Participants were faster at making comparisons for two liked individuals than they were  for 2 disliked individuals; they suggest that people engaged in more effortful processing strategies when making judgements about negative stimuli (e.g. there could be a processing difference). 

Alma College

Participants listed 4 people that they liked and 4 that they disliked. Similarity among the liked and disliked others was assessed using pairwise ratings on a 1-9 scale to questions such as "How similar are Liked Person 1 and Liked Person 2 to each other regarding their personalities?”. Participants also indicated how much they liked, knew, and how much time they spent with each person.

Experiment 3; All My Friends Are Alike

Alves, H., Koch, A., & Unkelbach, C. (2016). My friends are all alike—the relation between liking and perceived similarity in person perception. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 62, 103-117.

My Friends Are All Alike

Participants liked disliked individuals less, had less knowledge about them, and spent less time with them compared to liked individuals.

Exp. 3 Results: Liking, Knowledge, and Time Together (Alves et al., 2016)

Similarity was assessed using a Euclidian distance measure. They found that there was a significantly smaller mean distance between the liked individuals than there was between the disliked individuals. That is, people perceived the liked individuals to be more similar to each other. 

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