Empathic Accuracy

People are motivated to understand each other's psychological states as well as each other's personality traits. As a consequence, the more traditional study of accuracy in trait inference can be complemented by, and potentially benefit from, the insights provided by the more recent study of empathic accuracy. Findings in this area suggest that future research should devote more attention to (a) the history of the perceiver-target relationship; {b) the perceiver's desired future relationship with the target; (c) the possibility that perceivers have little or no "metaknowledge" regarding their own empathic ability; and {d) the possibility that, under certain conditions, perceivers might be motivated to be inaccurate, rather than accurate, in their inferences about other people's dispositions. People are not just motivated to understand each other's personality traits; they seek to understand each other's psychological states as well. For this reason, the process of getting to know other people involves more than making correct inferences about such stable and enduring dispositions as their abilities and aptitudes, their traits and temperament, and their long-term motives and goals. It also involves making correct inferences about such unstable and transient dispositions as the thoughts they are having, the feelings they are experiencing, and the more immediate, short-term goals they are pursuing. Indeed, it may be reasonable to assume that the accurate perception of states is a necessary (if not sufficient) prerequisite to the accurate perception of traits (e.g., how can I know that you are consistently morose unless I know that you are in a bad mood today, just as you were yesterday?). This article was written while the author was on sabbatical, and the support of the Department of Psychology, University of Washington, is gratefully acknowledged. Correspondence should be sent to William Ickes, Department of Psychology, University of Texas, Arlington, TX 76019-0528. Journal cf Personality 61:4, December 1993. Copyright © 1993 by Duke University Press. CCC0022-3506/93/$!.50