PSYC 231 Chapter Notes - Chapter 3: Fundamental Attribution Error, Counterfactual Thinking, Rosy Retrospection
27 Jun 2018
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•perceiving our social worlds — influenced by 4 factors:
-priming: activating particular associations in our memory in order to
make us act or react in a certain way
•influence our thoughts & actions, & how we interpret & recall events
•subliminal priming: our thoughts & actions are primed by events
that we are unaware of or are too brief to be perceived consciously
•embodied cognition: the mutual influence of our bodily sensations
on cognitive preferences & social judgements
-perceiving & interpreting events — we respond not to reality as it is, but rather
to reality as we construe it
•when social information is subject to multiple interpretations,
preconceptions & our perception of the source of the info matters
•our assumptions about the world can make contradictory evidence
seem supportive
•contextual information
-belief perseverance: persistence of one’s initial conceptions, even in
the face of disconfirming evidence
•if we construct it ourselves, we are more likely to stick with it
•the more we examine our own theories & explain how they might be
true, the more closed we become to info that challenges our belief
•having to explain the opposite reduces or eliminates belief
perseverance, & having to explain any alternative outcome drives
people to think about other various possibilities
-constructing memories — memories are not copies of experiences, but are
rather constructed at the time of withdrawal
•we use our current feelings & current expectations to recall an event
•misinformation effect: incorporating “misinformation” into ones
memory of the event, after witnessing an event & then receiving
misleading information about it
•we also reconstruct past attitudes & behaviours
-rosy retrospection: we tend to recall past pleasant events more
favourably than we we experienced them
-we emphasize high points & minimize the low points in our life
-we under-estimate bad behaviour & over-estimate good behaviour
-tend to assume that we are better now than we were in the past
•judging our social worlds — how we form judgments
-intuitive judgements — immediately knowing something without reasoning
or analysis (a form of automatic processing)
•automatic processing: implicit thinking that is effortless, habitual,
& without awareness (corresponds with intuition, thus does not
involve reasoning)
-schemas: mental templates that guide our perception o&
interpretations of our experiences
-blindsight: reacting to a stimulus in one’s blindspot (of someone
who cannot see), despite not being able to see it — when asked
why they responded they attribute it to some other reason
-emotional reactions: instantaneous reactions, before there is
time to deliberately think
-expertise: once we master a skill, it becomes so easy that we
don’t know how to explain it
•(vs. controlled processing: explicit thinking that is deliberate,
reflective, & conscious)
•explicit memory: consciously remembering something
•implicit memory: remembering something without consciously
knowing it or being able to declare that we know it
-judgemental overconfidence — as we interpret our experiences & construct
memories, our automatic intuitions sometimes err
•overconfidence phenomenon: the tendency to be more confident
than correct, due to overestimating the accuracy of our beliefs
-applies to factual information, judging others’ behaviour, &
judging our own behaviour
-fed by incompetence, giving too much weight to our current
intentions, & underestimating the importance of situational forces
-experiences of overconfidence does not lead us to make more
realistic self-appraisals, because instead of recognizing that we
were wrong, we remember it as being “almost right”
•confirmation bias: the tendency to search for information that
confirms our preconceptions, rather than disconfirming it
-this helps to keep our self-image seem relatively stable
•techniques to avoid overconfidence include:
(a) prompt feedback — receive clear feedback in order to improve our
judgment for next time
(b) break up the task — break up the task into its subcomponents &
estimate the time required for each unit to avoid planning fallacy
(c) consider disconfirming evidence — why you might be wrong
-heuristics: thinking strategies that enables quick, efficient judgments
•representative heuristics: the tendency to presume that someone
or something belongs to a particular group because they resemble a
“typical” member
-ignore base rate information
•availability heuristic: cognitive rule that judges the likelihood of
things in terms of their availability in memory
-counterfactual thinking: imagining alternative scenarios or outcomes
that could have happened, but didn't
•underlies our feelings of bad luck/good luck & regret
•more significant the event, more intense the counterfactual thinking
•typically more regret things that we did not do, rather than did do
-illusionary thinking — our search for order in random events
•illusory correlation: the perception of a relationship where none
exists, or a perception of a stronger relationship than actually exists
-example of noticing “coincidences” & superstitious thinking
•illusion of control: the perception of being able to control/have
more control over an uncontrollable events
-example by gamblers who attribute wins to their skills & foresight
-mood — our moods affect our memories & judgments & influence our
thinking, although we often do not acknowledge our moods
•our mood can district us from complex thinking & make us more
likely to make snap judgments
•explaining our social worlds — our judgments of people depend on how we
explain their behaviour
-attributing theory: how we explain other peoples’ behaviour
•misattribution: attributing a behaviour to the wrong cause
•dispositional (internal) attribution: attributing behaviour to the
person’s personality & traits
•situational (external) attribution: attributing behaviour to the
person’s environment & circumstances
•inferring traits — we often infer that other people’s actions are
indicative of their intentions & dispositions
-spontaneous trait inference: an effortless, automatic inference
of someone’s traits after being exposed to their behaviour
•common-sense attributions — try to explain behaviour rationally based on
(a) consistency: how consistent the person’s behaviour is in
different situations
(b) distinctiveness: how specific the person’s behaviour is to the
particular situation (yes → external, no → internal attribution)
(c) consensus: to what extent others in the same situation behave
similarly (yes → external attribution, no → internal attribution)
-doesn’t differentiate between intentional/unintentional behaviour
-fundamental attribution error: the tendency for observers to
underestimate situational influences & overestimate dispositional
influences on others’ behaviour
•also known as correspondence bias when we see someone’s behaviour as
corresponding to a disposition
•we make a judgement of the person rather than their situation
•reasons why we make the fundamental attribution error:
(a) perspective & situational awareness —
-actor-observer difference: we observe others from a
difference perspective than we view ourself
•when we act, the environment holds our attention, but
when others act, they hold our attention
-camera perspective bias: depending on who we are
looking at influences whether we think a confession is true
-our perspectives change with time
-our level of self-awareness
(b) cultural differences — predisposes explanations for someones
behaviour that are more socially acceptable
(c) we find causes where we look for them —
-a dispositional or situational attribution doesn’t mean the
reaction will be positive or negative - it just means what we
are attributing the behaviour to
•we study attribution errors because:
(i) they are the byproduct(s) of adaptive thinking
(ii) people should not always be blamed for their problems
(iii) we can benefit from greater awareness
•best way to combat attribution errors is by using critical thinking
PSYC 231: Chapter 3 - Social Beliefs & Judgements
Document Summary
Psyc 231: chapter 3 - social beliefs & judgements: perceiving our social worlds in uenced by 4 factors: Rosy retrospection: we tend to recall past pleasant events more favourably than we we experienced them. We emphasize high points & minimize the low points in our life. We under-estimate bad behaviour & over-estimate good behaviour. Tend to assume that we are better now than we were in the past: judging our social worlds how we form judgments. Intuitive judgements immediately knowing something without reasoning or analysis (a form of automatic processing: automatic processing: implicit thinking that is effortless, habitual, & without awareness (corresponds with intuition, thus does not involve reasoning) Schemas: mental templates that guide our perception o& interpretations of our experiences. Blindsight: reacting to a stimulus in one"s blindspot (of someone who cannot see), despite not being able to see it when asked why they responded they attribute it to some other reason.
