University,
Bloomington, Indiana 47405.
232
More recently, researchers have also ap-
proached social perception and social inter-
action from the opposite directional view,
examining the effect of perceptions on social
interaction (e.g., Darley & Fazio, 1980;
Jones & Panitch, 1971; Snyder, Tanke, &
Berscheid, 1977; Word, Zanna, & Cooper,
1974). Consequently, the research findings
have served to revive the concept of self-ful-
filling prophecy (Merton, 1948) or what
Snyder and his colleagues have termed be-
havioral confirmation. Both terms refer to
a perceiver's expectancies regarding a target
person prompting behavior from the target
that objectively confirms the expectancy.
First receiving widespread attention in the
context of classroom situations, (e.g., Mei-
chenbaum, Bowers, & Ross, 1969; Rosen-
thai & Jacobson, 1968), the self-fulfilling
prophecy has now been shown to extend be-
yond the purview of teacher-pupil interac-
tions to more general social interaction con-
texts.
Furthermore, the interaction process by
which the self-fulfilling prophecy occurs has
become more clearly understood. Appar-
ently, the perception-interaction sequence
involves (a) the perceiver's developing an
expectancy regarding the target person, (b)
the perceiver acting toward the target person
in accord with the expectancy, and (c) the
target person's responding in kind. This re-
 SELF-PERCEPTIONS FOLLOWING SOCIAL INTERACTION
ciprocation confirms the perceiver's original
expectancy. For example, Word et al. (1974)
found that white subjects posing as job in-
terviewers treated black applicants differ-
ently than white applicants, tending to non-
verbally distance themselves from the black
applicant. A second experiment revealed
that these differential nonverbal behaviors
were reciprocated by the applicant and that
the distancing received by the black appli-
cant in the first experiment was sufficient to
cause a job applicant of any race to perform
poorly during the interview and to be judged
inadequate for the job. Thus, the inter-
viewer's stereotype-based expectancy led to
his behaving in such a manner that the ap-
plicant responded by confirming the expec-
tancy. Similarly, Snyder et al. (1977) dem-
onstrated that males' stereotypic beliefs that
physically attractive females would be
warmer and more sociable than physically
unattractive females led the males to act in
a more friendly manner in a telephone con-
versation with females whom they were
falsely led to believe were attractive than
with females whom they believed to be un-
attractive. Since the females tended to re-
ciprocate the tone that they received from
the males, the females confirmed the males'
expectancy about their warmth and friend-
liness.
The Word et al. and Snyder et al. findings
are examples of the effect of social percep-
tion on subsequent social interaction. Both
this type of research and research that has
shown that perceptions, once formed, tend
to guide the interpretation of later events
and interactions (e.g. Hastorf & Cantril,
1954; Regan, Straus, & Fazio, 1974; Zadny
& Gerard, 1974) have led to a greater ap-
preciation of the cyclical nature of the re-
lation between social perception and inter-
action. The purpose of the present research
is to link this cyclical process, in general, and
the self-fulfilling prophecy, in particular, to
subsequent self-perceptions (Bern, 1972).
In an analysis of the social interaction
process that prompts the self-fulfilling
prophecy, Darley and Fazio (1980) have
suggested that once the target person be-
haves in an objectively confirming manner,
the target person may attempt to interpret
his or her own behavioral response to the
233
perceiver. By engaging in a self-perception
process, the target person may come to in-
ternalize the dispositions implied by his or
her behavior. Such internalizations may af-
fect the target person's behavior in future
and different situations, thus extending the
purview of the self-fulfilling prophecy be-
yond the immediate interaction with the per-
ceiver. In the Word et al. and Snyder et al.
experiments, the perceiver's originally false
expectancy became reality in the sense that
the perceiver's behavior altered the imme-
diate behavior of the target person in such
a way as to objectively confirm the expec-
tancy. The perceiver's impact was evident
in the immediate situation. The possibility
addressed by the present research extends
beyond the immediate interaction and ex-
amines whether the impact of the perceiver's
originally false expectancy may extend to a
new and different situation in which the per-
ceiver is not even present. What began as
the perceiver's mere expectancy may be-
come, via a self-perception process, an in-
ternalized disposition of the target person.
Recently, Snyder and Swann (1978a) ex-
amined this possible outcome of a social in-
teraction process. In the context of a com-
petitive game, the perceiver member of a
dyad was led to believe that his partner was
either hostile or nonhostile. These expectan-
cies affected the perceiver's level of com-
petitive behavior and, in turn, prompted the
target to respond as he was treated. Thus,
the self-fulfilling prophecy occurred; targets
who had been falsely labeled as hostile dis-
played more hostile behavior than those la-
beled nonhostile. Via some preliminary in-
formation that the experimenter had provided
and via a retrospective manipulation, the tar-
get persons were encouraged to interpret
their responses during the interaction as,
what Snyder and Swann termed, either sit-
uationally or dispositionally caused. In the
situational condition, the instructions fos-
tered an interpretation in terms of how the
opponent had behaved; in the dispositional
condition, in terms of the type of person the
target was and how he thought such com-
petitive games might best be won. To ex-
amine the effect of the first interaction and
of the subsequent attributions on the target
person, a new opponent played the game
234 R. FAZIO, E. EFFREIN, AND V. FALENDER

with the target. Targets in the dispositional and Laird (1975) contrasted subjects who
condition who had been originally labeled interpreted their agreement to perform an
as hostile by the first perceiver behaved in unpleasant task (in this case, eating a worm)
a more hostile manner than those originally as being due to the fact that eating a worm
labeled as nonhostile. In contrast, the out- was not actually all that unpleasant to sub-
come of the preliminary interaction did not jects who concluded from their agreement
persevere to the second interaction in the that they were either brave and heroic or
situational condition. that they deserved to suffer. These latter
Snyder and Swann's findings are quite self-ascriptions were found to affect later
consistent with the hypothesized processes. behavior in a different situation. When
In particular, they demonstrate that the im- asked to choose between a neutral task or
pact of a perceiver's expectancy will not ex- a task in which shocks were to be adminis-
tend to subsequent interactions if the target tered to the subject, a greater number of
person fails to internalize his or her behav- subjects who had modified their self-con-
ioral response by attributing that response cepts (the latter group) chose the shock task
to the perceiver. Interpretation of the dis- than did subjects who had modified their
positional condition, on the other hand, is conception of the worm.
much less clear. Although Snyder and Swann The present experiment seeks to illustrate
labeled the instructions as fostering dispo- such a self-perception outcome in the context
sitional attributions, it would appear more of a social interaction setting. The paradigm
appropriate to consider them attributions to employed is one used by Snyder and Swann
the game setting. That is, the dispositional (1978b) in yet another investigation of the
instructions were specific to the type of com- self-fulfilling prophecy. The experimenters
petitive task employed in the experiment. investigated hypothesis-testing strategies and
Hence, it is unclear whether the target per- found that subjects tended to employ a con-
sons concluded that they were generally hos- firmatory strategy. That is, when asked to
tile or, perhaps more likely, that it was ap- assess whether a target person was an ex-
propriate and strategic to behave in a hostile travert, subjects chose to ask from a list of
fashion when playing competitive laboratory available questions ones that virtually any
games. Furthermore, the impact of the at- person would answer by citing a specific in-
tributions was tested in a second interaction stance of extraversion on his or her part.
that involved not a wholly new situation but Similarly, when testing for introversion, sub-
the very same game setting as the initial in- jects were more apt to select introverted
teraction. Nor did Snyder and Swann ad- questions. Judges who listened to the targets'
minister any verbal self-perception measures responses to the questions rated the targets
to see if the targets differed in the degree as more extraverted in the extravert hypoth-
to which they had internalized a disposition esis condition than in the introvert hypoth-
of hostility. Consequently, the dispositional esis condition. Thus, the perceivers' hy-
condition of the Snyder and Swann experi- potheses and the strategy by which these
ment may actually represent an example of hypotheses were tested channeled the tar-
subjects' internalizing a mode of response to gets' responses in such a way as to produce
a limited class of situations rather than a a self-fulfilling prophecy and to confirm the
generalized disposition. The data from the original hypothesis.
experiment fail to provide any necessary rea- In the present experiment, the social in-
son for concluding that a general change in teraction sequence is "picked up" at the sec-
self-perceptions occurred as a result of the ond step of the sequence, namely, the point
initial interaction. of differential behavior on the part of per-
This is not to say that the outcome of a ceivers with differing expectancies. The ex-
social interaction may not be a general perimenter asked the subjects a set of either
change in the target's self-concept. Some extraverted- or introverted-related ques-
self-perception research suggests that this is tions. Responses on the part of target sub-
indeed a possibility. In particular, Comer jects who differed in their level of extraver-
 SELF-PERCEPTIONS FOLLOWING SOCIAL INTERACTION
sion would constitute the equivalent of the
self-fulfilling prophecy, namely, differential
behavior on the part of subjects that was
consistent with the way they were treated.
To examine the effect of this interaction on
self-perceptions, the subjects were then
placed into a waiting room situation in which
any conversation they had with a confeder-
ate was surreptitiously recorded. Unobtru-
sive monitoring of the subject's behavior in
a setting totally separated from the experi-
ment and from the initial experimenter-sub-
ject interaction was expected to provide non-
reactive evidence of internalization. In
addition, subjects completed a self-percep-
tion measure. In terms of both behavior and
verbal self-descriptions, subjects who were
asked extraverted questions were predicted
to display more extraversion than subjects
who were asked introverted questions.
Method
Subjects
Forty-two students from an introductory psychology
course participated in an experiment entitled "Person-
ality Interviewing" in partial fulfillment of a course re-
quirement. Subjects participated individually and were
randomly assigned to condition. The data from two sub-
jects, one from the introvert condition and one from the
extravert condition, were dropped because the subjects
reported suspicion about the true nature of the experi-
ment during debriefing.
Procedure
Upon his or her arrival, the subject was met by a male
experimenter who nonchalantly conversed with the sub-
ject about psychology courses. This brief preliminary
exchange provided the basis for the experimenter's as-
signing the subject a preinteraction rating ranging from
-3, "very introverted," to +3, "very extraverted." The
experimenter was unaware of the subject's eventual con-
dition assignment at the time that he made this pre-
judgment.
After the conversation, the subject was led to the ex-
perimental room. The experimenter presented the re-
search as involving "personality interviewing" and ex-
plained that the subject would be asked to respond
verbally to a set of interview questions. Ostensibly, each
question had been prepared by a graduate student in
clinical psychology as an exercise in interviewing. Pre-
sumably, the adequacy of each question in revealing
elements of an interviewee's personality was to be an-
alyzed. This cover story had the asset of not linking the
experimenter in any way to the set of questions or to
any particular question. Thus, from the perspective of
235
the subject, the experimenter had no personal stake in
the adequacy of the interview questions. This was done
to minimize the subject's experiencing any pressure to
respond (or to behave later) in such a manner as to
please the experimenter. The experimenter continued
by explaining that in the second part of the experiment,
the subject would be asked to listen to tapes of interviews
with previous participants and to judge each of these
people along a variety of personality trait dimensions.
While the subject signed a consent form agreeing to
participate, the experimenter consulted previously hid-
den information in order to randomly assign the subject
to condition. During the "interview," the experimenter's
interaction with the subject was limited intentionally to
reduce the likelihood that the experimenter might in-
advertently communicate a demand characteristic to the
subject. The experimenter merely handed the subject
a deck of 10 index cards. Each card presented a type-
written question that the subject was instructed to read
silently and then respond to aloud. The subject's re-
sponses were recorded by a cassette recorder visibly
placed on the table at which the subject was seated. The
specific questions used were taken from the list employed
by Snyder and Swann (1978b). In each condition, 2 of
the 10 questions were ones that Snyder and Swann's
pretesting had indicated to be neutral in nature ("What
are your career goals?" "What are some of your favorite
books? Can you recall a time that you got into a book
so much that you could hardly put it down?"). The
remaining eight questions formed the manipulation. In
the introvert condition, eight questions judged to char-
acterize individuals known to be introverted were em-
ployed (e.g., "What things do you dislike about loud
parties?"). Similarly, questions that would character-
istically be asked of individuals known to be extraverts
were employed in the extravert condition (e.g., "What
would you do if you wanted to liven things up at a
party?"). The set of cards containing the 10 questions
were randomly ordered for each subject.
At the conclusion of the interview, the subject was
escorted to a large central room in the laboratory. The
experimenter asked the subject for his or her social se-
curity number and added it to a list on the blackboard.
This momentary exchange served as a signal to the fe-
male confederate to prepare for the subject's arrival «by
turning on a small cassette recorder concealed in her
large purse. The experimenter then remarked that he
had to run downstairs to the clinic to obtain the cassette
tape that the subject was to listen to and evaluate during
the second part of the experiment. The experimenter
apologized for the short delay and asked the subject to
have a seat in an adjoining waiting room. This room
was visible from the large central room, and a sign la-
beled "Waiting Room" appeared on the doorway. A
folding chair was leaning against the outside wall of the
waiting room just to the right of the door. The experi-
menter remarked, "If you could grab that chair there
and sit in the waiting room, I'll come back shortly and
we can listen to the tape. Thanks." As the subject walked
to the waiting room, the experimenter exited the labo-
ratory, presumably to go downstairs, and returned 10
min. later.
Seated in the far corner of the waiting room was the
236 R. FAZIO, E. EFFREIN, AND V. FALENDER
female confederate, ostensibly waiting for her scheduled
experiment to begin. Her purse, containing the recorder,
was situated near her chair, and she was holding and
scanning a copy of the campus daily newspaper. The
confederate was blind to experimental condition and had
been instructed to act naturally. The only restriction
placed on the confederate was that she was not allowed
to initiate conversation when the subject entered the
room. Once the experimenter had retrieved the subject
at the end of the 10 min. period, the confederate com-
pleted a data sheet. She recorded whether the subject
had initiated conversation. She also recorded the num-
ber of floor tile blocks between the two nearest legs of
the subject's chair and her own chair. Since the subject's
chair placement is unlikely to have been affected by any
demand characteristic, this nonverbal distancing mea-
sure provides a nonreactive assessment of the subject's
behavior. Finally, the confederate rated the subject on
a scale ranging from -3, "very introverted" to +3 "very
extraverted" and also indicated whether she believed the
subject had been in the introvert or extravert condition
or whether she could not tell. Each of these dimensions
served as behavioral measures of extraversion.
In addition, each subject completed a trait inventory,
modeled after one employed by the judges in the Snyder
and Swann (1978b) study. The inventory consisted of
10 6-point bipolar scales: talkative-quiet; unsociable-
sociable; friendly-unfriendly; poised-awkward; extra-
verted-introverted; enthusiastic-apathetic; outgoing-shy;
energetic-relaxed; warm-cold; confident-unconfident.
The subject was asked to place himself or herself along
each continuum. The order of this self-perception mea-
sure and the behavior measures was counterbalanced.
Half the subjects completed this measure immediately
after the interview and before being directed to the wait-
ing room (self-description first condition). The other half
did so immediately after the waiting room situation
(self-description second condition).
After all the measures had been administered, the
experimenter carefully probed the subject for suspicion
and fully debriefed the subject.
Results
Interview Behavior
To test the hypothesis concerning self-per-
ceptions following social interaction, the
equivalent of the self-fulfilling prophecy
must be observable during the subject's in-
terview with the experimenter. Did those
subjects who were asked questions about ex-
traversion respond in such a manner as to
seem more extraverted than did those sub-
jects asked questions of an introverted na-
ture? To answer this question, it was nec-
essary to, in effect, conduct an additional
experiment.1 Twenty naive subjects were re-
cruited for payment and served as judges.
They were randomly assigned to one of two
conditions. Half of these judge-subjects eval-
uated the tapes of the responses of the sub-
jects who had undergone the introverted in-
terview. The other half of the judge-subjects
evaluated the tapes from the extraverted in-
terview condition.2 The judge-subjects in-
dependently listened to the tape and then
rated the actual subject on the same 10-item
trait inventory used to assess self-percep-
tions. The sum of these 10 ratings served as
the judge's overall assessment of the subject;
the average overall score each subject as-
signed to the tapes was then computed. On
the average, the judges who listened to the
tapes from the introverted interview condi-
tion found the subjects in that condition to
be less extraverted than the judges who lis-
tened to the tapes from the extraverted con-
dition found the subjects from that condi-
tion: Ms of 31.86 versus 38.31 on a scale
that could range from 10 to 60, t( 18)i = 4.06,
p < .001. Thus, as expected, behavioral re-
sponses to the two sets of questions were
easily discriminable. The biased sets of ques-
tions prompted the target person to cite
many instances of either introverted or ex-
traverted behavior.
1
It was not deemed reasonable to have a set of judges
evaluate all the tapes from both the introverted and
extraverted interview conditions. The judges would have
quickly discerned that the topics discussed in the two
sets of tapes differed and may have contrasted the two
sets simply on that basis. Instead, the more conservative
procedure of having separate groups of judges evaluate
the two sets was followed. This procedure possesses the
disadvantage of having the judges' ratings be potentially
influenced by context effects. That is, because of a con-
trast effect, any subjects in the introverted interview
condition who appeared slightly less introverted than the
modal subject might be rated atypically high in extra-
version by the judges who listened to the tapes from this
condition. Likewise, a contrast effect might lead judges
who evaluated the tapes from the extraverted condition
to rate a subject who seemed slightly less extraverted
than the modal subject lower in extraversion. Fortu-
nately, these context effects would exert an influence
counter to the hypothesis and to the extent that they
occurred lead to an underestimation of the effect of the
interview manipulation.
2
Due to a malfunctioning recorder, no tape was avail-
able for one subject in the extraverted interview con-
dition. Thus, judge-subjects who evaluated the tapes
from this condition listened to and rated a total of 19
tapes, whereas judge-subjects assigned to the introverted
interview condition rated a total of 20 tapes.
 SELF-PERCEPTIONS FOLLOWING SOCIAL INTERACTION 237

Subsequent Self-Perceptions fected the target's behavioral response to the

A 2 (introvert vs. extravert interview) X
2 (order of the self-description and behav-
ioral measures) analysis of variance revealed
no significant differences on the preexperi-
mental ratings of introversion/extraversion
made by the experimenter. The largest F
value was F(l, 36) = 1.58, p > .20, for the
main effect of interview condition, but the
direction of this slight tendency works op-
posite to the hypotheses (see the first row of
Table 1). Thus, random assignment to con-
dition was reasonably successful. This pre-
rating was employed as a covariate in all
analyses of measures of subsequent self-per-
ception, both verbal and behavioral, not so
much to equalize the minimal initial differ-
ence but to have the prerating "explain"
some proportion of what in an analysis of
variance would be considered error variance
(Cohen & Cohen, 1975). The analysis of
covariance assumption concerning the ho-
mogeneity of within-cell regression coeffi-
cients was met for each measure. The un-
adjusted means for each measure are
presented in Table 1.
Self-description measure. It is quite ev-
ident that the biased interview questions af-
questions. As a result of the manipulation,
subjects in the two conditions responded
quite differently during the interview. The
question that remains is whether the subjects
underwent a self-perception process and in-
ternalized their behavioral responses. Scores
on the 10-item trait inventory the subjects
had completed were summed. The mean
scores in each condition are reported in the
second row of Table 1. A 2 (introvert vs.
extravert condition) X 2 (order) analysis of
covariance, with the experimenter's prerat-
ing serving as the covariate, revealed a sig-
nificant main effect of the interview manip-
ulation, F(l, 35) = 4.93, p < .05. Subjects
who had originally been asked questions of
an extraverted nature perceived themselves
as generally more extraverted (M = 47.90)
than did subjects who had been asked ques-
tions of an introverted nature (M = 44.15).
Neither the main effect of order nor the in-
teraction effect were significant, both
Fs < 1.
Behavioral measures. Each of the be-
havioral measures was analyzed by a 2 (in-
trovert vs. extravert condition) X 2 (order)
analysis of covariance, with the preratings

Table 1
Mean Scores as a Function of Interview Condition and Order of Self-Description and Behavior
Measures
Interview
Introvert Extravert
Self-description order Self-description order
First Second First Second
Dependent variable (« - 10) (n = 10) (n =11) (»-9)
Prorating" 0.95 .55 .36 0.00
Self-descriptions6 44.40 43.90 48.36 47.33
Postrating" 0.00 -.80 .82 1.39
Proportion who initiate conversation .50 .50 .73 .78
Time talking (in seconds)' 34.20 24.84 57.42 85.62
Judges' ratingsbiC 17.54 18.87 24.39 25.64
Distance11 3.25 3.15 2.39 2.62

" Scale ranges from -3 to +3, with more positive numbers indicating greater extraversion.
b
Scale ranges from 10 to 60, with higher numbers indicating greater extraversion.
0
Means of scores transformed via a reciprocal transformation were computed and then retransformed back to the
original metric.
d
Refers to the number of floor tile blocks between the two nearest legs of the subject's and the confederate's chairs.
238 R. FAZIO, E. EFFREIN, AND V. FALENDER
of extraversion serving as the covariate. Nei-
ther the main effect of order nor the order
by condition interaction was significant on
any of the behavioral measures, all
Fs < 1.12.
The main behavioral dependent measure
was the confederate's postexperimental rat-
ing (see the third row of Table 1 for the
means). The analysis revealed that the con-
federate found subjects who had undergone
the extraverted interview to be more extra-
verted during the waiting room situation
than subjects who had undergone the intro-
verted interview: Ms of 1.08 and -.40, re-
spectively, F(l, 35) = 8.26, p < .01. Thus,
in the eyes of a confederate blind to exper-
imental condition, the behavior of the two
groups of subjects was distinguishable, so
distinguishable in fact that the confederate
was able to correctly identify the subject's
condition 26 out of the 37 times (out of 40)
that she ventured a guess. This accuracy rate
of 70.27% is significantly better than would
be expected by chance (p = .02 by a sign
test).
The proportion of subjects in each con-
dition who initiated conversation with the
confederate appears in the fourth row of
Table 1. Comparison of these proportions via
an arcsine transformation analysis (cf. Lan-
ger & Abelson, 1972) revealed only a mar-
ginally significant main effect of the in-
terview manipulations, z=1.69, p < .10.
Overall, 75% of the subjects in the extravert
condition initiated conversations compared
to 50% of the subjects in the introvert con-
dition. Consequently, the distributions of the
amount of time the subject spent talking
during the waiting room situation were
skewed. These time data were subjected to
a reciprocal transformation, Y= \/(X+ 1),
prior to analysis (Kirk, 1968). The means,
following a retransformation back to the
original metric of seconds, X = (1 — Y)/Y,
are presented in the fifth row of Table 1. The
analysis of covariance showed that subjects
responding to the extraverted questions
talked to the confederate more than did sub-
jects responding to the introverted questions:
overall Ms of 70.11 versus 29.52, respec-
tively, F(l, 35) = 4.54, p < .05.
The tape recordings of any conversation
between the subject and the confederate dur-
ing the waiting room situation were also
evaluated by two independent judges blind
to experimental condition. After listening to
each subject's tape, each judge evaluated the
subject on the same trait inventory that the
subjects had completed. Again the sum of
the 10-item scale was computed. Since in-
terjudge reliability was very high (r = .98),
the two judges' scores were averaged. As
would be expected given the large number
of subjects who never initiated any conver-
sation, the distribution of these scores was
also skewed. Hence, a reciprocal transfor-
mation was performed for purposes of anal-
ysis. The sixth row of Table 1 presents the
means following a retransformation back to
the original metric. The analysis of covari-
ance again revealed a main effect of the in-
terview manipulation F(l, 35) = 4.25, p <
.05. The judges found those subjects who had
earlier responded to extravert questions to
be more extraverted than those who had re-
sponded to introvert questions (Ms of 25.02
vs. 18.21).
Further support for the hypothesis is pro-
vided by a nonverbal measure. The subject
had placed a folding chair in the waiting
room, and the confederate had noted and
later recorded the number of floor tile blocks
separating the two nearest legs of their re-
spective chairs (see the last row of Table 1
for the means). Subjects exposed to the ex-
travert interview tended to sit closer to the
confederate than did subjects in the introvert
condition (overall Ms of 2.52 vs. 3.20). An
analysis of covariance revealed that this ef-
fect nearly reached a conventional level
of statistical significance, F(l, 35) = 3.79,
p < .06.
Thus, in terms of the evaluations of both
the confederate and the judges, in terms of
the amount of time the subject talked while
in the waiting room, and in terms of the non-
verbal measure of distancing, the data con-
firm the hypotheses. Importantly, these be-
havioral effects were observed in a setting
separated from the experiment. The subject
was merely waiting for the presumed exper-
iment to continue. Thus, even if the subject
had somehow become aware of the hypoth-
esis and/or experienced a demand charac-
teristic (as mentioned earlier, precautions
were taken to decrease the likelihood of such
 SELF-PERCEPTIONS FOLLOWING SOCIAL INTERACTION
an occurrence, and postexperimental inter-
views revealed such awareness on the part
of only two of the subjects), there would be
little motivation on the part of the subject
to comply with any such demand during the
waiting room situation.3 The subjects' re-
sponses to the interview appear to have been
internalized and to have affected their sub-
sequent behavior in a new and different sit-
uation.
As is to be expected, the waiting room
behavioral measures correlated significantly
with one another (all ps < .02). A behavioral
index composed of the sum of scale-free z-
scores of (a) the confederate's rating, (b) the
judges' rating of any conversation, (c) the
time spent talking, and (d) the distance mea-
sure (following a reversal of the scale so as
to have positive scores indicate greater ex-
traversion) was constructed. This behavioral
index was found to correlate with both
judges' assessments of interview responses
(/• = .497, p < .005) and self-descriptions
(r = .334, /?<.05), which also correlated
with one another (/• = .548, p < .001). Thus,
interview responses indicative of greater ex-
traversion were associated with both more
extraverted self-descriptions and later be-
havior.
Interestingly, examination of the relations
among the variables suggests that interview
behavior may not have affected later waiting
room behavior only through the mediating
influence of self-description. Partialling out
self-description scores reduces the correla-
tion between interview responses and later
behavior from .497 to a still statistically sig-
nificant .398, (p < .02). The meaning of this
partial correlation is not entirely clear. On
the one hand, it suggests that the interview
situation may have affected subjects' later
behavior in a manner other than via the
mediating mechanism of self-concept change.
That is, waiting room behavior may have
been a function not only of the self-descrip-
tion modification produced by the interview
but also of some result of the interview other
than inferences about one's self. On the other
hand, the partial correlation's significance
may only reflect the fact that the self-de-
scription measure is a less than perfect and
valid indicator of self-concept. Conceivably,
for example, self-concept may have changed
239
as a result of the interview along some trait
dimensions not included in the measure, and
the unmeasured change may have contrib-
uted to the later behavior.
Discussion
The experimental findings confirm the hy-
pothesized processes described earlier. Not
only was differential behavior produced by
the interview manipulation, but the impact
of the manipulation was evident beyond the
initial interview. In terms of both verbal self-
descriptions and subsequent behavior in a
new and different situation, subjects dis-
played evidence of having internalized the
implications of their behavioral responses
during the initial interaction. The implica-
tion of this finding is obvious, albeit a bit
frightening. If originally false, a perceiver's
3
One might argue that these distance data are tainted
by the fact that the experimenter was no longer blind
to condition when he requested that the subject "grab
that chair there and sit in the waiting room." Given the
brevity of the experimenter's instruction and its stan-
dardization across all subjects, we find this unlikely. Yet,
it remains a possibility. Especially problematic would
be the possibility that, once the chair had been posi-
tioned, the distance between the subject and confederate
determined the degree to which the subject experienced
social pressure to converse. This suggests that all the
measures of waiting room behavior may be suspect. This
possible impact of distance on the other behavioral mea-
sures does not appear warranted by the data, however.
Multiple regression analyses reveal that there are effects
of interview condition on waiting room behavior over
and above variance accounted for by distance. Each
behavior measure served as the criterion variable in a
regression equation involving the entry of the experi-
menter's prorating of the subject first (just as occurs in
the analyses of covariance described above), followed
by the distance measure, and then by a dummy variable
coded for interview condition. The increase in the pro-
portion of behavioral variance explained that was
brought about by the condition variable was examined.
In the case of the confederate's postrating, this increase
was statistically significant: increase in R2 = .095, F(l,
36) = 5.23, p = .028. Similar, although nonsignificant,
tendencies were apparent with respect to the amount of
time talking: increase in R2 = .035, F(\, 36) = 1.82,
p = .185, and the judges' assessments of any conver-
sations: increase in R2 = .028, F(l, 36) = 1.48, p =
.231. An overall index of waiting room behavior, com-
posed of the sum, following conversion to z scores, of
the postrating, amount of time talking, and the judges'
ratings, also was apparently affected by interview con-
dition over and above the impact of the distance variable:
increase in R2 = .054, F(l, 36) = 2.95, p = .095.
240 R. FAZIO, E. EFFREIN, AND V. FALENDER

expectancy can become reality not only in that under certain conditions, subjects
the sense that the target person's responses adopting either a self-enhancing or a self-
to the perceiver objectively confirm the ex- deprecating role during an interview subse-
pectancy but also in the sense that the target quently displayed a corresponding shift in
person has internalized the very disposition their self-esteem. Thus, internalization of
the perceiver expected him or her to possess. the self-presentation occurred. The present
In effect, the target person has become the data suggest that such a consequence of stra-
person the perceiver expected. tegic self-presentation can have implications
The present experiment illustrates how for later behavior in a different situation.
self-perception processes can be linked to On the basis of the present findings, a
social perception and social interaction. The complete social interaction sequence would
interview questions apparently led the sub- appear to involve (a) the perceiver's devel-
jects to consider behaviors relevant to intro- opment of an expectancy regarding the tar-
version/extraversion in a biased manner. get person; (b) the perceiver behaving to-
Questions about introversion made salient ward the target in accordance with the
to subjects many instances in which they had expectation; (c) the target person respond-
in fact behaved introvertedly. Likewise, ing; (d) the perceiver interpreting the target
questions about extraversion increased the person's response; and (e) the target person,
salience of instances of extraverted behavior. simultaneously, interpreting his or her own
Salancik and Conway (1975) have demon- response (cf. Darley & Fazio, 1980). With
strated that the increased salience of pro- or respect to step (d), the perceiver interpreting
antireligious behaviors prompted by a lin- the target's response, much research sug-
guistic manipulation can affect individuals' gests that the perceiver will fail to recognize
subsequent self-perceptions of the degree to the constraining impact of his or her own
which they are religious. Similarly, in the behavior on the target person and, instead,
present context, the increased salience of in- will consider the target's response to be re-
stances of introverted (or extraverted) be- flective of the target's dispositions (e.g.,
havior led subjects to perceive themselves as Jones & Panitch, 1971; Snyder et al., 1977).
relatively more introverted (or extraverted) Likewise, given the present findings, it ap-
and to behave in a more introverted (or ex- pears that the target person may also fail to
traverted) manner in a later situation. recognize the influence of the perceiver's
Future research needs to consider more behavior and may also consider his or her
fully the relation among these variables, that response to be self-revealing. This failure to
is, prior behavior, subsequent self-descrip- adequately consider the causes of his or her
tions, and later behavior in a different sit- behavior is consistent with the findings of the
uation. Recall that the partial correlation Ross et al. (1977) study described earlier
analysis presented earlier suggested that wherein subjects neglected to correct for the
prior behavior (in this case, interview be- advantages or disadvantages conferred by an
havior) may not only affect later behavior arbitrary role assignment.
through the mediating mechanism of self- This is not to say that the target person
description change but may also do so di- will always conclude that his or her behav-
rectly or through some additional mediator. ioral response is self-revealing. The research
Recognizing the difficulties that derive from literature on self-perception theory informs
our inability to feel confident that any verbal us that at minimum, an illusion of choice
self-concept measure has effectively assessed must exist if an individual is to self-perceive.
respondents' complete views of themselves, Thus, the target person must perceive that
this possibility merits further attention. he or she freely chose how to respond to the
The intriguing results of recent research perceiver. In the present context, although
conducted by Jones and his colleagues on the apparently unaware of the biased nature of
effects of strategic self-presentation on sub- the questions, the subjects probably experi-
sequent self-esteem (Jones, Rhodewalt, Ber- enced an illusion of choice because the spe-
glas, & Skelton, Note 1) are relevant to the cific content of their replies was uncon-
present experiment. These researchers found strained.
 SELF-PERCEPTIONS FOLLOWING SOCIAL INTERACTION
Given an illusion of choice and given that
the target person finds his or her behavior
to be self-revealing, the outcome of the self-
perception process need not be a change in
self-concept. There would appear to be three
possible outcomes of the self-perception pro-
cess, (a) The target might infer that his or
her behavior toward the perceiver is reflec-
tive of his or her attitude toward the per-
ceiver. Such a behavioral inference would
affect only future interactions with the per-
ceiver. (b) The target may infer something
about his or her reaction to the particular
class of situations in which the behavior oc-
curred and internalize a mode of response
only to such situations. As in the Snyder and
Swann (1978a) study involving a competi-
tive game, such an inference may affect the
target's behavior in that or similar situations
regardless of whom the target is interacting
with, (c) Finally, on the basis of the behav-
ioral response, the target might infer some-
thing about himself or herself, that is, his or
her characteristic traits or dispositions. It is
this self-concept change that is demon-
strated by the present experiment. Presum-
ably, such a general inference will affect
behavior across a variety of situations and/
or interaction partners. (See Darley and Fa-
zio, 1980, for a fuller discussion of these
three alternatives.) Clearly, future research
needs to address the question of the condi-
tions under which each of these alternatives
may occur.
The specific alternative illustrated by the
present research, that of a general self-per-
ception change, is relevant to the writings
of various theorists on the effects of labeling
on self-concept (e.g., Becker, 1963; Goff-
man, 1963; Schur, 1971; Szasz, 1961).
Handicapped or stigmatized individuals and
those labeled as mentally ill or simply de-
viant may find themselves treated differently
than nonstigmatized individuals. It is prob-
ably through the sort of process that our own
subjects underwent that societal labels and
the atypical treatment associated with such
labels come to affect an individual's self-def-
inition. This self-image as a deviant then
helps to maintain deviant behavior. Simi-
larly, it may be through the social interac-
tion and self-perception processes outlined
here that such sociocultural stereotypes as
241
those dealing with sex roles become trans-
mitted to the point that the individual even-
tually internalizes the very dispositions im-
plied by the stereotype (cf. Zanna & Pack,
1975).
The present data are also relevant to for-
mulations and research concerning the na-
ture of self-concepts. The data imply that
the specific content of self-concepts may be
surprisingly fragile in nature. A series of
biased questions that increase the salience
of certain behaviors can alter such self-def-
initions. Just like attitudes (cf. Kelman,
1974; Salancik & Conway, 1975), general-
izations about the self may be constantly
updated and modified by social interactions
and behavioral experiences. In fact, the pres-
ent data reveal that subjects' self-descrip-
tions correlated significantly higher with
judges' assessments of their responses during
the interview (r = .548) than with the ex-
perimenter's prorating of the subject's ex-
traversion: r = .162, Hotelling's f(37) = 2.56,
p < .02. Likewise, the index of waiting room
behavior described earlier correlated to a
greater degree with interview responses
(r = .497) than with preratings: r = .228,
Hotelling's t(37) = 1.72, p < .10. These dif-
ferences must be interpreted cautiously,
since they could be simply a function of
lesser reliability of the preassessment than
of the measure of interview responses. Yet
these findings are consistent with the sug-
gestion that self-conceptions are relatively
malleable.
This raises an intriguing and important
question. How long will the type of modi-
fication in self-concept illustrated by the
present experiment be maintained? Ethical
concerns prevented us from permitting the
subjects to leave the laboratory without fully
debriefing them. Consequently, we were un-
able to reassess self-concept days or weeks
later. We can only suggest, as do Jones et
al. (Note 1), that the change in self-concept
is maintained until some subsequent event
or behavior implicates other dispositions as
being self-descriptive. One intriguing possi-
bility is that the modified self-concept may,
in effect, maintain itself for a period of time
via the same sort of perception-interaction
cycle we have discussed. Believing himself
or herself to be extraverted, an individual
242 R. FAZIO, E. EFFREIN, AND V. FALENDER
may make warm overtures to others, who
then respond and treat this individual
warmly, prompting the individual to con-
tinue to respond in that way and maintaining
the self-ascription.
Reference Note
1. Jones, E. E., Rhodewalt, F., Berglas, S., & Skelton,
J. A. The effects of strategic self-presentation on
subsequent self-esteem. Unpublished manuscript,
Princeton University, 1980.
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Received August 21, 1980
Revision received December 18, 1980 •