ABSTRACT

Human beings are social animals and, as such, process enormous amounts of social information daily. This information can be explicit or implicit, and the processes involved may be conscious or unconscious. Some of the relevant information may be drawn top-down from memory (e.g., previously acquired representations about the attributes of different types of people), and some may be inferred or constructed (e.g., in the course of appraising a new person or situation). Some of the information may be descriptive and factual (e.g., members of that ethnic group have a different skin color to me) and some may be evaluative and affective (e.g., I prefer my group).