Pooled Peer Ratings, Self-Ratings, and Estimated Ratings of Therapeutic Communication and Popularity: A Relational Analysis

Two studies of therapeutic communication and popularity were conducted in the framework of Dialogic Action Therapy (Ho & Wang, 2009) that accords centrality to the bidirectional nature of interpersonal perceptions. Pooled peer ratings, self-ratings, and estimates of peer ratings were collected from 88 Chinese students in psychology who knew one another well. Self-inflation was operationally defined as the self-rating minus the peer rating, and overestimation as the estimated rating minus the peer rating, for each participant; negative values would be indicative of self-deflation or underestimation. Major results are: (a) Pooled peer ratings have superior validity over self-ratings of therapeutic communication; (b) bias effects (above-average and self-deflation) are found in ratings of popularity; (c) self-inflation and overestimation decrease as pooled peer ratings of therapeutic communication increase and, similarly, self-inflation decreases as pooled peer ratings of popularity increase. These results st...