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Longitudinal changes in consensus as a function of acquaintance and agreement in liking
1Department of Psychology, University of Colorado, Boulder 80309, USA. bpark@clipr.colorado.edu
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
|March 1, 1997
Summary
Increased acquaintance between dormmates did not lead to greater consensus on personality traits. Instead, agreement in liking predicted consensus in trait impressions, suggesting evaluation agreement drives consensus.
Area of Science:
- Social Psychology
- Personality Psychology
Background:
- Understanding consensus formation in social perception is crucial.
- Previous research often assumes increased acquaintance leads to higher consensus.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the relationship between acquaintance and consensus in personality perception among freshmen.
- To explore the role of evaluative agreement in predicting consensus.
Main Methods:
- A round-robin design was employed with freshmen rating dormmates at four time points.
- Impressions were collected using trait ratings based on the Big Five personality traits.
- Open-ended descriptions were also used to assess target impressions.
Main Results:
- Consensus on the Big Five personality traits did not increase with acquaintance over the academic year.
- Agreement in liking among group members predicted agreement in trait ratings.
- This pattern held true for both trait ratings and open-ended descriptions.
- Correlations between self-judgments and peer-judgments did not increase with acquaintance.
Conclusions:
- Increased acquaintance does not inherently lead to greater consensus in personality perception.
- Agreement in liking appears to be a significant factor influencing the level of consensus achieved.
- The findings challenge the assumption that familiarity automatically breeds consensus.