Says who?: Epistemic Authority Effects in Social Judgement.

This chapter features the concept of ascribed epistemic authority (Kruglanski, 1989) offered as a unique perspective on source effects in social judgment. In contrast to prior approaches that viewed the source of communication as external to the self, we assume that both the self and external sources may be assigned different degrees of epistemic authority in different domains and that this determines how individuals process information, make decisions, and undertake actions. The present framework traces the socio-developmental aspects of epistemic authority assignments and considers individual differences in the distribution of authority assignments across sources. From this perspective, we claim a central role in human judgment to the information’s source, and the assessment of its epistemic authority is seen to constitute an essential preliminary phase in individuals’ approach to information.