INTERPERSONAL RELATIONS AND GROUP PROCESSES On the Importance of Cognitive Evaluation as a Determinant of Interpersonal Attraction

Three studies examined a model of attraction in which the cognitive evaluation of the target individual was the primary determinant of interpersonal attraction. In Study 1, the cognitive evaluation of the target individual mediated the influence of attitude similarity on interpersonal attraction. In Study 2, a path analysis revealed significant indirect effects of (a) similarity on cognitive evaluation via the valence of information implied by attitudes and (b) the valence of information implied by attitudes on attraction via cognitive evaluation of the target. Study 3 provided empirical and theoretical support for the uniqueness of interpersonal attraction from cognitive evaluation. The implications of these data for existing attraction theory are discussed, and a new model of interpersonal attraction is described. One of the most robust phenomena in social psychology is the similarity–attraction effect (Byrne, 1997). Across a variety of populations and for countless different manipulations of similarity, increased similarity to a target is associated with interpersonal attraction to the target (hereafter we refer to this phenomenon as the similarity effect). The similarity effect has been observed wit