Halo effect

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The halo effect [ ˈheɪ.loʊ ɛˈfɛkt ] ( listen ? / I ) (from English halo , halo ) is a cognitive distortion known from social psychology . One inferred from known characteristics of a person to unknown ones. Audio file / audio sample

Example: Person A finds person B likeable . Person A also generally likes people who are generous . If the halo effect occurs, person A will now assume that person B is being generous without having any indication of it.

With a positive distortion one speaks of the halo effect , with a negative one the devil's horn effect .

In color perception, the term is also used to describe a special case of simultaneous contrast .

effect

The halo effect was first observed by Frederic L. Wells in 1907. The term was introduced by Edward Lee Thorndike in the 20th century .

The effect is understood to mean the tendency to incorrectly perceive factually independent or only moderately correlating properties of people or things as connected. Individual characteristics of a person (e.g. attractiveness, disability, social status) create a positive or negative impression that "outshines" the further perception of the person and thus disproportionately influences the overall impression. A typical example of a halo effect is when a teacher rates the performance of a good-looking and friendly student higher than it is objectively compared to the performance of other students. The name can also trigger certain associations and a corresponding halo effect.

The effect often occurs when the person being assessed is characterized by prominent, distinctive characteristics or behavior. The influence of the halo effect is particularly strong when the assessor attaches particular importance to a behavior or a characteristic and overrated it accordingly. A lack of motivation and a lack of information on the part of the assessors can increase the effect.

Research on the halo effect

There are a number of psychological experiments on this effect. The halo effect was particularly described by Thorndike and Gordon Allport . During the First World War, Thorndike investigated how superiors judge their subordinates. For his study, he asked officers to rate their soldiers according to certain criteria: intelligence, physical condition, leadership skills, character, etc. While some “super soldiers” received excellent marks in almost all areas, others remained below average in almost all areas. Apparently the officers automatically trusted a soldier with a handsome face and good posture to shoot with precision, clean his shoes and even play the harmonica.

Avoidance

For an assessment that is as objective as possible , assessment errors such as halo effects must be minimized. This can be done, for example, by raising awareness of the halo effect. The aim is to learn to better assess this source of error. Another countermeasure in the case of several persons to be assessed at the same time is to evaluate characteristic by characteristic. H. the first feature for everyone to be assessed, then the second, and so on. This prevents the assessor from orienting himself on an overall impression.
A teacher can do this when correcting exams by "correcting them sideways": first, problem 1 is corrected for all students, then problem 2, and so on. Thus, an extraordinary performance (in a positive or in a negative sense) by a student on a single task has less of an effect on tasks to be corrected subsequently by the same student.

Since the halo effect is promoted by the time pressure in the decision, a decision should not have to be made under time pressure.

Special applications

Surveys

The halo effect can also occur in a questionnaire and lead to an answer bias . Individual questions can "outshine" others. For example, if the previous question triggers certain thoughts or feelings, this may affect the answer to the next question. The halo effect must therefore be taken into account when constructing a questionnaire. The halo effect is used specifically for trick questions .

Entertainment industry

In the entertainment industry, the term halo effect is also used for influencing the perception of the consumption of related content products. Let us rate e.g. For example, if a film is positive, our perception of sequels is also positively distorted (Lieberman, 2002).

management

Phil Rosenzweig has examined how the success of companies is rated in the trade press. When a company achieves high profits, the characteristic features of the company are presented as success factors. If the same company later slips into the red due to a changed market environment or tougher competition, the same characteristics are seen from a different perspective and used as the cause of the decline in sales.

For example, the former success factor “flat hierarchies and freedom of choice for employees” is suddenly described as a “wild west culture” in which everyone did their own thing. The lack of a planning superstructure resulted in chaos in which the employees had no time for efficiency, cost reduction and teamwork. So here the current business result is the characteristic that outshines further perception.

Studies that aim to find the factors for successful corporate management are often full of deceptions, despite scientific analysis of extensive initial data, because many authors forego an independent data collection and instead fall back on easily available sources of information such as newspaper articles or specialist literature that are already under the Halo Effect.

See also

literature

  • Joseph P. Forgas, Dieter Frey: Social Interaction and Communication - An Introduction to Social Psychology, Halo Effects , p. 61 ff., BeltzPVU, 1999, ISBN 978-3-621-27145-5 .
  • EL Thorndike: A constant error in psychological rating . Journal of Applied Psychology (1920), 4, 25-29.
  • Al Lieberman: The Entertainment Marketing Revolution . Published by Financial Times Prentice Hall, New Jersey (2002). ISBN 0-13-029350-4 .
  • Phil Rosenzweig: The Halo Effect: How Managers Can Be Deceived . Gabal, Offenbach 2008. ISBN 3-89749-789-1 (deals with the influence of the halo effect on the assessment of management decisions)

swell

  1. ^ Definition and example from Daniel Kahneman : Thinking, fast and slow , Allen Lane Paperback, ISBN 978-1-84614-606-0 , p. 82.
  2. ↑ Werner Kroeber-Riel and Peter Weinberg: Consumer behavior . 8th edition. Vahlen Verlag, Munich 2003, p. 310.
  3. ^ Mark Schweizer: Cognitive illusions in court , Hofeffekt (halo effect) , Zurich 2005.
  4. ↑ Manfred Schmitt, Beauty and Talent: Investigations on the Disappearance of the Halo Effect , Journal for Experimental and Applied Psychology 1992, 475–492, 493.
  5. ↑ ER Igou, WA van Tilburg: Ahead of others in the authorship order: names with middle initials appear Earlier in author lists of academic articles in psychology. In: Frontiers in psychology. Volume 6, 2015, p. 469, doi : 10.3389 / fpsyg.2015.00469 , PMID 25954226 , PMC 4404737 (free full text).
  6. ↑ a b c Qualification and Mutation System in the Army p. 53 - Regulations 51.13de of the Swiss Army.
  7. ↑ Phil Rosenzweig: The Halo Effect: How Managers Can Be Deceived . GABAL, 2012, ISBN 978-3-89749-789-4 , pp. 234 .
  8. ↑ Rosenzweig: The Halo Effect: How Managers Are Deceived , p. 72
  9. ↑ Lexicon of Psychology: Halo Effect . Spektrum.de. Accessed March 17, 2018: "The occurrence of the halo effect is encouraged if the judgment is made particularly quickly."