My Experience With Attribution Theory: Exploring Social Psychology - Essay Sample

Introduction

In many occasions, people often make judgments on others based on the event or particular circumstances. In social psychology, the concept of making inferences based on situations is commonly referred explained in the attribution theory. I have been prone to constructing judgments based on circumstances and existing cases. Hence, this explains the reason why I selected the attribution theory as the social concept to use when relating it to an event in my life. Therefore, this paper discusses an experience I had when shopping at a mall that resulted in a situational attribution.

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About three weeks ago, I had gone out shopping at a mall. During my regular shopping activity, another person bumped to me, resulting in spillage of some of my shopping items. Despite the proper apology granted by the by-passer, I was angry and thought that the person must have been under intense stress that resulted in his careless actions. I wondered why an individual would go for shopping when stressed and end up causing minor accidents that would have otherwise been avoided. Also, I thought that the shopper would have gone somewhere else, such as the pool or attend fun-based activities to relieve their stresses and later shop.

In this case, I made a situation attribution for the behavior exhibited by the shopper. Importantly, situational attribution is a behavior or routine of assigning the cause of a particular action to external forces rather than inherent characteristics. In the event of a situational attribution, an individual is likely to explain an activity using the surrounding environment, which is usually beyond an individual's control. A situational attribution can be detected when an explanation provided focuses on external factors to explain an action or behavior.

In this instance, I was not a victim of Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE). Importantly, I did not attribute the shopper's carelessness to his personality rather than to the presumed stressful condition that caused the accident. Coming to think of it, I may have attributed the shopper's actions to a stressful situation since I tend to become careless when I am stressed out. In most cases, I opt to stay away from the public limelight to avoid extending my reckless actions to others. The presumed stress on the shopper is often referred to as a situational attribute since it helps to explain a particular occurrence.

Contrary to that, if I had assumed that the shopper is generally careless, I would have made a Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE). In that case, I would be judging the personality of the shopper based on one event or situation. In actual sense, the character of the shopper may be different from my perceptions. However, this was not the case hence making it a situational attribution.

Conclusion

To sum this up, this paper provides an experience where I made a situational perception of the actions of a shopper. The shopper bumped to me when I was shopping at the mall. I presumed that the shopper might have been under stress, which judged the environment rather than the shopper's personality. With this in mind, I did not make a Fundamental Attribution Error since I did not judge the shopper's character by assuming that the client was generally careless. Instead, I thought that the shopper might have been under stress. Although this presumption may have been wrong, I did not question the individual's personality.