HUMAN BEHAVIOR IN ORGANIZAtion

• Perception is a process by which individuals organize and interpret their sensory impressions in order to give meaning to their environment.
• 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.
• Factors in the perceiver

  • Attitudes

  • Motives

  • Interests

  • Experience

  • Expectations
• Factors in the situation

  • Time

  • Work setting

  • Social setting
• Factors in the target

  • Novelty

  • Motion

  • Sounds

  • Size

  • Background

  • Proximity

  • Similarity
• Attribution theory tries to explain the ways in which we judge people differently, depending on the meaning we attribute to a given behavior.
• fundamental attribution error The tendency to underestimate the influence of external factors and overestimate the influence of internal factors when making judgments about the behavior of others.
• self-serving bias The tendency for individuals to attribute their own successes to internal factors and put the blame for failures on external factors.
• Internally caused behaviors are those we believe to be under the personal control of the individual.
• Externally caused behavior is what we imagine the situation forced the individual to do.
• Distinctiveness refers to whether an individual displays different behaviors in different situations.
• attribution theory An attempt to determine whether an individual’s behavior is internally or externally caused.
• selective perception The tendency to selectively interpret what one sees on the basis of one’s interests, background, experience, and attitudes.
• halo effect The tendency to draw a general impression about an individual on the basis of a single characteristic.
• contrast effect Evaluation of a person’s characteristics that is affected by comparisons with other people recently encountered who rank higher or lower on the same characteristics.
• stereotyping Judging someone on the basis of one’s perception of the group to which that person belongs.
• self-fulfilling prophecy A situation in which a person inaccurately perceives a second person, and the resulting expectations cause the second person to behave in ways consistent with the original perception.
• Specific Applications of Shortcuts in Organizations

  • Employment Interview
  • Performance Expectations
  • Performance Evaluation
• decisions Choices made from among two or more alternatives.
• problem A discrepancy between the current state of affairs and some desired state.
• rational Characterized by making consistent, value-maximizing choices within specified constraints.
• rational decision-making model A decision-making model that describes how individuals should behave in order to maximize some outcome.
• Steps in the Rational Decision-Making Model

  1. Define the problem.
  2. Identify the decision criteria.
  3. Allocate weights to the criteria.
  4. Develop the alternatives.
  5. Evaluate the alternatives.
  6. Select the best alternative.
• bounded rationality A process of making decisions by constructing simplified models that extract the essential features from problems without capturing all their complexity.
• intuitive decision making An unconscious process created out of distilled experience
• Common Biases and Errors in Decision Making

  • Overconfidence Bias
  • Anchoring Bias
  • Confirmation Bias
  • Availability Bias
• anchoring bias A tendency to fixate on initial information, from which one then fails to adequately adjust for subsequent information.
• confirmation bias The tendency to seek out information that reaffirms past choices and to discount information that contradicts past judgments.
• availability bias The tendency for people to base their judgments on information that is readily available to them.
• Reducing Biases and Errors

  • Focus on Goals
  • Look for Information That Disconfirms Your Beliefs
  • Don’t Try to Create Meaning out of Random Events
  • Increase Your Options
• escalation of commitment An increased commitment to a previous decision in spite of negative information.
• randomness error The tendency of individuals to believe that they can predict the outcome of random events.
• risk aversion The tendency to prefer a sure gain of a moderate amount over a riskier outcome, even if the riskier outcome might have a higher expected payoff.
• hindsight bias The tendency to believe falsely, after an outcome of an event is actually known, that one would have accurately predicted that outcome.
• Individual Differences

  • Personality
  • Gender
  • Mental Ability
  • Cultural Differences
• Organizational Constraints

  • Performance Evaluation
  • Reward Systems
  • Formal Regulations
  • System-Imposed Time Constraints
  • Historical Precedents
• utilitarianism A system in which decisions are made to provide the greatest good for the greatest number.
• whistle-blowers Individuals who report unethical practices by their employer to outsiders.
• creativity The ability to produce novel and useful ideas.
• three-component model of creativity The proposition that individual creativity requires expertise, creative thinking skills, and intrinsic task motivation.