ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a general overview of the social cognition framework. It focuses on social cognition from something of a bird's eye view and to address general principles. The chapter outlines three general themes of social cognition. These themes pertain to: the limitations of processing capacity, and how the amount of processing depends on motivation and capacity; the interplay of stimulus information and prior knowledge; and the interplay of automatic and controlled processes. Cognitive processes differ with respect to the load they impose on processing capacity. Cognitive processes can differ with respect to their automaticity and controllability. The interplay of stimuli from the situation and prior knowledge is similarly present in the subsequent processing that individuals engage in. The task of interpreting a social situation, of making sense of and responding to one's social environment, comprises a variety of highly interconnected sub-tasks.
