The Weight of First Impressions

            The Customs Program here at Haverford has really opened my eyes to how important first impressions are. Sometimes it feels as though I already know everyone on campus, or at least that I can recognize everyone, because the student population is so small. But when I applied to be a Peer Awareness Facilitator last year, I realized that I didn’t know or even recognize most of the members of the PAF Committee who would be reading over my application, interviewing me, and, hopefully, accepting me into the program. All of this meant that my partner and I, through our application and interactions with them during the interview, would have to give a strong and positive first impression. I don’t think that any of the committee members knew me or even of me, either, thus they had to base my entire personality off of that one interaction.

            My partner and I must have given a pretty good impression, considering that we got into the program and are PAFs this year. What brought this whole idea of the weight of first impression to mind was recently applying to be an Honor Council Orienteer, another position on a Customs team, for next year. This time, things were a little different. I had definitely met and interacted with the majority of the members of the HCO Committee. While I wasn’t exactly friends with any of them, I’m sure that the members who already knew me had formed an impression of me prior to this experience. Not only would I have to take into consideration my application and the interview, but also whatever first impression or further impressions they had already formed about me. And for the couple of members who may have had no idea who I was, I would have to “wow” them and hope that the way I was presenting myself would lead to a good first impression.

            As my partner put it after our interview, “We’ve done all we can. They’ve read our applications and interviewed us, and if they don’t like us, then they don’t like us.” We put our greatest efforts forward to attempt to make a good first impression for the members who didn’t know us. For the members with whom we were acquainted, we hoped that they had already formed a good impression of us, or that our application and interview would change any negative impressions from a prior experience.

            We make and form first impressions everyday, and adjust our impressions as we gain new information through our social interactions. Going through processes like applications and interviews helps me become aware of how much first impressions really matter. Whether I get a job or position depends on the positivity or negativity of the impression I make, as well as the strength of that impression. An interesting aspect about an interview or application is that the applicant has the opportunity to put his or her best self forward to show the interviewer or person reading the application that he or she is a wonderful person and qualified for the position. Because there is this aspect of control, one would not typically behave in a negative way or show aspects of his or her personality that may be undesirable. And while the impression we make depends on how the other individual perceives us, I think that in a situation like this, we have more control over the positivity of the impression.

            In regular, everyday interactions, we have a degree of this control in that most of us try to be friendly and polite so that the people we interact with maintain a good impression of us. However, it is harder to control our daily behavior than it is to shape our behavior during an interview. In an interview, I usually have the mindset that whatever I say or do has to reflect a positive image of myself as a person or as a candidate. Going about my daily life, there are so many more situations that I encounter in which I am not as conscious about presenting myself in a way that would leave a lasting, positive impression. I am in a more natural habitat and I do not feel the pressure I would feel during an interview. This also means that there may be more opportunity for people to form a negative impression of me—there is more range, since my behaviors aren’t necessarily catered to forming the best impression possible all throughout the day.

            Needless to say, since it is extremely hard to alter first impressions, it would be a bad situation if one of the PAF or HCO committee members had formed a negative impression of me before their respective application processes. Even if they had only observed or interacted with me in one situation in which they viewed my behavior negatively, that would be the only information they would have to form an impression of me. And since this information is negative, and people tend to pay more attention to negativity, it would have a greater impact on the committee’s perception of me as a person, no matter how great I may portray myself in the application or how well my interview goes. As well, because of the perseverance effect, new information that the committee would gain about me during the application process would not likely change their initial impression. First impressions, whether they are made on a day-to-day basis or on a special occasion like an interview, really matter.