Norms and Ambiguous Codes

Norms and Ambiguous Codes

The interpretation of a comparative code is necessarily dependant on the norm to which the object of judgment is related. For example, hearing, “Jim has been given a long jail term” suggests different jail terms to listeners if they differ in the norm for jail terms that they attribute to the speaker. Communication fails if speakers and listeners do not share, or at least coordinate, their norms. Coordination of norms is also involved when an individual uses a remembered code to reconstruct the literal detail of an experience – for example, the length of a jail sentence that is only remembered as long. Accurate performance depends on the match between the norm that is applied when the code is interpreted and the norm that supported the initial judgment. As Higgins and Lurie (1983) demonstrated in an impressive experiment, the reconstruction of the initial episode is systematically biased if the norm changes in the interval. This effect, which Higgins and Lurie termed change of standard, can yield a range of cognitive and affective responses, including the disappointment that people often experience when they meet a former teacher whom they had always remembered as brilliant (Higgins & King, 1981).

Trait labels and expressions fall into two categories: (1) relative predicates, which specify the individual’s position on an interpersonal norm; and (2) absolute predicates, which summarize an intrapersonal norm of actions or feelings on relevant occasions. The same trait name can sometimes serve in both functions. The statement that “Jane is assertive” can be understood as saying either that she is more assertive than most people or that her behavior is assertive on most occasions. In the latter interpretation, the word assertive is a category label that evokes exemplars of assertive behaviors.

Trait labels that have both an absolute and a relative sense are potentially ambiguous. This ambiguity appears to underlie the tendency of people to accept general descriptions as uniquely relevant to them, also known as the Barnum effect (Snyder, Shenkel, & Lowery, 1977). Barnum statements typically evoke both absolute and relative interpretations. For example, the statement, “You are shy in the presence of strangers” can be recognized by most people as a valid description of themselves – if shyness indicates that one is less comfortable with strangers than with familiar others. In its relative sense, of course, the description is applicable only to the minority of people who are sufficiently extreme to deserve special mention. It is the validity of the Barnum statement in its absolute sense that makes it believable to the individual, but it is the unwarranted extension to the interpersonal comparison that makes it interesting. A similar mixture of meanings was noted by Higgins and Winter (cited in Kraut & Higgins, 1984) in their analysis of trait ambiguity. They asked subjects what percentage of people possessed various personality traits (e.g., friendliness, aggressiveness) and found many traits that were assumed to apply to an absolute majority of people. It appears that the assignment of these traits involves a mixture of comparative and absolute criteria.

Trait descriptions vary in the degree to which they lend themselves to interpersonal and intrapersonal interpretation. For example, the expression, “He is not very intelligent” evokes an interpersonal norm, but the statement “I like Coke” has an intrapersonal reference (more than other beverages, not necessarily more than other people). The difference has a predictable effect on the impact that information about others has on self-description. Whether a person is more or less intelligent than her reference group influences how intelligent she judges herself to be (Davis, 1966), but whether a person consumes more or less of a drink than her reference group does not influence her expressed liking for the drink (Hansen & Donoghue, 1977; Nisbett, Borgida, Crandall, & Reed, 1976).