Attribution theory Flashcards
What are attributions?
- Inferences about cause of behaviour (or events)
* How we explain behaviour
What is the simple attributional model?
It has two components – stability (whether it was due to stable or unstable causes) and locus of causality (whether it’s due to individual/internal or situational/external causes)
E.g., exam failure
Individual and stable - ability
Individual and unstable - motivation
Situation and stable - task difficulty
Situation and unstable - luck
What do attributions allow us to do?
Heider 1958
o Predict future behaviours
o Influence events –> if we have a causal explanation for why something happened, this can help us change that behaviour or event in the future
When do we make spontaneous attributions?
• Happens all the time, but particularly for some events
- Search for cause elicited by:
- Unexpected events
- Non-attainment rather than attainment of goal
If an event or behaviour is novel or unexpected, we have a desire to understand the cause of that. This allows us to adapt or understand in the future. With failure we want to understand the causes of that failure in order to avoid that failure in the future.
What are the four classic attribution theories?
- Theory of naïve psychology (Heider, 1958)
- Correspondent inference theory (John & Davis, 1965)
- Covariation model (Kelley, 1967, 1972)
- Attributional model of achievement (Weiner, 1979, 1985)
What is the theory of naive psychology?
Heider 1958
• People look for what motivates behaviour –> we know that our own behaviour is motivated, so we assume that other people’s behaviour isn’t just random
• Construction of causal theories to predict & control world –> we can’t predict and control things unless we understand how they work
• Preference for unchanging or stable explanations –> they are more useful to us because they can be generalised to different situations
His basic thesis was that people attribute behavioral outcomes to dispositional (internal) causes or situational (external) causes.
What is correspondent inference theory?
Jones & Davis (1965)
• The perceivers infer that an individual’s behaviour is caused by (i.e., corresponds to) their traits or personality
o We look for stable, underlying qualities in others e.g., Mr Men characters, Mr nosey will behave in a nosey manner because he has a nosey personality
According to correspondent inference theory, when are the inferences particularly likely?
Inferences particularly likely if behaviour:
o Freely chosen/intentional
o Produced unusual/non-common effects
o Socially undesirable
o Has direct impact on us – hedonic relevance
o Seemed intended to affect us – personalism
What is the problem with corespondent inference theory?
Gilbert & Malone (1995)
The problem with this theory is that people’s intentions can be very difficult to assess in real life. This can lead us to infer traits when we actually shouldn’t.
• Inferring traits automatic & effortless
• Situational correction not automatic, but effortful & happens later
• We are biased toward inferring dispositions
What does the covariation model show?
(Kelley, 1967, 1972)
Covariation Model is an attribution theory in which a person tries to explain others’ or her certain behavior through multiple observations.
In the covariation model, individuals identify factors that covary with behaviour and assign the factor a causal role.
What are the three types of information (factors) that are assessed?
(Kelley, 1967, 1972)
- Consistency: Does X always react like this to stimulus Y?
- Distinctiveness: Does X react like this to all stimuli?
- Consensus: Do other people react to stimulus Y the same way X does?
What can individuals conclude if consistency is low e.g., someone doesn’t always react in this way.
If consistency is low, people will discount the potential cause and search for an alternative. If behaviour is not consistent it’s hard to tie the behaviour to either the person or situation.
What do high/low factors mean in the covariation model?
Low factors = person (internal attribution)
High factors = situational (external attribution)
What attribution is concluded when consistency, distinctiveness and consensus are all high?
This should lead to an external attribution of the behaviour to the stimulus itself
What attribution is concluded when consistency is high, but distinctiveness and consensus are both low?
This means that the person reacts like this to all sorts of things and other people don’t react the same it should lead to an internal attribution of the person’s behaviour.
When does the covariation model fail?
o Often information (e.g., about consistency) is incomplete
o Distinctiveness only accessible if you know the individual and if they tend to perform behaviour in that way —> not possible for strangers
o False consensus effect (Ross et al., 1977) –> people were asked if they would spend 30 minutes carrying around a big placard advertising a café. They found that those who agreed to do the task thought that other people would agree to it as well. Those who did not agree to it also thought that most people would not agree to do the task. So regardless of what they chose people assume that others will behave similarly to them.
What is a problem with the three factors in the covariation model?
Do people really sift through info that rationally and mechanically? When there’s low consistency, the model states that people shouldn’t be attributing behaviour to either the person or external situation. But people will try and form an attribution regardless and the model doesn’t explain that
What about: o Systematic errors o Biases o Motivation & emotions o Causal schemata - peoples underlying beliefs about what can be expected in terms of how particular causes interact to produce specific effects or behaviour
What is the attributional model for achievement?
Weiner 1985
There are three critical variables that are considered here called performance dimensions:
Locus of causality o Actor (internal) vs situation (external)
Stability
o Stable vs unstable
Controllability
o Controllable vs uncontrollable
Controllability is about whether the person themselves can do something to change a cause of a behaviour, e.g., your own effort.
Stability on the other hand is stability over time – is it something that is stable across time and contexts or is it something that varies based on mood.
What sort of fundamental attribution errors might people make?
- Observers underestimate influence of situational factors
* Observers overestimate influence of dispositional factors
What is some evidence of participants making attribution errors?
Jones and Harris (1967)
This study had participants read a speech that was supposedly written by another student that was expressing either pro or anti-castro ideas. The participants were either told that the authors of the speeches were able to choose the argument that they make or that they had been instructed to make a particular argument. The authors found that that people made dispositional attributions even in the condition where they were reading speeches that were supposedly written by people who did not have a choice in making the argument that they make. Even though they knew the behaviour was constrained by the situation, they were still committing this attribution error and forming a dispositional attribution.
They found that participants rated the authors of pro-castro speeches as having pro-castro views in reality and the authors of anti-castro speeches as having anti-castro views in reality.
This effect was slightly decreased when they knew that participants didn’t have a choice but the effect is still there. They didn’t assume that people were neutral or had an opposing view, instead they assumed that people’s behaviour corresponded to actual beliefs.
What are the four mechanisms behind showing attribution bias?
(Gilbert & Malone, 1995)
- Lack of awareness (situational invisibility)
- Unrealistic expectations
- Inflated categorisations
- Incomplete corrections
Explain the different stages of making an attribution error.
(Gilbert & Malone, 1995)
• Firstly, the observer of the situation needs to recognise the situation, it might be something they are unaware of or only visible to the actor themselves.
o The observer may not know what the constraints of the situation are.
• The second is the behavioural expectations – an observer brings their own expectations and beliefs to their perception. This can lead them to underestimate the power of a situation for example, or expect the actor to behave in a way that is similar to how they would act in the situation.
• Then related to that, is behaviour perception – the observer has to perceive and categorise what the actors behaviour is.
o This is important because people’s behaviour can be ambiguous, and people’s perceptions of behaviour are influenced by their expectations from the previous step.
• This can lead to inflated categorisations; this means that your expectations can lead to a flawed perception of someone else’s behaviour. E.g., your expectations could lead you to believe that someone’s behaviour is more in line with an expectation than it actually is, or that it’s more contrasting than it actually is.
o These are called simulation of contrast effects – overall, it leads to an incorrect or inflated categorisation or perception of a particular behaviour.
• The final step is that an observer has to determine whether an actor’s behaviour violates the expectations based on the observer’s knowledge of the situation. Remember – trait inferences happen spontaneously, at this final stage is where you start correcting for your initial dispositional attribution and start taking the situation into account.
What happens when the individual is the actor, how do they attribute behaviour?
- When individual is the actor, fundamental attribution error reverses
- People attribute others’ actions to disposition (internal)
- They attribute own actions to situational factors (external)
Why does the fundamental attribution error reverse when the individual is the actor?
Gilbert & Malone (1995)
- Perceptual focus (can’t see yourself behaving, so seems less important than the situation)
- Informational differences (you know your own background - whereas you might not necessarily know that for another person)
Your perceptual focus is different when you’re observing your own behaviour compared to other peoples, so when performing a behaviour, you can’t see yourself behaving but you can see what the situational constraints are. So, the situation is going to be more salient. Whereas if the you are observing someone else’s behaviour, the actual situational constraints are not going to be salient to you if someone else is performing the behaviour.