The intellectual process which is used to transform the sensory into information which is meaningful to individuals is known as perception. Perception means to interpret something that is heard and seen in the minds of individuals and later on used to find a solution or judge a particular situation, group or person. Perception can be divided into six types. They are the perception of touch, speech, sound, taste, social world and other senses in the body. Perception of touch means that an individual can identify different objects by touching it. Perception of speech means that individuals would understand the sound of the language that is being spoken and interpret it accordingly (Huczynski, Buchanan and Huczynski 2013). Perception of sound means that individuals have the capability to receive the sounds around them by identifying the vibrations of those sounds. Perception of taste means that the individual would acquire the flavour of different items by tasting them with the help of taste buds which are the sensory organs present in the tongue. Perception of the social world means that the individual would have a view of the occurrences and places around them by viewing them through the social world. Perception of other senses implies that the individual acquires the perception through their bodies such as pain, balance, sensations, acceleration and others. Perception is the primary psychological process of an individual and it occurs for every person (Broadbent 2013). However, perception is subjective and the same events can be perceived by different individuals in different ways at the same time.
Perception goes through different stages which are known as the perceptual process. The different stages of perception are as follows. Firstly, receiving is the primary and the mandatory stage in the perception process. In this stage, individuals gather various information and then receives that information through their sensory organs. Secondly, selecting is the next stage of the perception process. In this stage, the individual receives selective information out of which he selects that information which is suitable to his needs and interests. This selection is based on specific internal and external factors (Goodwin, Piazza and Rozin 2014). The internal factors are interest, the background of the individual, psychological requirements, self-acceptance and learning. The external factors are movement, familiarity, repetition, intensity, novelty, contrast and size. Thirdly, organizing is the third stage of the perception process. In this stage, the individuals organize the information so that the data makes sense when they are acquired (Lee, McCauley and Draguns 2013). The received data is organized into groups according to their similarities. Lastly, interpreting is the last stage of the perception process. In this stage, the information that has already been gathered and organized finally gets a meaning so that it can be categorized by the individual. Through these four stages the process of perception is finalized.
Perception holds a great significance in the life of every individual. Every individual forms a picture and idea of their own when they perceive the world around them. However, it often happens that the picture that is perceived by the individual is quite far from the reality. Perception is quite significant for various organizations in many ways. For example, appraisals in performance if the employee is a matter where perception is significant. The rate of the performance of an employee depends mainly on the individual who is evaluating the employee. Not every performance can be measured quantitatively like in the case of salespeople, many performances are measured qualitatively. In such cases, the appraisal of the employee depends solely on the judgement of the individual who is conducting the appraisal. The relationship between the employee and the individual also plays a big part in the perception of the individual about the employee and hence the final outcome of the appraisal.
However, there are many factors which contribute to errors in the perception of an individual and make them biased towards a view or idea. These factors or errors are known as perceptual distortions. Distortion of the perception occurs when the understanding of a situation is not right and the interpretation of the situation is not correct. The perception of an individual is said to be biased or distorted when the individual does not perceive a situation in the standard way. Therefore, the factors which contribute to distortion is as follows. Firstly, the personality of the individual who is perceiving, also known as the perceiver, is of the utmost importance as it has the capacity to influence the perception of other individuals (Rogers 2013). Perception can be used to influence the perception of another individual in two ways. The perceiver would try to extend the characteristics of his personality in other people and then the perceiver would try to project his behaviour and views of the reality on those individuals as well. In this way the perception of the individuals would get distorted or biased as they will have a perception which is not their own, but of someone else. Secondly, the mental set is the way an individual behaves during a specific circumstance or situation (Bourget and Mendelovici 2014). This is a prevalent factor of perceptual distortion as in this the individual perceives the situation based on their predefined mental set about that particular situation. This causes misconceptions and biasness, as they do not feel the need to explore the situation and then form an opinion. They form their perception based on preconceptions about the same situation which has happened before.
Thirdly, self-serving bias is a huge factor of perceptual distortion. In this the individuals blame the external factors for any failure that they might face in their life (Harvey et al. 2014). The failures might be due to reasons which are made by the perceiver himself, however, he will never take the blame on himself and try to put the blame on external circumstances. On the other hand, in case of any success the perceiver gives credit to internal factors which include himself even if it is not the reality. This creates a huge misconception and bias as the reality if the success and failure are not taken into consideration. Fourthly, attribution errors are also a factor of perceptual distortion (Asai and Tanno 2013). In this aspect, the individual fails to acknowledge the right estimation of the internal and external factors while judging the actions of other individuals. As in the case of self-serving bias, the internal factors are overestimated and the external factors are underestimated while the judgement process. Fifthly, similarity effect which means that individuals might favour those people who are similar to them (Montoya and Horton 2013). This similarity can occur in any aspect, but create a likeness among the individuals and hence their perception is formed by bias. For example, if two people come from an interview and belong from two different places such as Pune and Bangalore, and the interviewer is from Pune, then there is a high chance that the interviewee from Pune will get selected due to the biasness that is formed in the perception of the interviewer regarding the similarity that is present between him and the interviewee from Pune.
Sixthly, first impression is the perception that is formed in the mind of the perceiver about an individual based on the information that they receive primarily (Howlett et al. 2013). The perceiver evaluates the individual purely on the basis of that information even if more information is received later on. The first impression about an individual could be correct if the information received in enough and correct. However, in most cases the information that is received is not always adequate and hence the opinion that is formed is not entirely correct. This biasness in the first impression can be sometimes changed id there are frequent interactions between the individuals, however, it is somewhat difficult to completely changer the first impression about any person. Seventhly, last impression is the perception that is formed about the person based on the recent or the latest event that has happened in the life of the person (Roulin, Bangerter and Levashina 2014). The last impression of the individual can create a significant impact on the mind of the perceiver, even if he has other information about the individual. This is a great cause of biasness as the last impression might be completely wrong and one event cannot project the characteristics of a person, however, the perceiver sets his perception of the person on the basis of that one event. Eighthly, halo effect is a term which was coined in the year 1920 by Edward Thorndike (Rosenzweig 2014). This term states that the perception of an individual is based in one characteristic which can be both positive and negative. For example, if a person is perceived as being good is one aspect, then there comes a perception that he might be good at every other aspect as well.
Ninthly, horn effect is the opposite of the halo effect which states that the perception of an individual is formed based on one negative quality that he might possess (Burton et al. 2015). This means that if one quality of the person is bad, then it is perceived that he might be a bad person overall, even if he is not. Lastly, stereotyping is making the perception of an individual on the basis of the group that he belongs in. The perception about the individual is not formed based on his characteristics and behaviours but according to the characteristics of his group (Mackie and Hamilton 2014). The above mentioned factors are the main reasons for biasness in perception about an individual and are known as perceptual distortions or errors. Many of these factors create a significant effect on many organizational circumstances. For example, first impressions matter a lot during interviews of employees and any biasness in the perception can cause the organization to lose a good candidate or acquire a bad one. Another example could be the evaluation of the performance of an employee. Qualitative methods usually do the evaluation and if the evaluator has any wrong perception of the employee then it can create issues in his evaluation and appraisal.
Hence, it is mandatory for organizations and individuals to overcome these biases in perception so that no wrong idea or view is formed about any individual and can create problems in his employment and future. All of the factors which are mentioned above contribute one way or the other into forming wring perceptions about an individual. Therefore specific ways should be adopted by individuals to make sure that the minimum of perceptual distortion occurs. Firstly, both the internal and the external causes should be taken into consideration when any individual performs poorly (Talke and Heidenreich 2014). It should be determined if any other individual in his place would have performed in the same way. If the answer is positive then the individual who has done the poor performance should be blamed for his failure. It should be stated that the causes of the failure are many, most of which are external factors over which the individual had no control. Secondly, the stereotypes that are identified must be confronted before any perception is formed about any individual. Even though it is a very natural act to believe and rely on the stereotypical aspects, however, the other information should be gathered and determined whether the stereotype gives the correct perception or not. In doing so the perception that is being formed based on the stereotype may be completely wrong and biased. Therefore, gathering more information would help overcome this bias and form the correct opinion and perception about a person (Silani et al. 2013).
Thirdly, people should stop themselves from asking any rash or sudden judgements about another individual based on the little information that they have about them. First impressions usually enable people to create the perception about one another in the basis of the primary information that they gather about each other. Due to this there are a lot of wrong perceptions that are formed which might be harmful for the organization. This is why rash judgement should be avoided at all times. The chance to communicate with one another should be given so that the correct impression is made and this would lead to better and correct judgement and perception about the person (Masson and Brault Foisy 2014). Lastly, people should also be evaluated based on quantitative factors rather than qualitative factors. This is because being objective towards a person’s characteristics would ensure that the perception might be somewhat correct. However, being subjective towards him would only make the perception biased and distorted. The judgements that are generally made by people are based on the subjective characteristics of the individual that are projected to them in the first sight. Therefore, a high level of perceptual distortion occurs which can be minimized of the people start looking at each other objectively. Hence, it can be deduced from the above study that perception is an essential part of an individual and an organisation. However, it is vital to form the right perception about a person so that no harm is caused to the employee and the organization (Barrouillet 2015). To form the right perception the factors that cause perceptual distortion should be eradicated or at least minimized and proper steps should be taken to ensure that the right perception is being formed by an individual. Therefore, organizations and individuals should always strive to form the correct opinion about any individual.
References
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