The impact of perceiver attitudes on outcome-biased dispositional inferences

Three experiments examined the influence of perceivers' attitudes on their outcome-biased trait inferences. Participants supporting or opposing mandat ory teacher resting read about the attempts of a teacher to pass a competen cy test. In ail experiments, participants supportive of mandatory teacher t esting made outcome-biased inferences about the teacher, judging her to be more intelligent and competent when she passed the test than when she faile d, even though her performance on both tests was held constant. Participant s opposed to mandatory testing made inferences about the teacher that were not outcome-biased. Experiment 3 showed that participants' beliefs about th e diagnosticity of the competency test mediated the biasing effects of outc omes on trait inferences. The motivational bases of outcome-biased inferenc es are discussed.