All the subjects were exposed to the same 20 minutes of lecture and interaction with the new instructor. However, the group of subjects who expected a warm person rated the instructor as more considerate, sociable, humorous, good natured, informal, and humane than the subjects in the group who had expected a cold person. Thus, it is clear that motives and expectations color our experiences. To some extent, we see what we want to see or what we expect to see. This subjectivity in perception turns out to explain a variety of behavioral tendencies that would otherwise leave us perplexed.
Human subjectivity is precisely what the scientific method is designed to counteract.
In using the scientific approach, psychologists strive to make their observations as objective as possible. In some respects, overcoming subjectivity is what science is all about. Left to their own subjective experience, people might still believe that the earth is flat and that the sun revolves around it. Thus, psychologists are committed to the scientific approach because they believe it is the most reliable route to accurate knowledge. Now that you have been introduced to the text's organizing themes, let's turn to an example of how psychological research can be applied to the challenges of everyday life.