social: attributions

Question 1

define causal attribution

Answer 1

the process of assigning a cause to or the explanation for an event or behaviour

Question 2

what are the 3 dimensions of causal attributions?

Answer 2

locus of causality (situational/dispositional)
controllability
stability

Question 3

describe Heider’s view of humans as naive scientists

Answer 3

humans are motivated by 2 needs:
need to form coherent view of the world
need to gain control over the environment
human desire for consistency, stability, ability to predict and control
like naive scientists we want to test our hypotheses about the behaviour of others by attributing causes to effects

Question 4

explain the concept of the correspondent inference theory (James & Davis, 1965)

Answer 4

when making social inferences people tend to prefer making dispositional attributions over situational with other people as its a more stable, valuable conclusion

infers that a persons actions are due to a stable, personality characteristic rather than the situation

Question 5

what are the 3 factors we base the correspondent inference theory on?

Answer 5

social desirability
(dispositional more likely if behaviour is negative/against social norms)
intention/choice
(freely chosen = dispositional)
non-common, unique effects
(more unique = dispositional)

Question 6

what are the key issues with the correspondent inference theory?

Answer 6

only focuses on internal/dispositional attributions

only focuses on single instances of behaviour

Question 7

explain the concepts behind the covariation model (Kelley, 1967)
most influential and well known model

Answer 7

principle states that for something to be the cause of a behaviour it must be present when the behaviour is present and absent when the behaviour is absent (must covary)

Question 8

what are the 3 types of information used in the covariation model?

Answer 8

consensus
consistency
distinctiveness

Question 9

low consensus =

high consensus =

Answer 9

dispositional

situational

Question 10

low consistency =

high consistency =

Answer 10

situational

dispositional

Question 11

low distinctiveness =

high distinctiveness =

Answer 11

dispositional

situational

Question 12

what are the pros to the covariation model?

Answer 12

accounts for multiple behaviours

accounts for both internal and external attributions

Question 13

what are the issues with the covariation model?

Answer 13

we don’t always have info on all 3 dimensions yet we can still make attributions when info is missing
also complex/effortful for humans to do all the time

Question 14

what are the 3 types of attribution biases?

Answer 14

fundamental attribution error
actor observer effect/bias
self serving attribution bias

Question 15

______ is the tendency to over attribute actions to the persons disposition rather than the situation

Answer 15

fundamental attribution error

Question 16

________ is the tendency to attribute others behaviour to dispositional factors and our own behaviour to situational factors

Answer 16

actor observer effect/bias

Question 17

_______ is the tendency to that people are more likely to attribute positive successful events to being dispositional and negative failures/events to being situational

Answer 17

self serving attribution bias

Question 18

attributing a positive event to an internal cause is called?

Answer 18

self enhancement bias

Question 19

attributing a negative event to an external cause is called?

Answer 19

self protecting bias

Question 20

describe evidence for the fundamental attribution error

Answer 20

ross et al (1977)
pair of participants randomly assigned to play host or contestant in a knowledge quiz game
2 conditions:
experimental condition = hosts generated their own Qs from their own topics of interest/expertise which contestants had to answer
control = hosts asked Qs that were pre generated by someone else
(contestants in both conditions aware of this)
participants then rated both their own and partners GK (general knowledge)
results:
all contestants rated their own GK worse than hosts rated theirs
experimental group rated their K worse compared to their hosts (not seen in control group)
interpretation:
contestants made dispositional attributions about the hosts knowledge while not considering the situational explanation for their behaviour that the host generated Qs from their own specific areas of expertise

Question 21

describe evidence for the actor observer effect

Answer 21

participants asked to write a paragraph describing why they and their best friend had chosen their uni degree
each reason was coded as an internal or external attribution
results:
puts attributed their own choice to internal + external causes equally
attributed friends choice significantly more to internal than external causes
demonstrates actor observer bias

Question 22

what new research has been shown that the actor observer bias is not universally observed?

Answer 22

Nisbett et al (1973)
meta analysis (173 studies)
bias was held true for negative behaviours but reversed for positive behaviours

Question 23

describe evidence for self serving attribution bias

Answer 23

mezulis et al (2004)
meta analysis (266 studies)
found large evidence
people made more internal (+stable, global) attributions for positive events than they did for negative events
found the bias was less common in adolescents/adults, some non western cultures, people with a psychopathology

Question 24

what are the possible causes of the fundamental attribution error?

Answer 24

1) lack of awareness of situational constraints
2) unrealistic expectations of behaviour
(bad at identifying how much a situation with affect someone else behaviour)
3) expectations of a behaviour may colour intepretations of a behaviour
4) incomplete corrections of default dispositional inferences
(stick to the automatic judgment of internal attributions because its quicker/easier and fail to correct for external influences)

Question 25

what are the causes for the actor observer effect?

Answer 25

perceptual focus

informational differences

Question 26

explain perceptual focus as a cause of the actor observer effect/bias

Answer 26

when observing others behaviour we are drawn to them rather than the situational background so make internal attributions to others
however…
when observing our own behaviour we can’t see ourselves acting just the situational background so make external attributions to ourselves

Question 27

explain informational differences as a cause of the actor observer effect/bias

Answer 27

we have more info about how we behave in different situations from personal experience than we have info about how others behave
(so internal for others and external for ourselves)

Question 28

explain the cause for the self serving attribution bias

Answer 28

adaptive to help maintain and enhance self esteem and good mental health

Question 29

critically evaluate the validity of the FAE

Answer 29

is it really fundamental?
cultural differences, chinese/american students, blue fish collisions, attributions affected by age and culture (not universal)
is it really about favouring dispositional attributions?
participants overestimate degree to which behaviours are caused by internal forces and underestimating role of external forces
is the FAE even an error?
dispositional judgments usually more accurate so bias towards internal isn’t actually an error
(now called correspondence bias as a result)

Question 30

describe the impact of individual differences in attribution

Answer 30

idea that we have particular trait tendencies to explain events and behaviours in a particular way
= attributional styles

Question 31

what are the 3 components of Peterson’s et al (1982) attributional style questionnaire?

Answer 31

internal/external
stable/unstable
global/specific