ATTRIBUTION
THEORY AND
ERRORS
SLOA
KEY VOCABULARY
• Attribution: The processes by which individuals explain the causes of behavior and
events.
• Attribution error: When our perception of causality is distorted by our needs and certain
cognitive biases.
• Defensive attribution error: Defensive attributions are made when individuals witness or
learn of a something bad happening to another person. In these situations, attributions
of responsibility to the victim for the accident will depend upon the accident's severity
and the level of personal and situational similarity between the individual and victim.
More responsibility will be attributed to the harm-doer as the outcome becomes more
severe, and as personal or situational similarity decreases.
• DIspositional factors: one's personality, character, and ability.
• Fundamental attribution error: the tendency to overestimate the dispositional and
underestimate the situational factors when explaining the behaviors of others.
• Modesty bias: Common among collectivistic cultures, the tendency to attribute
dispositional and internal factors for one's own failure and situational, uncontrollable
factors for one's own success.
• Self-serving bias: Attributing dispositional and internal factors for one's own success and
situational, uncontrollable factors for one's own failure
• Just world hypothesis: a belief that the universe is morally fair and that people are
rewarded for noble actions and punished for bad ones. This belief is the foundation of
defensive attribution error. If someone has something terrible happen to her, she most
have been doing something wrong. The implication is that "I" would never do that, so I
would have been safe.
KEY STUDIES FOR
ATTRIBUTION
• Fahr, Dobbins & Cheng (1991) - examining self-reports of 982
Chinese workers in Taiwan found that Chinese employees
rated their job performance less favorably than did their
supervisors. This modesty bias occurred relatively uniformly
across gender, various educational levels, and age groups
• Johnson et al (1964) - self-serving bias in student tutors
• Lau & Russel (1980) - on self-serving bias among football
coaches and players
• Quaquebeke & Giessner (2010) - on FAE in fouls called by
football referees.
• Ross et al's (1977) - game show study and FAE
• Walster (1966) - on defensive attribution error
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
The study of how we think
about, influence, and relate
to one another
(or how do we explain mass
suicides, prisoner abuse at
Abu Ghraib, brainwashing,
and other shocking
phenomena)
ATTITUDES INFLUENCE
ACTIONS…
Attribution Theory (Fritz
Heider, 1958) – people
usually attribute others’
behavior to either their
internal dispositions or their
external situations.
Actor-Observer Effect:
people tend to make an
attribution about behavior
depending on whether they
are performing or observing
some perform it.
DISPOSITIONAL (INTERNAL) OR
SITUATIONAL (EXTERNAL)?
•
They won only because the best athletes on the Central
State’s teams were out with injuries – talk about good
fortune.
•
•
They won because they have some of the best talent in
the country.
•
•
Internal (dispositional)
Anybody could win this region; the competition is so far
below average in comparison to the rest of the country.
•
•
External (situational)
External (situational)
They won because they put in a great deal of effort and
practice.
•
Internal (dispositional)
Our attributions
have consequences.
The following
attribution errors
lead to
overconfidence.
• Fundamental Attribution Error –
underestimating situational influences
when evaluating the behavior of
someone else.
• He swerved into my lane because he
is a jerk.
• Self-serving bias – crediting your own
successes to disposition, but attributing
your own failures to situation.
• Example: I won the game because I’m
talented. OR I failed the test because
the questions were unfair.
Modesty bias – attributing failures to
the lack of ability
• Example: I did not do well on the test
because I didn’t study like I should
have (because I’m unmotivated).
• Tends to be more prevalent in Eastern
cultures. WHY?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhkNVUZ4fVM