R.B. Zajonc
Feeling can come before thought.
Polish-born American social psychologist known for the mere-exposure effect, social facilitation and the primacy of affect.
Preferences can arise before conscious inference.
Who they were
Robert Zajonc showed how much of liking runs ahead of reasoning. Simply seeing something often makes us prefer it, and the presence of others reshapes how we perform. His most provocative claim was that affect can come first — we may feel before we have had time to think.
Famous books
What they left on the shelf
Terms they cared about
Ideas worth knowing
Their techniques
How the work was done
Best known as a theorist — their ideas shaped the techniques of those who followed.
Their big idea
Mere Exposure & Affective Primacy
Robert Zajonc demonstrated that repeated exposure to a stimulus increases liking for it, and argued for affective primacy: emotional preferences can form before, and independently of, conscious cognitive evaluation.
Questions in their spirit
What they’d ask you
Sit with one. Answer online, or in the app.
Carry the idea forward
Zajonc — What they’d ask you
Psipas asks you one small, honest question at a time — and builds the picture from your answers.