The recency effect is information we later learn, the longer it is left between the primary and recency effect the more likely the primary effect will not have the greatest influence.
Central traits are descriptions that alter people’s impressions very strongly; where as peripheral traits are impressions which we regard as being less important in making our decisions in what we see in people. For example, “the halo effect” when we describe a woman as being always on time, we can interpret that she is positive and enthusiastic and all things she does is positive.
Luchins study was to find out which was of the most importance the primary or rececny effect; the method of which he used was to describe a boy named Jim into two short paragraphs. In the first one he was described as being friendly and talking to people he knew, in the second paragraph he was described as being a bit of a loner crossing the street to avoid meeting people he knew. These two paragraphs could have been placed in either order, however the results showed that 95% described Jim as being friendly only so it was then concluded that the primary effect does lead a significant importance of our impression formation. Jims story was however fiction, but to backup this theory was a study where a student attempting to solve a series of difficult multiple-choice problems. The subjects then had to rate the student the intelligence of the student they had just seen, the person they were watching always solved 15 out of 30 problems correct however the subjects who had seen the successes at the beginning bunched together rated the student as intelligent. On the other hand those who had seen the successes at the end rated the student as not so intelligent.
To stereotype we would be attempting to pigeonhole people based on the primary effect and snap judgements, to divide them up into in-groups and out groups also known as social categorisation. To assume people’s personalities on little information could lead to negative evaluation, as first impressions are not always accurate.
Luchins study could be used to everyday life as we tend to make snap judgements about people we meet or see based on first impressions, for example someone is loud and shouting we could based on first impressions say that the person is drunk or argumentative or out to look for a fight, not taking into account that the person could have a mental illness and not on medication.
