Similar or Different Advisors 1 Running head: SIMILAR OR DIFFERENT ADVISORS THE IMPACT OF INFORMATION FROM SIMILAR OR DIFFERENT ADVISORS ON JUDGMENT

On a daily basis, people rely on others’ advice to make judgments. In two studies, we examine the differential impacts of similarity between the source of the advice and the person making the judgment in two settings: judging others’ behavior and judging one’s own actions. We find that similarity interacts with the target of the judgment. In particular, information received from a different advisor is more heavily weighed than from a similar advisor in judging others’ actions, but information from a similar advisor is more heavily weighed than from a different advisor in judging one’s own. We provide two potential explanations for this interaction, difficulty of the judgment and informativeness of the advice. Using mediation analyses, we find evidence for both.