Abstract: The “Big Two” model in social cognition demonstrating two basic dimensions when people are making sense of individual or groups: perceived warmth (including warmth, friendliness, cooperation, morality and trustworthiness) and perceived competence (related to goal pursuit attributes, including intelligence, competence, assertiveness). Previous research also explored the relationship between warmth and competence, and found the existence of “the primacy of warmth effect”: warmth judgments are primary. As previous research indicated that context might have moderate effect on “the primacy of warmth effect” , this study carry forward to verifythat whether contextual factor may strength or weaken “the primacy of warmth effect”. Moreover, the present study used peer nomination research paradigm to explore how context influenced the “the primacy of warmth effect” from independent and interdependent perspectives which have higher ecological validity than previous research paradigm for study of “the primacy of warmth effect”. Study 1 examined the contextual effect on “the primacy of warmth effect” from the independent perspective of warmth and competence. The subjects were asked to nominate three people who met the situational requirements and rate their warmth and competence independently. One hundred and twelve university students were assigned to a 2 (context: social orientation vs. work-oriented) × 2 (dimension: warmth vs. competence) within-participants design. The results of study 1 showed “the primacy of warmth effect” significantly showed up under the social orientation context, however, disappeared in the work-oriented condition because of the weakening effect of context. Study 2 examined the effect of context on “the primacy of warmth” from the interdependent perspective of warmth and competence. Participants nominated three people and rated their warmth and competence interdependently(total points of warmth and competence were 100). One hundred and two participants were recruited in campus and assigned to a within-participants design, in which the dependent variable was context(social orientation vs. work-oriented). The results showed that, both under the social orientation and work-oriented context, there were significant “the primacy of warmth effect”; however, the size of effect of “ the primacy of warmth effect” under work-oriented context was smaller than it under the social orientation, which meant that in the work-oriented context, the weakening effect of context decreased “the primacy of warmth effect”. Taken together, the present study found that: 1) participants gave judgements in a way of “the primacy of warmth effect” under the social orientation from both the independent and interdependent perspective; 2) the salience of work-oriented context for competence was contrary to the manifestation of “the primacy of warmth effect”: from the independent perspective, the weakening effect of context makes the manifestation of “the primacy of warmth effect” impossible; From the interdependent perspective, “the primacy of warmth effect” was stronger enough and wouldn’t be restrained by the weakening effect of context. The present study suggested that context moderate “the primacy of warmth effect”, and “the primacy of warmth effect” would be weakened in work-oriented context.

Key words: the primacy of warmth, the social orientation context, work-oriented context, peer nomination test

摘要： 本研究同时从热情和能力维度独立和互依视角，采用同伴提名法考察社交与工作导向情境对“热情优先效应”的增强与削弱作用。结果发现：（1）社交导向情境下表现出明显的“热情优先效应”；（2）工作导向情境对能力的突显效应与“热情优先效应”的表现相反：在热情与能力独立视角下，情境的削弱效应使得“热情优先效应”无法表现；而在热情与能力互依视角下，“热情优先效应”则强于情境对其的削弱效应。

关键词: 热情优先效应, 社交导向情境, 工作导向情境, 同伴提名法