No one has done more to establish and popularize the social cognitive perspective than Robert S. Wyer, Jr. Through his extensive research, editorial activities, and his enormous impact on students and colleagues, he has established himself as one of the most prolific scholars in the history of social psychology. This book is a tribute to his remarkable contributions. Foundations of Social Cognition provides an introduction to the major issues and current thinking in the field. It offers a compelling analysis of the underlying processes that have long been the focus of Bob Wyer's own research, including attention, perception, inference, and memory. In each of the chapters, leading scholars provide an in-depth analysis of these processes as they pertain to one or more substantive areas, including attitudes, construct accessibility, impressions of persons and groups, the interplay between affect and cognition, motivated reasoning, and stereotypes, among other topics. Each chapter traces the development of ideas in the field by combining the review and synthesis of past scholarship with the assessment of current understanding and cutting-edge trends and issues. A "must have" for scholars, researchers, and advanced students in the fields of social and cognitive psychology, as well as those interested in understanding the workings of the social mind in related fields, such as consumer, organizational, and political psychology, neuroscience, marketing, advertising, and communication.