Abstract: Spontaneous trait inferences are trait inferences that occur unintentionally, almost effortlessly, and usually without awareness. Recently, spontaneous trait inferences become an important topic of research for social cognition. In the past few yeas, a new research trend has been developed to describe the cognition phenomenon of spontaneous trait inferences. By examining the impact of implicit stereotypes on spontaneous trait inferences, researchers gained access to a new level of understanding on it. They provided evidences for the influence of automatically activated stereotypes, including occupation stereotypes, race stereotype and gender stereotypes on the process of spontaneous trait inferences. After a brief introduction of the theoretical basis for researchers to explore the stereotype effects on spontaneous trait inferences, the present paper systematically reviewed some studies related to this topic. In the end, three prospects for the future research were pointed out.

Key words: spontaneous trait inference, implicit stereotype, stereotype effect, recognition probe paradigm