The human psyche is one of the most complex creations of nature. Of course, it cannot always work perfectly, and some of its functions often do not work quite as they should, contributing to cognitive distortions and other perceptual phenomena. One of these phenomena is causal attribution - a mental property that forces us to make incorrect conclusions about others and their motives. Today we will talk about what it is, how it manifests itself, how it is explained, and how it often affects our lives.
What is causal attribution?
Causal attribution is a psychological phenomenon that manifests itself in the fact that we explain the actions of others based on what we know about them and how we perceive them. This feature of perception can work in relation to one person, a certain community of people or a social group. However, the conclusions we draw are usually based on our expectations based on life experience.
The term "causal attribution" is of Latin origin. It is formed from the words causa (translated as “reason”) and attributio (assignment, attribute property). That is, it can literally be read as “attribution of causes.”
This phenomenon is associated with perception and thinking. It is based on completing the picture and recreating the missing information. A person involuntarily finds simple explanations for actions performed by other people and by himself. At the same time, logical thinking is often interfered with by emotions, so causal attribution is most clearly manifested when a person explains successes and failures (both others’ and one’s own).
The term "attribution" is used to refer to the attribution of various properties, and the word "causal" implies that we are talking about causes. This phrase was first used by the Austrian psychologist Fritz Heider , who studied the peculiarities of how people interpret information when there is a lack of data.
Example of causal attribution
Causal attribution is a feature of perception that is common to all people, and you have probably encountered it one way or another. It manifests itself in the fact that we find an explanation for the actions of others that would correspond to our own expectations. At the same time, expectations are often dictated by emotions and attitude towards a person. Remember a situation when someone you know was late for a meeting with you. In such situations, there can be any reason, and we don’t know anything about it, but we draw conclusions based on how we perceive the person who is late.
If we are accustomed to the fact that this person is often late, then we immediately assume that he, as usual, is late due to his own irresponsibility. If we are accustomed to considering him a responsible person, then we begin to worry, assuming that something has happened to him. also influences our premature conclusions. If we are in a hurry and nervous, then the likelihood of reproaching a person for irresponsibility increases.
Impact on time
This is the second property endowed with the causal body. All events inevitably occur in time. Every person has 24 hours in a day. This is completely inevitable. However, quantity does not always mean quality. Everyone has their own time density. Someone has been planning to hang a picture on the wall for a month, for which all he has to do is hammer a nail in the right place. Well, someone manages to open several art galleries in different cities in a week. A person’s ability to make money can also be attributed to the properties of the causal body.
Typical errors in causal attribution
As noted above, the key feature of this phenomenon is that the explanations found for someone else’s or one’s own actions do not always correspond to reality. Let's look at a few typical errors that arise as a result of this.
Fundamental attribution error
Psychologists believe that this mistake is common to everyone, although this point of view also has opponents. The essence of the mistake is that we unconsciously attribute our successes to personal qualities, and our failures to the influence of circumstances. At the same time, looking at other people's successes, we prefer to explain them by luck or someone else's patronage, and we often explain the failures of other people by their own shortcomings and mistakes.
American social psychologist Lee Ross identified the following reasons for the fundamental attribution error:
- False consent. It is common for all people, in any circumstances, to consider their own point of view, as well as their own ideas about morality and ethics, to be the most correct. If someone's behavior contradicts these ideas, this is explained by his personal characteristics.
- Unequal opportunities. When assessing someone else's behavior, the influence of the role position in which this person is located is underestimated.
- Priority of trust in facts that do not require comprehension. Personality is the most noticeable fact that people pay attention to first. At the same time, the circumstances in which the individual finds himself still need to be assessed. Therefore, when assessing someone else’s behavior, the focus is on the facts, and the circumstances remain an inconspicuous background.
- Ignoring the importance of events that did not happen. We tend to perceive only what happened, but do not attach importance to events that did not happen, even if we know that they were prevented thanks to someone else's efforts.
- False correlations. By observing another person, we may combine unrelated personality traits, believing that they always go together. This often manifests itself in attributing certain character traits or intellectual abilities to people based on their appearance.
An example of a fundamental attribution error:
Let's imagine the following situation: you and your colleague start working on similar projects. If your colleague's project isn't going as well, you attribute it to the fact that he's less talented, less prepared, and putting in less effort. You don’t think about the fact that external circumstances, both work-related and unrelated, may interfere with him.
Explaining a person's success or failure by personal qualities is called internal disposition. If your colleague’s project is developing more successfully than yours, you are likely to explain this by saying that some circumstances are hindering you. This phenomenon is called external disposition. Essentially, this is a defense mechanism that helps to avoid rumination and not aggravate the situation with unnecessary worries.
Different perceptions of the participant and the observer
A person assesses the role of personal qualities and circumstances differently depending on whether he is a direct participant in events or observes them from the outside.
In the first case, he analyzes the circumstances in more detail and attaches greater importance to them. In the second, he practically does not notice them or considers them insignificant.
Cultural prejudice
There are many stereotypes associated with various national characteristics. These prejudices are not necessarily associated with chauvinism, and yet there are certain character traits that are usually attributed to representatives of different nations. For example, Asians are considered to be more collectivist, while Europeans are generally considered to be individualists.
In the post-Soviet space there are also many stereotypes associated with the behavioral characteristics of certain peoples. Most of these prejudices are conveyed primarily through anecdotes, but this does not prevent people from taking them seriously and allowing them to influence the way they treat others.
Dispositional attribution
It is a judgment about a person's personality based on his behavior. For example, if in some situation a person behaved rudely towards us, we believe that he has a bad character. At the same time, we don’t think that right now he’s in a bad mood, he’s late for something, or he’s annoyed by someone’s behavior. Thus, we make conclusions about a person's personality, completely ignoring situational factors.
Self-serving attribution
When a person receives encouragement at work, he explains it through his own merits and professionalism. At the same time, he explains the lack of expected encouragement by the fact that his superiors do not like him. Previously, psychologists believed that this was a defensive reaction to preserve self-esteem. But now it is believed that people tend to take credit for circumstances that meet their expectations (“I worked for it and got it!”).
Defensive attribution
It is difficult for any person to admit that it was his mistake that led to losses. Therefore, protecting himself from unnecessary worries, he believes that external circumstances are to blame for his failure. Defensive attributions can also be directed toward others.
In particular, most people have an internal belief that bad things only happen to people who deserve them (this explains, for example, victim blaming). This helps them feel safe, confident that they don't deserve bad things to happen.
Causal attribution theories
There are several different theories explaining how causal attribution works. The most popular are two of them, each of which should be considered in detail.
The theory of correspondent relations
This theory was created by psychologists Edward Jones and Keith Davis. They hypothesized that people tend to consider any behavior of others to be intentional and attribute it to personality traits. This should help us better understand what we can expect from people in the future. If a person behaved in a friendly manner, we assume that he is friendly and will continue to behave in the same way.
Thus, according to this theory, causal attribution is the tendency to make natural conclusions that a person’s actions are fully consistent with his inner world. To denote the situation when an observer makes a conclusion about a person’s personality based on his behavior, the authors introduced the concept of “correspondent inference.” They argue that we draw this conclusion based on such sources of information as:
- Freedom of choice. If a person had the opportunity to choose and chose this particular action, then it is explained by his personal characteristics.
- Randomness or intentionality of behavior. If certain actions were committed by a person intentionally, we try to explain them by internal factors, but if something happened by accident, we look for external reasons.
- Social desirability. If someone engages in behavior that is characterized by low social desirability (i.e., “wrong”), they are attributed to personality traits.
- Personalism. If someone's actions influence us, we believe that they are due to the person's personal qualities.
- Hedonic relevance. Also, our conclusions about the personal qualities of another person are influenced by whether their actions brought us benefit or harm.
Kelly covariance model
The author of this attribution theory is the American social psychologist Harold Kelley, who published it in 1967. It is a logical model according to which people attribute certain behavior to internal motives or external factors.
In mathematical statistics, the term “covariance” refers to the mutual dependence of two random variables. Within the Kelly model, covariance refers to the dependence of attribution on random factors that are noticed and taken into account by the observer.
According to Kelly, when interpreting another person's behavior, people unconsciously use the same principles that scientists use in their research. In particular, he identified three criteria:
- Consensus (similarity). Does the person's behavior correspond to the typical behavior of most people?
- Distinctiveness. Are a person's actions towards an observer different from their actions towards other people?
- Consistency. In all situations does a person behave the same way towards the observer, or does his behavior depend on the situation?
As an example, consider the reaction of a person (let his name be Sergey) to a joke told in a company. If everyone, including Sergei, laughs, we can conclude that there is a high consensus. If only Sergei laughed, the consensus is low.
If Sergei laughs when this storyteller tells jokes, but perceives others no worse, the distinctiveness is high. If all the jokes seem funny to him, his distinctiveness is low. If Sergei always laughs when this person tells jokes, consistency is high; if not, consistency is low.
Now imagine a situation in which the jokes of a particular person cause the whole group to laugh, but at the same time they are not so willing to laugh in response to the jokes of another. In this case, we believe that Sergei is laughing, since the narrator who made him laugh is really talented at telling jokes. If only Sergei laughs, and at the same time he laughs at every joke, we can come to the conclusion that he is simply easy to make laugh.
In the example described above, we proceed from the fact that we have the opportunity to observe how Sergei behaves in different situations , how he reacts to different narrators, and how other participants behave. However, in reality, we often do not have such complete information, and we still find a convenient explanation for any situation, which we consider to be quite accurate.
In 1972, Kelly published a paper expanding on his theory. He supplemented it with principles that explain how we draw conclusions when there is a lack of information. In particular, this deficiency is compensated for by personal beliefs and accumulated life experience. In his published work, Kelly proposed 2 schemes:
- Many good reasons. There may be several factors, each of which is sufficient to have the necessary influence. An interesting side effect of this scheme is the devaluation of individual factors if we assume that there are several reasons for the current situation (if a person is late for work because there was no water in the tap and his bus was delayed, he does not attach importance to the fact that he overslept).
- Many necessary reasons. This scheme implies that we artificially combine several factors to explain a certain event, since only such a complex cause seems sufficient.
Kelly also described the “Principle of Magnification,” according to which the role of a cause is significantly exaggerated in the presence of negative factors. For example, if a person copes with a task despite unforeseen difficulties, he values his merits much higher.
Shaping events
As already stated, the main function of the causal body is to shape events. Thus, all our ideas, thoughts and desires become possible in the physical world thanks to our karmic energy. Moreover, our life energy often implements the plans and ideas of other people. For example, a worker uses his own energy to implement the plans of his boss. The child's desire to get a new toy motivates parents to buy it. The same can be said about a wife's desires for her husband, and vice versa. There are many examples of such interactions. It is noteworthy that when we implement other people’s plans with the help of our own energy, our consent and desire are not at all necessary. Here everything depends on the development of a person, as well as the state of his subtle bodies and chakras.
