The Long-Term Effects of New Evidence on Implicit Impressions of Other People

Implicit impressions are often assumed to be difficult to update in light of new information. Even when an intervention appears to successfully change implicit evaluations, the effects have been found to be fleeting, reverting to baseline just hours or days later. Recent findings, however, show that two properties of new evidence-diagnosticity and believability-can result in very rapid implicit updating. In the current studies, we assessed the long-term effects of evidence possessing these two properties on implicit updating over periods of days, weeks, and months. Three studies assessed the malleability of implicit evaluations after memory consolidation (Study 1; N = 396) as well as the longer-term trajectories of implicit responses after exposure to new evidence about novel targets (Study 2; N = 375) and familiar ones (Study 3; N = 341). In contrast with recent work, our findings suggest that implicit impressions can exhibit both flexibility after consolidation and durability weeks or months later.