I’m studying for my Psychology class and need an explanation.

Week 4 – Assignment

Reality versus Perceptions

[WLO: 3] [CLOs: 4, 5, 6]

Prior to starting this activity read Chapter 8 in the course text and review the Instructor Guidance and any relevant announcements.

Our text suggests that objective reality is often significantly different from our perceived reality and is an important variable to consider when making decisions within an organization. In addition, attribution theory describes how people create the explanations for their own and others’ actions, as well as for the outcomes of applied behaviors. Based on these two premises, formulate an analysis about how the development of our realities explain human behaviors within organizations and industry that can essentially affect rational decision making.

Your paper should include the following:

• Summarize the differences between perceived and objective realities and how our perceptions negotiate what we believe to be true.
• Discuss how the following affect one’s perception of reality and rational decision making.
  • Attribution theory
  • Bias
  • Bounded rationality
  • Cognitive biases
  • Conjunction fallacy
  • Primacy and recency effects
  • Selective perceptions
  • Contrast effect, and
  • Stereotyping
• Consider using headings in your paper to organize these elements.
• Explain why, as a leader or manager of an organization, one should be aware of the bias that our perceptions may have on day to day rationale decision making.
• Identify strategies to increase awareness of potential effectors of our ability to make rational decisions based on our developed realities.

Your assignment should be a minimum of four to five double-spaced pages, and should adequately discuss the topic, demonstrate maturating self-awareness, and include at least one peer-reviewed source, in addition to your text. Use the rubric to check for thoroughness. Include frequent citations to resources. Refer to the APA: Citing Within Your Paper (Links to an external site.) resource for guidance. Apply headings to organize your writing more successfully. Review APA Style Elements (Links to an external site.) to support you in this process.

The Reality Versus Perceptions paper

• Must be four to five double-spaced pages in length (not including title and references pages) and formatted according to APA style as outlined in the Ashford Writing Center (Links to an external site.)’s APA Style (Links to an external site.)
• Must include a separate title page with the following:
  • Title of paper
  • Student’s name
  • Course name and number
  • Instructor’s name
  • Date submitted
    For further assistance with the formatting and the title page, refer to APA Formatting for Word 2013 (Links to an external site.).

• Must utilize academic voice. See the Academic Voice (Links to an external site.) resource for additional guidance.
• Must include an introduction and conclusion paragraph. Your introduction paragraph needs to end with a clear thesis statement that indicates the purpose of your paper.
  • For assistance on writing Introductions & Conclusions (Links to an external site.) as well as Writing a Thesis Statement (Links to an external site.), refer to the Ashford Writing Center resources.
• Must use at least 1 peer-reviewed source in addition to the course text.
• Must document any information used from sources in APA style as outlined in the Ashford Writing Center’s Citing Within Your Paper (Links to an external site.)
• Must include a separate references page that is formatted according to APA style as outlined in the Ashford Writing Center. See the Formatting Your References List (Links to an external site.) resource in the Ashford Writing Center for specifications.