AP Psychology - Unit 4.1 Attribution Theory and Person Perception

Person Perception

refers to how an individual forms impressions of themselves and others

• includes attributing behaviors

Social Identity

a person’s sense of who they are

defined partly in terms of an individual’s groups

Attributions

refers to how an individual explains the causes of events

• influenced by culture

Attribution Theory

• a psychological concept that was proposed by Fritz Helder

• explains how people interpret the causes of behaviors

• recognizes the thought process behind perceptions of events

• highlights the significance of internal and external factors

Dispositional Attributions

internal characteristics

• intelligence

• attitude

• personality

Situational Attributions

environmental factors that impact an individual

• world events

• weather conditions

Explanatory Style

the predictable way an individual will rationalize or explain different situations

Optimistic Explanatory Style

• tend to believe that negative outcomes are temporary problems

• often explain situations as a result of external factors that are out of an individual’s control

• credit positive outcomes to their personal disposition

Pessimistic Explanatory Style

• tend to think that negative outcomes are more permanent

• focus on internal factors that end up impacting them

• attribute positive results to situational factors

Fundamental Attribution Error

the tendency for individuals to underestimate the influence of external factors and overemphasize the impact of internal factors when analyzing a person’s behavior

• may possibly ignore obvious situational factors

• people often use this tendency when a stranger is misbehaving

Actor-Observer Bias

• occurs when an individual utilizes situational attributions to explain their own behaviors, but uses dispositional attributions to explain someone else’s actions

• tendency is caused by individuals being informed on their circumstances, but lacking awareness of any external causes that could impact others

Self-Serving Bias

occurs when an individual attributes their success to their internal characteristics, but they attribute failure to situational factors

• helps protect a person’s self-esteem

• can prevent people from learning from their own mistakes

Locus of Control

who or what an individual belies has power over the events in their life

External Locus of Control

the belief that situational factors determine the outcome of events

can cause an individual to assume their actions do not make a difference

• leads to learned helplessness

Internal Locus of Control

• the belief that an individual’s own actions directly affect what happens to them

• results in the individual taking more initiative and taking responsibility for bad outcomes

Mere Exposure Effect

an individual is repeatedly exposed to a stimulus

• results in the individual to like the stimulus more and more over time

people tend to like familiarity

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

• a person’s expectations influence their behavior in a way that causes those expectations to become true

• can cause people to confirm perceptions they have about themselves

Social Comparison

the tendency for individuals evaluate themselves by comparing their circumstances, skills, abilities, and internal characteristics to other people

• can directly influence how someone sees themselves

Upward Social Comparison

an individual compares themselves to someone they believe is better off

• positive: helps motivate an individual to improve and strive for higher goals

• negative: can cause the person to feel inadequate

Downward Social Comparison

an individual compares themselves to someone they believe is worse off

• positive: can cause an individual to feel better about their own situation

• negative: reduces a person’s motivation to improve

Relative Deprivation

the feeling that an individual is missing out on;

• resources

• opportunities

individual may feel inadequate, even if their basic needs are met

Fraternalistic Relative Deprivation

the belief that an individual’s in-group is not receiving as much resources as an out-group

• leads to feelings of group-level resentment

Reference Group

the people an individual compares themselves to

Prejudice

a preconceived and negative attitude toward a group and its members

formed by;

• negative emotions

• stereotypes

• a predisposition to discriminate

Stereotypes

generalized beliefs about a group of people

a form of heuristics

• allow an individual to effortlessly make judgements about someone

often overgeneralize a community of people

can either be positive or negative

Discrimination

unjustifiable treatment toward a group and its members

Explicit Prejudice

unjustifiable attitude that a person is aware of and consciously agrees with

Implicit Prejudice

negative attitude an individual is unaware of

shown through;

• unconscious group associations

• unconscious patronization

• reflexive bodily responses

Just-World Phenomenon

the tendency for people to believe that the world is just and that people therefore get what they deserve and deserve what they get

• belief is usually justified by stereotypes

Victim Blaming

• the assumption that an individual’s misfortunes are well deserved

• often a result of the just-world phenomenon

• reassures people that a victim’s trauma could not happen to them

• hindsight bias amplifies these assumptions

In-Group

• the people with whom an individual shares a common identity with

• individual perceives the group as having similar characteristics as them

Out-Group

the people who an individual perceives as different from their ingroup

In-Group Bias

the tendency for an individual to favor and support people a part of their own group

Scapegoat Theory

proposes that prejudice offers an outlet for anger by providing someone to blame

Ethnocentrism

the tendency for an individual to view their own culture/ethnic group as superior

Out-Group Homogeneity Bias

the tendency for an individual to overestimate the similarities between members of an out-group

Other-Race Effect

the tendency for an individual to recall faces of their own race more accurately than faces of other races

emerges during infancy

• also referred to as cross-race effect or own-race bias

Own-Age Bias

people tend to remember faces of their own age group