You’ve Got An Attitude!

Handout Time!  Fill out the questionnaire using Britney Spears as your inspiration.

What might this driver be thinking about the negative behavior ahead of him?

Attribution Theory  We tend to give a causal explanation for someone’s behavior; often crediting either  Situation = environmental factors  external  Disposition = traits or personality factors  Internal/innate

Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE)  (FAE) Tendency to over estimate the Disposition/Trait & under estimate the Situation  Actor-Observer Bias  “We” (Actor) attribute our behavior to the situation  “They” (Observer) attribute our behavior to our disposition.  The actor-observer bias tends to be more pronounced in situations where the outcomes are negative.  This effect can be reversed if you like someone.

Attribution Handout  How many times did you circle “depends on the situation” for yourself compared to the other person?  Tendency to focus on the person, not the situation.  Western culture intensifies this error, we are often socialized to prefer dispositional factors to situational ones.

Attributions Continued  Self-Serving Bias  The tendency to view positives about ourselves as dispositional (innate traits)  Also, the tendency to view negatives about ourselves as situational.  Why do we think like this? How might the Self-Serving Bias influence what each of these students think contributed to their grade?

Self Fulfilling Prophecy & Confirmation Bias  Self Fulfilling Prophecy: Negative thoughts predict negative behaviors.  Pygmalion effect, or Rosenthal effect  Higher expectation = higher performance  Confirmation Bias: Belief that other people think as we do

The Highway Man!  Read the story and answer the questions!  If the story was about a widow who was crossing the river to work to support her children, would that have changed your ranking? Why or why not?  How do attributions and attribution errors explain your ranking of these characters?

Attributions Continued  Just World Belief:  Tendency to believe that the world is, on the whole, fair, and that wrongs will be punished and rights rewarded at some time in the indeterminate future.  “You get what you deserve, and you deserve what you get!”  A number of studies have shown beliefs that people who suffer deserve it and have brought their ills upon themselves.

How Correlated are Actions and Attitudes?

Attitudes & Behaviors may not be as correlated as you think!  Read the description of the psychology experiment & answer the question.  When we feel less coerced & more responsible for troubling actions we feel greater cognitive dissonance.  Rationalization: protects our ego; If we choose to do/say it, we must believe it.  Cognitive Dissonance Theory: When attitudes and behaviors do not match it creates stress. Especially when you feel responsible for your behavior!!  What causes changes in our attitudes?  Persuasion  Credibility  Likability  Attractiveness