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- Cheerleader effect (2) (remove)
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The cheerleader effect describes the phenomenon, where pictures of faces are rated to be more attractive when presented as part of a group, than when presented in isolation. This study employs electroencephalography (EEG) and event-related potentials (ERP) to explore the origins of the cheerleader effect. We found significant ERP differences which suggest that the cheerleader effect is not caused by perceptual differences, but instead through social cues which distort the decision-making process that gives rise to subjects’ trait judgments.
The well-substantiated “cheerleader effect” proposes that individuals in groups are perceived to be more attractive compared to when they are presented in isolation. With the aim of finding out whether this effect is applicable to additional dimensions of social perception, we investigated attractiveness, salary, vanity and intelligence judgements in two methodologically distinct experiments. We could not detect differences in ratings between the isolated and group presentations of individuals in a between-subjects design but found evidence supporting the existence of the cheerleader and the “banker effect” in the within-subjects design. Besides an increase in attractiveness, replicating the cheerleader effect, individuals were as well perceived to be earning higher salaries when surrounded by others, thus establishing the banker effect and further emphasising the actual impact of group context on trait judgements. The supplementary finding that both effects do not occur simultaneously within the same person creates new pathways for identifying their underlying causes and deriving possible explanations.