Imagine attending a college graduation ceremony and the man giving the keynote address strolls with hunched shoulders up to the podium. His hair has dreadlocks and stands on end in several places. His clothes look as if he quickly picked them out of the bargain bin of the local Goodwill Store. He is wearing a striped sports jacket, plaid golf pants and white, athletic socks with his bright, Bronco orange Crocs. Based solely on this information, will the audience listen intently and gain inspiration from the knowledge this man has to impart? Is it possible for his words to have the same impact on this particular audience as a speaker who marched confidently up to the podium, his head held high, his hair neatly combed, his suit meticulously tailored, and shoes polished to a glossy shine? Most likely not because human nature takes over and first impressions form.
First impressions are powerful and can be difficult to overcome. Research shows first impressions form within a few moments of an encounter and may take many additional encounters to overcome (Tongue, 2007). Observers use many different criteria, such as personal beliefs, verbal cues, non-verbal cues, and aesthetic cues, to form first impressions. However, content has little to do with the impact of a first impression. Appearance has the most impact on a first impression. In fact, only 7% of an impression comes from the actual content of a message. Another 35% of the impression comes from the delivery of the message; tone, inflection and pitch. This leaves, a very large percentage, approximately 55%, of an impression forming based on visualization, how one appears (Jeavons, 2007). Imagine appearance being the deciding factor rather than knowledge. This is h...
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...s” is one of many tools that can be used to gain the necessary understanding of human behavior to be successful in setting aside first impressions and working toward a common goal.
Works Cited
Babcock, M. K. (1989). The dramaturgic perspective: Implications for the study of person perception. European Journal of Social Psychology, 19(4), 297-309. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.
Clark, D. R. (2010). First Impressions. Retrieved Sept 9, 2011 from http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/leader/impress.html
Clark, D. R. (2011). Leadership and Human Behavior. Retrieved Sept 9, 2011 from http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/leader/leadhb.html
Jeavons, S. (2007). Take Command of the Room With Strong Body Language. American Salesman, 52(4), 28. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.
Tongue, S. (2007). Every day brings a first impression. Nursing Standard, 22(4), 62-63. Retrieved from EBSCOhost
Many people in life, present themselves to society in a manner in which they want to be seen. Maybe an employee wants to be seen as a hard working person, so when the supervisor is around, they might act busy. Or sometimes, when a person wants to be accepted, they present certain attributes to make them look good. Erving Goffman believed that “we present a certain self or face when in the presence of others”. He called these actions the key concepts of dramaturgy. The movie Grown Ups provides many examples of these key concepts.
Craven, R., & Hirnle, C. (2009). Fundamentals of nursing: Human health and function (6th ed.). Philadelphia: Lippincott.
Taylor, C., Lillis, C., LeMone, P., & Lynn, P. (2011, 7th edition). Fundamentals of Nursing. (pg. 45-46). China. Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins.
Americans sometimes have trouble making first impressions.Although many factors can affect someone's first impression, Statistic show that 55 percent of first impressions is actually about appearance and body language. Which means depending on how someones day is going can potentially affect their first impression.How people first present themselves the first time they meet can change they way someone may view their character.
First impressions are created by a composite of signals given off by a new experience (Flora, 2004). The judgment of these impressions depends on the observer and the person being observed (Flora, 2004). When you meet someone for the first time it takes about three seconds to be evaluated by the observer (Mind Tools, 1996-2011,). During this time the person forms an opinion about you based on your appearance, your body language, your demeanor, and how you dress (Mind Tools, 2996-2011,). Impressions are important to us because they are impossible to be reserved and the set the tone for all the relationships that follow (Mind Tools, 1996-2011).
Potter, P. & Perry, A. (2009). Fundamentals of Nursing (7th ed.) St. Louis: Mosby Elsevier, 1029-1084.
Any communication interaction involves two major components in terms of how people are perceived: verbal, or what words are spoken and nonverbal, the cues such as facial expressions, posture, verbal intonations, and other body gestures. Many people believe it is their words that convey the primary messages but it is really their nonverbal cues. The hypothesis for this research paper was: facial expressions directly impact how a person is perceived. A brief literature search confirmed this hypothesis.
Potter, P. A., & Perry, A. G. (2005). Fundamentals of nursing (6th ed.). St. Louis, MO: Mosby,
art and science of nursing care (6th ed). Philadelphia, PA, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a Wolter Kluwer business.
“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.” William Shakespeare may have written these words in As You Like It in 1600, but Erving Goffman truly defined the phrase with his dramaturgical theory. Dramaturgical analysis is the study of social interaction in terms of theatrical performance. Unlike actors though, who use a script telling them how to behave in every scene, real life human interactions change depending upon the social situation they are in. We may have an idea of how we want to be perceived, and may have the foundation to make that happen. But we cannot be sure of every interaction we will have throughout the day, having to ebb and flow with the conversations and situations as they happen.
Taylor, Pepau, & Sears (2000) explain that first impressions are extremely important because they are the initial idea that an individual forms about another individual and determine whether they decide to pursue any type of relationship. People tend to form impressions of each other relatively quickly and use minimal information such as the gender of the o...
Dalai Lama said “Sometimes one creates a dynamic impression by saying something, and sometimes one creates as significant an impression by remaining silent.” (Dalai Lama, n.d.) Some people are of the belief that first impressions are lasting and hard to overcome if they are bad. As a leader a person can’t judge solely on the basis of a first impression nor can they ignore them. A lot can be gathered from first impressions and that knowledge should be kept while obtaining a better understanding of that individual. In the class example an extroverted and introverted scenario of John was given. Let’s explore how first impressions strike people, take a look at how the picture of John changed from one reading to the next. Lastly, looking to see if the picture of John in the mind’s eye changed if the scenarios were read in a different order, introvert to extrovert?
How first impressions are formed has been a subject of interest by many researchers in the area of psychology.
In every first encounter with another person, we make judgments about them almost immediately based on a few simple factors. In the first few seconds upon meeting a new acquaintance we will take in and subconsciously process their age, choice in style of clothes, hair, their posture and the way that they carry themselves. In that short time we will form subconscious opinions about them based on our own personal prejudices and bias. After the first initial visual judgment we generally move into the physical greeting.
Potter, P. A., & Perry, A. G. (2009). Fundamentals of nursing (Seventh ed.). St. Louis, Mo.: Mosby Elsevier.