by Lois Lawrence

Created on: October 21, 2009   Last Updated: December 09, 2009

In 1958, Austrian born scientist Fritz Heider published The Psychology of Interpersonal Relations, a work that was to become a seminal study in the area of social psychology. Since that time, Heider's attribution concept has become one of the most widely studied theories in the field of social psychology.

Heider's concept is that individuals have a natural tendency to attribute reasons or motivations to the behavior of others and also to conceive explanations for their own behaviors. According to Heider, these explanations are most often naive. This is because simple explanations for behavior satisfy the need to understand the world in an orderly way. By contrast, trying to understand the more complex factors that actually motivate human behavior leads to confusion and ambivalence. Also, Heider argues that individuals are most likely to attribute motives that they find the least harmful to their own self-esteem.

Thus, the behavior of another person might be attributed to internal factors such as the person's general attitudes, or to external factors such as peer pressure or random chance. On the other hand, one's own behavior might be explained by internal factors such as hard work or, on the other hand, laziness, or by external factors such as luck or accident.

In the mid-1970's, psychologist Bernard Werner published Achievement Motivation and Attribution Theory, exploring the practical applications of the concept of attribution in the field of education. His theory is that when students can be persuaded to attribute their educational successes to internal factors such as, native intelligence, or careful study, they will be more likely to strive to do well. If, on the other hand they believed that their success or failure was due to external forces like the quality of instruction, or testing conditions, motivating them to study became more difficult.

Attribution theory has application in any field where positive motivation or empowerment is a goal. For example, in cases of domestic abuse it is not uncommon for the abuser to blame his or her actions on the victim of the abuse. Heider would say that this allows the abuser to maintain self-esteem and justify destructive behaviors.

An abuse counselor applying the principles of attribution theory would, therefore, want to help the victim develop other, more empowering, and probably more accurate, theories of what might be motivating the abuser.

To learn more about the attribution concept click here and here.

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