The Sociocultural Level of Analysis
Session 3Errors in Attribution
A recap
Principles of SCLOA?
1.2.3.4.
How well do you know yourself?
Complete the following questionnaire. Results will be kept anonymous.
How well do you know me?
Discuss two errors in attributions
Learning Outcome
What the command term
means:
Discuss: Offer a considered and
balanced review that includes a
range of arguments. Factors or
hypothesis. Opinions or
conclusions should be presented
clearly and supported by
appropriate evidence
Theory argues that people act like naïve scientists Humans are very social and have a need to
understand why things happen and how and why people behave in certain situations.
Heider (1958) proposed a theory in which he suggested that we tend to interpret and explain our own behaviour and the behaviour of others by assigning attributes to behaviour.
Heider suggested that attributions can be situational (external) or dispositional (internal)
Attribution Theory
Attribution: how people interpret and explain causal relationships in the social world and society.
Psychologists have discovered that when attributing behaviour, people can often make errors and biases.
Attributional error (AE): a false assumption or distortion in perception or judgement about the causes of our own or other people’s behaviour.
Important Definitions
1. Fundamental Attribution Error2. Self serving Bias
Two Errors in Attribution
1. Fundamental Attribution Error
What’s Johnny Depp like?
What’s Will Ferrel like?
Refers to when people overestimate the role of dispositional factors in an individual’s behaviour and underestimate situational factors
Since people gather information by observing others, this often leads to illogical conclusions
According to social psychologist Fiske (2004), people rely too much on personality in explaining behaviour and they underestimate the power of situations
Fundamental Attribution Error (Ross 1977)
In Western societies it could be because of the ideology that people get what they deserve (Gilber, 1995)
It makes life more predictable if people’s behaviour is mainly caused by their personality. This gives the impression that people are understandable and easy to deal with
Explanations solely based on personality are often incomplete, it is wrong to ignore the power of the situation
Why is the FAE so common?
Aim to investigate whether knowledge of
allocated social roles in a quiz show would affect participants’ judgement of people’s expertise
Ross et al (1977) FAE Study
Procedure 18 pairs of students from an introductory
psychology class Participated in a simulated quiz game Randomly assigned to roles of either quiz
host or contestant 24 other participants assigned to role of live
audience
Ross et al (1977) FAE Study
Procedure Quiz hosts asked to compose 10 questions based on
their own knowledge and contestants were asked to answer these questions
Quiz hosts instructed to ask each question, wait around 30 seconds for a response
If contestants did not answer correctly the host gave the correct answer
After quiz all participants and observers were asked to rate the general knowledge of contestants and hosts
Ross et al (1977) FAE Study
Results Both contestants and observers consistently
rated the intelligence of the host as superior despite being aware that each participant was randomly assigned to a condition.
Those assigned to quiz show host did not rate their intelligence as being superior
Ross et al (1977) FAE Study
Conclusions Clear demonstration of FAE. Contestants and observers attributed the
hosts ability to dispositional factors and failed to take into consideration the situational factors that gave the hosts an advantage (they got to write the questions)
Ross et al (1977) FAE Study
Experimental setup was ingenious. It clearly gave the opportunity to demonstrate attributional biases because the hosts made up their own questions and this was known by all participants
The participants were all university students. University students are accustomed to listening to authority figures who they deem to have superior knowledge. It could be that this is a learned response rather than an attribution error
A study that used a sample of university students is not necessarily generalisable to whole population
As this was an artificial task the ecological validity could also be questioned, people may not necessarily reflect the same behaviour in a real world context
Evaluation of Ross et al (1977)
Aim: To see whether participants would demonstrate
FAE when attributing behaviour (to disposition), even if they knew that a specific role was assigned, and chance-directed behaviours to situation.
Jones and Harris (1967)
Method: Asked American students to read essays written by
fellow students about Fidel Castro, who were told to write either pro- or anti- Castro and guess the attitude of the writers towards Castro.
Half the participants were told the writers were free to choose their view on Castro in the essay (choice condition).
Other half were told the writers had no choice; experimenters assigned them a view on Castro (no choice condition).
Jones and Harris (1967)
Results: Participants assumed the viewpoint of
Castro in speeches reflected attitudes (dispositions) of the writers in both choice and no choice condition.
Conclusion: Although participants knew that the view of
the writers was constrained by situation, but still opted for dispositional attribution.
Jones and Harris (1967)
Strengths ◦ Laboratory experiment
Strict control over variables Determined a cause-effect relationship Findings support FAE
Limitations ◦ Lacks ecological validity - cannot be generalised to
the whole population Participants (ethnocentric)
Thus, not representative sample, as all American P"s were used
Laboratory experiment Artificial environment
Jones and Harris (1967)
Investigated attributions made by Holocaust survivors
Researcher gave questionnaires to members of Holocaust survivor groups and age matched Jewish participants who had not personally experienced the Nazi persecution (control)
2 groups were asked for their views on possible factors in survival during the Holocaust
Suedfeld (2003)
Results
This indicates personal experiences during Holocaust influenced survivor’s attributions because they had witnessed that it was actually often luck or help from others that determined who survived. The survivors had a clear picture of the power of the situation during the Holocaust.
Suedfeld (2003)
Holocaust Survivors Jewish control
Situational Factors 91% 51%
Dispositional Factors 34% 71%
Things about you Things about meDispositional Situational Dispositional Situational
Back to our questionnaire responses
Can we see any evidence of FAE here?
Culture seems to be a determinant in attribution style:
In collectivist cultures the emphasis is on the primary social relationships of an individual (family, social role, cultural activities)
In individualistic cultures the emphasis is on the individual as the primary cause of action leads to dispositional factors. The individual is seen as the main cause of success and failure
Cultural Bias in the FAE
Norenzayan et al (2002) Tested whether information given to Korean and
American participants would influence their attributions
When participants received information about individuals, both groups made dispositional attributions
When situational information was also provided, the Koreans tended to include this information in their explanations more than Americans did
This indicates there may be cultural differences in attribution errors
Cultural Bias in the FAE
Strengths Theory has promoted understanding of
common errors in explanations of what happens around the world
The theory has proven very robust and has been supported by many empirical studies
Evaluation of Theory of Fundamental Attribution Error
Limitations Theory is culturally biased with too much
focus on individualism Much research on theory has been
conducted in laboratories and with student samples
Evaluation of Theory of Fundamental Attribution Error
Think back to a time when you have:
◦ Done something you’re proud of◦ Won something◦ Been rude to someone◦ Messed up
Class discussion
Why do you think these things happened?
◦ Done something you’re proud of◦ Won something◦ Been rude to someone◦ Messed up
Class discussion
2. Self Serving Bias
SSB is a self enhancing strategy Refers to people’s tendency to evaluate
themselves positively by taking credit for their success and attribute their failures to situational factors
The Self Serving Bias
Self Serving Bias
A special version of SSB is called “self handicapping”
When people expect to fail they may openly make situational attributions before their actions
The Self Serving Bias
Self-handicapping
Greenberg et al (1982) argued SSB could be a way to uphold self esteem. If we can attribute our successes to dispositional factors and our failures as being beyond our control, it protects our self esteem. It is a means of self protection.
Possible Explanations for SSB
Miller and Ross (1975) suggested that cognitive factors (what we expect to happen) play a role in SSB
We usually expect to succeed at a task
This is commonly observed in Western world
Possible Explanations for SSB
• Success= dispositional factors• Failure= situational factorsIf we expect
to succeed
• Success= Situational Factors• Failure= dispositional factorsIf we expect
to fail
A sporting example…how might they explain their win?
A sporting example…how might they explain their loss?
Found that American football coaches and players were more likely to attribute success to dispositional factors and failure to situational factors
Lau and Russel (1980)
Performed an SSB experiment with children Asked children to do math problems sitting
either with a friend or non-friend Although they sat in pairs the children had
to do the math problems alone, but the total score of the pair was noted
Posey and Smith (2003)
Children were asked who did the better job Children who worked with friends and failed
were less likely to show the SSB and more likely to give their friends credit when they succeeded.
Children who worked with a non-friend were more likely to show the SSB
Posey and Smith (2003)
Culture specific attribution styles may be a natural part of enculturation and socialisation
Some argue that SSB is primarily linked to individualistic cultures but others believe it can be found in both individualistic and collectivist cultures
Cultural considerations in the SSB
Kashima & Triandis (1986) Showed slides of unfamiliar countries to American and
Japanese students Asked them to remember details When students were asked to explain their performance, the
Americans explained their own success with internal factors such as ability and failure with external factors
The Japanese tended to explain their failure with lack of ability. Reasoned that due to more collective nature of Asian societies
that if people derive self esteem not from individual accomplishment but instead from group identity then people are less likely to use SSB
This is called the modesty bias and is a cultural variation of the SSB
Cultural Considerations in SSB
Bond, Leung & Wan (1982) Found that Chinese students who exhibited
the modesty bias instead of SSB were more popular with their peers
Argued that a possible explanation for the modest bias in collectivist cultures could be a cultural norm in Chinese societies to maintain harmonious personal relationships
A person who makes self-effacing attributions could be expected to be better liked
Modesty Bias- a cultural variation of SSB
The theory can explain why some people (mostly from individualistic cultures) explain their failures as being caused by situational factors
Evaluation of SSB theory
The theory is culturally biased. It cannot explain why some cultures emphasise a self-effacing attribution (modesty bias)
Evaluation of SSB theory
Top Related