Attribution Theory Rebecca Jedel, PhD

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Attribution TheoryRebecca Jedel, PhD
ChAD 169
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Atkinson Expectancy X

• Motive for Success (MS)
• Motive to Avoid Failure (MAF)
• Perceived Probability of Success (Ps)
• Incentive Value of Success (Is)
• Perceived Probability of Failure (Pf)
• Incentive Value of Failure (If)
• Tendency to approach or avoid achievement
  activity (TA)
• Formula to get published
• TA TS MAF
• TA (MS x Ps x Is) (MAF x Pf x If)

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Rotters Social Learning Theory

• Beliefs
• Value assessments
• Expectancies (based on subjective criteria)
• Locus of Control
• Internal LOC
• believe success based on own behavior, choices,
  ability
• External LOC
• believe success is random based on luck, fate,
  tarot cards, other people

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Weiners Attribution Theory

• Locus of Control
• people use this to predict a future outcome for
  themselves
• Attribution Theory
• a review of why a current outcome occurred

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Causal Attributions

• Ability
• stable
• beyond the individuals control
• Effort
• situational
• under personal control
• Random
• idiosyncratic rationalizations

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3 Dimensional

• Causal Dimensions of Common Attributes
• Causes
• causal dimensions ability
  effort

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Antecedents to Attributions

• Consensus
• how well other people perform in the same
  conditions
• establishes locus external vs. internal
• Consistency
• comparisons to prior performance
• establishes stability stable vs situational

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Attribution Profiles

• History of Poor Performance
• Internal, Stable, Uncontrollable
• Cultural Differences
• Asian students Effort
• Gender
• Boys success explained by ability
• Girls success explained by situation
• failure explained by ability

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Outcomes of Attributions

• Expectations
• Expect to perform better after success
• Expect to perform worse after failure
• Therefore better to have effort attributions
• Learned Helplessness
• When nothing can be done to avoid failure
• Stable, External, Uncontrollable
• Not worth trying
• wastes time, energy, resources, emotion

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Emotions Connected to Attributions

• happy ? success (attribution irrelevant)
• sad ? failure (attribution irrelevant)
• surprise ? succeed or fail because of luck
• grateful ? succeed with someones help
• guilty ? succeed without effort
• shame ? internal attribution
• pride ? internal attribution

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Teachers Attributions

• Intrapersonal Attributions
• we all like to judge one another
• angry reaction ? teacher attribution of low
  effort (a controllable dimension)
• sympathetic reaction ? teacher attribution of low
  ability (stable dimension)

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Problems in the Classroom

• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
• prevalence 3 5 of all students
• diagnosed through psychological assessment (not
  teacher opinion)
• Characteristics
• impulse control problems
• need for instant gratification
• limited sustained attention
• distractible and distracting
• off-task behavior

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Addressing ADHD in the Classroom

• communication with parents
• create partnership with parents
• create structure and predictable routine
• state precise rules and make them visible
• state rules in positive terms
• be fair, firm and consistent
• administer consequences (pos and neg)
• make certain that student hears and registers
  instructions/excpectations

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Oppositional Defiant Disorder

• Frequently co-occurs with ADHD
• Characteristics
• often loses temper
• argumentative with adults
• defiant
• deliberately annoys others
• blames others

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Addressing ODD in the Classroom

• Dont take it personally
• Stay calm
• Find a way to priase
• Positive interactions must outweigh negatives
• Active ignoring
• Time-out
• When then
• Daily report card

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Conduct Disorder

• Characteristics
• ODD with teeth
• all of ODD issues with violation of the rights of
  others mixed in