When it's bad to be friendly and smart:the desirability of sociability and competence depends on morality

Landy, Justin and Piazza, Jared Raymond and Goodwin, Geoffrey (2016) When it's bad to be friendly and smart:the desirability of sociability and competence depends on morality. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 42 (9). pp. 1272-1290. ISSN 0146-1672

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Abstract

Morality, sociability, and competence are distinct dimensions in person perception. We argue that a person’s morality informs us about their likely intentions, whereas their competence and sociability inform us about the likelihood that they will fulfill those intentions. Accordingly, we hypothesized that whereas morality would be considered unconditionally positive, sociability and competence would be highly positive only in moral others, and would be less positive in immoral others. Using exploratory factor analyses, Studies 1a and 1b distinguished evaluations of morality and sociability. Studies 2 to 5 then showed that sociability and competence are evaluated positively contingent on morality—Study 2 demonstrated this phenomenon, while the remaining studies explained it (Study 3), generalized it (Studies 3-5), and ruled out an alternative explanation for it (Study 5). Study 6 showed that the positivity of morality traits is independent of other morality traits. These results support a functionalist account of these dimensions of person perception.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/3200/3207
Subjects:
?? MORALITY SOCIABILITYCOMPETENCEPERSON PERCEPTION DIMENSIONAL MODELS SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY ??
ID Code:
79801
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
01 Jun 2016 10:28
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
17 Sep 2023 01:52