Chapter 4: Attitudes, Attributions, and Behavior Two women in work clothing sit on chairs facing each other and shake hands. ©IS Stock/Valueline/Thinkstock Learning Objectives By the end of the chapter you should be able to: Define attitude, and differentiate between implicit and explicit attitudes Describe when behaviors and attitudes are likely to match Explain the theory of planned behavior Describe cognitive dissonance theory and insufficient justification Describe self-perception theory Define an attribution, and differentiate internal and external attributions Define the fundamental attribution error Explain how explanatory style works, and differentiate between optimistic and pessimistic explanatory style Describe the hostile attribution of intent Differentiate the false consensus effect and false uniqueness effect Explain the illusion of transparency and spotlight effect Chapter Outline 4.1 Attitudes 4.2 Behavior and Attitudes Theory of Planned Behavior Behavior and Attitude Mismatch What Is My Attitude? 4.3 Explaining the Behavior of Others 4.4 Fundamental Attribution Error 4.5 Explanations and Our Behavior Optimistic and Pessimistic Explanatory Styles A Hostile World Just Like Everybody Else What Do Others See? Chapter Summary * * * If you have ever tried online dating, you are in good company. A study by Match.com reported that 40 million people visited or used an online dating site in the previous year, with an annual revenue of 1.9 billion dollars (Laird, 2012). Most online dating sites involve profiles, where potential daters post information about themselves. Others then access that information and decide whether they would like to communicate with or date the person profiled. People often share their likes or dislikes in their profiles, and potential online dates look at those attitudes and form their own attitudes about the person. In meeting new people, online or face to face, and in interacting with those we know, we are constantly trying to understand the motivations behind people's actions—we make attributions for behavior. In this chapter we look at both of these phenomena, attitudes and attributions, and how they interact with our behavior. 4.1 Attitudes From the time you wake up in the morning to the moment your head hits the pillow at the end of the day, you encounter objects, people, animals, actions, and situations that require a response. As you face all these things, you must make quick evaluations so you know how to react. For example, if you evaluate the neighbor as mean and cream as good, you would avoid interacting with the neighbor and put cream in your coffee. Attitudes are evaluations. These evaluations are based on our reactions—both in terms of how we feel and what we think—to some attitude or object. The objects of our attitudes/evaluations can be physical objects, other people or groups of people, abstract or conc ...

1. Chapter 4:
Attitudes, Attributions, and Behavior
Two women in work clothing sit on chairs facing each other and
shake hands.
©IS Stock/Valueline/Thinkstock
Learning Objectives
By the end of the chapter you should be able to:
Define attitude, and differentiate between implicit
and explicit attitudes
Describe when behaviors and attitudes are likely
to match
Explain the theory of planned behavior
Describe cognitive dissonance theory and
insufficient justification
Describe self-perception theory
Define an attribution, and differentiate internal
and external attributions
Define the fundamental attribution error
Explain how explanatory style works, and differentiate between
optimistic and pessimistic explanatory style
Describe the hostile attribution of intent
Differentiate the false consensus effect and false uniqueness
effect
Explain the illusion of transparency and spotlight effect
Chapter Outline
4.1 Attitudes
4.2 Behavior and Attitudes

2. Theory of Planned Behavior
Behavior and Attitude Mismatch
What Is My Attitude?
4.3 Explaining the Behavior of Others
4.4 Fundamental Attribution Error
4.5 Explanations and Our Behavior
Optimistic and Pessimistic Explanatory Styles
A Hostile World
Just Like Everybody Else
What Do Others See?
Chapter Summary
* * *
If you have ever tried online dating, you are in good company.
A study by Match.com reported that 40 million people visited or
used an online dating site in the previous year, with an annual
revenue of 1.9 billion dollars (Laird, 2012). Most online dating
sites involve profiles, where potential daters post information
about themselves. Others then access that information and
decide whether they would like to communicate with or date the
person profiled. People often share their likes or dislikes in
their profiles, and potential online dates look at those attitudes
and form their own attitudes about the person. In meeting new
people, online or face to face, and in interacting with those we
know, we are constantly trying to understand the motivations
behind people's actions—we make attributions for behavior. In
this chapter we look at both of these phenomena, attitudes and
attributions, and how they interact with our behavior.

3. 4.1 Attitudes
From the time you wake up in the morning to the moment your
head hits the pillow at the end of the day, you encounter
objects, people, animals, actions, and situations that require a
response. As you face all these things, you must make quick
evaluations so you know how to react. For example, if you
evaluate the neighbor as mean and cream as good, you would
avoid interacting with the neighbor and put cream in your
coffee. Attitudes are evaluations. These evaluations are based
on our reactions—both in terms of how we feel and what we
think—to some attitude or object. The objects of our
attitudes/evaluations can be physical objects, other people or
groups of people, abstract or concrete ideas, animals, behaviors,
or even some aspect of ourselves (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993). An
online dater might have an attitude about his online date, as
well as about her dislike of football, her love of cats, and her
identity as a runner. The woman, football, cats, and running are
all attitude objects. Your neighbor and cream are also attitude
objects.
Expand Your Knowledge: Pew Global
Attitudes Project
If you would like to investigate a wide variety of attitudes from
around the world, take a look at the Pew Global Attitudes
Project website at http://pewglobal.org/. Reports on a variety of
surveys are also available.
Attitudes have long been considered important to social
psychology (Allport, 1935). Throughout the years, social
psychologists have found the subject of attitudes a fruitful area
of research (Crano & Prislin, 2006). The evaluations we make
have two measures: strength and valence. Attitudes may be very
strong or very weak. In terms of valence, we may have attitudes
that are on the positive side of the spectrum (you like cats) or

4. negative side of the spectrum (you hate elephants). Putting
together strength and valence, you might have a fairly weak
positive attitude toward cats and a very strong negative attitude
toward elephants. There is also a body of work on ambivalent
attitudes—attitudes that are simultaneously positive and
negative (Armitage & Conner, 2000; van Harreveld, van der
Plight, de Vries, Wenneker, & Verhue, 2004).
When most of us think of attitudes, we probably think of how
we feel about objects, people, or groups, but researchers have
found that consciously known and reported attitudes are only
part of the attitude picture (Nosek & Smyth, 2007; Payne,
Burkley, & Stokes, 2008). The attitudes we report, those that
rely on our knowledge and beliefs about an attitude object, are
called explicit attitudes. Implicit attitudes—attitudes that we are
unaware we hold—are based on the automatic, unconscious
reactions we have toward an attitude object.
We learn implicit and explicit attitudes either through symbolic
representations of or through encounters with attitude objects.
Explicit attitudes are based in language, logic, or some other
symbolic representation. Because of this, we can develop
explicit attitudes relatively quickly through simple
communication. For example, if someone told you about a
particular group you had not known about before (e.g., pygmies)
and shared with you how much he or she liked this group, you
might form a positive explicit attitude toward the group.
Implicit attitudes are learned as we encounter the attitude
object. For example, if you always encountered representations
of a particular group (pictures of pygmies) that were positive,
you might develop a positive implicit attitude toward them
(Olson & Fazio, 2006; Rydell & McConnell, 2006; Strack &
Deutsch, 2004; Wilson, Lindsey, & Schooler, 2000). This
difference in the processing of implicit and explicit attitudes
allows for people to hold opposite explicit and implicit
attitudes. If people logically believe that a social group is good

5. and report a positive explicit attitude but society has a negative
view of the group and that has been communicated with
individuals, they might hold a negative implicit attitude.
Implicit attitudes are frequently communicated by society. The
particular social environment and culture people are exposed to
has a large impact on their implicit attitudes (Shepherd, 2011).
If representations of a particular racial or ethnic group in the
media are always paired with violence or poverty, individuals in
that society tend to hold negative implicit attitudes toward these
groups. Because implicit attitudes are associations that occur
outside of conscious awareness, they are not subject to logic.
For example, if you found out that a new friend is in a bowling
league, you would know logically that your friend may or may
not have a number of qualities that you associate with people in
bowling leagues. Your explicit attitude toward this person
would, at least for a while, still rely on what you know about
your friend rather than her membership in this group. Your
implicit attitude would, however, not be ruled by logic but
would automatically assign the stereotypical characteristics of
people in bowling leagues to your friend (Ranganath & Nosek,
2008).
Figure 4.1: Implicit association task
Figure showing a possible task on an IAT. The figure contains
two illustrations. One displays a computer screen with the word
"joy" in the middle. The upper left portion of the screen
instructs the test taker to "press 'e' for Good" and the upper
right portion of the screen instructs the test taker to "press 'i'
for Bad." An arrow points to the second portion of the figure,
which also shows a computer screen. In this illustration, a
picture of an older man's face is in the middle of the screen. The
upper left corner instructs the test taker to "press 'e' for Good"
and the upper right instructs the test taker to "press 'i' for Bad."
An IAT might first prime you for "good" words, and then ask
you to match older faces with "good" words.

6. Based on Project Implicit® (2011). Four-category race-gender
IAT. Retrieved from https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit
Photo credit: Amos Morgan/Digital Vision/Thinkstock
Expand Your Knowledge: Implicit Association Test
Information about implicit attitudes and the opportunity to take
a variety of implicit association tests can be found at the Project
Implicit website, http://www.projectimplicit.net/. You can read
research papers, take an Implicit Association Test, and
participate in ongoing research. Most of the research studies
take about 10 to 15 minutes, and participants must register
before taking part in research. Participants are provided with a
summary of their own results at the end of their participation. If
you want to see what your scores might be but do not want to be
part of a research study or register, you can take a demo test.
To assess implicit attitudes, researchers need to measure our
automatic reactions—reactions we are not even aware of.
Psychologists developed a test to look at implicit attitudes
called the Implicit Association Test (IAT) (Greenwald,
McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998; Schnabel, Asendorpf, &
Greenwald, 2008). The IAT measures implicit attitudes by
evaluating reaction times. Test-takers match characteristics that
are flashed in the center of a computer screen to a category of
words in the upper corners of the screen (see Figure 4.1). For
example, if "good" is in the left corner and "bad" in the right, a
word like "joy" should be matched to the left corner and "evil"
to the right. Attitude objects are placed in the same corners as
those words, and respondents need to quickly match to words
for the good and bad categories and words or faces associated
with that attitude object. For a test looking at implicit attitudes
toward older adults, "old" might be assigned to the left corner
and "young" to the right. The respondent would need to quickly
switch from a word (joy) to a face (older adult) and match each
with the correct corner (left).

7. A person who has a negative implicit attitude toward older
adults should take longer to match the picture of an older person
with the left "good" corner than to the right "bad" corner. This
delay in matching an older person with a corner that also
contains the category "good" provides evidence of a negative
implicit attitude toward older adults.
Test Yourself
Click on each question below to reveal the answer.
Can someone have an attitude toward a color? A day of the
week? Their right big toe? A concept like justice?
How is it possible to have a mismatch between an explicit
attitude and implicit attitude?
4.2 Behavior and Attitudes
Our attitudes involve evaluations of other people, behaviors,
and objects. Logically, these evaluations should affect how we
behave toward these attitude objects (Allport, 1935; Droba,
1933). For example, if you have a favorable attitude toward
exercise, you should be more likely to engage in physical
activities than if you had a negative attitude. LaPiere (1934)
was one of the first to investigate the relation of attitudes to
behaviors. In the 1930s, LaPiere traveled around the United
States with some of his Chinese friends. In that time, many
Americans held negative attitudes toward the Chinese, and
LaPiere and his friends were concerned about the service they
might get as they traveled. Despite this fear, they were treated
well in all but one location. LaPiere was curious about this
reaction, so several months later he sent questionnaires to the
places he and his friends had visited, as well as a number of
hotels and restaurants they had not visited. Almost universally,
these businesses reported they would not serve someone who

8. was Chinese. The negative attitude was present but, happily,
LaPiere and his friends found that behavior did not match these
attitudes.
Since the 1930s, a great deal of work has been done to sort out
this problem. Researchers have identified factors that can
strengthen and weaken the ability of attitudes to predict
behaviors. Attitudes that are particularly accessible are more
likely to determine our behavior (Fazio, 2000). Generally, if
people respond quickly in reporting their attitudes, these
attitudes are highly accessible. If you respond quickly that you
hate blind dates, you are unlikely to find yourself on one. When
relatively narrow attitudes are assessed, then relatively narrow
behavior also needs to be assessed, but when broader attitudes
are assessed, broad behaviors must be assessed as well (Weigel
& Newman, 1976). For example, if you were asked about your
attitude toward sports, your answer may not match well with
your attendance or lack thereof at the local high school football
game. If we asked about your attitude toward the local high
school football team, we may have better luck predicting if we
will see you at a game. Another factor is whether the behavior
is easy or difficult to perform (Wallace, Paulson, Lord, & Bond,
2005). One might have a negative attitude toward smoking but
continue to smoke because quitting is difficult. The social
pressure one has to join in or avoid a behavior is also important.
If a person feels a strong social pressure to engage in a behavior
(wearing a seat belt), that person may engage in the behavior
despite a negative attitude (Wallace et al., 2005).
Explicit attitudes can predict consciously controlled behaviors,
but implicit attitudes are the best predictors of nonverbal
behaviors. Those with a negative implicit attitude toward people
of a particular racial group tend to show nonverbal behaviors
that indicate dislike for a member of the group with which they
are interacting, even when their verbal behavior is friendly and
welcoming (Dovidio, Kawakami, & Gaertner, 2002). Therefore,

9. negative implicit attitudes can have an unconscious, adverse
effect on our interactions. In a study of physicians, those with
negative implicit attitudes toward Black patients had more
negative interactions with Black patients. The clinicians tended
to dominate the conversation, and the patients showed less
confidence in and were less trusting of the physician (Cooper et
al., 2012).
In contrast, consciously controlled, deliberate behaviors are
evidence of explicit attitudes (Jellison, McConnell, & Gabriel,
2004; McConnell & Leibold, 2001; Rydell & McConnell, 2006).
Because implicit attitudes are less consciously controlled, they
are better at predicting behavior in situations where the ego is
depleted and behavior is more instinctual. For example, if you
have a negative explicit attitude about the healthiness of
chocolate, when you are trying to eat healthy and have not
already exerted self-control, you would choose to eat fruit over
chocolate. However, when you are tired, you might
automatically reach for the chocolate bar in the checkout lane,
following your positive implicit attitude toward chocolate
(Friese, Hofmann, & Wanke, 2008).
Test Yourself
Click on each question below to reveal the answer.
Has attitude research been a topic only recently for social
psychology?
What makes explicit attitudes more likely to match with
behaviors?
Theory of Planned Behavior
Behaviors may be difficult to predict from attitudes alone. The
theory of planned behavior combines several factors to provide
for better prediction (see Figure 4.2). According to this theory,
if we want to predict both intent to behave and actual behavior,

10. we need to know three things: (1) attitude toward that specific
behavior, (2) subjective norms related to that behavior, and (3)
perceived behavioral control (Ajzen, 1991). Subjective norms
involve people's beliefs about how other people in their
environment perceive their behavior. For example, you might
believe that people in your social circle (friends, relatives)
think healthy eating is a good idea, but yoga is silly. Perceived
behavior control is your belief that you can engage in the
behavior. For example, you might think that eating a healthy
diet is a lot of trouble, but going to yoga class is easily
accomplished. In this example, your perceived behavioral
control would be high for yoga but low for healthy eating. If
someone has a positive attitude, positive subjective norms, and
high perceived behavioral control, we can predict with some
accuracy their intentions to engage in that behavior and their
eventual behavior. You might join a yoga program if you have a
positive attitude toward yoga, if people in your environment
think it is a good idea, and if you foresee no problems in getting
to the studio for classes.
Figure 4.2: The theory of planned behavior
Flow chart showing the theory of planned behavior. On the right
are three circles stacked vertically. The first is labeled "attitude
toward the behavior," the second "subjective norm," and the
third "perceived behavioral control." Double-sided arrows point
between the first and second circles, the second and third
circles, and the first and third circles. To the right of the
"subjective norm" circle is a circle labeled "intention." Arrows
point from all three of the first circles towards this "intention"
circle. To the right of the "intention" circle is a circle labeled
"behavior." An arrow points from the "intention" circle towards
the "behavior" circle. A dashed arrow points from the
"perceived behavioral control" circle towards this "behavior"
circle.
The theory of planned behavior relies on several factors for
predicting behavior.

11. Reprinted from Ajzen, I. (1991). The theory of planned
behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision
Processes, 50(2), 179–211. Copyright © 1991, with permission
from Elsevier.
The theory of planned behavior is an extension of an earlier
theory called the theory of reasoned action. The theory of
reasoned action, developed by Ajzen and Fishbein (1972),
predicted behaviors using just attitudes and subjective norms.
Ajzen (1991) later added the element of perceived behavioral
control to provide better prediction of behavior. This addition
created better forecasts about behavior.
Some behaviors are difficult to control. For example, many
people find quitting smoking a very difficult thing to do. Taking
into account the amount of control people have for such
behaviors is helpful to predicting behavior. For behaviors like
quitting smoking, where a perceived lack of control interferes
with actually engaging in the behavior, assessing smoker's
beliefs about their control makes predicting smoking cessation
more reliable (Madden, Ellen, & Ajzen, 1992). Since the
addition of perceived behavior of control to the model, the
theory of planned behavior has been used to help explain an
extremely wide variety of behaviors, from smoking cessation
(Norman, Conner, & Bell, 1999), to using dental floss (Rise,
Astrom, & Sutton, 1998), to composting (Kaiser, Wolfing, &
Fuhrer, 1999). Evaluating these behaviors through meta-
analysis, Armitage and Connor (2001) found that this model can
accurately predict behavior, and that attitudes, subjective
norms, and perceived behavioral control are all important to
accurate prediction.
This theory does not predict behavior perfectly; there are a few
factors that may make it more or less likely to lead to accurate
predictions. Habitual behaviors, such as driving a car to work

12. instead of taking the bus, may not be well-predicted by the
model. However, habit may undergo a change if circumstances
change, such as when bus tickets become cheap and a bus stop
comes to one's street (Bamberg, Ajzen, & Schmidt, 2003;
Verplanken, Aarts, van Knippenberg, & van Knippenberg,
1994). The theory of planned behavior also assumes that people
make rational decisions about their actions. This may be true
some of the time, but at the moment of decision, one's good
intentions may not be enough to deter behavior. In one study of
risky sexual behavior, anticipated emotions that would occur
after sex, such as regret, were a strong predictor of actual
sexual behavior (Richard, van der Plight, & de Vries, 1996). For
some decisions, emotions may rule the day. Overall, the theory
of planned behavior does a better job of predicting behavior
over which individuals have some control. The theory also is
more accurate when people are in the process of actually
making decisions, rather than relying on habits or other
mindless behaviors to determine their actions (Manstead, 2011).
An older man rests his head on his arms and stares at a bowl
full of cigarette butts.
Stockbyte/Thinkstock
Edward, a longtime smoker, wants to stop smoking, but has
doubts that he will be able to do so. According to the theory of
planned behavior, these doubts might inhibit his actual behavior
of quitting.
The theory of planned behavior may be particularly helpful to
those who want to encourage people to engage in healthy
behaviors by determining what might be standing in the way of
the healthy behavior. As noted previously, research using the
model has been done on a number of health-related behaviors.
Other researchers have investigated exercise (Spink, Wilson, &
Bostick, 2012), fruit and vegetable consumption (Kothe,
Mullan, & Butow, 2012), screening programs (Cooke & French,

13. 2008), and risky drinking behavior (Collins, Witkiewitz, &
Larimer, 2011). If an individual believes eating lots of
vegetables is a good idea (positive attitude) and those in his or
her environment also think so (subjective norm), but this
individual feels unable to buy or prepare vegetables, an
intervention might be targeted at the element of perceived
behavioral control— the individual's belief in the inability to
attain and prepare enough veggies. An information campaign
might be launched that gives hints where to find reasonably
priced vegetables and provides recipes for cooking vegetables.
On the other hand, if people did not see the value in eating
vegetables (negative attitude), but others in their environment
were encouraging them to eat vegetables (subjective norm) and
vegetables were easy to find and prepare (perceived behavioral
control), a campaign to change attitudes might be launched.
Test Yourself
Click on the question below to reveal the answer.
What are the three components of the theory of planned
behavior?
Behavior and Attitude Mismatch
Imagine you have agreed to be part of a research study. You
come to the study and are asked to do two boring, repetitive
tasks for an hour. As you finish, the researcher looks distressed;
there was supposed to be another student coming to introduce
the tasks you just completed to the next participant. The
researcher tells you that the next participant is supposed to be
told that these tedious tasks you just completed are fun and
interesting, with the goal of measuring how expectations
influence performance. The researcher asks if you might be
willing to help him out and tell the next participant that what
you just did was fun. He is willing to pay you $1 for your
effort. You agree and tell the next participant that the task was

14. interesting and exciting. Afterward, you are asked how
interesting the tasks you just did were and whether you'd be
willing to participate in similar types of studies in the future.
How would you have answered? Would your answer be different
if the researcher had given you $20?
A group of male college students faced exactly this situation in
a study by Festinger and Carlsmith (1959). In their study, one
third of participants received $1 to tell the next participant that
the study they were about to participate in was fun and
interesting, another third received $20 to do so, and the final
third, the control group, was not asked to say anything to a
future participant and was not given any money. Unbeknownst
to the participants, the hesitant request was part of the
experiment and the other participant was working for the
experimenter. What the researchers were really interested in
was whether the different amounts of pay would affect how
participants felt about the study. According to Table 4.1, which
group thought the research was most interesting when later
asked? Who was most interested in participating in similar
studies in the future?
Table 4.1: Results from Festinger and Carlsmith's (1959) study
of cognitive dissonance
Interview Question Experimental Condition
$1 Group $20 Group Control Group
Were the tasks interesting and enjoyable? (rated from –5,
extremely dull and boring, to +5, extremely interesting and
enjoyable) +1.35 –0.05 –0.45
Would you have any desire to participate in another similar
experiment? (rated from –5, definitely dislike to participate, to
+5, definitely like to participate) +1.20 –0.25 –0.62
From Festinger, L. & Carlsmith, J. M. (1959). Cogintive
consequences of forced compliance. The Journal of Abnormal
and Social Psychology, 58(2), 203-210. doi: 10.1037/h0041593.

15. As you can see, the participants who received $1 seemed to like
the study best. Festinger and Carlsmith proposed that those
participants who received $1 for lying to another person felt
they had insufficient justification for doing so. In other words,
these participants lied for a very small amount of money and
could not explain (justify) what they did by the monetary
reward. These participants were faced with two things:
knowledge that the research was boring (the researchers had
deliberately made it mind-numbingly tedious) and a behavior
that involved telling someone else it was interesting. The gap
between what they believed and what they did created a type of
tension known as cognitive dissonance. Cognitive dissonance is
uncomfortable because it indicates an inconsistency in what
people think or feel and do. People are motivated to reduce this
tension. The participants could not go back in time and change
what they had done, so their only option was to change how
they felt about the study. In the $20 condition, there was also a
gap between what they did and how they truly felt, but these
people did not experience any tension. They had sufficient
justification for what they did: $20. The people in the $20
condition later reported that the study was boring because they
had no need to justify what they did. When the discomfort of
cognitive dissonance is felt, it results in an attitude change to
reduce tension.
Cognitive dissonance can be reduced without changing one's
attitude. For example, if you decided you needed to be on a diet
but then went to a dinner and had chocolate mousse, you could
change your attitude toward the diet (maybe you do not really
need to diet), but you could also reduce that tension by doing
other things.
Expand Your Knowledge: Attitude and Behavior Mismatch
Do your attitudes and behaviors always match? If you are
similar to most people, you see distracted driving as dangerous,
but also engage in the behavior.

16. A post on this issue can be found here. The author describes a
study in California in which almost 60% of participants listed
talking on the phone as a serious distraction for drivers while
almost 46% admitted to making a driving mistake while talking
on the phone.
One option would be to minimize the importance of one of the
elements (Festinger, 1957). You could say that dieting is not
that important to you or that chocolate mousse is not a big deal.
Another option would be to reduce your perceived choice
(Beauvois & Joule, 1999; Wicklund & Brehm, 1976). You might
tell yourself it would have been rude if you had not eaten your
host's dessert. You might also add thoughts that support or
explain your behavior. You could tell yourself that chocolate
mousse is healthy; after all, chocolate contains flavonoids that
are good for your health.
The principle of cognitive dissonance can be helpful in
understanding or promoting behavior change. Researchers have
found that differences between attitudes about dating aggression
and behaviors resulted in a decrease in dating aggression over
time (Schumacher, 2004). In a study involving high school
students at risk for eating disorders like anorexia or bulimia,
researchers induced behavior change by creating dissonance
(Stice, Rohde, Gau, & Shaw, 2009). The students were part of a
program where they were asked to engage in behaviors that
went against their unhealthy attitudes toward their bodies and
food. For example, they were asked to write a letter to a young
girl about the dangers of the thinness ideal, to share what they
like about themselves, and to practice what they would say to
others to challenge the thinness ideal. This intervention
decreased risk factors in the participants for an eating disorder.
Cognitive dissonance has different manifestations across
cultures (Hoshino-Browne et al., 2005). Individuals in

17. independent cultures like the United States are more concerned
about their own individual identity and attributes. Therefore,
internal consistency is the primary goal for someone in an
independent culture. For example, if Alice had a positive
attitude toward children and disliked her neighbor's 4-year-old,
she would know these two things were inconsistent. Even if she
never told anyone of about her dislike of the child, she would
still feel guilty because her attitudes and feelings were
inconsistent. Individuals in interdependent cultures, like that
found in Japan, are more concerned about how they fit with the
expectations of others—in particular, others that are part of
their own group. The approval of others is, therefore, of great
importance.
For interdependent cultures, internal consistency is not as
important as consistency between attitudes or behaviors,
especially when others are going to be appraised of one's
behavior. In a study by Shinobu Kitayama and colleagues
(Kitayama, Snibbe, Markus, & Suzuki, 2004), Japanese and
American college students were asked to make judgments that
revealed the amount of cognitive dissonance they felt. The
Japanese college students showed greater dissonance when they
were aware of potential public scrutiny of their choices. When
there was no potential of others being made aware of their
choices, dissonance did not appear to come into play. When this
study was done on American college students, the results
showed that the potential for public scrutiny did not matter.
Because the American students were attempting to be internally
consistent, they showed a similar degree of dissonance in both
situations. The amount of dissonance the American students
showed was not as high as that shown by the Japanese students
who thought their choices would be public, but was higher than
that of the Japanese students who believed others would not
know of their choices.
Test Yourself

18. Click on the question below to reveal the answer.
Why did the $1 group in Festinger and Carlsmith's study say
they enjoyed the boring study while the $20 group did not?
Social Psychology in Depth: Cognitive Dissonance, Children,
and Monkeys
Where does cognitive dissonance come from? In investigating
the origins of cognitive dissonance social psychologists
investigate whether children feel cognitive dissonance, or if it
develops later in life. We may also want to know if cognitive
dissonance occurs in nonhuman primates, or if it is unique to
humans. This would help us understand the potential
evolutionary origin of the phenomenon.
Egan, Sanatos, & Bloom (2007) investigated cognitive
dissonance in children and in monkeys. For both populations,
they created cognitive dissonance by having the child or
monkey make a choice between two alternatives, two different
stickers for the children or two different M&M candies for the
monkeys. Frequently, when faced with two equally good
options, we will reduce our cognitive dissonance by increasing
our liking of our chosen option, and decreasing our liking of the
option we did not choose.
In this study, the participants made an initial choice and were
then asked to make a second choice. The second choice included
the option not chosen on the first trial and a new option.
Presumably, if cognitive dissonance was at play, the
participants would have decreased their liking of their un-
chosen option and be less likely to choose that option in the
second trial. For example, if children originally rated stickers
with a flower, a bird, and a rainbow equally, they might initially
be asked if they wanted the flower or the bird sticker more.
Having chosen the flower, they would then be asked to choose

19. between the bird (the option not chosen in the previous trial)
and the rainbow. If cognitive dissonance is in play, they should
choose the rainbow. The initial choice would have created
cognitive dissonance, leading the children to discount their
liking of the bird sticker to reduce that dissonance. Even though
the participants initially liked all three options equally, the
results showed that after making a choice, they were less likely
to choose the option they had not chosen on the first trial. The
authors proposed that due to the fact this effect is found among
young children (4-year-olds) and monkeys, cognitive dissonance
may be impacting us before we have much experience in making
choices; language and socialization may not be necessary
precursors to cognitive dissonance.
What Is my Attitude?
If attitudes help determine our behaviors, do behaviors ever
help us define our attitudes? If you were wondering about your
attitude toward sushi, one place you could look to determine
your attitude is your behavior. If you have chosen sushi
restaurants over those that do not serve sushi and order sushi
when you get the chance, you are likely to conclude that you
have a positive attitude toward sushi. If you have spent a lot of
time making fun of people who eat sushi, you might conclude,
looking at these actions, that your attitude toward sushi is
negative. This sense that we can figure out our attitudes by
looking at our behaviors is the basis of self-perception theory
(Bem, 1967). Self-perception theory explains how we might
form or enhance particular attitudes, while cognitive dissonance
theory explains how our attitudes change.
A young adult male lays on a couch and holds a television
remote control.
Hemera/Thinkstock
An example of self-perception theory is when you assume that
you don't like the news just because you repeatedly change the

20. channel when a news report comes on TV.
To evaluate the extent to which our actions influence our
attitudes, Zak, Gold, Ryckman, & Lenney (1998) asked 64
dating couples to come to their lab. Each member of the couple
was asked to provide information on how much they trusted
their partner. The couples were separated and told one of three
things. The first third of participants were told that their partner
would be dancing with a research assistant to a Debbie Gibson
or Madonna song. These participants were asked if that was
okay with them—if they trusted their partner to dance with
someone else. The next third of participants were told they
would be dancing with a research assistant to a Debbie Gibson
or Madonna song. The researchers told them that their partner
had been asked if that was all right, and their partner had said
yes, they trusted their significant other. The final third of
participants, the control group, were told that their partner
would be listening to music.
The researchers wanted to measure whether acting in a trusting
manner, that is, telling the researcher that they trusted their
partner to dance with someone else, would increase trust. When
the researchers assessed levels of trust at the end of the study,
they found that both the participants who acted in a trusting way
and those who were trusted showed an increase in trust when
compared to the control group. The biggest change, however,
was with the participants who acted in a trusting matter. The act
of trusting, it seems, increases trust.
Behavior can be affected in more subtle ways by our self-
observations, such as with our relationship to certain colors.
The color black is often associated with bad things. This fact is
evident in our language. For example, people might be
blacklisted or blackmailed, or their reputation might be
blackened. Even dark colored chocolate cake is called devil's
food cake. Would members of sports teams in black uniforms

21. therefore observe themselves in that bad color and be more
willing to engage in aggressive behavior? Frank and Gilovich
(1988) investigated whether what we are wearing has an impact
on our actions. They found that individuals who donned black
were more willing to engage in aggression, measured by their
choice of aggressive games over nonaggressive games, than
those who were asked to wear white. National Hockey League
teams wearing black were more aggressive on the rink than
those wearing other colors; that is, members of teams wearing
black spent more time in the penalty box than teams wearing
other colors. A similar result was found in online gaming with
people whose avatars were wearing black (Yee & Bailenson,
2009).
Test Yourself
Click on the question below to reveal the answer.
Of self-perception theory and cognitive dissonance theory,
which is more focused on attitude change rather than attitude
formation?
4.3 Explaining the Behavior of Others
Our daily lives present us with situations where we need to
explain the behaviors of others. At work, you might want to
know if your boss intended her behavior as encouragement to
pursue a raise or as a clue that your job might be in danger.
Attributing your friend's late-night phone call to concern will
affect the relationship differently than attributing it to rudeness.
Attributions are also involved in deciding the proper
punishment of a misbehaving child or a criminal. Attributions—
our explanations of the behavior of others and ourselves—have
been of interest to psychologists for a long time. In 1958, Fritz
Heider wrote a book on how we make judgments about one
another. According to Heider, and others who came after him,

22. we generally explain others' behavior as due either to something
internal to the person or to something external to the person.
Imagine you are sitting in a coffee shop waiting for a date you
met online. Your date is late. If you decide that your date is
inconsiderate, you have made an internal attribution for your
date's behavior. When you make an internal attribution, you
blame personality, attitudes, or some other dispositional factor
for the action. If, on the other hand, you think your date is late
because of the traffic or some emergency at work, you have
made an external attribution. When you make an external
attribution, you attribute situational factors for the action. We
do find differences in the patterns of attributions in different
cultures. Generally, individuals from more independent cultures
make more internal attributions while those in more
interdependent cultures make more external attributions
(Triandis, 2001). For example, in the United States, salespeople
tend to attribute their performance to internal factors—their
sales are due to their hard work and wonderful people skills. In
more interdependent cultures, such as that found in India,
attributions tend to be more external—their sales are due to a
good customer base (DeCarlo, Agarwal, & Vyas, 2007).
Attributions can make a difference in how we treat people and
deal with societal problems. For example, how crime is
attributed can impact how we handle criminals. If a society and
the people within that society believe that criminals engage in
crime because it was their choice or because they have no
morals, then that society will lock up its criminals and try to
prevent them from ever getting out to offend again. On the other
hand, a society that believes that lack of job opportunities,
racism, or peer pressure is primarily to blame for criminal
behavior is likely to offer rehabilitation and education to
criminals as well as work to eradicate societal ills (Templeton
& Hartnagel, 2012; Unnever, Cullen, & Jones, 2008).

23. 4.4 Fundamental Attribution Error
Daily life offers many opportunities to make attributions. When
a neighbor fails to greet or wave at you while passing in the
hallway or street, you might declare your neighbor rude and
unfriendly. Blaming a behavior on a dispositional factor, like
rudeness, may not be accurate. Your neighbor might not have
seen you because of the large bag of groceries you were
holding, or been distracted by a fight she just had with her
child. When people attribute behavior to dispositional factors
when there are clear situational factors at work, they are
engaging in correspondence bias, also known as the
fundamental attribution error (Gilbert & Malone, 1995; Gilbert,
Pelham, & Krull, 1988; Jones & Harris, 1967; Ross, Amabile, &
Steinmetz, 1977). See Figure 4.3 for an example.
Figure 4.3: The fundamental attribution error
Flow chart showing how attributions can lead to the
fundamental attribution error. The illustration first shows the
silhouette of a woman sitting at a restaurant alone with the text
"James is running late to his first date with Beth. An arrow
points from this image to a box labeled "Beth's attributions."
Two arrows point from this box towards to new boxes, one
labeled "situational" and one labeled "dispositional". Text under
the situational box reads "His babysitter may be late or there
may be traffic on the freeway." Text under the dispositional box
reads "He's inconsiderate and doesn't manage his time well." An
arrow flows from the dispositional box to a box with arrow text
reading "has the possibility of leading to" and the new box is
labeled "fundamental attribution error." This final box contains
the text "ignoring clear situational factors and only attributing
behavior to dispositional factors."
Often when we attribute behavior to dispositional factors, we
engage in the fundamental attribution error.
Based on Wade, C., & Tavris, C. (2004). Interactive lectures. In

24. Psychology, Media and Research Update (7th ed., Chapter 8).
Retrieved from
http://wps.prenhall.com/hss_wade_psychology_7_mru/21/5605/
1434950.cw/content/index.html.
In Ross, Amabile, and Steinmetz's (1977) study on the subject,
participants were randomly assigned the role of questioner or
contestant in a quiz game. The questioners came up with
questions from their own storehouse of esoteric knowledge.
Depending on the background of the questioners, they might
develop questions on geography or cars or breeds of cows or
any number of other odd topics. Contestants completed the quiz
and rated the general knowledge of the questioner. Given the
freedom of the questioner to develop difficult questions from
any realm, most contestants did not do very well. When rating
the general knowledge of the questioner, they overestimated
that knowledge. The contestants overestimated the effect of
dispositional factors (knowledge) and underestimated the effect
of the situation (freedom to ask any question).
Various factors make the fundamental attribution error more
likely. People make the fundamental attribution error more
when they are happy versus when they are sad. Because happy
people process less information from their environment, they
tend to make quick and easy decisions about the cause of the
behavior of others (Forgas, 1998). The attributions people make
with the fundamental attribution error grow more situational
over time. When making an immediate attribution, we tend to
show the bias toward dispositional attributions predicted by the
fundamental attribution error. When time has passed, our
judgments take the situation into account to a greater degree
(Burger & Pavelich, 1994; Truchot, Maure, & Patte, 2003).
Over time, then, the power of the fundamental attribution error
diminishes. The likelihood of making the fundamental
attribution error also diminishes from young adulthood to
middle age. After middle age, the likelihood of making the error

25. begins to increase again (Follett & Hess, 2002).
Fundamental Attribution Error
The nature of the fundamental attribution error.
Critical Thinking Questions
Why do people assume that hosts are smarter than
contestants?
How have you seen the fundamental attribution error play out
in your own life?
There are certainly times when behavior is due to rudeness, so
your decision that your neighbor is inconsiderate could be
appropriate. The fundamental attribution error is an error
because we make these kinds of decisions about someone's
disposition even when clear situational factors are at work. But
you don't make this error, do you? Most people believe
themselves to be less vulnerable to the fundamental attribution
error than others, even though we are generally similar to others
like us in our tendency to make the error (Van Boven, Kamada,
& Gilovich, 1999; Van Boven, White, Kamada, & Gilovich,
2003).
One context where the fundamental attribution error is
particularly likely is in communication using a computer.
Messages in one's email inbox provide few cues as to the
situation of the writer. Without these cues, it is easy to
misjudge details about the sender and the message. For
example, if you received a message with a number of
misspellings and grammar mistakes, it is likely you would judge
the writer of that message as not very intelligent or competent.
Without knowing the writer was pressed for time, distracted by
a crying child, and dealing with a faulty computer keyboard,
you may judge that dispositional, rather than situational, factors
were at work (Cramton, 2001). It is only when we are made
aware of some of these situational forces that we change our

26. judgments. One study found that when people are told that the
sender of an email is from a different culture, the email
recipients are less harsh in their dispositional judgments for
language errors like misspellings, although dispositional
judgments are still made for etiquette errors (Vignovic &
Thompson, 2010).
With a name like fundamental attribution error, one would
assume that this error is common in all people in all cultures.
Not so. When comparing European Americans, researchers have
found that East Asians are more aware of situational constraints
on behavior.
When situations are powerful or easily recognized, East Asians
are more likely to attribute behavior to those situational factors
(Choi, Nisbett, & Norenzayan, 1999; Miyamoto & Kitayama,
2002; Morris & Peng, 1994). When research participants were
told that the person whose behavior they were evaluating had no
choice in his behavior, and simply followed the directions of the
experimenter, Korean participants were more likely to take into
account the situational constraints on the person, whereas
American participants largely ignored the situational factors
(Choi & Nisbett, 1998). For example, someone raised in an East
Asian culture might say that a person is rude because his
parents never taught him manners rather than rude because it is
part of his nature. East Asians also think more holistically about
the person (Choi, Nisbett, & Norenzayan, 1999). Even if
someone's behavior is blamed on internal factors, these internal
factors are explained situationally. Although the phenomenon
came to be known as the fundamental attribution error because
so many researchers found similar results over a number of
years (Jones, 1998), it turns out the fundamental attribution
error is not as fundamental as we thought.
A man holds up his hands in frustration while driving his car.
Hemera/Thinkstock

27. When a driver assumes the person who cut him off is
inconsiderate and incompetent, even though they may have had
to switch lanes to avoid an accident, it is an example of the
fundamental attribution error.
A related concept to the fundamental attribution error is the
actor-observer bias. The fundamental attribution error suggests
that as observers, people discount situational factors and
overestimate dispositional factors. The actor-observer bias
expands this tendency to explain our own behavior as actors.
Actors tend to make more situational attributions for behavior
(Jones & Nisbett, 1972). The situationally based explanations
for our own behavior are stronger when we are explaining
negative rather than positive events (Green & McClearn, 2010).
When explaining positive events, like doing well on a test, the
self-serving bias leads us to account for our behavior using
more dispositional explanations, such as our own intelligence.
Recent research has called into question the traditional
formulation of the actor-observer bias. In a meta-analysis,
Bertram Malle (2006) found that actors are not more likely to
make situational inference, and observers are not more likely to
make dispositional inferences. Actors and observers do,
however, explain behaviors differently. Malle and colleagues
(Malle, Knobe, & Nelson, 2007) proposed an asymmetry in
explanations based in different desires and different knowledge.
Actors know the reasons behind a decision and are motivated to
present themselves as rational people. Imagine Jill cleaned out
the work refrigerator and in the process threw out several
people's lunches. She would describe her action as due to the
boss's request to clean the refrigerator, the lack of clear
markings on containers about who they belonged to, and her
overall helpfulness in keeping the office clean.
Observers can only guess at the reasons for a behavior and must

28. instead rely on their general knowledge of situations and their
ability to mentally simulate the thought process of the actor.
Observers have no particular need to present the actor in a
positive light. Jill's coworkers might explain her actions as
irrational, making the argument that the refrigerator did not
need to be cleaned and Jill should not throw out things that do
not belong to her. The coworkers would describe Jill's actions
as due to her rude and inconsiderate nature. Observers are more
likely to distance themselves from an actor's actions by making
note of a belief or motive rather than just the reason itself. Jill
might say, "The food in the refrigerator was old; that's why I
threw it out." A coworker would say, "Jill believed the food in
the refrigerator was old; that's why she threw it out." Malle and
colleagues' explanations for differences between actors and
observers provide a more nuanced approach to these differences
and help explain inconsistencies in past research.
Test Yourself
Click on each question below to reveal the answer.
Someone cuts in line in front of you at the grocery store.
Describe some internal attributions for that behavior. Describe
some external attributions for that behavior.
Which of these people may have made the fundamental
attribution error?
Janelle believes the clown she hired for her son's birthday
party is a happy and joyful person.
Kim attributes the store clerk's rude behavior toward her to
the crankiness of the customer in front of her.
Ted attributes his friend's service at the soup kitchen to his
kind and giving nature, not a requirement of the social work
major his friend is pursuing.

29. 4.5 Explanations and our Behavior
As we make attributions day after day, we may develop patterns
for making these judgments. These patterns then influence how
we approach others and react to events. Two of the major
patterns investigated by researchers are those surrounding
whether we explain events in an optimistic or pessimistic way
and the extent to which we expect hostility from others in our
interactions. The attributions we make are influenced by our
need to fit in with others but also by our need to differentiate
and stand out from the crowd. However, we tend to overestimate
the amount we stand out and are noticed by others. The
behaviors we engage in are influenced by these various patterns
of attributions.
Optimistic and Pessimistic Explanatory Styles
Every day we interpret the actions of others and the events that
occur. As we do so, we may fall into a certain pattern of
explanation. One pattern of attributions is optimistic and leads
us to expect positive outcomes from our interactions. Another
pattern is more pessimistic and leads us to expect negative
outcomes from our interactions. Consider how you would
explain these two events: your date complimenting you on your
appearance and your inability to find a job. According to
researchers, you have three decisions to make as you interpret
those events (Seligman & Nolen-Hoeksema, 1987; Seligman &
Schulman, 1986). When you are explaining a compliment you
receive, you could assume the other person was just having a
good day and complimented everyone. On the other hand, you
could assume that the compliment was prompted by your own
appearance. In this case you are attributing the compliment to
either an external cause, something about the other person or
the circumstance, or an internal cause, something about you.
Your second choice involves whether you consider the
compliment to be an event that will likely never or rarely

30. happen again, like a free makeover you just had, or something
that will always be around, your attractive face. In this case,
you are making an attribution that is either unstable, meaning
that the cause is there rarely or only some of the time, or stable,
meaning that the cause is always there. You need to decide
whether the compliment just applies to your present appearance
at the mall where you got the makeover, or whether you will
likely get compliments in all situations in your life. In this case
you are making a decision of whether the cause is specific,
applying only in this particular situation, or global, applying to
all situations. Putting this all together: When you decide on the
cause for a behavior or event, you decide whether it is external
or internal, unstable or stable, and specific or global.
People tend to have relatively stable patterns in making such
decisions. These patterns characterize a person's explanatory
style. If you received a compliment, what kind of attribution do
you think would make you feel the best? If you consider the
cause of the compliment to be internal (something about you),
stable (something that will always be there), and global
(something that will be found in all situations), you are likely to
feel better about yourself.
Would the same be true in explaining long-term unemployment?
If you think about a negative event like long-term
unemployment, an explanation that will make you feel best
about yourself is one that says the cause is external (something
about the job market), unstable (a job market that will change),
and specific (applies only to the job market).
People with an optimistic explanatory style show exactly this
pattern. Someone who is optimistic will explain positive events
as internal, stable, and global. Negative events, on the other
hand, will be explained as external, unstable, and specific.
Individuals with a pessimistic explanatory style have exactly

31. the opposite pattern. Pessimistic people generally blame
themselves for negative events and believe those events are
typical of what is likely to happen in many aspects of their
lives. They also tend to imagine such events continuing in the
future. Optimistic people generally blame outside influences for
negative events and interpret these events as temporary. See
Figure 4.4 for examples of how optimists and pessimists may
respond to certain events.
Figure 4.4: Explanatory style
Box showing optimistic and pessimistic explanatory style for a
bad event (rear ending another car) and a good event (getting a
work promotion).
Optimistic people see bad events in the same way as pessimistic
people see good events. Conversely, pessimistic people see bad
events in the same way as optimistic people see good events.
Optimistic explanatory style is related to more positive well-
being in both younger and older adults (Forgeard & Seligman,
2012; Mohanty & Begum, 2012). Individuals with optimistic
explanatory styles are more likely to persist in the face of
failure. This can be seen in the case of sales agents. Sales
agents experience a lot of failure, as the majority of their
potential clients say no to their product. Researchers assessed
the explanatory style of beginning life insurance agents using a
questionnaire and followed them to see how much life insurance
they would sell and how long they would remain in their jobs
(Seligman & Schulman, 1986). Those agents who were most
optimistic sold the most insurance. At the end of the first year,
those who were the most optimistic were twice as likely to still
be selling insurance.
In contrast, individuals with a pessimistic explanatory style are
more likely to get sick when they encounter stressful events
(Bennett & Elliott, 2005; Jackson, Sellers, & Peterson, 2002).
Pessimistic explanatory styles have been linked to depression

32. and suicide (Hirsch, Wolford, LaLonde, Brunk, & Parker-
Morris, 2009; Peterson & Seligman, 1984). When people with
negative explanatory styles encounter a bad event, like losing a
job, they are likely to explain it as due to something about
them, such as having unmarketable skills—something that will
always be there, such as no one will ever hire someone with
their skills, and something that is global, such as that all of
their skills are useless. These explanations lead to a state of
learned helplessness. Learned helplessness occurs when we have
acquired through our experiences a sense that no matter what we
do, our actions will not have a positive impact on negative
experiences (Seligman & Maier, 1967). When a job loss is
explained as internal, stable, and global, it is unlikely anything
the person does will change the situation; so giving up is the
most rational response to the problem.
Expand Your Knowledge: Martin Seligman
Martin Seligman, a prominent researcher in the area of
explanatory style, has a website dedicated to his research. The
website is primarily focused on his work on positive
psychology, but some references to work on explanatory style
and learned helplessness are provided.
Seligman's website: http://www.ppc.sas.upenn.edu/index.html.
Opportunities to participate in Seligman's ongoing research are
available. Seligman is known for his work on explanatory style,
so there may be some related to the material within the text.
Seligman also does research in the area of positive psychology,
studying human flourishing.
Negative explanatory styles are linked to poorer academic
performance (Peterson & Barrett, 1987). Researchers found that
first-year university students who interpreted negative events as
internal, stable, and global received lower grades. These lower
grades seemed to be due to a reluctance to seek help when

33. struggling (why do so if you believe your poor performance is
due to your lack of intelligence?) and a lack of academic goal
setting. Similarly, college students with a pessimistic
explanatory style were less likely to actively deal with their
symptoms when they got ill, prolonging or exacerbating their
illnesses (Lin & Peterson, 1990).
Pessimism does not always link to poor performance. In a
longitudinal study of law students, researchers assessed
explanatory style with a survey at the beginning of law school
and revisited the students throughout their time in school
(Satterfield, Monahan, & Seligman, 1997). The students with a
more pessimistic style at the beginning of school ended up with
higher grade point averages and did better in publishing in law
journals. The difference may come from the fact that the law
students had already proven to be resilient in the face of
problems, given their ability to get into law school, as well as a
profession that rewards skepticism and cautious decision
making.
Social Psychology in Depth: Attribution, Story, and Depression
A male psychologist watches as a young boy takes a thematic
apperception test.
Lewis J Merrim/Photo Researchers/Getty Images
As part of their study, Peterson and Ulrey gave participants
Thematic Apperception Tests. Subjects were given an
ambiguous scene and asked to describe what was happening in
the scene.
Our explanations for behavior influence how we feel about
ourselves. Adler, Kissel, and McAdams (2006) interviewed
adults within the community, asking them to tell about eight
different episodes in their life (e.g., childhood memory, high
point, low point) as well as themes they saw in their life and
how they would divide their life into chapters. When the

34. researchers looked at attributions made in the stories, they
found that when individuals explained negative events in their
stories as stable and global, they were more likely to report
symptoms of depression in a depression scale. Keep in mind
that these were attributions that appeared spontaneously and
were not solicited by the researchers through a questionnaire or
direct questions.
Depression was also related to contamination sequences in
stories. A contamination sequence occurs when a story begins
well but is ruined or spoiled by negative events. For example,
someone might tell a story about a fun day at the beach that was
spoiled by a fight and ended in a car ride home in stony silence.
The presence of these types of stories independently predicted
depression, apart from attributional style.
Other evidence linking stories with attributional style and
depression was found by Peterson and Ulrey (1994). In their
study, they showed people pictures of ambiguous scenes and
asked them to describe what was happening in the picture. The
researchers then analyzed the stories that were told. They found
that individuals who used a negative attributional style to tell
stories explaining the events were at greater risk for depression.
We may often think of depression as simply feeling bad about
oneself and the world, but these studies reveal that depression is
related to the way we view and describe the world around us.
Test Yourself
For each of the following indicate whether the explanation is
internal or external, stable or unstable, global or specific. Click
on each explanation below to reveal the answer.
Karen blames her own stupidity for her bad grade on the
history test. For all of her classes she says that any studying she
does goes to waste because she never does any better.
Andrew believes his disastrous date on Friday night was due

35. to a cold he is developing that made him a bad conversation
partner. Once he recovers he's certain future dates will go
better. His cold might also be to blame for a fight he had with
his roommate in the morning and the bad day at work he had on
Friday.
Jeremy blames his bad day at work on his computer losing
the project he worked so hard on. Fortunately, all his other work
is going well, and the technology department promised to have
his computer fixed tomorrow.
Shawna celebrates her new job. She believes her great
interviewing skills landed her the job, skills she has honed over
the years and uses in all kinds of situations.
A Hostile World
Some individuals view the world as a hostile place. In making
judgments about the actions of others, we can decide that others
engaged in those actions to deliberately harm us. People who
chronically make these kinds of judgments have a hostile
attribution of intent, sometimes called hostile attribution bias
(de Castro, Veerman, Koops, Bosch, & Monshouwer, 2002). If
you believe someone has deliberately stepped on your toes or
cut in front of you in line, your reaction is likely to be different
than if you believe these actions were unintentional. Hostile
attribution of intent does tend to lead to more aggressive
behavior, at least in children, where this has been studied the
most (de Castro et al., 2002). One source of these attributions
may be peer interactions or interactions in the home. Freeman
and colleagues (Freeman, Hadwin, & Halligan, 2011) conducted
a study in which kids in their early teenage years communicated
with hostile or non-hostile teens in an online chat room. Some
of the teens from this chat room explained behavior of others in
a hostile way, but for others the explanations were more benign.
For example, when explaining why a group of unknown kids
stood up when approached, some said it was a desire to defend
territory, a hostile attribution. For others a more nonthreatening

36. explanation was given—that the kids were going to give a
greeting. The teens that interacted with more hostile peers were
more likely to make hostile attributions.
For children, a rejection by their peers can activate the hostile
attribution of intent and lead to aggressive action. Kids who
thought others rejected a personal profile they posted online
believed that others had more hostile intent toward them and
were angrier and more aggressive toward the rejecters (Reijntjes
et al., 2011). Family also plays a role. Negative interactions
within the home are related to more hostile attributions
(Bickett, Milich, & Brown, 1996; Gomez & Gomez, 2000). For
example, parents who reported using harsh discipline tactics had
children with more hostile interaction goals and more
aggressive behavior (Heidgerken, Hughes, Cavell, & Willson,
2004). Children's exposure to violent video games also
increases hostile attributions, both immediately after they play
and over time (Hasan, Bégue, Scharkow, & Bushman, 2013).
Test Yourself
Click on the question below to reveal the answer.
Given the factors that contribute to and are related to a
hostile attribution of intent, describe a person who is likely to
show a hostile attribution of intent.
Just Like Everybody Else
As we observe others, we look for clues concerning what they
think or feel. One way in which we fill in the gaps of our
knowledge is to overestimate the extent to which people have
similar interests and preferences, a phenomenon called the false
consensus effect. For example, we assume that our friend will
love going to our favorite coffee shop; we love the place, surely
our friend will as well!

37. When research participants were asked about something they
liked, such as movies or particular types of music, and then
asked to estimate the degree to which others like those things,
they tended to overestimate the extent to which their own
preferences are shared by other people (Gilovich, 1990; Ross,
Greene, & House, 1977). False consensus is stronger for our
likes than our dislikes (Gershoff, Mukherjee, & Mukhopadhyay,
2008). We more easily come up with reasons for liking what we
like, so we may overestimate how common those opinions are
(Mullen et al., 1985). We engage in the false consensus effect
for a wide variety of opinions, from favorite ice cream sundae
toppings or movie posters (Gershoff et al., 2008) to favorite
celebrities (Bui, 2012), from sexual behavior (Whitley, 1998) to
illegal drug use among both college students and elite athletes
(Dunn, Thomas, Swift, & Burns, 2012; Wolfson, 2000).
False consensus comes, in part, from selective exposure to
others that are like us and agree with us (Whitley, 1998). Online
groups are one way people connect with others who are like-
minded. Being part of one of these groups may increase false
consensus by giving one a feeling that there are many people
who share one's opinions, even though there may be few in the
general population (Wojcieszak, 2008, 2011). When trying to
estimate how many other people share our opinions, instances
where we remember others agreeing with us (e.g., I like cats
too!) more easily come to mind and may therefore lead us to
overestimate how many others do agree (Marks & Miller, 1987;
Mullen et al., 1985). Another source of our overestimations
comes from our desire to see ourselves as part of the group
(Marks & Miller, 1987; Sherman, Presson, & Chassin, 1984).
People who have a greater need to belong show a greater
tendency toward false consensus (Morrison & Matthes, 2011).
In a desire to see our behavior as normal, we may overestimate
the extent to which others are engaging in that behavior. For
example, college women who were sexually experienced gave
higher, and less accurate, assessments of peer sexual behavior;

38. the further their own behavior was from the norm, the higher
their estimates of their peers' behavior (Whitley, 1998).
False consensus may lead us to make judgments about others
that can create later problems. For example, not knowing if your
online date likes the singer Beyoncé or not, you may simply
assume he or she does because you do. This can make additional
conversations and face-to-face meetings problematic when one's
illusions about the other person's thoughts and attitudes are
revealed (Bridges, 2012; Finkel, Eastwick, Karney, Reis, &
Sprecher, 2012). Even more serious, false consensus has been
shown to lead to inaccurate judgments about HIV risk in
intimate relationships (Harman, O'Grady, & Wilson, 2009). If
judgments based on false consensus translate into risky
behavior, severe consequences can result.
In contrast, we also have behaviors or beliefs that we view as
unique. The tendency for people to underestimate the extent to
which their opinions or behaviors are shared by others is the
uniqueness bias, or the false uniqueness effect. This
underestimation usually involves beliefs or behaviors that are
desirable or a source of pride. When we perceive our attributes
to be more unique than they really are, we make ourselves feel
even better about our rare and wonderful qualities. For example,
if you give blood on a regular basis, you may underestimate the
number of people who also give blood so that you feel
particularly virtuous (Allison, Messick, & Goethals, 1989;
Goethals, 1986; Monin & Norton, 2003).
Test Yourself
Click on the question below to reveal the answer.
When are we likely to find the greatest false consensus?
What do Others See?

39. When people feel a strong emotion, they often overestimate
others' ability to discern that emotion. For example, if your new
romantic interest baked you terrible-tasting cookies, your
feeling of disgust as you ate them might not be as clear to your
date as you think it is (Gilovich, Savitsky, & Medvec, 1998;
Holder & Hawkins, 2007). This tendency to believe that our
thoughts or feelings can be more clearly seen by others than
they actually are is called the illusion of transparency. If you
have ever been surprised that a family member did not know
you were upset or that your boss did not notice how hard you
worked, blame the illusion of transparency (Gilovich &
Savitsky, 1999). Because we believe those we are closest to can
read us well, or at least better than others can, we are more
likely to have an illusion of transparency among those we know
well, such as a friend or romantic partner (Kudo, 2007). This
principle also applies to our beliefs about our ability to lie.
People generally believe that their lies are easier to spot than
they actually are (Gilovich, Savitsky, & Medvec, 1998; Rai,
Mitchell, & Faelling, 2012). In truth, the emotions or behaviors
that we thought were so apparent to others are not so clear.
Evidence for the illusion of transparency has proven helpful to
those who suffer from speech anxiety. Although most people
who suffer from speech anxiety believe their anxiety is evident
to the audience, most people listening to a speech are unaware
of the extent of the anxiety the speaker suffers. After realizing
this, those high in speech anxiety gave better speeches
(Savitsky & Gilovich, 2003). The vicious cycle of being
anxious, believing others know we are anxious, and therefore
becoming more anxious can be broken by knowledge of this
illusion.
Aerial view of a large group of people standing around one man
and pointing and looking at him. The man looks up at the
camera.
Hans Neleman/Getty Images

40. Sometimes you might feel that everyone notices your behaviors
or appearance, when in reality, most people aren't paying
attention. This is called the spotlight effect.
Along with our illusion of transparency comes a sense that
others are aware of our triumphs and our trials. This tendency to
believe that others notice our behaviors and appearance to a
greater extent than they actually do is known as the spotlight
effect. Imagine you arrange to meet a new friend at a restaurant.
When you get to the restaurant, you realize you have a spot of
spaghetti sauce on your sleeve. Although you believe your
friend will quickly zero in on the spilled sauce, the likelihood is
that person is too focused on making a good impression to
notice such a small spot.
In one study of the spotlight effect, college students were asked
to don a T-shirt with a depiction of Barry Manilow on the front.
Manilow is a singer-songwriter who is well known but not very
popular with college students. The Manilow T-shirt was chosen
because college students reported that they would be
embarrassed to be known as a Manilow fan. After the students
had put on the shirt, they were brought to a room where other
students were working, staying there briefly before leaving
again. After leaving the room, the students were asked how
many of the other students noticed their T-shirt. The T-shirt
wearers believed, on average, that about 45% of the people in
the room would notice their Manilow shirt. The other students
were also asked if they noticed the Manilow shirt. Of the
students in the room, on average, just over 20% of the students
actually did notice (Gilovich, Medvic, & Savitsky, 2000).
Along with this sense that we are noticed, we generally believe
that others judge us more harshly than they actually do. For
example, if you accidentally set off an alarm by taking the fire
exit as you left a university library, you might assume everyone

41. thinks you are stupid. While there may be a few who think so,
the vast majority of students are much less harsh in their
judgments and are likely to be sympathetic to your plight
(Savitsky, Epley, & Gilovich, 2001). Embarrassment caused by
the behavior of a friend or relative is also often more acutely
felt than is necessary. When someone we are known to be
associated with makes a blunder, others generally do not
connect that action with us, contrary to what we might think
(Fortune & Newby-Clark, 2008). Just because your brother
picks his nose in public does not mean that others think you are
disgusting by association.
Test Yourself
Click on each question below to reveal the answer.
Why is the illusion of transparency called an illusion?
If you dropped your books all over the sidewalk, what would
the spotlight effect predict you would feel and others would
notice?
Conclusion
Our lives are full of things that demand explanation. People
form attitudes by evaluating the things and objects in their
environment. Although we may not always be aware of the
attitudes we hold, they may still affect our behavior. These
attitudes can be helpful in predicting our behavior, although
many other factors come into play. Our attitudes can change
because of our behavior (as in cognitive dissonance theory), or
be formed because of our behavior (as in self-perception
theory). As we make judgments, our attributions tend to follow
certain patterns. Those patterns can be fairly common across a
culture, as is so with the fundamental attribution error, or be
based on our experiences in life, as is so with the hostile
attribution of intent.

42. Chapter Summary
Definition of Attitudes
Attitudes involve an evaluation of an entity or behavior.
Attitudes can be placed on a continuum from weak to strong,
and on a continuum from positive to negative. When people
report on an attitude, they are describing an attitude that they
are consciously aware of, called an explicit attitude. Attitudes
that emerge from automatic processes are implicit attitudes.
Implicit attitudes can be assessed with the Implicit Association
Test (IAT).
Behavior and Attitudes
Attitudes and behaviors are often misaligned. We are more
likely to see an agreement between attitude and behavior when
the attitude is accessible and it matches the behavior in level of
specificity, the behavior is easy to perform, and social pressures
support an alignment. The theory of planned behavior allows for
the prediction of behaviors from attitudes, subjective norms,
and perceived behavioral control. Cognitive dissonance theory
proposes that when our attitudes and behaviors do not match up
and we have insufficient justification, we are likely to change
our attitude. Self-perception theory involves figuring out our
attitudes from observing our own behavior.
Explaining the Behavior of Others
When making attributions, we attempt to explain the behavior of
others. Internal attributions involve attributing an action to
something internal to the person, such as personality. When we
make external attributions, on the other hand, we attribute
actions to something outside the person, such as current
circumstances. When we make internal attributions despite
plausible external causes we are making the fundamental
attribution error. The actor-observer bias adds the idea that as
actors we point to situational factors in our behavior.
Explanations and Our Behavior

43. Our habitual patterns of making attributions can vary in terms
of whether we make an internal versus external, a stable versus
unstable, and a global versus specific attribution. When we
make internal, stable, and global attributions for positive things,
and external, unstable, and specific attributions for negative
things, we are showing an optimistic explanatory style.
Pessimistic explanatory styles are directly opposite optimistic
styles. Patterns of attributions can also involve how much
hostility one expects from others and therefore sees in actions,
known as hostile attribution of intent. At times we overestimate
the extent to which our attributions or abilities are shared,
engaging in false consensus. At times we overestimate how rare
our abilities or beliefs are, engaging in false uniqueness. With
an illusion of transparency we think that when others look at us
they see more than they actually do.
Critical Thinking Questions
How might making the fundamental attribution error affect
your relationships? Are there times when the effect might be
positive and times when the effect might be negative?
Within your own cultural tradition, is the fundamental
attribution error common?
An optimistic explanatory style was represented as generally
positive for well-being and persistence. When might an
optimistic explanatory style be detrimental to a person?
The text points out one positive to knowing about the illusion
of transparency, lower speech anxiety. What might be some
negative effects of knowing about the illusion? In other words,
why might it be good for us to believe others see more than they
actually do?
If implicit attitudes are something we are not even aware of,
do they matter?
What other influences on attitudes and behaviors might
researchers study?

44. If you were to add a factor to the theory of planned behavior,
what might it be? What additional variable might be added to
better predict behavior?
Have you ever had an experience where your attitudes and
actions did not match? Did you do any of the things suggested
to reduce cognitive dissonance?
Key Terms
Click on each key term to reveal the definition.
actor-observer bias
attitudes
attribution
cognitive dissonance
explanatory style
explicit attitudes
external attribution
false consensus effect
false uniqueness effect
fundamental attribution error
hostile attribution of intent
illusion of transparency

45. implicit attitudes
insufficient justification
internal attribution
learned helplessness
optimistic explanatory style
perceived behavior control
pessimistic explanatory style
self-perception theory
spotlight effect
subjective norms
theory of planned behavior
GrillWizard
Fast and efficient frying and cooking with propane gas. Light
the burner and instantly you have a hot 100,000 BTU
continuous flame.
The GrillWizard will help you eliminate fish and other lingering
cooking odors from your home.
The GrillWizard is used for fast frying of fish potatoes, onion
rings, chicken, vegetables, and donuts. Substitute water for oil
and it's also great for shrimp, crab, and lobster boils as well as
steaming clams.

46. This cooker is completely portable with all parts easily
assembled and disassembled for compact transportation and
storage, yet it weighs only 40 lbs.
When the control valve is open, a full100,000 BTUs of powerful
heat prepares cooking oil in 3 minutes for frying. Adjust the
heat with a touch of the control valve.
Operating Instructions
Place grill on level ground. Insert tapered end of tubing into the
hole in the base of the grill. (CAUTION: Make sure the cooker
is level and the burner is facing up.)
Attach grill connector to propane cylinder. Completely open
propane valve.
Slightly open control valve at grill connector and light cooker at
top of tube immediately (CAUTION: DO NOT stand directly
over cooker when lighting burner).
Adjust control valve for desired flame height.
When finished cooking, always close both grill connector valve
and propane cylinder valve completely.
The GrillWizard works with any size of propane tank cylinder
and all will give off the same amount of heat. A 20 pound
cylinder will provide approximately 6 hours of cooking time if
valves are completely opened.
The intense heat produced by the GrillWizard allows you to fast
fry all foods. The cooking oils of conventional fryers drop in
temperature as food is added, but the GrillWizard maintains its
temperature with just a quick touch of the control valve.

47. The GrillWizard has been designed for easy care. However,
keep all dirt and foreign objects out of connectors, hose, valves,
and openings. Failure to do so could cause obstruction of gas
and greatly diminish the effectiveness of the GrillWizard.
CAUTION: If you suspect leaks DO NOT light unit before
checking.
For outdoor use only.
After washing pan with soap and water, dry thoroughly and coat
the entire pan with cooking oil on paper towel to prevent
rusting.