I should clarify - though a lot of people didn't figure out that it was specifically my nose that had changed, most people with whom I had any semi-regular interaction noticed that something was different about me, and commented to that effect (and of course there were certain groups - flatmates, lovers, my anatomy teacher - who immediately realized it was a nose job). The lesson I took away from that was that while people do evaluate your attractiveness when they see you, mostly they don't cache much more than a general positive or negative impression of your appearance. Thus when something changes for the better, they think "Ey looks better" but can't quite place why. I should have realized this before - the number of times I've thought someone looked different but not been able to place why defies counting.

In light of that, I would say it was definitely partly due to the reactions of others (positive without knowing why) and partly due to being able to observe a material change myself, but as to their proportions I have only speculation. As a hunch, I would guess that the latter was a larger factor - my self-evaluations after the settling-in period were pretty close to what I imagined they'd be, when I was visualizing myself with a new nose before the operation.