In your Interactive Notebook: Unit.Day 2.1
Attribution Theory
Unit 2 – Social Psychology: ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS: How do people influence each other?
How do psychological factors affect decision-making?
ON YOUR DESK: 1) reading journal
2) Daily commentary notebook
3)
•
Today’s OBJECTIVE(S) -- WRITE THESE DOWN:
– I can apply my
understanding of
attribution theory to real
life scenarios
• DAILY
COMMENTARY
– How do you know
when something is
your fault? Someone
else’s fault?
• TURN IN:
– Place Discussion Questions in box
Today’s Discussion Questions
• Make sure your name is on the questions you
submit, and that your question is unique.
– This will be factored into your grade.
DQ’S, Updates & Reminders
• BIG PICTURE
– Friday Quizzes
• September 13 & September 20
– Projects Due
• Reflection Paper: Why do
good people do bad
things?
– Unit Exam:
• Friday, September 27th
• BEFORE YOU LEAVE:
– Place Daily Commentary
Notebooks on Center Table
• Exams: I have them all.
Tonight’s Homework:
– RJ 2.2
• Griggs 289-303
• Myers 730-738
Unit 2: Social Psychology
• ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS:
– How do people influence each other
– How do psychological factors influence individual
decision-making
• Minority Studies:
– Unit 1: Isms, Group Identity, & a Theory of Oppression
– Taught within the Social Psychology Unit
– Will start next week
Focuses in Social Psychology
“We cannot live for ourselves alone.”
Herman Melville
Social psychology scientifically studies
how we think about, influence, and
relate to one another.
5
Social Thinking
1. Does his absenteeism signify illness,
laziness, or a stressful work atmosphere?
2. Was the horror of 9/11 the work of crazed
evil people or ordinary people corrupted by
life events?
Social thinking involves thinking about others,
especially when they engage in doing things
that are unexpected.
6
Attributing Behavior to Persons or to
Situations
http://www.stedwards.edu
Attribution Theory: Fritz
Heider (1958) suggested
that we have a tendency
to give causal
explanations for
someone’s behavior,
often by crediting either
the situation or the
person’s disposition.
Fritz Heider
7
Attributing Behavior to Persons or to
Situations
A teacher may wonder whether a child’s
hostility reflects an aggressive personality
(dispositional attribution) or is a reaction to stress
or abuse (a situational attribution).
http://www.bootsnall.org
Dispositions are enduring
personality traits. So, if Joe is
a quiet, shy, and introverted
child, he is likely to be like
that in a number of
situations.
8
Fundamental Attribution Error
The tendency to overestimate the impact of
personal disposition and underestimate the
impact of the situations in analyzing the
behaviors of other people leads to the
fundamental attribution error.
9
Effects of Attribution
How we explain someone’s behavior affects how
we react to it.
10
Actions Can Affect Attitudes
Why do actions affect attitudes? One
explanation is that when our attitudes and
actions are opposed, we experience tension.
This is called cognitive dissonance.
To relieve ourselves of this tension we bring our attitudes closer to our actions
(Festinger, 1957).
11
Actor-observer bias
• Basically another term to describe
fundamental attribution error
– We tend to ascribe our own behavior to
situational factors and the behavior of others to
character flaws
Internal v. External Locus of Control
• Internal Locus
– Personal decisionmaking determines what
happens in a person’s
life
• I am responsible for
everything
• EXTERNAL LOCUS
– Situational factors
determine everything
• It’s not my fault
Self-serving bias
• We choose to remember and emphasize
information about ourselves that makes us
look/feel better than we are
– Why did I ace the test?
• I am awesome
– Why did I fail the test?
• The teacher did a bad job
Just World Phenomenon
• people have a strong desire or need to believe
that the world is an orderly, predictable, and
just place
– Therefore, people tend to rationalize what they
see in the world as being fair
• The wealthy probably worked harder
• The man who was murdered was probably into some
bad stuff and had it coming
Power of Individuals
Non-violent fasts and
appeals by Gandhi led
to the independence of
India from the British.
Margaret Bourke-White/ Life Magazine. © 1946 Time Warner, Inc.
The power of social
influence is enormous,
but so is the power of
the individual.
Gandhi
16
SKITS!
• Work in groups of 5.
• Each group will develop and perform a short skit
that demonstrates the real life significance of one
of the following:
–
–
–
–
Fundamental Attribution Error (2 groups)
Self-serving bias
False Consensus effect
Just World Phenomenon
• 10 minutes to plan the skit
– Maximum 3 minutes per skit
Skit Rubric
Students use
planning time
efficiently
5
Each student has a
role in the skit
Skit clearly and
accurately conveys
the concept
5
5
Performance is
professional and
each student can
answer questions
5
DQ’S, Updates & Reminders
• BIG PICTURE
– Friday Quizzes
• September 13 & September 20
– Projects Due
• Reflection Paper: Why do
good people do bad
things? 1 page essay
– Unit Exam:
• Friday, September 27th
• Tonight’s Homework:
– RJ 2.2
• Griggs 289-303
• Myers 730-738