Methodological Approaches to the Study of Social Event Perception

Abstract

The ecological-event-perception view of social knowing differs from the traditional cognitive approach to person perception in some fundamental ways. First, the ecological view holds that veridical information about people and their interactions is available in dynamic, ongoing stimulus events. Second, perception itself is conceptualized as a dynamic process, in which an active perceiver comes to recognize the potential of the environment through exploration and behavior These tenets provide researchers with some unique methodological challenges both when selecting stimuli for study and when assessing subjects' responses to those stimuli. This article describes a number of methodological approaches taken by researchers to deal with these problems. The advantages and disadvantages of each are discussed.