Information about a target person’s appearance, behavior, trait, and demographic attributes was searched by 120 participants (half male, half female) while forming an impression under one of four search goals: deciding whether or not to choose the target person as a friend, date, coworker, or employee. The hypothesis that trait attributes would be searched most and appearance attributes least in all goal conditions except the date condition was confirmed (p <.001). Although no attribute preference was evident in the date condition, men searched more appearance information than women (especially in the date condition) and women searched more trait information than men (p<.03). The lessor sampling of appearance attributes was due in part to the inhibiting effects of negative appearance information which constrained further search activity within the appearance attribute category (p<.001). These search patterns were discussed in terms of contemporary models of information search, recall of person memories and impression formation.