EFFECTS OF SOCIAL VALUE ORIENTATION ON EXPECTING AND LEARNING OTHERS ORIENTATIONS

The influence of an individual's own social value orientation on the o rientation expected from others and on the learning of others' social orientations was examined. The subjects (N = 148) were classified acco rding to their own social value orientation. The orientations they gen erally expected from others were assessed as well. Each subject learne d the choices of five other persons, representing the orientations alt ruism, cooperation, equality, individualism, and competition. With res pect to subjects' expectations of others' orientations the triangle hy pothesis was not fully supported: only individualists expected their o rientation in high frequencies. The false consensus hypothesis receive d more support. Generally an orientation was expected more frequently by subjects who themselves had that particular orientation than by sub jects with other orientations. With regard to the learning of others' orientations support was found for the predictions derived from the tr iangle and the false consensus hypothesis. Cooperators and individuali sts were the best overall learners, followed by egalitarian and maximi n subjects, and at the lowest level competitors. In addition, nearly e very orientation was learned better by subjects who had that orientati on than by subjects with a different orientation.