Attribution and Motivation

Abstract

So far in this book we have been concerned with questions related to a person’s own internal states, such as intrinsic motivation or attitudes. We turn now to the question of how a person infers the internal states of another. If Ken watched Nancy build a table, how would he decide whether or not she liked what she was doing? Or if Judy watched David type a manuscript, how would she decide whether or not he was motivated primarily by the pay or by his interest in typing? These are questions of attribution. How does one person make causal attributions to another? As first discussed by Heider (1958), attribution involves the linking of some event with the conditions which underlie it, through a process of considering personal and environmental forces. This process of attribution stems from a person’s desire to undertand his world as somewhat ordered and nonrandom. He can, through attribution, predict and control his own relation to the world, which in turn plays a part in his feeling a sense of competence and self-determination.