After reading Yolanda’s blog “People believe what they want to believe”, I felt the same as selective perception is so prevalent among the process that people make judgments towards one thing or a person based on what they self-believe to be right. Due to the complete ignorance of opposing viewpoints, the shortcuts of the decision may draw unwarranted conclusions from an ambiguous situation. The bias caused by people perceiving a situation on the basis of their own interests, background, experiences and attitudes, lies in the way of making objective interpretations.

People’s tendency towards selective perception always happens during the hiring process within the organization. Sometimes managers tend to think female applicants are less competitive than male since the existed common sense believes that women are more household-orientated, while men are more work-orientated to earn money to support families. People tend to think the applicants with higher level of education are more qualified to the job for the reason that they may have a broader range of knowledge that they could apply to real use. Although selective perception allows us to make quick predictions about a person. Due to lack in a time of contacts, selectively interpreting distracts us from making a correct judgment.

In order to solve this issue, people need to be aware of the fact that getting to know a person demands time. Here are some tips: 1.Do not let first impression or your past experience fools you; 2. Accept the possibility of exception and do not make arbitrary decisions based on prejudice and bias; 3. Considering all aspects of a person before you make any judgment.

*Word Count: 266

References:

Yuyang Zhou, “People Believe What They Want to Believe,” https://blogs.ubc.ca/yuyangz/2017/02/02/people-believe-what-they-want-to-believe/, Feb 2, 2017.

Puja Lalwani, “A Simple Explanation of Selective Perception for Better Understanding,” http://www.buzzle.com/articles/selective-perception.html, Oct 19, 2016.