The Influence of Trait, Sex, and Information on Accuracy of Personality Assessment

Summary The effect of the sex of the judge, amount of information received, and the trait being evaluated on perceptual accuracy was investigated. Eighty-four judges, after receiving one of two instructional sets, predicted 16 targets' responses after receiving both minimum and maximum information. The two types of accuracy scores computed were separately analyzed by ANOVA. The results revealed that certain traits are more difficult to perceive accurately, that sex of the judge influences perceptual accuracy only on certain traits and only when predicting targets' “self-description,” and that increased information increases perceptual accuracy on some traits and decreases it on others.