Benito, a psychology student, has had an overall negative impression of his psychology professor. As a consequence, during the end-of-term appraisal, he rates his professor low on all performance criteria. Which of the following rater errors has Benito committed?

A) Horns

B) Leniency

C) Central tendency

D) Contrast

E) Strictness

The correct answer is A) Horns.

Explanation:

TThe Horn effect is a cognitive bias that can be understood as the tendency that individuals have to form complete opinions of others based solely on a particular negative trait of the other person.

For example:

When Dave and Laura were introduced last Saturday, Laura criticized Dave over his shoes; she told him that his shoes looked very dirty and giggled. After that, Laura was completely neutral to dave the whole evening.

The next morning, Dave's friend Josh asked him about his opinion on Laura and he said: I didn't like her. She just seems like an awful person.

In this particular case, Benito has had an overall negative impression of his psychology professor. As a consequence he rates his professor low on all performance criteria.

The rater error that Benito has committed is called A) Horns, or the horns effect.