fundamental attribution error

I myself am guilty of committing the "fundamental attribution error" on a number of occasions and see others do it too.  It is called 'fundamental' because so many people do it so regularly - in fact most of us.  It is called an 'error 'because we are almost always wrong. It is a social psychology term and 'human attribution' research has confirmed its commonality.   So what is it?

In short, "a fundamental attribution error," is an error in judging the reasons for another person's actions,  attributing (hence the word attribution) internal processes: their personality, thinking, motivation, character. etc. Here is an example used by the authors of the book Influencer. They describe a study in the field of 'human attribution' that went this way.  Suppose you are in a grocery store check-out line and you notice a man with a toddler in his cart coming towards you. From the way his cart is pointed you begin to think he plans to butt into the line. He leans over to talk to his toddler as he comes and looks over at the magazines seeming to study the headlines. He makes eye contact with no one in the line. You watch him closely; sure enough he goes directly to the front of the line and begins to put his items onto the conveyer, ignoring everyone else.  Why do you think he did this?   In the study, various people were asked to say what they thought. Very rarely did anyone in the study attribute positive reasons, of give him a break. Almost overwhelmingly they said things like: "He thinks he is too important to take his turn.  He thinks he is more important than anyone else. He doesn't care about anyone but himself.  Etc."  When people who actually did butt into line were confronted about it, generally they seemed surprised and gave as a reason that they actually didn't notice the line.  Lack of mindfulness was by far the most common reason.  

Think of a time when someone cut you off in traffic. What was your first response to him? How did you describe him in your head?  I know - "Jerk."  We instantly attribute personal negative motives, thinking the person did it on purpose. Now think of a time when YOU cut someone else off in traffic. Maybe you noticed what you had done when they honked or gave you the finger, and if you saw their face, you knew approximately what they were thinking -  and it wasn't good. Now what did you say to yourself about it?  "Oops, shouldn't have done that, should focus more on my driving, shouldn't be driving when I feel unwell, really I didn't notice him until it was too late because of that guy changing lanes ahead of me.  It's just that I am so pre-occupied with what happened at home/work/school/etc."   We all tend to excuse ourselves for mistakes because we know we didn't INTEND to cause anyone trouble but it was just the circumstamces we were in. In a course I teach we use a saying:  "We judge other by their actions, we judge ourselves by our intentions."

Unfortunately the fundamental attribution error can cause a lot of pain to others.  For example, once almost 20 years ago, I was asked to substitute for someone playing the organ in Sacrament meeting.  I want to say right now off the top, that I am not that good and I get extremely nervous. But the regular organist had experienced trouble finding someone to do it for her, so I agreed.  I made the one hour drive to the church twice that week to practice, even though I had children at home. One of the hymns chosen was fast and tricky.  I practiced that one the most but still didn't feel really confident. On Sunday, the chorister - I don't remember her name but I can still see her face - tried to lead the hymn much faster than I was able to play it.  She turned around during the hymn and glared at me when I didn't keep up and continued to lead faster than I was playing. After it was over, she glared at me walking back to her seat and after the meeting she glared at me again, jumped up and stomped off. No doubt in my mind what SHE thought.  Ask me if I have ever let myself be in that position again?  When I moved to my current Ward, because a member of the bishopric helped to move my piano into the house, he subsequently asked me how I would feel about a calling playing the piano/organ.  I told him in no uncertain terms that I DID NOT play.

Often when we commit an attributiion error, we become indignant about how we were treated and incensed that anyone would deliberately treat us like that. We tend to tell others about it and the words we use influence others to think negatively of the person as well.  "This jerk cut me off in traffic today; there could have been an accident."  It is one thing when we don't really know the person, but what about  - "That so-and-so thought her speed playing the organ was better than mine and deliberately ignored me. She is just so arrogant.  I hope no one asks her again!"  Or  "So and so thinks they are so important, but they really are just arrogant and selfish." So we share our judgments with others and commit the sin of gossiping without thinking whether there could be other less personal reasons. 

Why do people do this if they are mostly wrong?  Sometimes, very occasionally, we are dealing with a selfish person and we are right; this encourages us as humans to see things this way despite the fact that most people have positive intentions and a truly selfish person is rare.  The fundamental attribution error also offers a simple explanation and our brains like simplicity. We are then not required to find out more about the person's context. Some cultures tend to the fundamental attribution error more than others. Studies have shown that people in oriental cultures are more likely to give contextual factors than person internal factors. They tend to attribute factors happening outside the person , or to simply say they don't know enough to make a judgment.

Once we have committed the error, it is hard to talk us out of it. In one study in the US, college students were assigned to write an essay about Fidel Castro. Half were asked to write a favourable essay about him and half were asked to write an unfavourable one. Test subjects were asked to read the essays and comment on the writers.  In nearly all cases, the writers of the favorable essays were judged to be 'Castro lovers', sympathetic to him. When the test subjects were told that the writers had no choice and were assigned to write a favourable essay, it made NO differencethe test subjects' judgment of the writers. My own personal experience in dealing with people in conflict, even family members who are supposed to love each other, is that explaining to one person the context the other person is in that may have contributed to their behaviour makes no difference in their judgment. They still insist that the other person was being judgmental, selfish, rude, or whatever; even if they don't say it, behaviour over time demonstrates that they still think it.. 

The moral of this story?  I guess we all need to be less quick to judge another person by assigning personality and character defects like selfishness, self-importance, etc, which are rarely the reason. We should try harder to give them a break because like us, they are working from the best of intentions and sometimes get overwhelmed or make mistakes. We likewise need to take greater responsibility for our own internal processes that may have contributed to the situation. Even though this course of action is consistent with the dictum: "judge not that ye be not judged," it is not as easy as it sounds. However it is possible. So good luck with that!