ABSTRACT
ALTHOUGH considerable research attention has been directed to understanding the various baises and shortcomings that plague social decision makers (Kahneman, Slovic, & Tversky, 1982; Nisbett & Ross, 1980), relatively little work has been done to explain how persons acquire the social information they process. Snyder’s work on hypothesis testing (see Snyder, 1981, for review) has revealed that when persons have a hypothesis they wish to test about another, they tend to ask questions that will confirm the existence of the hypothesized trait rather than ask questions that disconfirm its existence. However, Troupe and Bassok (1982) found that under certain conditions persons seek diagnostic information rather than confirmatory information about others. In addition to this line of research is a study by Major (1980) that revealed that persons utilize relatively little information made available to them when they are asked to make attributions about others.
