Discuss two errors in attribution
Attribution is defined as how people interpret and explain causal relationships in the social world. It is designating an outcome to one or more external factors. There are two errors in attribution: The fundamental attribution error and the self- serving bias.
The definition of the fundamental attribution error is when people tend to aggrandize the role of dispositional factors (something to do with personal or internal factors) and disparage the situational (something to do with external or external factors). The fundamental attribution error occurs when individuals observe other individuals and automatically make assumptions about their behavior. The assumptions are usually dispositional factors, for example if someone sees one person hitting another person, they automatically arrive at the hypothesis that the person actually hitting the other person is evil, rather than even thinking about the situational factors (the man could have been doing it in self defense).
An example of the fundamental attribution error is Ross et al. (1977). In this study, the participants were assigned one of three roles: a game show host, a game show contestant or a part of the audience. The game show hosts were instructed to design their own questions that they would ask the contestants. The aim of this study was to see if the participants would make the fundamental attribution error (overestimate the role of dispositional factors, and underestimate the situational factors), despite the fact that they knew all the participants of the experiment were simply playing a role. The result of this study was that when the observers were asked to rank the participants in terms of intelligence, they consistently ranked the game show hosts as being the most intelligent, despite the fact that they knew that this person was randomly assigned to this position, and that this person had also written the questions. The observers attributed the person’s performance to dispositional factors
The definition of the fundamental attribution error is when people tend to aggrandize the role of dispositional factors (something to do with personal or internal factors) and disparage the situational (something to do with external or external factors). The fundamental attribution error occurs when individuals observe other individuals and automatically make assumptions about their behavior. The assumptions are usually dispositional factors, for example if someone sees one person hitting another person, they automatically arrive at the hypothesis that the person actually hitting the other person is evil, rather than even thinking about the situational factors (the man could have been doing it in self defense).
An example of the fundamental attribution error is Ross et al. (1977). In this study, the participants were assigned one of three roles: a game show host, a game show contestant or a part of the audience. The game show hosts were instructed to design their own questions that they would ask the contestants. The aim of this study was to see if the participants would make the fundamental attribution error (overestimate the role of dispositional factors, and underestimate the situational factors), despite the fact that they knew all the participants of the experiment were simply playing a role. The result of this study was that when the observers were asked to rank the participants in terms of intelligence, they consistently ranked the game show hosts as being the most intelligent, despite the fact that they knew that this person was randomly assigned to this position, and that this person had also written the questions. The observers attributed the person’s performance to dispositional factors