Can the same information be typical and atypical? How perceived typicalitymoderates assimilation and contrast in evaluative judgments

The authors investigated how the perceived typicality of context informatio n for a target category moderates whether that information produces assimil ation or contrast in the target evaluation. To manipulate context informati on, the accessibility of either positive or negative exemplars was increase d. These exemplars were pretested to seem moderately typical with respect t o the target category if participants were not provided with additional ins tructions. To manipulate perceived typicality, different instructions were provided so that participants categorized the same activated exemplar as ei ther typical or atypical. Information that was perceived as typical resulte d in assimilation effects, whereas information that was perceived as atypic al resulted in contrast effects. The results showed that the very same cont ext may result in assimilation or contrast as a function of the categorizat ion decisions that operate on the context information.