Group And Individual Regularities In Trait Inference: A Multidimensional Scaling Analysis

This study concerned regularities in trait inference, the manner in which limited information about another person is used to form a consistent total impression. An individual differences model for multidimensional scaling was appraised as a method for faithfully strong both broad culturally- determined standards, and differently-structured points of view. Judgments of likelihood of joint occurrence of trait pairs and measures of cognition were obtained from 139 subjects. Scaling analyses resulted in two points of view, the largest of which yielded dimensions of interpersonal affectivity, harmfulness, and charitableness. S e w a t e analyses of randomly divided groups yielded indices of dimension stability ranging up to .99. The results support the view that the multidimensional scaling model can serve well to explain and order trait inference data.