Attribution Theory

Attribution Theory

Human beings can explain anything. No matter the cause, we have a strong need to understand and explain everything. Due to people feeling the need to explain, it goes beyond the information received. Attribution theory is a theory about how people explain things.3333333333333. Explanation is a synonym for attribution. There are two types of explanations about why things happen. They are external attribution and internal attribution. External attribution places blame to an outside agent or force.333333333. An example is "My girlfriend made me do it." An internal attribution puts all blames on him or herself.33333333333. An example of this is "It is my entire fault we lost the game, all I had to do was make that last shot." The purpose behind making attribution is to have cognitive control over ones environment by understanding and explaining the causes behind behavioral and environmental occurrences. Making attributions gives order and predictability to our lives. Imagine what it would be like to not have any control at all. When we make attributions we are able to analyze the situation and answer the question "why?" Attribution theory looks at how people make sense of their world.

Here are some examples of the attribution theory in a real life situation. An example of an external attribution for losing the basketball game could be because the referees made bad calls, the coach did not know what he was doing, or everyone did not do their part in order to win the game. One might also say the gym floor was to slick or it was to hot or cold in the gym, or the fans were too loud or not loud enough. Internal attributions for losing the game might be it is my entire fault, I did not make the last shot, or I did not play good defense because the person I was guarding scored too many points. Some external attributions for winning the basketball game could be the whole team played together, all the referees calls went our way, or we just had a very good coach that knew what he was doing. One might also say that the other team did not have their best players or their coach did not know what he was doing. Some internal attributions would be I won the game for us, if I would not have hit them foul shots we would not have won, or if I were not here we could not have beat that team. Some external attributions would be because we practiced so